metal dawn on 9/6/2018 at 21:51
I'm aware that I just necro'd an old thread, but I'm wondering if anyone else has had this issue.
I fiercely love the Originia missions despite (or perhaps partially
because) of) their difficulty.
I've played through them many times in the past. However, Since I started using NewDark, I've played the missions 3 times in the last three years and have noticed each time that a gimmick the creator wanted you to exploit...well, can no longer be exploited.
The mystic soul gems (Oldorf, Quagnali, Mythra, Alphadius, Zazarius) are supposed to be used to spot invisible or nearly-invisible things. The Shadow Beasts, the personal enforcers of
the Dark One are the most obvious example, but they can also be used to find a secret in the last mission -
The Power Cells exhibit has a manipulable floor panel that leads to flooded passage that ends up in the central core of the power room (the big structure in the center resembling a holding tank). The core has an invaluably useful and unique item, the Clear Orb. However to get the panel to open, you have to find an invisible key and then use it to unlock a lockbox which is also invisible.I have tried dicking with scripts to no effect. I can only assume the engine changes from NewDark broke this "feature". It doesn't break the mission, but does end up making an extremely tough mission even more difficult.
You can still
technically spot the Shadows but their outlines are almost totally invisible and even though they still emit black hazy smoke, even
that is hard to see - even with good sources of light trained on them. So hard to see, in fact, that I had to edit this screenie to point them out.
Inline Image:
https://i.imgur.com/J91bJPQ.jpgFor comparison's sake, here is a pic from an old walkthrough that shows how revealing the Soul Gems originally were...
Inline Image:
http://www.thiefmissions.com/walkthroughs/RuinsOfOriginia/AtA_walkthru_files/ata-shadowbeasts.jpgfortuni on 9/6/2018 at 22:15
I replayed that one a few days ago and never realised the Gem of Oldorf was not working correctly, but your correct, it played the same way with me. Hopefully a dml can fix this issue.
metal dawn on 9/6/2018 at 22:33
Yes, I hope so too.
I mostly posted this as a friendly warning to those using Yametha's walkthrough.
Amusingly, despite being so old, that one feature about the gems is the only thing "broken" about Originia. It has aged phenomenally well considering all the game changes, engine-related and otherwise.
klatremus on 10/6/2018 at 03:52
I can verify that the gem's feature of revealing hidden items also did not work in mission 1 Mines of Margroth in NewDark for me. Can't comment on missions 2-4. A .dml would be very nice.
Unna Oertdottir on 11/6/2018 at 11:37
Here's a fix. It's not exactly the same setup, but it has the same effect. The shadowbeasts become visible when using a gem.
Code:
DML1
//Fixed light based transparency on Shadowbeasts//bantar.gam.dml
+ObjProp -7843 "LBAlpha"
{
"Active" true
"Min alpha" 0.01
"Max alpha" 1.00
"Light level (0-100) for min" 70
"Light level (0-100) for max" 90
}
Code:
DML1
//Fixed light based transparency on items//miss28.mis.dml
+ObjProp 328 "LBAlpha" //invisible key is invisible by design//transparent texture
{
"Active" true
"Min alpha" 0.01
"Max alpha" 1.00
"Light level (0-100) for min" 1
"Light level (0-100) for max" 10
}
+ObjProp 330 "LBAlpha"
{
"Active" true
"Min alpha" 0.01
"Max alpha" 1.00
"Light level (0-100) for min" 1
"Light level (0-100) for max" 100
}
+ObjProp 335 "LBAlpha"
{
"Active" true
"Min alpha" 0.01
"Max alpha" 1.00
"Light level (0-100) for min" 1
"Light level (0-100) for max" 100
}
+ObjProp 328 "SelfLit"
{
"" 9
}
+ObjProp 328 "SelfLitRad"
{
"" 11
}
metal dawn on 15/6/2018 at 10:01
Excellent. I really appreciate you going to all that trouble. I'll give it a go on my next playthrough.
YcatX on 1/11/2018 at 15:24
Damn. I am going to have to read this thread. My phone is too small.
Unkillable Cat on 2/11/2018 at 20:30
So, uhh... either I'm doing something wrong here, or something's not working with Unna's dml fixes.
Just to make sure I'm doing this right:
1 - Copy text from quote field into a text file and save it.
2 - Rename text file so that its filename matches that as given in the quote field, ensuring there's a '.dml' extension at the end.
3 - Do this so that first file is 'bantar.gam.dml' and the second file is 'miss28.gam.dml'.
4 - Copy the .dml files into the root directory of the FM, so that they sit next to their parent files (in this case 'bantar.gam' and 'miss28.gam' are joined by 'bantar.gam.dml' and 'miss28.gam.dml').
After doing this, I load up Ruins of Originia, skip to Ashes to Ashes and make my way down to the bottom of the crater.
With both dml files enabled I can see the Shadowbeasts clearly at the bottom of the crater, even from high up above (they look like regular Treebeasts with black smoke coming from them).
With the bantar dml file renamed to have an .xxx extension (effectively disabling it) I reloaded the mission and the Shadowbeasts became their invisible selves again.
Restoring the bantar dml file, but disabling the miss28 dml file instead turned the Shadowbeasts into regular Treebeasts again, but not other changes were visible.
Also, throwing the Gem of Orlof near them didn't change anything about their appearance, regardless of which dml files were enabled/disabled.
Everything points to the bantar dml file not doing its job properly.
Any ideas?
Unna Oertdottir on 2/11/2018 at 20:50
The 2nd is
miss28.mis.dml
YcatX on 2/11/2018 at 20:57
I was afraid that changes to dark engine, would likely break my missions. The engine was so limited when I made them, I had to use several blue rooms and immortal invisible rats that operated buttons. Thinner was going to be next to impossible to implement because there was little support of campaign variables at the time. Part of me believes, that I really screwed up making it so insanely difficult and long.
