Many apologies if there's already a thread about this somewhere, but a search of the board yielded so many largely unhelpful threads that I figured it'd be best to post a new thread.

First- Windows-version Stuffit is a nice program in that it actually starts up, but when it gets to the nitty-gritty of actually opening files it doesn't perform so well on my machine. Matter of fact, it doesn't perform at all. Hence, I can't get at lots of useful things, primarily the AddShips tutorial. Having access to a tutorial would probably save everybody a lot of idiotic question threads by me. Is there a ZIP version of this somewhere?

Second- RLED files (and, to a lesser extent, RLE8). I assume these are some kind of funky proprietary RLE that requires a converter, like the PICT files, but I don't see one in the downloads section. So, uh, yeah- how d'ya convert 'em?

And finally, if anybody knows what the standard camera angle EV ships are rendered at is that'd be nice. I'm not exactly going to set out to replace everything , at least not yet (hey, a game that doesn't require C coding to mod is a vast enhancement over most I know...), so ideally I'd like my stuff to not look horribly out-of-place with the existing vessels. It looks 45*-ish, but I long ago learned to stop trying to eyeball these things. I can approximate the lighting, but in a two-dimensional game rotations out of the standard plane look damn strange...

(This message has been edited by Coyote (edited 03-18-2004).)

Quote

Originally posted by Coyote:
**Many apologies if there's already a thread about this somewhere, but a search of the board yielded so many largely unhelpful threads that I figured it'd be best to post a new thread.

First- Windows-version Stuffit is a nice program in that it actually starts up, but when it gets to the nitty-gritty of actually opening files it doesn't perform so well on my machine. Matter of fact, it doesn't perform at all. Hence, I can't get at lots of useful things, primarily the AddShips tutorial. Having access to a tutorial would probably save everybody a lot of idiotic question threads by me. Is there a ZIP version of this somewhere?

Second- RLED files (and, to a lesser extent, RLE8). I assume these are some kind of funky proprietary RLE that requires a converter, like the PICT files, but I don't see one in the downloads section. So, uh, yeah- how d'ya convert 'em?

And finally, if anybody knows what the standard camera angle EV ships are rendered at is that'd be nice. I'm not exactly going to set out to replace everything , at least not yet (hey, a game that doesn't require C coding to mod is a vast enhancement over most I know...), so ideally I'd like my stuff to not look horribly out-of-place with the existing vessels. It looks 45*-ish, but I long ago learned to stop trying to eyeball these things. I can approximate the lighting, but in a two-dimensional game rotations out of the standard plane look damn strange...

(This message has been edited by Coyote (edited 03-18-2004).)**

I don't know anything about your first question, but the EnRle DeRle programs are availible at the wOOtWare nova tools site.

If you are talking about nova in your third question, 45* is correct.

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Cmon people, the (url="http://"http://www.AmbrosiaSW.com/cgi-bin/ubb/forumdisplay.cgi?action=topics&number;=20&SUBMIT;=Go")Chronicles(/url) are worth looking at.

All right, thanks. I can sort out most of the rest on my own, I think, so the tut's not really necessary, it'll just be messy.

It occurred to me also that I should doublecheck on the lighting, if anybody knows any specifics on that. Thanks again!

EDIT: Aiee! The SIT format strikes again! Anybody wanna be really, really nice and extract those for me, and then I'll put more Windows-friendly versions up on a server for the next person who has this problem?

(This message has been edited by Coyote (edited 03-18-2004).)

En/DeRLE are Macintosh applications. As far as I've heard, EVNEW has a built-in RLE converter.

~SpacePirate

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Fear the SpacePirate,
He made a (url="http://"http://www.evula.org/infernostudios/search.html")plug-in search page(/url)...
And he'll board your ship! -mrxak

Quote

Originally posted by SpacePirate:
**En/DeRLE are Macintosh applications. As far as I've heard, EVNEW has a built-in RLE converter.

~SpacePirate

**

oops, I forgot about that.

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Cmon people, the (url="http://"http://www.AmbrosiaSW.com/cgi-bin/ubb/forumdisplay.cgi?action=topics&number;=20&SUBMIT;=Go")Chronicles(/url) are worth looking at.

It does?

Oh! It does! Wow, I'm stupid. Thanks...

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Pay attention to the fact that windows stuffit will probably uncompress a macintosh-compressed file, but it may be possible the uncompressed file is completely useless, or has no extension. If it's a text, try opening it with word, it will probably work. But anything else has a very high probability of not working, and if it's a program (or something that is technically a program, like a docmaker file), do not even think about it. Therefore, a .zip version would not change much, it's the base file the PC doesn't understand.

Both fortunately (for you) and unfortunately (for me), I'm on a PC right now, let me look at this addships tutorial...
Unfortunately, even before considering downloading, the description tells "It includes several new steps and pictures and examples of each step", pictures probably included in the document, meaning it is some special format. Therefore it is almost sure it won't work on a PC.

Remember most of the plug-maker help files here have been made when Nova was Mac-only, and even after the release of PC Nova, plug designing was thought to be done only on Macs. It's only very recently aprosenf (may he be thanked for eternity for allowing the PC folks to make plugs, even if I only have Macs it will allow much people to do them) made a PC plug maker, EVNEW, and most of the documentation/help to plug designers isn't PC friendly (with the overwhelming exception of the Bible, fortunately, and these boards).

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The (url="http://"https://secure.ambrosiasw.com/cgi-bin/store/hazel.cgi?action=serve&item;=breakdown.html&BREAKDOWN;_SKUID=1480")Ambrosia Mac CD(/url) with other registrations - 5$. Paying for (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/evn/")EV Nova(/url) as it's such a great game - 30$.
The (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/evn/tshirts.html")1337 EV Nova T-shirt(/url) - 22$. The (url="http://"http://w00tware.ev-nova.net/")NovaTools(/url) by wOOtWare to tinker with your Nova - FREE!
The feeling you're a Nova geek - priceless.
There are things you can't buy or that are free, for everything else, there's indeed Eurocard Mastercard.

Stuffit doesn't work on my computer in that it freezes as soon as I tell it to open a file. I think that's pretty unequivocal.

I was assuming the tut would be HTML, as anything else would be unnecessarily complex to make for the function it'd serve.

And yeah, I've noticed that the majority of the Nova community is Mac-based already. Kinda assumed it would be from the start. But the PC editors seem to be very well-made and I have enough equipment to make modding the game quite a simple task so I couldn't very well pass it up, now could I?

Thanks for any help you can provide. Hell, thanks if you end up having just the same luck I did, was worth a shot. I think I've basically got it down anyways, working on adding running lights to a tester now, I'll upload it for anybody who's interested or wants to beta test in a few hours...

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Quote

Originally posted by Coyote:
Stuffit doesn't work on my computer in that it freezes as soon as I tell it to open a file. I think that's pretty unequivocal.

I'm sorry, you have to have a working version of Stuffit to appear as being serious in plug designing, even if just to download and use plugs. However, the one that is to be used is the 7.5, available (url="http://"ftp://ftp.aladdinsys.com/pub/_old/pc/StuffIt/stuff75l.exe")here(/url) (upon clicking download will start).

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The (url="http://"https://secure.ambrosiasw.com/cgi-bin/store/hazel.cgi?action=serve&item;=breakdown.html&BREAKDOWN;_SKUID=1480")Ambrosia Mac CD(/url) with other registrations - 5$. Paying for (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/evn/")EV Nova(/url) as it's such a great game - 30$.
The (url="http://"http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/evn/tshirts.html")1337 EV Nova T-shirt(/url) - 22$. The (url="http://"http://w00tware.ev-nova.net/")NovaTools(/url) by wOOtWare to tinker with your Nova - FREE!
The feeling you're a Nova geek - priceless.
There are things you can't buy or that are free, for everything else, there's indeed Eurocard Mastercard.

That's fine. I don't particularly care about appearing anything. Either the plug I make will work, and I might make more and bigger ones, or it won't.

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You really should try to get stuffit to work, sothat you can see the work that other's have done on EVN plugins soas to improve your own plugin work. Seeing other's plugs is really helpful.

On your comment on wellmade PC editor, I agree entirely. Aprosenf did an excellent job on EVNEW. Reliable, consitant, editors, tooltips with relevent passages from the Bible, easy conversion between text and .rez, fast, and most of all, STABLE (something none of the mac editors are!). Due to the way that EVNEW converts text to .rez, It is possible to use Excell to set up the numeric data for sprites (with references to the sprite graphics files) and in one shot RLE as many sprites as one wants.
-Az

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It is here. EVNEW Public Beta (url="http://"http://www.aznt.com/EVN/EVNEW")www.aznt.com/EVN/EVNEW(/url)
Stuffit is a piece of .sit.

Eh, the sprites aren't an issue anymore. Now I'm just wrestling with the standard addon bloat- figured while I was testing out ship additions I might as well take a shot at all the other data formats, and then that lead to doing two ship addons to make the missions I made interesting, and... well, you can see where this is going. I capped it at pretty much what I've got now, though, so I'll upload soon as I finish bugfixing.

And yeah, I'd like to get Stuffit working, some of the TCs look like good ol' Override-style fun, but unless Zacha's version suddenly starts working there really isn't much I can do about it.

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