Turtle Arena 0.5.3 Released

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Turtle Arena 0.5.3, after long delay, is now available for download! It has many improvements and bug fixes.

There are now (untested) Windows x64 client and server executables included in the download (credit goes to ioquake3 for windows x64 support).

A lot of code was merged into ioq3ztm during the development cycle for Turtle Arena 0.5.3 and resulted in bug fixes for TA and cleaner code.

Turtle Arena now has increased memory usage, partly due to new features/graphics (such as support for four times as many game objects). The minimum recommended RAM is now 512MB (plus memory for the operating system), the 128MB (plus OS) recommended until now many have to too low to actually run the game.

Changes:

* New icon / loading image.

* Switched to M+ Outline fonts from GUN FreeFont and DejaVu fonts.

* Started an Arcade Mode. It’s a single player (score-attack) mode for playing the multiplayer gametypes. It saves the best 5 scores/times with player name for each map/gametype.

* Players can now move through each other.

* Initial support for four times as many entities in game, 4096. (This hasn’t been stress tested yet, but should allow creating maps with a lot more objects.)

* Better handling of incompatible mods.
* Added Virtual Machine API version checks for game and cgame moduals (already existed for ui modual).
* Don’t allow VM to make system calls before checking API version.
* Don’t call VM shutdown functions when VM reports an unsupported API version.

* Started work on allowing IQM model skeleton to be accessed/modified-for-rendering by cgame/ui.
* This will allow players to have smooth bending at waist/neck, instead of using three separate models for legs, torso, and head.

* Save games now support splitscreen.

* Air meter now is only shown when needed (when waist-deep in water or deeper and shortly after getting out of water)

* Many, many bug fixes.
* Fixed object collision to use real contents (e.g. solid, player, water), required for allowing player to move through each other.
* Fixed client-side prediction issues due to different bounding box on server and client.
* Fixed crash when beginning intermission in maps without an info_player_intermission entity (such as map dm2).
* Splitscreen bug fixes.

Delay and Plan

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The next Turtle Arena release is currently on hold while I work on the new game design.

  • Finalize new name.
  • Create new icon.
  • Create new logo.
  • Finalize story (general concept/overview of world, intro, and ending).
  • Create playable character concept artwork.
  • Create NPC concept artwork [common enemies and bosses], names, and describe them.

I’ll hopefully get most of this done in the next month. After the game design is done (or mostly complete) I’ll finish the new website and make it public. New releases will resume after that.

The next major release (0.6), with new name and all new characters, is targeted for a Q1 2012 release.

Awfully Quiet

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It has been over a month since the last Turtle Arena release (v0.5.2). I haven’t completed the goals for the next release yet, I got side tracked working on some new ideas.

A new “arcade mode” has been started. It is a single player mode for playing the multiplayer game types (deathmatch, CTF, etc) alone. It saves the top five high-scores (w/name), this the main reason it is called arcade mode. There is still some things that need to changed and features to add. It replaces the ‘Vs. Bots’ mode which was essentially off-line multiplayer (it was the same as Quake 3′s skirmish mode).

I started working on a new website using WordPress, so the blog and main Turtle Arena site can be combined. It reuses a lot of content and design from the current website.

I have a lot of specific ideas for the playable characters, but still need to create concept drawings to be references for the 3D models. I created some concept drawings for the rabbit character this week. There are still a few things to work out with the design, I’ll probably post a concept image after that.

The support for using a single IQM model for players (which was basicially the main feature for the next release) is unfinished. Engine-side code should work (hasn’t really been tested). I haven’t added the game/cgame/ui code yet. I need to learn to use Blender so I can create test IQM models. After that it should proceed.

I’ll try to finish arcade mode and do a new release by the end of the week. The general plan (since June) is a new release each month.

Hello world!

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Testing WordPress, may switch from xhtml website (that I have to manually update rss feed…) and ‘development blog’ (which I post all news on now…) to using WordPress instead. Merging the two back together would be a good idea.

New ioq3 fork, ioq3ztm

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Ever since Turtle Arena was started I maintained the ability to compile it as unmodified ioquake3, or as ioquake3 with some additional changes from Turtle Arena (which I called ioq3ztm). However, it has been coming increasingly difficult (and messy), so support for compiling ioq3 has been dropped. Support for ‘ioq3ztm’ build will most likely be removed as well.

I am now creating ioq3ztm as a separate project, by porting things from Turtle Arena back to a clean ioq3 source. It will contain fixes and features that don’t fit in ioq3 for one reason or another. This is an effort to make a better base engine for standalone ioq3 games and to clean up the Turtle Arena source code. ioq3ztm, unlike Turtle Arena, does not add “#ifdef”s around new code, this results in cleaner code. ioq3ztm is not planned to change q3 gameplay, only to fix things and add features to enhance to standalone games.

Turtle Arena’s four player splitscreen will be ported to ioq3ztm.

ioq3ztm is not compatible with quake3 qvms, this means q3 mods can’t be used with it. I don’t see this as being an issue, people can still create new mods using ioq3ztm source code. Might be considered an issue if a standalone ioq3 game wanted to switch to ioq3ztm (and wanted existing mods to work).

ioq3ztm is planned to not add an additional data requirements, so that it will work with q3 data or q3 replacement data (such as q3min or OpenArena?). I will probably create a full q3 data replacement based on Turtle Arena data someday, “baseioq3ztm” or something, which would be included in a playable ioq3ztm download.

Turtle Arena will now be based on ioq3ztm, instead of ioq3 directly.  I will probably port some of the changes to ioq3 (but only ones that fit in of course). I may port ogg theora video playback to ioq3, which is originally from XreaL, World of Padman.

It should be possible to port standalone ioq3 games (Q3Rally, Smokin’ Guns, OpenArena, World of Padman, etc) to ioq3ztm and use ioq3ztm as a single engine for multiple games. Though merging features like four player splitscreen wouldn’t be easy.

In short; I’m porting features from Turtle Arena to a new ioq3 fork, ioq3ztm, and merging the changes into Turtle Arena/ioq3ztm “properly”.

Turtle Arena 0.5.2 Released

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Turtle Arena 0.5.2 has been released. It features a new HUD, some graphic improvements, and various bugfixes. Changed master server address to use a running dpmaster (dpmaster.deathmask.net), now you can host and find online games easily. Give it a try, beat up some bots today!

The next release, 0.5.3, is planned to focus on improving the player animation system. (See the RoadMap for more details on future plans.)
* Support single skeleton model (IQM format) for players.
** Skeleton animation is better then current vertex MD3 models (visually, file-size, etc)
** Allows smooth bending at player waist and neck.
** Allows creation of seamless player models.
* Add head animation support.

Notable changes;
- Improved HUD (see blog post).

- New strength icon/model.
- r1537: Fixed issue starting splitscreen game.
- r1538: Smoother camera zooming.
- r1539: Changed master server address, use a running master server.
- r1540: Added camera controls to player controls menu.

- r1553: Fixed spectator head models on scoreboard to not to be blue.
- r1554: Made spawn/teleport temporary invincibility have a pulsing transparency effect.
- r1557: Added waiting animation for players (current player models don’t have animation though).
- r1558: Added video mode for using current display resolution.
- r1561: Use display resolution by default.
- r1562: Fixed crash loading duel gametype.
- r1574: “Analog” (move relative to camera [when it is rotated]) fixes.
- r1576: Made bots check all held items for shurikens, instead of just selected item.
- r1577: Fixed bots selecting unusable holdable item.

Turtle Arena HUD Preview

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The next release of Turtle Arena will feature a new (well, modified) HUD.

The top zero is the score. The blue bar is the “air bar” which shows how much air is left underwater. The orange bar is the health bar (finally added like originally intended). Weapon icon (and ammo –not shown) and holdable icon (and use count) are below much like before, though placement and spacing are slightly changed.

HUD background changes color in teamplay. Flag model is draw to right of main HUD like before.

 Lives in single player and co-op are now fit in much more with the HUD. A “x #” to the right of player’s head. Old HUD had “Lives #” listed below weapon icon.

Healthbar changes width based on player’s max health. Doubles in size when player has guard powerup (as max health is double). This should make max health changes more visible to players.

If player doesn’t have guard power up, health can go over “max health” by picking up health items. (Health slowly drops to max health.) Health over “max health” is draw lighter over the top of the health bar.

For reference, the hud used by Turtle Arena 0.5.1 and all previous versions is below. Originally the background was green, but in later versions it was changed to use player color.

Turtle Arena 0.5.1 Released

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After about only six weeks since Turtle Arena 0.5.0 was release; I present Turtle Arena 0.5.1, the latest development version of Turtle Arena. Turtle Arena is on its way to being… well, extraordinary. You can download it at the website.

Turtle Arena no longer uses any (GPL2+) graphics or sounds from OpenArena, which is a step forward for being a unique game and more unified data licensing.

Notable changes (and a few some less notable changes)
- r1452: Fixed transparency issue with models using cel-shading.
- r1453: Fixed player walking underwater (player use to be jittery when looking up).
- r1456: Added support for special jump backward animation when using lock-on. Currently it isn’t used, but will allow making it so players only backflip when in lock-on mode.
- r1459: Increased weapon respawn time. Should cut down on number of weapons that end up floating around random weapon spawn point.
- r1465: Changed how next map is selected, now it uses the scripts/arenas.txt and scripts/*.arena allowing add-on maps to be automatically added to map rotation.
- r1467: Removed Casey Jones player, don’t plan to have humans in the game anymore.
- r1469: Removed sound effects from OpenArena, now all sound in game is licensed as CC-BY-SA-3.0. They haven’t been replaced yet.
- r1473: Replaced two wall marks from OpenArena, with higher resolution SVG.
- r1477: Modified the weapon trails/ghosting, I think it looks better now. Also removed player speed ghosting effect.
- r1478: Made the Turtles’ tales look more like real red-eared slider tales, instead of trying to look like the Mirage Studios Ninja Turtle comics.
- r1479: Fixed long sword color so all players can see the color.
- r1481: Modified some messages;
    – “so-and-so entered the game” is now only show once (instead of after each map load).
    – Client team change messages now colorize team names.
    – Client change team messages are now shown in the notify area/console instead of center print.
    – Changing to spectator mode no longer prints “so-and-so killed [him|her|it]self” (instead it just prints team change)
- r1481: Drop CTF flag when player suicides (using kill command), instead of instantly returning it to base.
- r1482: Remove Foot Ninja player skins (that were used in teamplay on red team).
- r1486: Made players drop flag when shot or hit by an explosion.
- r1487: Show message when player drops flag.
- r1489: CTF flags no longer bob and spin.
- r1490: Don’t show frag messages in CTF, 1 flag CTF, and Overload. It isn’t the goal for those gametypes. Only the goal for the gametype should center print.
- r1491: Show center print message in Overload when destroying base object. This continued the line of thinking that accomplishing goal should center print.
- r1495: Remade water splash sprite and shader. Now water ripples look like they only go away the player that is causing them, instead of odd q3 way of ripples going from and back to player.
- r1504: Improved server browser
  – Added cancel refresh button.
  – Moved/renamed global “specify” favorite button to “new” button only shown when source is favorites.
  – Save port of new favorite servers.
- r1513: Increased protocol to 7, there have been multiple incompatibilities with TA 0.5.0.
- r1515: Added support for dpmaster protocol, now the game can be used with uncustomized dpmaster. (Quick server delisting still requires my modified dpmaster as it was not accepted by dpmaster developer.)
- r1517: Fixed requesting server for a specific gametype in server browser to work with all gametypes.
- r1520: Removed saving/loading server list (servercache.dat).

- New more secure network protocol from ioq3.
- Security fixes from ioq3.
- Fixed numerous minor issues