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Yet more ships
March 31, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 Yet more ships. I don't think I could stifle the creativity of the team if I tried. We're still brainstorming ideas for the ship-to-ship combat system, though I suspect we may start moving beyond simply moving a ship around the map fairly soon. There's also the psionics system to work on, of which I have a number of ideas.
Another writer came aboard the other day. He's been keeping me to task with the main quest, which is quite welcome. It's still somewhat in flux and I like the way we're going back and forth to solve some of the issues that popped up.
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I continue to be amazed at the volume of thin...
March 30, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I continue to be amazed at the volume of things that the team has been producing. I find myself spending most of my time giving feedback and suggestions, tweaking the web site, and watching in awe as things pour in.
There's a particular music piece that was done recently that has a distinct pirate feel. The composition is great and it may end up being our main theme (or something similar).
Sunjammer finished most of the work on one of the trickier puzzles, the one involving mirrors and light. I've got some modeling stuff to do before it feels like it's truly finished up, but hopefully not much more.
The ship models continue to be cranked out at an amazing pace. I'm feeling very confident that we'll have a range of ships for the player to battle against.
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I decided to do a little prototyping yesterday
March 28, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
I decided to do a little prototyping yesterday. The very first scene is completely playable in NWN. My hope is that I can do this for much of the campaign, making it possible to playtest and debug before we have to actually build it in the real thing. I'm not spending too much time on making things look nice, as I know all that will change.
It was fun getting into the toolset again, as it seems like I've been doing a lot of writing lately. After playing a number of recent titles, the graphics of NWN seem to feel increasingly dated. It'll be great to see what some of the shiny new RPGs look like. I'm especially excited to be able to use some of the new techniques, as I found myself getting frustrated with some of NWN's limitations over the years.
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It's days like this when I think that all the...
March 27, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 It's days like this when I think that all the time I've spent pulling together a project web and writing documentation seems to be paying off. We have yet another ship in the works. A 2D artist signed up today. I listened to some great piratey music the other day. It's really fun seeing all the creative energy bubbling up.
Not to completely miss out on the fun, I spent some time working on dialog. There's an entire level that mixes comedy, puzzles, and combat in a hopefully tasty blend. I do wish I had more hours in the day to work on this stuff, though I keep reminding myself that I've got at least a year to go.
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I continue to work away on the project and th...
March 25, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
I continue to work away on the project and the web stuff to support it. I managed to get the bulletin board's e-mail system working. Perhaps this weekend I'll open up the discussion board to more people to poke at.
The project team continues to produce prolific amounts of content. Already several people are working away on music. I just finished listening to an uplifting, mischevious piece that makes me think of a swashbuckling scoundrel sneaking out the back stairs with the mayor's daughter. Great stuff.
I also played with Sunjammer's latest version of the ship-to-ship combat system. The ship does indeed move around appropriately, which is a good sign of things to come. Now we're brainstorming things like ship weapons, combat mechanics, and so on. Plenty to do.
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The incredible work continues to flow from th...
March 24, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 The incredible work continues to flow from the team. I'll show off another of the ships today, though there's tons more being worked on. It's amazing to see how hard everyone is working, even without the traditional flogging. Magnus offered up composing some music today as well, sending along a Celtic piece that was very moving. I feel honored to have all these talented people giving their time and talents so freely.
I also signed up some more crew: QA people, voice actors, artists, and writers. There's certainly more opportunities for those of you thinking of joining. To quote St. Thomas Aquinas:
"If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever."
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It's been amazing watching everyone get enthu...
March 24, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 It's been amazing watching everyone get enthusiastic and create so many cool things. Razvan created the basics for not one but two sailing ships. Christian has another song that he's working on. Juliano continues work on his seaside village. Sunjammer's been finding and fixing bugs with some of the prototypes I threw together.
While I'd like to say that I've been sitting back and eating bonbons, the reality is that I've been writing and doing webmaster stuff. The new discussion boards are fairly well polished, with the ability to upload files and have the images turn into thumbnails. I've also written out the overall plot and story arcs, which I'm quite happy with.
So, things are going well, though I never seem to have enough time to get things done. I keep reminding myself that I've got a year to go.
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Well, I'm not back home, but I'm connected to...
March 21, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
Well, I'm not back home, but I'm connected to the world again. We've been driving around and I've taken the opportunity to write like a maniac. Soon enough I'll be throwing lengthy project documents at the rest of the team.
I also have a bit of a present brewing. I recently installed a fairly robust discussion board and will likely open it up for everyone to post in should they like.
The rest of the team continues to slave away, with me doing much of anything. Already we have a dozen models and a few music themes.
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I'm off to the coast for the next few days, s...
March 19, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I'm off to the coast for the next few days, so you won't be hearing from me in awhile. I've been consumed with the project team over the last couple days, adding and greeting new people and trying to write down all the plans that have so far been sitting in my head. My goal is to take some time over this vacation and create a more formal project plan.
Though project management isn't always my favorite thing to do, it has been admittedly cool to see folks already cranking out nifty looking things. Sunjammer spent some time cleaning up the ship-to-ship combat system. You can now move the boat around the ocean in a predictable fashion. Razvan has been making elegant beds and side tables, which Juliano has volunteered to texture.
Already the crew is threatening mutiny unless I whip up some better web tools, especially the discussion board which is a bit old and creaky.
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The very observant among you may have noticed...
March 18, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
The very observant among you may have noticed a "Join Us" link on the left. I've literally been sitting here for the last hour and a half typing up the needs for the project and a short-term project plan for the team. I'm going to be unplugged and away from my computer starting tomorrow, but feel free to look over the list of project needs and see if there's a role that sounds interesting to you.
I suppose this is the beginning of my "call to arms", gathering up a motley crew for my pirate project. I can't promise fame, booty, grog, or wenches, but hopefully it'll be an interesting and fun experience.
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No pretty pictures today, unfortunately
March 17, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 No pretty pictures today, unfortunately. I spent last night and this morning working on more organizational tools for the project team. This one is a place to upload files, comment on them, and do some simple searches and versioning on them. Hopefully it'll meet our needs.
I also had a tentative suggestion for a team name - "Adam Miller's Pirate Project". It has the abbreviation of AMPP, which sounds eXXtreme. I can also talk about how well my PP is doing and we can all have a juvenile laugh about it.
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I whipped up some normal mapped fish last night
March 16, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I whipped up some normal mapped fish last night. They're really just a flat texture, to be used for hanging fish on the wall or some such thing. I suppose I could cheat and use them for fish swimming by in a scene, though I'd have to carefully control their position (they'd look silly head-on). I've passed them on to Juliano to see if he could use them dangling from a rafter or some such thing.
The screenshot shows the lighting from two different positions. In theory it should further the illusion of depth as shadows are cast realistically.
 I also played around a bit more with my ship-to-ship combat system this morning. It now works closer to what I expect. No longer does your speed go to completely zero if you head upwind. The dialog box reappears if you close it. If you don't issue commands, the ship continues to move forward.
On the down side, the commands to turn seem to have nothing to do with the direction you end up facing. Movement is somewhat jerky, with a noticeable slow-down as you arrive at your destination. Finally, I sailed off the edge of the world and decided to call it quits for the day.
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I wanted to start with a model from Juliano, ...
March 15, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I wanted to start with a model from Juliano, the architect from Brazil who's been helping out. This is his work-in-progress of a poor Caribbean-style home. Right now he's working on some other buildings in a similar style. Modeling is a task that seems to spawn endless details. I instantly want to start hanging nets and fish from the roof, as well as scattering miscellaneous fishing gear about.
The project web is slowly coming along. I've got some of the first people popping into the discussion group. After I get organized I'll probably put out a more formal "call for help". It's admittedly a bit strange shifting from solo module developer to project organizer.
Of course, I still planning on playing a central role in development. Yesterday I managed to type up some more dialog, this time for the second module. One of the nice things about doing a pirate/seafaring campaign is that the dialog is so much fun to produce. The humor almost writes itself.
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For months I've been coveting a particular mo...
March 14, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 For months I've been coveting a particular model at the Stanford 3D Scanning Repository. It's a scan of an actual angel statue. I finally managed to piece together a relatively low-polygon version (500,000 polygons) that my computer could actually work with, as well as software that converts the weird ply format to something useful.
I ended up using PolyChop to generate the in-game model, then projected the high-poly version to that. Unfortunately I'm not completely happy with the result. There's some significant weird bumps and errors that are obvious close up. I want to spend some time and see if I can further improve the result, as I have a place in the module all picked out to put it.
If you're curious, the original is on the right, with the normal mapped version on the left. I think the "low-poly" version is around 3,000 polygons, which is pretty high.
I also spent some time chatting away at the NWN2 roundtable. I was hoping a developer would show, but it seems that the allure of the sunny weather was too much for them. I only managed to make it through about half, as the kids grew restless.
Hopefully today I can start getting team members set up with the new project web. I keep asking myself if I need a team name. All the cool kids seem to have one, though nothing comes to mind.
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I sunk some more time on the project web this...
March 13, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I sunk some more time on the project web this morning, putting together a simple framework to hang content off of. The important thing was the discussion group, as getting people talking to each other is a short term goal of mine.
Fairly soon I'll probably put out the call to a range of people. Bide your time for now, as I'm still trying to gather up my strength and summon my project management mojo.
I did a little writing yesterday as well, introducing a somewhat comical figure. Since NPCs are fairly light in this first module, he gets quite a bit of dialog. Fortunately it should be fun to write for.
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I stayed up way too late last night, trying t...
March 12, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I stayed up way too late last night, trying to put together the basics of a project web for the people volunteering their time. So far I have a discussion board with the ability to upload files, along with a simple security mechanism. Hopefully that'll be enough to get everyone started. Eventually I'd like to have a better way to organize and share files, and perhaps a gallery of sorts.
I've been trying hard to use the plethora of free models scattered around the web. I'm thinking of having a stationary steam-powered gun of sorts. I don't think I have the texture quite right, but it does look close to what I'm thinking of.
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I did some more mushroom fiddling this mornin...
March 11, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I did some more mushroom fiddling this morning, adding a normal map to Schazzwozzer's Myconid placeables. They turned out better than some of my previous experiements, which ended up looking a bit silly. This ended up using the tried-and-true Photoshop NVIDIA plug-in method, which is also very fast.
Talking to batinthehat the other day, he mentioned that pretty screenshots draw artists to a project like moths to a flame. I had another 3d modeler volunteer their efforts to this project. It's a treat to work with such a variety of talented folks.
It's getting to the point where I think I need to create a project web for the various team members. I'm currently juggling e-mails with two modelers and a musician. I also got an e-mail from a writer with some voice over experience. Basically we need a discussion board, a place to upload files, and so on. We'll see how much time I get in the upcoming days. Hopefully I can share some screenshots of some of the new artists' work. It's coming along nicely.
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Long ago, I'd started work on a ship-to-ship ...
March 10, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 Long ago, I'd started work on a ship-to-ship combat system. It was fairly ambitious and I never got even the most basic functionality working. This morning I dusted it off and fixed things to the point where I can at least start fiddling with it. It doesn't crash immediately, for example, nor does the ship sail backwards. There's still tons of work to do.
The screenshot of the day is a continuation of yesterday. Here's a close-up of the ship deck with nice bumpy surfaces.
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I couldn't help myself
March 09, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I couldn't help myself. I loaded up Some_ux's Carrack hak pack and did some normal mapping stuff with the textures. Odds are, I'll be using this with some modification as it's one of my favorite pieces of custom content that I wasn't able to use for NWN.
I managed to find some time yesterday, rewriting my documentation and getting things better organized. I have it broken down by Act and level. A few things happen before and after the main dungeon area. Most other things work best if broken down by level.
Finally, I fixed some bugs in the Demon Cards game. One NPC didn't play for ante properly. Plus the Potion of Heroism made a creature basically unkillable. It's in testing currently.
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I was less than productive yesterday, though ...
March 08, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
I was less than productive yesterday, though fortunately some of my team mates were not. Juliano has a new, "dirtier" version of his Carribean fishing hut. He wants to work on the texture a bit more, though perhaps I can convince him to show off a screenshot for everyone. Christian continues to work away on music and ambient sound.
I have an IRC chat scheduled for this weekend, talking about custom content in NWN2. Some CODI folks will be there, along with other familiar faces, so it should be a bit of a treat. It may be that some actual developers show up too.
Hopefully today I can beg, borrow, or steal some time to work on setting up the documentation for the maps. It's really what I need to focus on next.
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There's several approaches to making normal m...
March 07, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 There's several approaches to making normal mapped models. The typical approach used in Doom 3 (and most games, I imagine) is to take a high resolution model and "project" it to a low resolution model. In theory that makes it look about the same but without using so many video-card taxing polygons.
I spent a few hours yesterday playing around with the concept and never got it looking the way I wanted. On the right is a render of the high-resolution model. On the left is the low-resolution with a normal map. If you look closely, it has weird artifacts and bumps not present in the original model. I may still try fiddling with that approach, but I may set it aside for the moment.
Most of my productive work has been creating normal maps for fairly flat surfaces. The Photoshop method is very fast and produces a good result in those cases.
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I've finished up the mapping, which makes me ...
March 06, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I've finished up the mapping, which makes me quite happy. Of course, now I need to fill in all the details, but this is a good first step. What worked pretty well when I planned out Shadowlords was to script the entire campaign with minimal detail, and then go back and add more detail in multiple passes. I already have some ideas for the next module, as well as the overall story arc for the campaign.
I've also been working with some of the models at the Stanford 3D Scanning Repository. I managed to take the bunny and turn it into a normal mapped low-poly version. I might throw up some pictures tomorrow, though my fiddlings are still early. The biggest problem at the moment is that the conversion of the 500 MB file causes me to run out of system memory. We'll see how it goes.
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I've been slowly mapping the final level
March 05, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
I've been slowly mapping the final level. It's the biggest by far, five separate areas really. I'm also emphasizing the tactical aspects of the game, though not at the exclusion of puzzles and character development. Hopefully it'll work well.
I also had a wacky idea this morning. Perhaps I can create this first campaign for NWN2, then continue the story with a second campaign for Dragon Age. Hmm.
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I have a new version of the control panel tha...
March 04, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I have a new version of the control panel that I'm happier with, though I don't think it's quite yet done. The panel itself seems off, perhaps too obviously flat. Well, something to work on when I get a chance.
I'm also feeling the need to hunker down and finish my mapping, along with starting in on the room descriptions. Ideally I'd like a heavily marked up map with notes for triggers, waypoints, creature notes, and so on. We'll see how far I get today.
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I added some hinges and a door handle, which ...
March 03, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I added some hinges and a door handle, which was about the limits of my creativity yesterday.
I scribbled down a rough map for the final level and wrote out the plot. I still need to organize everything, but I'm feeling pretty settled on the overall structure of the module.
I'm also playing project manager again, listening to the ambient sounds that Christian put together, passing along some modeling advice from batinthehat to Juliano. Busy, busy.
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I made some serious progress with the cable car
March 02, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
 I made some serious progress with the cable car. The first version was very boxy and quickly scrapped. I'm feeling better about this version, which is has a fairly low polygon count and the two textures I use are quite small. It still needs some prettying up with hinges and handles, but I think I'm getting closer to what I'm shooting for.
A horde of volunteers seems to be helping out as of late. Christian Pacaud offered up his musical services, which I've happily accepted. He's working quite fast, with the first song slowly approaching completion. He also does work with ambient sound, so it'll be interesting to hear what he comes up with.
Juliano, the Brazilian architect, has started in on a new project. I may show off some pictures once it's closer to completion.
All the extra help is certainly motivational.
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I've been struggling to create a particular o...
March 01, 2005 by Adam in NWN2
I've been struggling to create a particular object - a cable car that plays a significant role in the flow of the module. Unfortunately I've been fairly unhappy with my various attempts to model the thing (hence no picture today), though I did make some nice normal mapped rivets. I might give it another try today, depending on how it goes.
I'm also seriously considering releasing the Demon Cards 3.0 version today. The bug reports have slowed to a trickle and I feel pretty good about where things are.
Update: I threw caution to the wind and updated the module on the Vault. It's been awhile since I've released anything, so it was a bit of a thrill.
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About Me
I've won multiple awards for my Neverwinter Nights modules, which I've been working on since the year 2000.
In the real world, I'm a web developer for a healthcare organization. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.
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