The Great Freedoom Graphics Improvement Project

[Fredrik]

Enjay said:

Almost all these graphics look fantastic. I'm glad to see your cardboard boxes, even in low-res. I think they are great.

The only reason I didn't submit the cardboard boxes earlier is that I couldn't figure out how to scale them down and convert them to the Doom palette without making them look ugly.

The only ones I'm not sure about are the sw19 ones. The parts where the brown/green is broken and fading into grey looks a little "painted on" rather than some actual, proper surface damage-like effect.

Agreed, though it doesn't look so bad in-game. I'll make another iteration later.

The shotgun guy looks great too. How many half finished monsters do you have for freedoom now? ;)

Maybe 10? :P

On the other hand, I have contributed one essentially finished monster (the Lost Soul, though I'll have to touch up that one as well). The new demon is also NEARLY finished -- all that remains is to clean it up a bit and add attack & pain frames.

The good news is that if I ever finish the shotgun guy, I should be able to create a zombie guy and chaingunner fairly quickly based on the existing animation.

[Fredrik]

Now working on computer textures; two updated tekwalls have been added.

[myk]

These Freedrikdoom graphics are superb; consistent, somewhat doomish in feel, and yet unique!

[Fredrik]

Several new tek/computer graphics have been added. (Finally a decent PLANET1!)

[Manc]

Fredrik said:

Several new tek/computer graphics have been added. (Finally a decent PLANET1!)

At the sacrifice of advanced AGM monitoring!

[RjY]

Fredrik said:

This is an important issue. Another aspect of it is gameplay -- we've all played Doom so long that we subconsciously associate the original colors of the various powerups with their effects. I've made several powerups that break the color scheme (in the name originality), but I'll be happy to recolor those if there is a consensus to stick with the original colors.

I guess I'm 10 days late saying this but I agree the colours of certain items would be better if they matched the originals - green invulnerability, white megasphere and in particular blue combat armour. There is a tendency in really old Doom maps to put a soulsphere and blue armour in a room textured entirely in blue, so the armour being red looks quite odd :)

Correct me if I'm wrong but I was under the impression that when the project was started one of its purported aims was that, apart from being a free-as-in-speech Doom game, you could play PWADs without having the originals. Therefore since nearly all PWADs were designed with the original IWADs in mind, compatibility wins over originality. Although I vaguely recall that there was some disagreement on this issue..?

[Hobbs]

RjY said:

white megasphere

uhh...

[leileilol]

Don't post Doom sprites in a Freedoom forum! That is NOT Free Software !!

[Manc]

HobbsTiger1 said:

uhh...

He is of course referring to the effect in his post and not the actual sprite image. In this case however he need not worry as the color is based on the engine, not the image resources.

[Hobbs]

Remind me in what game the colormap shift (or as you call it the "effect") for a combat armour was blue, and that of an invulnerability artifact was green? Since he refers to the "green invulnerability, white megasphere and in particular blue combat armour" in his post.

Hell, just tell me a game besides Doom with an invulerability artifact, a megasphere, and combat armour and that'll work for me.

[andrewj]

Any chance of hi-res versions of these textures?

[Fredrik]

Ajapted said:

Any chance of hi-res versions of these textures?

Except for the existing crates; no, not likely. This is taking enough time already.

[RjY]

HobbsTiger1 said:

uhh...

Okay, a light shade of beige then. The point is, it's not green - Freedoom's megasphere is green.

Mancubus II said:

He is of course referring to the effect in his post and not the actual sprite image. In this case however he need not worry as the color is based on the engine, not the image resources.

No I am referring to the sprite colours. In Doom the invulnerability is green, the megasphere is whitebeige, and the combat armour is blue. In Freedoom, the invulnerability is blue and pink, the megasphere is green, and the combat armour is red. Honestly I was just agreeing with Fredrik's point earlier in the thread that it might be better if the colours of some objects better matched those of the original game. No big deal

[myk]

RjY said:
No I am referring to the sprite colours. In Doom the invulnerability is green, the megasphere is whitebeige, and the combat armour is blue.

Yeah, but also, don't some GL engines apply colored lights to these power-ups?

By the way, Alien Vendetta's Map31: Killer Colours is an example of a map combining sprite and texture colors the way you described.

[andrewj]

myk said:

don't some GL engines apply colored lights to these power-ups?

Yeah, in EDGE the Freedoom plasma looks a bit odd with green sprites giving off a blue glow.

Ideally the GL port would analyse the sprite, extract the dominant hue and use that for the dynamic lighting color. Quite a lot of coding though!

[Fredrik]

After some experimenting, I've finally managed to create a decent skin texture.

[Jon]

I've stuck the chaingun and your previous SG/SSG sprites, plus the demon WIP into svn HEAD, I'll do the textures so far at some point this evening (do you have them WADded up already? :))

[Fredrik]

Hrm; I'm having trouble with the university remote login. I've emailed the WADs.

[DaniJ]

Ideally the GL port would analyse the sprite, extract the dominant hue and use that for the dynamic lighting color. Quite a lot of coding though!

Doomsday already does this if you want to have a look and see how we've done it.

Excellent work thus far Fredrik, much higher quality than the old Freedoom textures.

[Orna fulsamee]

Remember to fix the plasmagun sprite (plasmagun sitting on the floor), It shows the old plasmagun. Besides, it just looks like the original that has been made green and black.





Also one thing bothers me about the BFG9000. It looks alien-y. Im used to human techie. You dont have to change it, It just nags me somehow.

[Little Faith]

I still motion that we should remember the Freedoom nr7 weapon slot is called the SKAG, not the BFG.

[Fredrik]

Yep, SKAG for Super Kick-Ass Gun.

SKAG! also happens to be the most annoying sound made by Link in Ocarina of Time.

The SKAG should be remade, by the way, but I'm not up for it at the moment.

[myk]

SKAG is silly, and reminds me of the Quake Skrag, that has nothing to do with this. Call it MOM (Mass Ownage Machine). And foot soldiers say "the mother of all guns". In any case, renaming everything is pointless, unless a DeHackEd (or BEX) patch is included in the wad, renaming stuff (I've always thought that should be done).

[Fredrik]

MOM is not too bad either.

[exp(x)]

It needs a recursive acronym.

[Fredrik]

How about "MOM Of MOM" (or any other pointless word starting with O), an acronym that expands exponentially?

[david_a]

myk said:

unless a DeHackEd (or BEX) patch is included in the wad, renaming stuff (I've always thought that should be done).

This is a good idea. Freedoom is aiming for Boom compatibility last time I checked, so why don't we have a BEX that renames some of the weapons/items? I can see it being nice for the MAP30 role call too (I'm assuming you can change monster names; I honestly don't remember).

[andrewj]

Fredrik said:

How about "MOM Of MOM" (or any other pointless word starting with O)

How about "on"? Then two people playing deathmatch can have some hot MOM on MOM action...

[RTC_Marine]

Your MOM

[Jon]

myk said:

In any case, renaming everything is pointless, unless a DeHackEd (or BEX) patch is included in the wad, renaming stuff (I've always thought that should be done).

I'll accept such a lump if one is submitted. It would mostly be useful for renaming levels, but none of the mappers so far have expressed an interest.

It's likely we'll do that with the next release as we'll have concreted some more storyline by then.