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Messages - Enigma

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1
Hi, D3x0R, glad to see you  :)

Thanks for sharing your tought about tetraedron. We'll read it.

Like triangle is more a primitive than square, Tetraedron is more a primitive than cube.

Cube is easier to handle for player. Tetraedon permits more details with less sharp edges.

Be carefull about Coronavirus as it is spreading massively worldwide now.

The Blackvoxel Team

2
Programming with Blackvoxel / Re: Programmatic handling of the player
« on: November 30, 2019, 02:21:30 pm »
Hi MUY_Belgium,

Thanks for your suggestions.

About PlayerSetAccell(), the player displacement is not proportionnal to the values because of air friction and ground friction. Blackvoxel use realistic physics formulae. To make it simple, the air friction is proportionnal to square of the speed. So, if you accelerate the player to an high speed, the friction will be very high... so the speed will go down very fast.
In an realistic world, the player should die above some limits.

For PlayerMove(), there is a bug. The good news is that's already fixed in our work. Stay tunned, we'll try to make a bugfix release in the next few days.

The values indicated in PlayerMove() is in player unit, not in voxel unit. The player unit is 256.0 units for a voxel.

The actual limit is 5000 units.

Best regards,
The Blackvoxel Team


3
General Discussion / Re: Questions
« on: November 30, 2019, 02:18:45 pm »
So, thanks for your encouragements and your positive thoughts  :)

The photorealistic voxel engine you spoke about are not a likely "improvement" way for Blackvoxel engine. That's completely different way, architecture and engine type. Not the same needs and objectives.

In the eventuality we'll make an uprade of the rendering system someday, it would likely end up in something specificly chiselled for the Blackvoxel needs.

Our original goal for Blackvoxel was to make a good game, to make something different and creative by exploring new concepts. Competing in the general engine costly race against big game companies is a completely different business.

In the hope we have answered to your question, we wish you a good game.
The Blackvoxel Team

4
General Discussion / Re: Questions
« on: November 20, 2019, 10:10:21 am »
Hi and welcome to the Blackvoxel Forum.

Quote
I would like to ask a few questions before purchasing BlackVoxel's paid content (adventure mode):
What the limitations to the school mode are, what extra
functionality is added in the paid Adventure version that makes
it worth buying?

To make it simple, in adventure mode, you have access to the whole world : http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1641
You are intended to play, extract resources, process it, use machines to build stuff, machines and make airplanes.
You have access to all materials, so you can access the complete tech tree.

In school mode, you are limited to the flat blue central zone. The other zones doesn't exists in this mode.
The school mode is mainly intended to teach and learn programming with the 3 actual programmable robots.
In this mode, you can get stuff like programmable robots and automation directly with the "J" key.
The school mode in not really intended for playing. Even if we did not disabled the regular game mechanics,
 you can not access other zones in the world, so some materials will be missing to really play the game.

Quote
is the Voxel Fire engine modifiable
to include octree /light rendering systems or would it be an
impractical modification for the underlying code? If not, what is the
extent of the engine's capability, would it be easier to start from
scratch to make a sandboxed game like TROVE or Un-turned (with
physics) or could the engine manage it?

To answer in few words, the VoxelFire engine is a specialized game engine, not a general purpose game creation tool like (as example) Unity, the Unreal Engine or the Godot Game engine (to speak about a free software tool) that would allow easy game creation. I know that many of the game like you mentionned are often made with the Unity game engine.

The VoxelFire engine was thinked in first place to make possible what the Blackvoxel game needed to do. This game have very specific needs that would not have been possible without a custom engine. Programming an engine like the VoxelFire takes a long time.

With the definition you gave, you are far enough from the Blackvoxel paradigm. And modifiying a game engine (or more, creating a new one) is not something I would recommand unless you know very well what you are doing. It requires a very good level in programming and can take a very long time.

In addition if you want to create a game, you have take also into account the terms of the licence of the game engine. The GPL V3+ licence of the VoxelFire code means you have to comply with it. https://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1571

Quote
keep improving, and it will become what most hope for... A software that
can be used for almost anything voxelized, best of all, Open Source.

Such a tool would be a dream. But I'm affraid it won't exist.
First because the word "voxel" can mean a lot of very different things. I mean, really different. And there is not best choice. What is good depend on the game.
Then because game engines are like cars. You can't have an "all in one" vehicle that can be best than specialized vehicle in their specific area. What you can call "the best car" depends on what you want to do.
VoxelFire can be good in Blackvoxel because it is specialized for what this specific game have to do.
Unforunately, specializing means making choices. Some choice you have to make in a game engine to make it better for some uses means... that you have a price to pay : it will be worst or not suitable for some other uses.

Best regards,
The Blackvoxel Team


5
General Discussion / Re: School Mode
« on: November 15, 2019, 09:51:24 pm »
Hi D3x0r,

Thanks for your comment and tought!

The good new is that you don't have to dig. In school mode, a special key "j" give you access to programmable robots and other automations automation stuff directly without following the habitual proces (digging, collecting resources, making metals).

Open the inventory and press "j" key. Pressing again give access to another page. Look at this page http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1560

Your post suggest us some improvements to the school mode to let user know minimal information on how to get started. We will think about it.

Best regards,
The Blackvoxel Team

6
Programming with Blackvoxel / Re: Odd behavior
« on: May 15, 2019, 07:22:15 pm »
Hello Animar,

I see what is the problem. The functions you mentioned are executed... but in your case,  they are doing nothing. That's because in some cases, your program is running out of "action ticket".

To make the things simple, you have the right to do only one Move() per Voxel_Step() call. Then, your Voxel_Step() function must terminate before you have the right to do another Move(). That's for limiting the power of the programmable robot to avoid being faster than extraction robots. If you call the Move() function another time, it will do nothing but return "false" to say the move action was refused. In the documentation, the functions consuming the "action ticket" are documented with the sentence like "You can move the robot only once per cycle (per Voxel_Step() call)" http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1303

To understand more deeply, an important precision : The Squirell Robot is not running a continuously running program, but a function called cyclically. The function Voxel_Step() is called each time the voxels of the world are moving (Approx 5 time by seconds). It's working synchronously with the Molecular Voxel Interaction Engine. So it's synchronous with other machines. If you want to use a program behaving a more continuous way, see the trick below.

So, there is what you can do :

  • Rethink your program using some "state machine" like the example here : https://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1306 so you'll make only one action per voxel_step.
  • Always call any PickVoxel() before moving the robot.
  • Use the newest "Remote Programmable Robot" along with the Scratch programming language. It have a much simpler behavior and use a continuously running program (http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1705). But Squirrel robot remains more powerful and faster.
  • If you want to use some loops with Move() and make it like it's running continuously, you can use a trick : the squirrel generators with the yield() function after each Move() . The yield() will return execution to the Voxel_Step and resume at the same point on the next call. Here is an example.
Code: [Select]
// Continous program called by a function.

// The generator

Rep<-0;

// My continuously running program

function MyStuff()
{
  local x,y;
 
  for (y=0;y<8;y++)
  {
    for (x=0;x<8;x++)
    {
      PickVoxel(5);
      if (y & 1) Move(1);
      else       Move(3);
      yield(true);
    }
    PickVoxel(5);
    Move(2); yield(true);
  }
 
  return(null);
}

// Calling the continuous program using a generator.

function Voxel_Step()
{
  // Creating the generator.
  if (Rep==0) Rep = MyStuff();
 
  // Calling the generator... or resuming where it was stopped.
  if (Rep==1) return(0);
  if (!resume Rep) {Rep=1;}
}


In the hope we have answered your questions, we wish you a good play.

The Blackvoxel Team

7
Troubleshooting & Bug Reports / Re: Sequencer Bug ?
« on: May 15, 2019, 07:14:25 pm »
Hi Animar,

This is an intended behavior :)
The idea behind this is that the player should learn to "know what it does".
Like with the real world machines, some mistakes should have costs.  :P
But... not too much.
The problem with Atomic Compressors, they may contains a lot of things and/or very valuable things.
As we played, we found that mistakes with Atomic Compressors was too much punitive. It was very frustrating and ruined gaming experience.
That's why we made an exception to the default policy and protected the Atomic Compressor (and also XR robots in the unloading phase) from direct user mistake.

The Blackvoxel Team

8
Suggestions / Re: My Long Waiting Wish
« on: May 12, 2019, 02:31:28 pm »
Hi Animar,

Thanks for exposing your problem and thoughts. We understand better why you want a better tool.

A faster tool dedicated to machines and automations sounds like a good idea. We will think about it.

About something to make vertical travel easier, be sure we have a lot of ideas. A lot of things were already discussed in the forums like lifts, cars, trains, space ships, etc...

But we have some good news for you, lifts are already possible with the current game. The programmable robot can do it. You can also do multiblock animation and some vehicles with it.

I have posted some example scripts here : https://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1614. One simple proof of concept. And one complete lift with a command panel.

About collecting ores, don't forget that there is some world area with much more ores than in the blue flat central zone. The best is the Flat White http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1637

The ground scanner will be useful for exploration. Update 2.41 was released with the fix for it.

Thanks for loving our game. Support from users is very important for us.

Have a good play :)

The Blackvoxel Team

9
Suggestions / Re: My Long Waiting Wish
« on: May 02, 2019, 09:23:04 am »
Hi Animar,

Thanks for loving our game and for your support. :)

  • About Constructor/Destructor 4 and 5, we planed initialy to enable them at some point after some reflexion for game balancing.

    But the plan have changed inbetween. We finally decided to not enable these as the gameplay evolved to more automation. We'll have to make this game balancing choice.

    Blackvoxel is a game about automation machines, not human hand/tool working. So our thought is that hand tools should'nt be too powerfull. Also, 4&5 wasn't even fun to use.

    What the player is supposed to get as an upgrade to the Constructor/Destructor number 3 are now the Extraction Robots. That's far more powerfull than Constructor/Destructors. There is also a bunch of programmable robots.

    Anyway, thanks for signaling the inconsistency of this old screenshot. We'll need to fix it.
     
  • Stairs ? The interest of Blackvoxel is to make original choices. The lack of stairs pushed players to find interesting solutions like using airplanes to travel underground or water systems. On the technical side, the Blackvoxel engine would'nt like to render stairs (it is particular. It was made for full voxel paradigm and fast animation).
     
  • For the ground scanner, this is a mistake :o. Sorry for this. And there is not yet recipe for it in the game, so the page would'nt have been made public. It will be fixed in our next bugfix release (We'll make it available).

About future content and update, our policy is to not make any promises. We have a lot of ideas and wishes. But like in any project, sales will decide if (and when) we'll can be able to develop new content.

As you made the choice to buy the game for contributing, i'm embarassed to can't tell you more. But I feel you are already understanding that. But if it's not the case and if you want to go back on your purchase decision, contact us by email.

I wish you a good play ;)

The Blackvoxel Team

10
Announcements / Re: Blackvoxel is now on GitHub !
« on: March 04, 2019, 05:43:39 pm »
Thanks for the release of the source code. Can I use some of the code snippets in my project?

Hello RobertThomas and welcome to the Blackvoxel Forum ;)

The answer is fixed by the GPL V3+ Free Software Licence.

To make it simple, it depends if your project is Free Software.

If you want to re-use some Blackvoxel code for a proprietary software, the answer is No. It's not permitted at all. It would be a licence infringement.

If you want to re-use Blackvoxel code in a free software with Free Software Licence, the answer is Yes. In this case, you'll have to fully comply with GPL V3+ licence (your licence must be compatible), and make citation of the source of the Blackvoxel project and it's copyright owners (authors and contributors).

Simple conclusion : Free Software projects are welcome, others are not.

In the hope we have answered to your questions.

The Blackvoxel Team

11
General Discussion / Re: Anyone went below the green acid?
« on: March 01, 2019, 08:30:30 am »
Hi Yves,

Yes there is a way to get through the acid layer without bypassing it ;)

As you already guessed, the Falling Rock is the way to get safely on the surface of the acid layer.

There is very few blocks which are immune to green acid. But Falling Rock is one of them. That's not by coincidence.

Now, you have to find a way to make some voxels to get bellow the surface.

We'll give you one hint : when you put a  "non immune" block on the side of a block which is on the acid layer, it will react with acid and this will make a temporary hole in the acid layer.

The Blackvoxel Team

12
Suggestions / Re: Extended voxel interface
« on: March 01, 2019, 08:28:13 am »
Hello Yves,

Thanks for your suggestion.
Yes, the transfer speed is rather slow.
At origin, we didn't made the programmable robot very efficient at mining in order to keep interest to the other mining robots. That said, the item transfer speed could be made better without harming this goal. This limitation isn't very interesting to keep and could harm some good use of the programmable robot in factories. We'll think about this and it's very likely we'll retain this wish and make some improvement.

The Blackvoxel Team

13
Gallery / Re: Learning with Blackvoxel
« on: March 01, 2019, 08:26:21 am »
Hello Yves and welcome to the Blackvoxel Forum ;)

Thanks for your interesting thoughs about using Blackvoxel with Kanban.

Yes, Blackvoxel is a game about organisation. That's a good idea to experiment with professionnal organisation methods. Using such a simulation for testing and comparing approachs.

There is always some useful lessons to learn with video game which can be used in real life. And you are showing a good way on this kind of analysis.

It's well made, we'll take time to read it tourroughly.

Have a good fun with Blackvoxel...

The Blackvoxel Team

14
Hi, MUY_Belgium and Welcome to the Blackvoxel Forum  :)

Thanks for your return and comments.

Yes, it appears the manual should be improved about how to start with the programming robot. The Squirrel Robot should have an ingame status display like the assembly language one already have.

In the meantime, here are quick setup instructions :
  • In order to use the programmable robot, you should start the game in windowed mode because you'll have several programs alongside.
  • There is actually a compilation result and error output. These informations are displayed in the standard terminal. A terminal Windows is launched automatically along with the game when you use windows so you should see it when you are in Windowed mode. But if you use Blackvoxel with Gnu/Linux, you must launch Blackvoxel into a command line terminal in order to get it.
  • The choice was made to use an external editor(which can have complete features) rather to a simplified in-game one. When you click "edit", then an external editor is launched. The editor can be modified in the "Settings_Hardware.dat" file.
In the hope we have helped you :)
The Blackvoxel Team

15
Happy to have solved your problem.

We wish you a good game.

The Blackvoxel Team

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