XWAUP: 1999 vs 2020

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XWAUP: 1999 vs 2020

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DTM
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Post by DTM » Thu Mar 19, 2020 7:35 pm

It is not easy to realize how much XWA has changed over the years. This comparative video can give us a precise idea of all the improvements. Some of the things you see are an anticipation of what will be available in a very short time. Good vision!

https://youtu.be/9BBFVMD-PrU

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JeremyaFr
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Post by JeremyaFr » Thu Mar 19, 2020 7:55 pm

Great

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Rookie_One1
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Post by Rookie_One1 » Thu Mar 19, 2020 8:19 pm

nice!
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DarHan
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Post by DarHan » Thu Mar 19, 2020 8:27 pm

Whoa whoa whoa, that ISD model! :shock:
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blue_max
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Post by blue_max » Thu Mar 19, 2020 11:32 pm

Yup, lots of eye candy in that video (and few more that are coming soon!) Great job everyone, and thanks for making/sharing this video, DTM!

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keiranhalcyon7
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Post by keiranhalcyon7 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 7:42 am

Nice.

You didn't call out the active cockpit, though. Unless I missed it?

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DTM
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Post by DTM » Fri Mar 20, 2020 10:51 am

The gameplay was recorded playing with TrackIR. The active cockpit function was temporary deactivated because there was no need to use it.

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Post by Charger116 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 11:04 am

How amazing does that look :shock:

The engine glare, new hyperspace etc... are these included with the pack or not yet released? I installed DSUCP and don't seem to have them. Anywhere I can download separately?

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Vince T
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Post by Vince T » Fri Mar 20, 2020 11:21 am

Those were released after the last packs, the download links for each is in their respective Forum thread.
New Shader Model
High Res Hyperspace

@blue_max: For ease of use, could you create a central topic in the Editing forum with Download Links to your various mods? I can sticky it then.
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Forceflow
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Post by Forceflow » Fri Mar 20, 2020 12:45 pm

DTM wrote:
Thu Mar 19, 2020 7:35 pm
It is not easy to realize how much XWA has changed over the years. This comparative video can give us a precise idea of all the improvements. Some of the things you see are an anticipation of what will be available in a very short time. Good vision!

https://youtu.be/9BBFVMD-PrU
Took the liberty to embed the video in the screenshots page, hope that's okay with you :)
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DTM
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Post by DTM » Fri Mar 20, 2020 1:11 pm

Took the liberty to embed the video in the screenshots page, hope that's okay with you
Sure! That's ok!

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Post by Charger116 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:01 pm

General_Trageton wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 11:21 am
Those were released after the last packs, the download links for each is in their respective Forum thread.
New Shader Model
High Res Hyperspace

@blue_max: For ease of use, could you create a central topic in the Editing forum with Download Links to your various mods? I can sticky it then.
Thanks for linking. They look brilliant.

A quick question about this though as I don't have VR (simply wanted the new look and effects). Some of the display info (laser charge on the Y-Wing, targeting computer on the X-Wing) are not in view in the neutral camera position. Is there anything I can do to have everything visible? Not the biggest issue but thought it was worth asking.

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Post by blue_max » Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:06 pm

Charger116 wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:01 pm
A quick question about this though as I don't have VR (simply wanted the new look and effects). Some of the display info (laser charge on the Y-Wing, targeting computer on the X-Wing) are not in view in the neutral camera position. Is there anything I can do to have everything visible? Not the biggest issue but thought it was worth asking.
Open dynamic_cockpit.cfg and set "dynamic_cockpit_enabled = 0", that's the easiest way to get all the displays back on all the crafts.

@GT: Thanks! Yeah, I can create a new topic with just download links. Any suggestions for the topic name?

@keiranhalcyon7: I'm going to publish a basic version of AC in the next release as there are enough AC-enabled cockpits now and it looks like all the buttons work.

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Vince T
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Post by Vince T » Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:14 pm

Maybe something like "XWA Graphics & Shader updates" ?
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Post by Charger116 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:32 pm

blue_max wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:06 pm
Open dynamic_cockpit.cfg and set "dynamic_cockpit_enabled = 0", that's the easiest way to get all the displays back on all the crafts.
Thanks for the quick response. Ideally I would like to keep the dynamic cockpit active, just have everything visible without the need to look down. Anything you could suggest for that?

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Post by blue_max » Fri Mar 20, 2020 9:59 pm

Charger116 wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:32 pm
Ideally I would like to keep the dynamic cockpit active, just have everything visible without the need to look down.
You can have both the DC active and the HUD display; but you need to do this on a per-ship basis. You need to go to the "DynamicCockpit" folder in your XWA install dir and search all the *.dc files in there. For each one, you will see lines that begin like this:

"erase_region = XXX"

Just comment these lines out by prepending a semi-colon, like this:

"; erase_region = XXX"

Or you can erase these lines. Save the *.dc files and restart XWA.

Now that I think about it, I should probably add a global option to toggle all the HUDs without having to do this for every ship...

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keiranhalcyon7
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Post by keiranhalcyon7 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 10:42 pm

@blue_max, apologies if I've asked this before, but would it be possible to intercept the insert/home/page up/delete/end/page down keys and have them toggle the erase regions instead of toggling the native HUD display settings?

@Charger116, you can try increasing your FOV until all the instruments are visible. It may still turn out to be unusable, though, due to distortion and inverse telescoping.

Again, I must protest that making VR/TrackIR a de facto prerequisite for AC/DC is a terrible decision on the part of the XWAUP modeling community; cockpit instrument layouts should be designed to be usable without niche hardware, giving an experience similar to the games before XWA. (XWVM understands this.)
Last edited by keiranhalcyon7 on Sat Mar 21, 2020 2:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

Charger116
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Post by Charger116 » Fri Mar 20, 2020 11:55 pm

keiranhalcyon7 wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 10:42 pm
@Charger116, you can try increasing your FOV until all the instruments are visible. It may still turn out to be unusable, though, due to distortion and inverse telescoping.

Again, I must protest that making VR/TrackIR a de factor prerequisite for AC/DC is a terrible decision on the part of the XWAUP modeling community; cockpit instrument layouts should be designed to be usable without niche hardware, giving an experience similar to the games before XWA. (XWVM understands this.)
I can just about make the instruments as it is, so I don't think it's worthwhile increasing the FOV.

And I do agree, it's a shame. I imagine with VR this would be excellent. I don't know if there's an actual limitation that forced this decision.

Thank you for your response though @blue_max. The alterations at least give me full visibility of what I need.

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DTM
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Post by DTM » Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:14 am

I had already anticipated this request. The installer of the crafts will have two options:

- "I use TrackIR or VR: I don't need the HUD anymore" (The HUD is replaced by the Active Cockpit functions)
OR
- "I prefer to keep the good old HUD" (The Active Cockpit is active, but the traditional HUD is maintained)

I've already created the first installer with these options. The user will only have to choose one of these two options, and the installer will do everything automatically. It will also be possible to change your mind by running the installer again.

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Post by Charger116 » Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:34 am

Apologies for my probable ignorance here, but if you were to keep the traditional HUD... it wouldn't be an active cockpit?

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Post by Driftwood » Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:40 am

Charger116 wrote:
Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:34 am
Apologies for my probable ignorance here, but if you were to keep the traditional HUD... it wouldn't be an active cockpit?
Active cockpit is being able to push buttons in the visible model that correlate to a keybind on your stick/keyboard. Really to use this effectively you need to have a head tracking software/hardware implemented. If you disabled or did not install this option, this functionality just wouldn't work but you'd have the dynamic cockpit elements still.

Dynamic cockpit is just the integration of the HUD elements into the model/textures, you can overlay the hud or disable it per preference, or as I understand disable it entirely and keep with the standard HUD, though I don't know why you would at this point given how much of an improvement it is visibly. Obviously disabling it entirely or overlaying the HUD elements over this feature it would be less immersive, but you don't lose any functionality either way.

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Post by Charger116 » Sat Mar 21, 2020 1:00 am

Driftwood wrote:
Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:40 am
Charger116 wrote:
Sat Mar 21, 2020 12:34 am
Apologies for my probable ignorance here, but if you were to keep the traditional HUD... it wouldn't be an active cockpit?
Active cockpit is being able to push buttons in the visible model that correlate to a keybind on your stick/keyboard. Really to use this effectively you need to have a head tracking software/hardware implemented. If you disabled or did not install this option, this functionality just wouldn't work but you'd have the dynamic cockpit elements still.

Dynamic cockpit is just the integration of the HUD elements into the model/textures, you can overlay the hud or disable it per preference, or as I understand disable it entirely and keep with the standard HUD, though I don't know why you would at this point given how much of an improvement it is visibly. Obviously disabling it entirely or overlaying the HUD elements over this feature it would be less immersive, but you don't lose any functionality either way.
Ahh that makes total sense. Thanks for clearing that up!

The dynamic cockpit is totally worth it despite maybe 1 instrument being out of the default view :)

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Post by Blazingfirestorm » Sat Mar 21, 2020 11:53 pm

hi is this going to be a part of 1.7?

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blue_max
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Post by blue_max » Sun Mar 22, 2020 1:19 am

keiranhalcyon7 wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 10:42 pm
Again, I must protest that making VR/TrackIR a de facto prerequisite for AC/DC is a terrible decision on the part of the XWAUP modeling community; cockpit instrument layouts should be designed to be usable without niche hardware, giving an experience similar to the games before XWA. (XWVM understands this.)
It's not a de facto prerequisite at all, and I don't think anyone from XWAUP has ever stated that. I think XWAUP also understands that VR/TrackIR users are a minority. I accept that my earlier mod to the X-Wing cockpit kind of sucked because the elements were too small; but that was just an unofficial proof-of-concept. I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong impression that it was XWAUP-official when it wasn't. If you need to blame someone, then blame me, not the XWAUP team. On the other hand, DTM has done a great job with the new cockpit: things are quite readable even without VR/TrackIR.

Also, I'm going to add a hotkey to toggle the HUD so that people won't have to go and edit the individual .dc files. Again, that's all my fault; don't blame the team.

I still have no clue how to intercept the keys that XWA uses to toggle the visibility of the individual HUD elements. I can see the state of the keys; but I can't intercept them :?

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Post by blue_max » Sun Mar 22, 2020 2:05 am

Charger116 wrote:
Fri Mar 20, 2020 6:32 pm
Ideally I would like to keep the dynamic cockpit active, just have everything visible without the need to look down. Anything you could suggest for that?
Sorry, I missed this. Currently, I think the only cockpits with official DC support are the A-Wing, the RZ-2 and the Y-Wing. If I remember correctly, some of the installers for these crafts come with .SHIP files that configure the POV so that most of the DC elements are visible. To apply the POV from the .SHIP files you'd need to download MXvTED from here:

https://darksaber.xwaupgrade.com/tutmxvted.html

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