I thought it would be good to start over a new thread for my SDK beginning with already common information and.. some news as an overview.


Name: UT99 Software Development Kit
Authors: Shadow (nearly everything), Moonangel (additional renderer assistance), Creavion (overall help, suggestions, some testing)
Release: January/February 2008
Official Moddb Site: http://www.moddb.com/mods/9974/ut99-extension-pack
Demo/Preview:yes
Expected Filesize: ~ 100 MB

Content (not Features):

- around 200 Classes for the Core Pack
- around 300 Classes for the Content Pack
- many many Textures, Sounds, Skins, Example Classes to play around with
- all old Creatures with the new Enhancements
- around 10 old/UT99 weapons with the new Enhancements
- many new Gameplay Classes (for cutscenes, triggers, new movers etc.)
- tons of new graphic extensions
- own renderer and dll-files
- own tools (mesh system tool for example)
- more than 10 example maps (cutscenes, scripted events showing new AI and so on)
- more than 10 test maps (play around with everything! the testmap from the beta is no comparison to these maps!)
- more than 5 tutorial maps (maps used in tutorials)
- Class Reference for EVERY Class + (short) Description
- Class Tutorials/How-To-Use Documentation
- improved code of features in the Demo/Beta Version

Requirements (min/max):

- Unreal Tournament Version 436 + common Bonus Packs (not higher, since it's not proven if the SDK will work with the community patch!)
- ~ 100 MB free HDD Space
- (min) 1.0-1.5 GHZ IBM compatible CPU, (max) 3.0 GHZ CPU, no support for DualCore, only SSE, SSE2, and MMX
- Windows, Linux or MacOS (note: c++ extensions may faail on Linux/MacOS or other OS)
- (min) DirectX 5-7 compatible Graphics Card (64 MB), onboard cards aren't recommended! (max) DirectX7-8/OpenGL 2.0 compatible Graphics Card (128 MB and more)
- (min) 256 MB Ram, (max) 512 MB and up -> 1 GB, 2 GB.. (DDR1 and DDR2 recommended)
- the SDK mostly benefits from a good CPU (many features are CPU accelerated since they're only UScript-side) and a big RAM/GRAM (the SDK will probably contain S3TC/HighRes Textures) and for hardware accelerated extensions (distance fog, mesh sysem) from a good Graphics Card

Overall Progress: 67 %

Pictures: click


Actually I can't give a proper full feature list because the features are changing nearly every day (one gots senseless and implemented in other classes, one changes it's name, one changes it's functionality, one gots completely deleted..)

The SDK will always be shipped with the Core Files AND the Content Files, There might be a version without the Content Files (for Modem Users, ~ 20 MB) but than you'll have the blank SDK without Content and Examples.

You'll get a complete Pack for improving UT and developing fresh stuff, maps and mods on the old UT for free. It has many maps to play around with, tons of new graphics stuff, all creatures with new graphic extensions and AI, a detailed documentation and so on..

Well I'm open for every suggestion you have for the Final Version, any advice for new features? What was bad on the features/content in the Beta? Any bugs you recognized I didn't? ..

Do you have any Distance Fog actor?

Looks good, be sure to release betas for us eager mappers.
@GTD
If you want to use distance fog there's raven's distance fog hax of d3d and opengl.

Beta as UT or Unreal beta?

Betas of this pack.

Ah lol, me stupid, I didn't read the whole post anyway.

umm yes.. we had distance fog since 2 years with LSoNP.. now it'll be bundled inside the SDK

Definitely looking forward to this for the next version of Marathon: Resurrection.

so you're in the team of M:R ? didn't know about that before.. I just wrote a comment relating my offer to help M:R with my Extension pack. Maybe I'll try to contact Tycho via mail and do it in a more official way.

Yup. He mentioned your post on ModDB to me last night, although I've actually been awaiting the release of this SDK for awhile now. I remember getting the beta off of the old UnrealSP forums and being pretty excited at the prospects these features could do for improving MR.

great! well I contacted your leader Tycho and I hope he'll acknowledge my offer as you did here and at IRC, maybe a customized version adapted on M:R wouldn't be that wrong^^

*small update*

I just thought about showing what I'm working on now (well already finished 2 days ago)...
I finally managed to get dynamic Sprites working. Sprites that have stretchable U/V Size, Tiling, Panning, AutoPanning, Combiners, Dynamic Color and Blending and so on... That also means much better particles. Imagine fireparticles fading from one color to another or particles whose VScale is increasing stretching it into the height or particles that have a combiner applied on multiplying output color to appear more brighten..


Here are some examples with descriptions..


UScaling


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- UStretching
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:



VScaling


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- VStretching
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:



Relative Tiling


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Relative 4x4 Tiling
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:



U Tiling


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- UTiling 1x4
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:



V Tiling


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- VTiling 1x4
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:



U Panning


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Static UPan (U +- 64 to move it partially to the left/right)
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:


Instead of just placing it to the left/right it can actually move automaticly to the left right in a loop or switching between left/right using AutoUPan.


V Panning


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Static VPan (V +64 to move it slightly upwards )
- Cyan Color
- Translucent Blending

Result:


Instead of just placing it up/downwards it can actually move automaticly up/downwards in a loop or switching between up/down using AutoVPan.


Simple Combiner


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color



Used Combiner

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color
- Modulated Blending


Result:


The base material is now a stone texture with no blending. The combiner is now the test texture with a modulated blending. It brightens up the stone texture and only the black part (the text) is completely overlaying.


Auto VPanning Variant 1 (Texture Based)


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color



Used Combiner

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Based VPanning (Looped)
- Texture Color
- Modulated Blending


Result:



Auto VPanning Variant 2 (Texture Based)


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color
- Translucent Blending



Used Combiner

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Based VPanning
- Texture Color
- Modulated Blending


Result:


Other blending.. other result, here the panning texture only affects the black part of the texture, because the base texture is translucent and the text is black thus this part is completely translucent only letting through the combiner where the text stands.


Complex Combiner


Used Base Texture

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color



Used Combiner (1) Specularity

Modifier Properties:
- Texture Color
- Modulated Blending



Used Combiner (2) AutoUPan

Modifier Properties:
- UPanning (Looped)
- Texture Color
- Translucent Blending



Used Combiner (3) AutoVPan (Texture based)

Modifier Properties:
- VPanning (Looped)
- Texture Color
- Translucent Blending


Result:


This is an example of a complex combiner sprite. As base texture the stone texture was used again. The first combiner is a specularity map making the sprite appear shiny and more brighten on certain areas defined through the specularity map. The second combiner is self UPanning red texture. It pans from left to right. The third combiner is the already seen VPan texture. As the panning combiners move the specularity map is influenced by them making the final sprite appear bright and shiny when the panning allows to let brighter color shine through.


I was also working on finally getting RenderToTexture working. The result of the partially successful work was a ManagerClass that is able to render a scene on a sprite, corona or the screen using an Advanced Portal Function and a custom "camera" class.
However this is unfortunatly not full RenderToTexture maybe I'm going to hardcode this feature for my D3D8 and OpenGL Drivers thus rendering a scene directly on a texture to allow monitors or something on BSP and not on sprites, screens and coronas only.

Continuing work on hardcoded features starts after finishing UScript-side visual features, physics features and gameplay/ai features. I'm looking forward on implementing real RenderToTexture (as described above), Texture-based Shaders (rather than using Combiners/Overlayers), real Texture Projection and maybe Dynamic Shadows (using RenderToTexture/Projectors then or StencilBuffer), but that's all still utopic.. It is possible of course, but me alone working on this makes it hard to implement... I hope to make it available both for D3D8 and OpenGL Drivers.

Overall progress of the pack is just fine. The UScript-side Visual Features are nearing completion (just need to rewrite the ParticleSystem, improving WeaponCombiners, improving/testing Vegetation Generators). Physics Features are progressing well, still much to do on AI/Gameplay Features and the hardcoded Extensions.

Holy shit that's awesome

That specularity thing is the shiznit! :0

Aaaaaah, they were sprites , now I know what the fuss is about. With that in regard...Awesome! This will do miracles for weaponFX