Modding, developping and all

Elvithra · Post by **Elvithra** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 2:47 pm

First, hello to all, it's my first post here

2nd, I AM angry

I'm one fan of DL since version 1.3~1.4 and now C1.5.

Awsome game, really, BUT, HELL, it could have been even so much better

Who do we need to blame for that ?
Only the economic system which makes developers in such a hurry ?
YOU MUST KEEP ON DEVELOPPING IT (I know I'm few years late..)

Looking a little deeper at it with granny viewer, I was becoming sader and sader viewing
all the awsome stuff originaly intended (even beyond what we could legitimately
guess: Vartugg's enhancements, The Watcher capabilities,..., only to say that ones...)

By the way, I was a Wizardry player and I think I can say that all who played these games could more and more
sense with the latest versions of DL, its REAL potential (and I clearly support D.W.BRADLEY for, I guess,
he's not the one to blame here, except maybe for being too generous and having too much ambition to please
all the gamers..."keep your creativity and wishes up and thanks for all"!)

So PLEASE, DO something for all the fans (and YES, there are fans, don't simply listen, even for the future,
to "1day-players" negative feedback..)

Of course a patch would have been the less (omg I can't believe I'm talking about a patch),
there are so much little things that could still be "easily" fixed, if the idea of a major fix is forever burried.
Make at least a modding-tool available so that "hard-fans" can try somethings...

It's really sad to see that game will die like that, I just can not understand.

Any answer, official or not, is greatly welcome.

p-s:I know I'm really really late on this one and that it may not be the good place to talk about that, but there
are not much places where I could have said it. thanks

War-Wiz · Post by **War-Wiz** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 4:26 pm

Hi and welcome to the forum

First off, let me say I feel your pain. I would have liked to see Dungeon Lords continued development take place too.

The original developers, Huristic Park, seems to have ceased to exist

I don't know if they were bought out by someone else or just went bankrupt.

Dreamcatcher has become part of JoWood, an Austrian company and they are looking at maybe developing a console version of Dungeon Lords at some point later on or so I've read.

I've heard rumours about a Dungeon Lords II coming out next year but I haven't seen anything official on it yet. Maybe someone else has more info, I'd appreciate hearing anything new myself.

All this means there will be little or no support for this game that I can see in the forseeable future so don't get your hopes up.

As far as what Vartuug can do and doesn't, remember that the characters and NPC's are 3D models added into the game. They come with moves and gestures that the developers might not use. For example: Did you know that your player character can sit down? The developers didn't need that feature in the game but your character, just a generic 3D model, has that ability. That 3D model might be used in other games and those features could be utilized.

[ATTACH]3755.vB[/ATTACH]

I fooled around in the model file to achieve that pose, the same file you use when you check out the granny viewer.

Remember, don't forget to save a backup copy of the whole model file first if you mess with it. Otherwise you'll have to reinstall.....a needless pain

Da Wiz :mischief:

Elvithra · Post by **Elvithra** » Thu Jul 05, 2007 3:08 am

Hey War-Wiz, thanks for your reply

Indeed, seeing all that Vartugg gestures made my blood boiled, imagining tons of
different scenarios.
Well, I guess all that is now nothing more than a sweet dream and it's very sad.
Btw nice one with Staroxia, I didn't notice this one

Please all, post your finding on how to edit DL:
like adding natural caves with bosses in and treasures, making new quests or maybe add/edit items and so much things that could have been implemented

Well thanks anyway War-WIz
bye

War-Wiz · Post by **War-Wiz** » Thu Jul 05, 2007 7:56 am

Hi Elvithra

The only things I've played around with are the skins in the texture file and swapping in the model file. I wouldn't have a clue about adding a scenario, new buildings or quests. However I did notice that there were untextured buildings in the model file including a different tower for Emmindor

When some games are published they will offer SDK's or scenario development kits to licensed developers to come up with new maps, buildings etc. Some other games they allow ordinary gamers like us to come up with new stuff but as far as I know nothing like that was ever released for Dungeon Lords. I think there was talk of an SDK but I'm not certain. And even if someone out there was savvy enough to do it without an SDK, they might actually be infringing on the copyright if they offered there game mods to the public.

There are some people here that know much more about this modding stuff than me and I hope they post to clear up any misconsceptions I may have

because I don't want to mislead you into thinking I'm some sort of gaming guru or anything :laugh:

Da Wiz :mischief:

Elvithra · Post by **Elvithra** » Thu Jul 05, 2007 10:02 am

There are also a bunch of files for an "advanced-technological" race
(still reminds me of Wizardry

and still sad to see inachivied ideas...)

These are "test....gr2" files and others

one proof

http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/5626/pistolgh0.jpg

of course it's still acting like the weapon you replaced

Well all that gone with the wind ...

kathycf · Post by **kathycf** » Thu Jul 05, 2007 4:20 pm

Unlike other games such as Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights and Morrowind, Dungeon Lords has never released modding tools, nor do they support modding....which is a huge shame because modders could have tapped the unrealized potential of this game.

Without modding tools, it would take advanced game programming skills to make the game recognize new file names and content. I have very limited experience with 3D modeling (tinkering around with Blender and gmax) but I lack the skills to implement anything I might be able to do in this game. And of course, War Wiz makes a good point that doing so without permission (which the release of toolkits implies) would be copyright infringement.

I have been doing a lot of modding for Dungeon Siege 1 even though it is an old game because it is extremely mod friendly. Too bad more game companies don't support modded content. Hello, Dreamcatcher! I wish you guys were listening!!