FOnline: 2238, Jumping into the 3d era

Lexx

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FOnline: 2238 Announcement, Jumping into the 3d era
(or: how we learned to not be that flat anymore.)

A long time has passed since we released our last developer video and really, it was about time this changed. The new developers video features a topic that we have been working on for some months and we are proud to finally have it in a shape to present it to the public: 3D models.

We decided to move the FOnline engine from a pure 2d to a 2.5d engine, due to the fact that sprite editing is a long and tiresome job. With every change on the player characters, it is nesaccary to edit more than 10.000 single images, even if it's something simple like a different hair color or a new armor type. The use of 3D models helps us in developing more and diversified content in a shorter timer span and still keep the look and feel of the original games.

After the release of the first 3d model converter for the Van Buren models (Van Buren - the code name of the cancled Fallout 3 by Interplay, for the ones who don't know it), we thought it was a great idea to reuse the material we could get out of the tech demo that has been released in 2007. Even if not complete, the build featured character models with already more than 90 animations and a lot customisations for body type or hair and beard styles.

In the third developers video, Anton "Cvet" Tsvetinskiy, FOnline main programmer, is talking about the details of how the new 3d critters are working and will work in the future of FOnline: 2238. Check it out:

Videos & Audio on ModDB or YouTube.

The first update-wave will introduce 3d models for the animal creatures, such as models for the rats, ants, venus mantrap, thorn slinger, desert stalker or the lovely rad toads. Also a big content update is going to hit the server, which includes new game features and quests for both, PvP and PvE-friends.

In combination with this, the server has to undergo a full wipe. This will happen in approx one or two weeks at most, when the update will be available on the public server.

As an appendix, beside the video, here are some actual ingame screenshots:





- Cvet & Rotators
 
Oh my god, awesome news. Im really thankfull that the developers made this step and put so much work in their game. Another proof that the Fallout community is a great one. :clap:
 
it is a graet news unfortunately i can not try it out till i get my second pc back. this one does not support anything above dx6.0
 
Looks nice, though not as Fallouty as the previous one. But if it's because modelling gets faster, then it's definitely worth it. After all, the game is still in active development. Better to have Van Buren character models, but to develop faster, rather than original Fallout models, and slower development.

And you can bring back the original models after a several months/years.
 
Continuum said:
Holy fucking shit! AWESOME! This engine is true gold! :D

And you will be able to make singleplayer games with it. Imagine! :P
 
Are those Van Buren extracted beasts applicable to the "normal" Fallout? I just have to have that fucking hungry flower.
 
It's possible to render them to 2d and make behave like it's needed for Fallout 2.
 
Congratulations what you guys have made is brilliant. I can’t imagine how long it took to convert the assets from Van Buren to FOline. The Fallout community is full of great surprises.
 
Lexx said:
Continuum said:
Holy fucking shit! AWESOME! This engine is true gold! :D

And you will be able to make singleplayer games with it. Imagine! :P

It looks awesome!
Does the engine support Turn Based combat? :)
Will it be released for free?
Would be awesome if someone would start to make fallout mods using it.
 
.Pixote. said:
I can’t imagine how long it took to convert the assets from Van Buren to FOline.

I think it was approx one or two weeks to write the converters and get everything straight. :) It was more and longer work to change the engine from 2d to 2.5d and to get the model shadow done correct, etc. etc. all this tiny stuff. Cvet has done a great job on it.


Dagon said:
It looks awesome!
Does the engine support Turn Based combat? :)
Will it be released for free?
Would be awesome if someone would start to make fallout mods using it.

The engine supports rt and tb combat. Yes, the engine is free and it's possible to make whole new games with it (even retail games, if you strike out all Fallout content).
 
This looks really awesome! especially animation, it is not jumpy only goes from 1 state to other fluently.

I would love to see hero look depending on SPECIAL:

- high strength = muscular body (or maybe when connected with high endurance as well)
- high charisma = big breast (female characters)
- low perception = pirate eye lash
- low agility = character limps when walking (also when crippled) or even walks with crutches
- low charisma = body scars (connected with low perception giving huge scar over half of the face)
- old (50/60+) = grey hair only (at the start, colouring during game possible?)

etc ... but yet this gives lot of fun and possibilities
 
Lexx said:
And you will be able to make singleplayer games with it. Imagine! :P
Yep, my wet dreams come true: hexes + 3d characters! Not to mention about lack of this stupid restrictions, broken "features", etc.

Also, WTF?! Power Armour got normal size?! :ugly: Awesome!

Jesterka said:
Are those Van Buren extracted beasts applicable to the "normal" Fallout?
Stop living in the past, and move forward! :revolution:
 
I forgot about one thing... I do hope you'll implement "weapon placed in hands will look exactly the same as inventory item" type of 3d engine/layered sprites feature.
 
Lexx said:
And you will be able to make singleplayer games with it. Imagine! :P

It's great news, but imo this stuff should've happened years ago and not now when the TC's are so far along the road, i mean, i'll probably die of old age before i see a sp game out of that engine.

Would be good for a Van Buren recreation, though.


P.S the VB human crittters doesn't seem to "merge" all that well with the original models, so i guess there'll be need to remake all the original NPC critters to fit the VB ones.

P.P.S hate that power amor. :ugly:
 
The power armor is cool, but looks strange in Lost Hills, because everything else seems to be so big.

It's great news, but imo this stuff should've happened years ago and not now when the TC's are so far along the road, i mean, i'll probably die of old age before i see a sp game out of that engine.

It doesn't have to be a Fallout game. You can also create whatever other game with it, if you want to. :P

P.S the VB human crittters doesn't seem to "merge" all that well with the original models, so i guess there'll be need to remake all the original NPC critters to fit the VB ones.

It's the idle animation that looks so different in this case. In general some animations are still missing and need to be recreated. Also with time we want to adjust it more to get it more into "the old style" (even though I personally love the Van Buren stuff).

Continuum said:
I forgot about one thing... I do hope you'll implement "weapon placed in hands will look exactly the same as inventory item" type of 3d engine/layered sprites feature.

Yes, every weapon in players hands can look like in the inventory now. It's just needed to create the models. :)
 
Power Armour with VB's animations is super cool now. VB's animations are looking 1K times better than original ones (which are looking exactly the same as male hero, which is lame). I wouldn't change anything there ;)

As for the engine itself: are you planning to release the source code?
 
I think at least for the singleplayer part, something will be released. But I am not sure about it right now. But if something will be released in this direction, it will still take some time.

The first release will be the client and server software (but not the 'deep' source code).
 
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