[WIP] Zeus: Pre-alpha 1 release

[343thesentient]

Halo 2 Main menu? I like, ahead of the curve there Sparky

Since this finally allows cross-platform conversion between trial/demo, im assuming there is a way to use it on Windows computers? Or do windows users have to resort to VMWare OS emulator and such

[Sparky]

Firstly, please tell me your suggestions that you mentioned previously when you told me to get on iChat, Samuco.

Secondly, I'd rather make a Universal Binary or two different applications than make it for 10.4+: one for 10.6+ Intel and one for 10.4 PPC.

Thirdly, I'm setting Garbage Collection to "supported" so that I can manually use retain and release and also use the autorelease Garbage Collection pool. According to what I've read in the XCode documentation and in the Objective-C book I'm using, it is einfach.

Fourthly, I'm not including a license, since it's officially the property of the MacGamingMods and HaloDemoMods communities. A trail of "who did what" to the program is all that is needed, and would be placed in the "About" .rtf file that displays in the "About" menu item.

Fifthly, I'm considering making the official name of the application something besides Zeus, and making Zeus it's codename, so to speak. Just for fun, although mildly pointless.

Sixthly, I don't know what you mean about Halo 2 Main Menu. EDIT: Oh, you mean the map file used by Halo 2 for the main menu! Right, like the ui.map for Halo 1.

Seventhly, do you know the difference between trial and demo map files? Eschaton doesn't specify. Support will first be for Halo Demo and Full (Mac) map files. Then I'll tackle discrepancies with Halo Trial and Halo PC. Then Halo 2, etc.

[Modzy]

Seventhly, do you know the difference between trial and demo map files? Eschaton doesn't specify.

They are exactly the same. Down to the last bit.

[Sven]

NO NO NO NO NO.

10.5+

[Sparky]

Seventhly, do you know the difference between trial and demo map files? Eschaton doesn't specify.

They are exactly the same. Down to the last bit.

Then why are some maps only playable in Halo Trial? For example, AID has made some maps that he tested in Halo Trial, but Halo Demo crashes when trying to load them.

[Mgalekgolo]

Seventhly, do you know the difference between trial and demo map files? Eschaton doesn't specify.

They are exactly the same. Down to the last bit.

Then why are some maps only playable in Halo Trial? For example, AID has made some maps that he tested in Halo Trial, but Halo Demo crashes when trying to load them.

I believe Trial Allows for a larger map size before exceptioning, which makes the most sense.

[Modzy]

Then why are some maps only playable in Halo Trial? For example, AID has made some maps that he tested in Halo Trial, but Halo Demo crashes when trying to load them.

They're two different versions of the engine, they parse maps differently. The demo version tends to be very strict with parsing and will crash if the map structure is not followed nearly 100%. A good example of this is changing the scnr tag class. Every map should ALWAYS have the scnr as the first tag class, this is a *given*. So, by renaming the class to something like "zteam," will crash Halo Demo, because it is only programmed to handle parsing the scnr first so as to avoid malformed structures. However, in the trial version, it uses the first tag and parses it as the scnr regardless of it's class, it also ignores most tag classes in the index and bases its parsing on the classes displayed in the meta data instead. These differences between strict and non-strict parsing are almost always the cause of a map crashing in one version, and playing in another.

[Sparky]

Don't forget Lion ^^

Yep, it seems like this application was meant for Lion's fullscreen functionality.

Also, I find myself doing more studying, this time about Grand Central Dispatch

[Dead Site]

Fullscreen?

“NO WAI!”

[Mgalekgolo]

Looks Like it will lag up the system and make ease of use that much more shittier.

[Samuco_]

*sigh* it's not like that...
Everything is normal except most things have a full screen button. Spaces is gone. You use the spaces shortcuts to switch between fullscreen apps or "desktops"
It's actually quite good.

Sparky:
The idea was to have an object library similar to X-Code. You could import objects into it from different maps, then simply drag-drop them into new maps.

[Sparky]

*sigh* it's not like that...
Everything is normal except most things have a full screen button. Spaces is gone. You use the spaces shortcuts to switch between fullscreen apps or "desktops"
It's actually quite good.

Sparky:
The idea was to have an object library similar to X-Code. You could import objects into it from different maps, then simply drag-drop them into new maps.

I'm going to download and try Lion.
Object library? Similar to XCode? Drag-Drop? Those were ideas already planned for Zeus. However, your written description assisted my imagination quite well and my conception of it has improved, thank you. Basically, thanks for the idea, it'll happen similarly.

EDIT: NOOOOOO it costs money I thought it was free NOOOOOOOO.

[Mgalekgolo]

*sigh* it's not like that...
Everything is normal except most things have a full screen button. Spaces is gone. You use the spaces shortcuts to switch between fullscreen apps or "desktops"
It's actually quite good.

Sparky:
The idea was to have an object library similar to X-Code. You could import objects into it from different maps, then simply drag-drop them into new maps.

I'm going to download and try Lion.
Object library? Similar to XCode? Drag-Drop? Those were ideas already planned for Zeus. However, your written description assisted my imagination quite well and my conception of it has improved, thank you. Basically, thanks for the idea, it'll happen similarly.

EDIT: NOOOOOO it costs money I thought it was free NOOOOOOOO.

YESSSSSSS PIRATE YESSSS

[Sparky]

Nope, No pirating.

Bought XCode 4 through the AppStore. Downloads in only an hour with my 1337 connection. Lion not necessary. I should be fine with my fragmented sentences and improper grammatical structures. XCode 4 is what I've always wanted Apple to make XCode into.

[343thesentient]

Then why are some maps only playable in Halo Trial? For example, AID has made some maps that he tested in Halo Trial, but Halo Demo crashes when trying to load them.

They're two different versions of the engine, they parse maps differently. The demo version tends to be very strict with parsing and will crash if the map structure is not followed nearly 100%. A good example of this is changing the scnr tag class. Every map should ALWAYS have the scnr as the first tag class, this is a *given*. So, by renaming the class to something like "zteam," will crash Halo Demo, because it is only programmed to handle parsing the scnr first so as to avoid malformed structures. However, in the trial version, it uses the first tag and parses it as the scnr regardless of it's class, it also ignores most tag classes in the index and bases its parsing on the classes displayed in the meta data instead. These differences between strict and non-strict parsing are almost always the cause of a map crashing in one version, and playing in another.

So that explains it I'll get working on fixing all those maps

Also Modzy, is there a possible discrepency between trial and demo that would screw up spawn points? Because on the Databank Facility mod and a few of my others, players sometimes spawn once and then another spawn point can't be located, while when playing on pc spawning works fine.

Also, lets say i renamed levels/test/bloodgulch to levels/test/tier0. Would renaming it back to levels/test/bloodgulch fix this, or the header/tag data perm damaged?