APB Dev. Blog :: January 18th, 2009 Options

2008 Mod Of The Year Top 100!

Hey everybody, we managed to make it into the Top 100 again this year for the ModDb 2008 awards! This goes for both Red alert: A Path Beyond and Red alert 2: Apocalypse Rising. Both projects made it into the running again this year! Thanks a ton for your support over the years. As before, we're once again in a position to take victory. Unlike last year there's something close to $10,000 in sponsor prizes available for overall winners, category winners, and runners-up. These come largely in the form of highly useful programs, instruction material, and usable media. For example, there are a bunch of high quality texture packs available as prizes, and development tips and guidelines as well as modeling/prototyping utilities.

What does this mean? How do I vote?

Alright, stay with us here: we've entered Phase Two of the voting. We've made it past the first step, getting into the top 100 projects. APB is in the released indie games category, and AR is in the unreleased indie games category.

This means we need your votes one more time here, now that we've been Nominated, to attempt to place in the final rankings and have a shot at the awards and the prizes. Even third place provides us a strong moral victory, loot aside, remember. APB is competing with six other projects, and seven other projects. Confused by the flashy interface? Here's how to vote:

1) Go to http://www.moddb.com/events/2008-mod-of-th...r-awards/top100 to view the top 100 projects

2) Click "Indie Games" under the first header for Released projects to expand the view

3) Click "Vote" next to the entry for "A Path Beyond" to cast your vote

4) The "Vote" image will change to confirm your vote

5) Click "Indie Games" under the first header for Upcoming projects to expand the view

6) Click "Vote" next to the entry for "Apocalypse Rising" to cast your vote

There you have it! The competition rules page oddly conflict with the voting page, and claim that you only get three (3) votes for this phase. I'm not sure if any votes past your first three will count, but we'd be honored if you picked us first just in case!

For the sake of being complete, in case you want to check them out, our ModDb profiles are at here and here. Good luck to everybody who has made it this far!

Redone Infantry

Hey everybody, check it out, we've updated the Engineer and Mechanic (done by ScreamingCricket) to enhance your Gamma experience. TruYuri rigged them up to practice for probably ending up rigging the AR infantry once they are ready, and they will be in the next public release. To go with it, we've posted the game updates to reflect their new appearance and list their new abilities; a lot of the gameplay has really changed since Beta 1.0.0 first had its debut, so you should take the time to check these out so you won't be confused. Learn how to make the most of your units and click either image to go right to the update page. Note that they might change a bit before the release.

Camo/Textures Surface

Oh, right. The APC is getting its alternate looks for a forest, desert, and snowy theater in Gamma as well. They're a solid-color to match more or less how the APC looked in the RA1 cutscenes, similar to the Longbow's camo scheme. The Longbow's missing snow camo look will also be making an appearance in Gamma, so you can be a jerk and use it on night-time maps like Stormy Valley to let everybody know just how pretentious you are Not only that, we tracked down the proper (and previously missing) texture for the Ranger's windshield.

Now, to get back to work making all the new impact marks...

Rigging ahoy

The drivers will now appear properly in cargo trucks, mobile gap generators, and ore miners. We're working on a few details still but cargo trucks will show whoever else is riding along sitting there in the back, and the AI ore truck will let you see the technician riding along inside. He might even pop out after you kill the truck to get his revenge Despite years of the "Demolition trucks are remote controlled!" stuff, we might even just add the drivers to that unless we want to hook them up to actually be remote controlled.

What else... the V2 launcher issue wherein sometimes the missile would not disappear has been solved (thanks jonwil) and the AI ore trucks will now play the scooping animation while they're actively mining. By the way, we've also fixed "bad driving" a bit. The MRJ, Tesla Tank, and Ranger were adjusted so that they'll no longer scrape the ground as much, which should help out quite a bit. The tech scanners, wrench, RedEye, and LAW will also no longer have a collision issue in first person. TruYuri's been doing a whole bunch of rigging changes and generally putting up with a lot of demands from me but hopefully it'll pay off for all of you and add a bit more polish.

C&C Hourglass Flying beta map

If you're interestead in playing the upcoming Hourglass remake early, and have a copy of Renegade handy, you can go grab the download off Planet C&C right now. They were having some 20+ player games the other night from what I heard, and it'll give you a good taste of what to expect. This is, of course, Fabian's new map that set out to set some new quality standards while fixing up everything that sucked about Hourglass originally. If you have trouble downloading from PCNC, you can also get it off Fabian's mirror here but please hit up the first link if you can.

The current version of C&C_Hourglass_Flying is 0.98; if you want older versions for some reason or in case you missed it the first time, OR just because you want to discuss it with the maker and other players: the Fan Projects thread with pictures is here

Voted, hope you guys win. The new APC camos are epic, and using snow camos on nighttime maps is always the best way to go; it means you know which Longbow/tesla tank/phase tank/V2 is yours if lots of people end up leaving random vehicles lying around.

Thanks to everyone who got us nominated. I am voting with you guys again, hope we do well!

+vote.

Awesome work team, work is absolutely fantastic.

<3 the sig Venompawz :P

This post has been edited by Nod Guy: Jan 19 2009, 05:55 AM

I don't like the new engineer or Mechanic. Although I do believe we need new models, the mechanic looks like a cheap allied soldier, and the engineer texture feels a little bland.
No offense or anything, I just think they're not that great :X
Top of the green camo APC - is it all one color? I can't tell from the SS.
Other than that, I'll vote for both APB and AR in the moddb contest. I hope we win something that'll progress our mod more.
How'd reborn do? edit: I see they're on the list as well.

This post has been edited by Deadpikle: Jan 19 2009, 06:18 AM

I agree, those 2 infantry models aren't very appealing, especially the Engineers face. The camo looks great on the APC, though! And you have my vote as well.

This post has been edited by Nozzy: Jan 19 2009, 06:59 AM

I like the new camo. And hope you guys win. =o

Voted. And I'm undecided on those infantry. Can't really tell much from those images though what I see doesn't look too good to me. Maybe once I see some better images.

Nice.

Although the textured spades look crap. Could you photoshop the spades/shovels out and just have paint? The extra tank tread bits look not as bad though.

Also the snow camo APC; under the head lights the texture is very white, should that not be dark like the rest to show dirt or rust or whatever?


Mech looks far far better

New APC alternate camos are awesome. The engineer reminds me of Chris Cooper (bad guy actor in several films.) The mechanic looks like a frontline soldier imo.

P.S. Suck it reborn! Go APB!



This post has been edited by pzeper: Jan 19 2009, 10:20 AM

Voted and I like the new camo, awesome work.

Voted... some halo mod you know haha, Any ways great work like always.

AR, APB got my votes.

Not too keen on the new infantry, but I am looking forward to the camo APCs and snow LBs.

Engineer looks like a Zookeeper...

Mechanic is not that bad.

APCs ftw!

Also grats being in the top 100.

Epic blog!

Voted. I hope you people win! Does this mean that all of the vehicles will get alternate camo?