PC World Komputer 1998 July & August

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ PC World Komputer 1998 July & August / Pcwk78b98.iso / Bcadds / BC3KUKD7.ZIP / BC3KBUGS.TXT next >

Wrap

Text File | 1997-11-03 | 52KB | 1,239 lines

BATTLECRUISER:3000AD LIST OF BUGS & FIXES ========================================= Last Updated : 11-03-97 Author : Derek Smart, Ph.D [Project Manager/Lead Developer/Designer] GA Version : v1.01 D7B - 11-03-97 Test Version : v1.01 D7B - 11-03-97 Modules: Artificial Intelligence & Logistics, AILOG Dynamic Motion System, DMS includes: tacOPS computer Flight model and general ai/dynamics Cockpits and HUD symbology Visual Reality Engine, VRengine includes: Space Traversal Engine, STE Planetary Traversal Engine, PTE FrontEnd module includes: Main Menu, Roster, Miscon, Config, Docking/Launch Bays Tactical computer, Navitron computer, Logistic Computer Tradecom computer Legends: * fixed @ Fixed in 3000AD version not out to testers yet # needs further verification. Works as far as I can see ? needs further verification. Could not reproduce $ No bug, works as designed ! Reopened report % New suggestion added to wish list CONTENTS SECTION 1 - AILOG & AI RELATED SECTION 2 - DYNAMIC MOTION SYSTEM SECTION 3 - VISUAL REALITY ENGINE SECTION 4 - FRONTEND SECTION 5 - MISC. BUGS SECTION 6 - SCRIPTING SYSTEM (FF/ACM/XC) SECTION 7 - V1.1 TASK LIST ============================================================================== SEC-1 : AILOG & AI RELATED ============================================================================== 001 Surface dynamic entities (i.e with ai) flying due to ai parameters being misinterpreted. SAMs, SALs etc which are 'dynamic' entities because they have intelligence, are flying because they share the same/similar ai as objects that _do_ fly, ie spacecraft. Requires are separate parameter in their ai flag which anchors them to the surface and prevents them from taking off. 002* A flaw in the alliance system is causing ships to not attack races they R4C are not hostile to. This usually causes scripted scenarios to fail or not operate as designed. This also enables the player to go around attacking and blowing up friendly/neutral targets without retaliation from the victims or GHQ. 003* Player able to dock at hostile starstations even as 'military' caste R5C 004* A destroyed drone is sometimes listed in the shuttle as active RD7B 005* Illegal items are not detected in the player's cargo hold when docking R5C at GALCOM controlled stations. Items should be confiscated, a violation logged, as well as loss of experience points. 006* Prisoners are ending up in medibay instead of detention hold R3C 007* Marines in 'searching mode' going off-station prematurely. Unless there R3C are escaped prisoners or intruders, marines will go off-duty if put on searching duty. 008* Unable to manually put people in the detention hold. R3C 009* Fatigue Factor of people in detention hold will no longer increase R3C Also, they will no longer leave the detention hold when tired or hungry. Food is supplied directly to the detention hold. 010* An IC will no longer launch if the pilots are not physically 'located' R3C IN the craft. The 'assignment' is NOT the same as the 'location'. 011* Speed with which personnel move about the ship has been increased. R3C 012* A shuttle now requires at least one person to be 'located' in it before R3C it can launch. If this person dies when the shuttle is in flight, the shuttle, like the IC pod, will auto-return to the BC using the a/p. If on the surface, it will drop to the ground. 013* Retrieving all interceptors via tacOPS causes a crash R4C 014* The Combat Kills attributes for pilots is now updated during combat R3C 015* Alliances are now saved with the save file and reset at beginning R3C 016* Weapon systems no longer disarmed during hyperjump, ie PTE remains active R3C 017* The alert condition now flashes red. If hostiles are in the region, the R3C alert condition is set to red and the klaxxon sounds 3 times. This check is performed every 2.4 secs for the region the battlecruiser is currently in. Note that internal ship conditions such as a radiation leak, badly damaged reactor core etc will also set off the red alert condition as will jumping into a region with *any* type of hostile target in space or on the planet. 018* It is no longer possible to tow targets in orbit. Those of you who have R3C been pilfering starstations had better find something else to steal. 019* Ships emitting an SOS signal will no longer be attacked by alien nations R3C who observe the rules of engagement. 020* Personnel messages are now integrated into ACM scripts. This is a first R3C pass test in order to see if the player can benefit from the added info that his crew has access to. However, the person must be on station. All messages are sent to the COMMLINK log. 021* During auto evacuation, if the alter-ego cannot make it to a shuttle, he R3C will die when the ship self-destructs and the game will end. 022* Dead or off-station officers will no longer send messages R3C 023* The Chief Engineer will now eject the reactor core during a severe breach R3C regardless of his ai level IF he's on-station. 024* Passive Target Acquisition, PTA system will now operate in DIRECT and AI R2C modes. It may take a while for PTA to fire since it has to build a target list. The turrets, controlled by the PTA will NOT fire unless the target is in range. 025* Docking events for ships is now accurately detected. This means that for R2C instance in ACM mission 1, when a diplomat ship docks, you will be advised. 026* It is no longer possible to assign more than 2 pilots to an IC R3C 027* Invalid personnel listed in TradeCOM when docked with shuttle at station R3C 028* Flaws in trading model. Affects inventory and inflation logic R5C 029 Ship radiation flag not being cleared if ship degaused at starstation 030* Transfering missiles from shuttle to BC results in invalid BC inventory R5C 031* Firing last missile resulting in empty missile pod and weapons bay R4C results in looped message from Mother and Tactical Officer. 032* Combat Pilots not moving to Medibay when extracted from escape pod R3C 033* People will no longer auto-leave a shuttle or ATV that is deployed R3C when they get tired or hungry. 033 Medics are refusing to auto-search/heal injured personnel on BC 034* Launching weapons results in negative number in cargo listing R4C 035* Weapons bay overflows to 65535 if full and a missile is removed R5C 036* IC weapons loadout changed if waypoint assignment in tacOPS is R4C changed though the ship is deployed and NOT on the BC. 037* Activating PTA causing missile type to change R4C 038* XC data files are no longer saved since scenario is not saved R4C 039* Delivery of tractored ship will now succeed at non-hostile stations R4C (previously only Terran stations). Will not ask player for delivery instructions if the delivery is invalid. 040* If the player opts not to deliver a tractored ship, the ship is not R4C released but remains tractored when the player leaves the station. 041* Tractored ships will now not vanish if they were fleeing and are released R4C in a region that is not the same as the prior flee region. In this case the tractored object attempts to flee using a new escape-item in the current region. 042* AI/TACTICAL is now disabled for an object that is being tractored. R4C Fixes problem where a disabled/tractored object "escapes" when the tractoring ship conveys it to the jump point it was trying to escape to. 043* Target TTD color is immediately restored if tractor link is lost R4C 044* Tractored ships have additional protection from being attacked by R4C hostiles, which will now break off if their target becomes tractored. If the attacker had STRIKE orders, orders revert to SAD. 045* Targets not attacking hostiles or retaliating against attacks from R4C neutral or friendly targets resulting in script 'holes' and various illegal attacks on non-hostile targets by trigger happy players. Requires an overhaul of race/caste alliance modelling. Also requires a friendly fire avoidance and target leading model. 046* Ship personnel messages in ACM pertaining to current scenario being played R4C even though player may very well have ignored the mission anyway! It gets better, some actions pertaining to the current mission, ie beaming people to the ship, still happen even though the player may not even be in the region. Requires a player-ship-detect-in-region type check for scripted messages, comms and actions. 047* Rebuild elapse time too short or instantaneous for some objects subject R4C to 'rebuild' ai such as Barin starstation. 048* Ships alert condition conflicting with internal condition. Requires two R4C separate alert conditions Combat Alert Status, CAS and Ship Alert Status, SAS which monitor different alert conditions. 049* Increased cpu usage as game universe evolves RD0 050* Image of external comms party not being displayed in NID or tacOPS R5C 051* Unable to dock at Sarien and Majoris starstations R4C 052* Starstation Adonis located in Capella instead of Pravis R4C 053* Strange anomalies with cargo pods dropped after targets destroyed RD7 054* Reports of FF and LF values exceeding 100 R4C 055* Player's support ships subject to script 'ignore' command causing R4C them to ignore hostiles which have this flag set, ie leader-one 056* Unable to dock at Parix station R4C 057* Invalid weapons in IC weapons bay when set to auto-arm R5C 058* Cargo Bay quantity overflow to 65535 when attempting to unload drones R5C into already full BC cargo bay. 059* Docked ships not switching ai state when launched. Maintain waypoint R5C state for some reason. 060* Auto-arm option using default weapons loadout instead of checking in R5C BC weapons bay. 061* PTA system running out of allocated target slots (8) thereby if other R5C types of targets are already accounted for, ie neutrals, friendlies etc, it will not have slots for hostiles. So it won't fire. This is being revised so that hostiles are given priority especially those which have targeted the BC. 062* Jump points to Frellis and Midae reversed R4C 063* Hazards (asteroids/meteoroids/comets) being seen as valid targets by R4C ai platforms. 064* AI dynamic autogeneration still occurs in regions the player has not R4C visited. 065* 'missile pods are empty' message repetition by Mother and TO when R5C missile stores are depleted. 066* Replacing a destroyed interceptor/shuttle results in a GPF R5C 067* Revised personnel FF/LF/AI model R5C 068* Prices of illegal items ridiculously high because the checks for illegal R5C items (which you get fined for) is not being made. 069* Violations awarded when illegal items are located in your cargo bay or R5C when you fail to complete a tow request transaction, are not being recorded in COMMLINK 070* Evacuated interceptors stuck in assignment and not sent to Medibay C5(2) 071* Shuttles reporting stores full when collecting cargo C5(2) 072 tacOPS probe information not being reset when a destroyed probe is replaced in TACTICAL. 073 If the BC life support systems are destroyed, personnel are moving to ships with functional ones, i.e, interceptors. 074* Ships under AI control are unable to make jumps. I suspect this is due to RD1 the new link control file which was created when I created the new MOON region in C5.0 075* Disabled ships will no longer be able to hyperjump RD1 076* Probes sometimes reporting laser shots and other irrelevant data feedback RD7 077* Personnel assigned to an ATV in TACTICAL are unable to 'locate' the craft RD7B 078* Reactor, shield fuel and nutripak levels being incorrectly reported as RD7B depleted. 079 Radiation Control Units not being removed from cargo when used. RCUs are disposable. 080* 'Shields down' message played when docking though shields not affected. RD7 081 Tractoring with the shields down is fine but if you jump into a new region and the CO raises shields due to hostile contact, the shields are raised but the tractor beam remains in tact. 082 Ships with waypoint orders in tacOPS are not using hyperjump to travel ============================================================================== SEC-2 : DYNAMIC MOTION SYSTEM ============================================================================== 001 Cross region problem which prevents player's ships in ai mode to use jump anomaly when moving from one region to the next. 002 Missiles not operating according to programmed specifications. 003* BC will now be destroyed if it's hull is fully breached. R3C 004* Ship moves backwards after jumping to a new region R3C 005* Ships can now fly to planetary waypoints set in tacOPS. Note: A last R3C minute bug was detected which caused the ship to drop to the surface under gravity and take damage based on altitude. Once this ship falls, it may not be able to leave the surface since it will not be able to achieve enough thrust to breach the planet's escape velocity. If this happens, you may have to manually fly the ship back to the battlecruiser. 006* Ships will no longer take damage when flying planetary waypoints since R3C waypoints are now pegged above the surface. 007* The engine sound will no longer 'pulse' during hyperjump transitions R3C 008* The ACM mission status can now be accessed via the bridge menu R3C 009* MTD bug which caused GPF crash in FATAL has been fixed R3C 010* The altitude lines in tacOPS are no longer displayed if TTDs are off R3C 011* The Orbit To Surface acquistion count-down time in tacOPS is now fixed. R3C Once the countdown expires, the weapon will lock. Once launched, switch to the bridge, select the missile in the TACSCAN computer, press F10 to switch to the external camera and follow the missile to the surface. If jammed or shot downit will not reach it's target. If the target acquisition reticle is too large, zoom the tacOPS view. 012* The battlecruiser 'destroyed' sequence will no longer loop R3C 013* Modified VTOL (still work in progress). Left/Right slips ship in that R2C direction. Pushing the stick forward/backward increases/decreases altitude. Later, the forward/backward motion will be modified so that they move the ship forward/backward whilst the ~ and tab keys modify the altitude. 014* Take2 Chase 'dogfighting' Engine 99% removed R2C 015* Fixed bug which prevented ships from launching missiles when they should R2C 016* Fixed bug manual ctrl+d ATV->shuttle docking R2C 017* Armor & shield upgrades/repairs now updated accurately. The value R2C displayed on the BC bridge is in armor units. The HUL value displayed is the current percentage of the max available protection. Protection max values are based on the currently installed armor or shield type. Note: when speaking of the armor and hull, they are one an the same since the hull has armor which only takes damage when the shield is breached. 018* Breaching an object's armor will now not necessarily destroy it R2C An AI object is destroyed if (a) its reactor reaches 0 integrity unless it doesn't have a reactor in which case (b) its engine reaches 0 integrity unless it doesn't have a reactor or engine in which case (c) its armor reaches 0 integrity. 019* ATVs & shuttles will no longer attempt to use HyperJump engines on a R2C planet. 020* Modified the maneuvering code so that ships can now accurately retrack R2C waypoints if they miss on the first pass. 021* The external F10 camera will now show the current object's target if any. R2C 022* Shuttles should should now be able to deploy/extract mining drones and R2C ATVs 023* TACOPS now follows the players ship if it switches to another region and R2C was previously in the currently observed region. This means that if you are in Earth region and viewing that in tacOPS and the ship switches to Mars as a result of flight, then tacOPS will automatically be updated. It will NOT however switch to a region that the ship is NOT in. So if you're in Earth and viewing Mars in tacOPS (using probe's SCI-LINK programming) and the BC switches regions, tacOPS will not be updated. 024* You can now select planet surface mode from tacOPS by simply clicking on R2C the planet or moon from within tacOPS. Select 'observe' and it will be loaded. Once this is active, to revert to space mode, bring up the tacOPS command palette by moving the mouse to the right side of the screen and clicking and clicking on the SPACE button. Once in space mode, the button will revert back to BRIDGE. Due to the night/day effect. IF it is night time on the planet, everything will be pitch dark. See #35 below. The old method still works though until this mode is finalized. 025* Mining drones and ATVs can no longer be deployed in space from tacOPS R2C 026* Navigation modified. In order for the ship to fly to a region R2C you no longer need to have the jump anomaly (jpoint, wormhole, fluxfield) targeted in the CVD. You should first select the target you wish to fly to in either the NID or TACSCAN, activate the Flight Path Designator, using shift+f and the ship will fly to the target. If it's a jump anomaly, it will do the jump, if not, it will stop short of the target. This method allows you to continue using other modes of the NID, TACSCAN and CVD computers without accidentally clearing the current jump target. The FPD target can be cancelled by either turning off the FPD with f or by clearing the target with x. You can now have the ship flying toward a target while doing other things such as acquiring new targets, firing at them etc. Once a nav target is set in Navitron, activating the FPD with f will cause the AutoNav system to jump to the region without relying on the current CVD target. THE AUTO-PILOT MUST BE TURNED ON FOR THIS TO WORK IN EITHER AI OR DIRECT MODES SINCE THIS ALLOWS THEM TO CALCULATE THE ROUTE. TURNING IT OFF WILL TEMPORARILY CANCEL THE AUTONAV TARGET. If the HUD is in TAC mode, ie weapons on, the FPD will _not_ appear though the route is being flown. Put the HUD in NAV mode by disabling weapon systems in order to see the FPD. The flight control is slightly offset to the left so that you can see the jump anomaly if it's obscured by the FPD 027* More modifications to VTOL. Move the stick left-right to slip in that R2C direction. Move the stick forward-backward to slip in that direction. To increase your lift (altitude), using the throttle commands. Later, the ~ and tab keys will do the same thing. To auto-hover, reduce speed to around factor 2-4, enough to counter the effects of gravity and prevent the ship from falling. Activate VTOL and use the throttle wheel keys to find a suitable hover altitude. Use the numeric 5, auto-leveling key for a quick attitude orientation. 028* The ship should now come to a relative complete STOP on the planet. You R2C need to fine tune this and is dependent on the elevation and slope of the current terrain you're on. 029* You can now use ctrl+d from a shuttle to recall the targeted ATV or mining R2C drone. This will only work if there is space in the shuttle. Once personnel flight is handled, you will be able to do the same for personnel from the shuttle and ATV. The proposed ALT+F9 menu command (NYI) is going to be used for this. The shuttle must wait for the ATV to dock. There is a strange anomaly which causes the ship to be immediately docked without actually travelling to the ship! 030* Docking the shuttle with an ATV or interceptor in tow will now dock both R2C ships. Normal docking rules apply. ie, the status of the docking bay, launch bay etc. 031* Clicking outside the PTE surface in tacOPS will no longer create a GPF R3C The tacOPS grid is scaled so it does not exceed a planet/moon climate limit Some planets/moons may be larger than the tacOPS coordinate system, so the grid has an upper limit. 032* TACOPS 'zoom to' list only shown in view state (otherwise it interferes R4C with waypoint setting). 033* TACOPS 'zoom to' list not being shown after removing command palette R4C 034* Ships will now auto-egress surface at 200,000 ft msl R4C 035* Jump delay timer for AI ships re-enabled. Prevents ships jumping unless R4C their jump engine has been recharged. Disabled AI ships cannot re-charge their jump engines. The lower the engine integrity, the longer it takes to recharge the jump engine. 036* Personnel image obscuring tacOPS command palette R4C 037 Missiles and OTS weapons unable to catch up with high turn rate targets. Note: The damage a missile inflicts on a target is determined by the damage factor of the missile and it's length of time in flight. The longer it remains in flight, the less the damage inflicted. If it stays in flight too long, it will self destruct and no damage will be done. This is being changed. 038* Mysterious crashes when making long ai pre-computed nav jumps R5C 039$ Alert klaxxon not being reset when region clear of hostiles. R4C 040 Placing waypoints or selecting location using mouse in tacOPS results in slight offset due to view angle of tacOPS. 041* Lockup on launch from station. Traced to invalid setup.cfg file when R4C when joystick selected in config when game run the first time. 042 Ships in waypoint follow mode colliding with surface, taking damage and being destroyed. This also affects ATVs and drones deployed at high altitude from shuttles. They take serious damage when dropped. Surface flight model requires 'terrain following' model and relaxed rules for ATV/drone deployment from shuttles at high altitude. 043* Extracting ATV from shuttle results in crash if flight engineers or RD7B medics are on board. 044* Disabled ships will no longer take off using hyperjump engines. R4C 045* Unable to leave nullspace first time fluxfield is used. This works R4C correctly since fluxfields are unstable and may not work the first time even though they may only have one exit point. The nullspace fluxfield needs to be special case so that is works first time around. shift+f must be used to target fluxfield. 046$ PTA system not working in DIRECT mode. PTA will not acquire nor fire R3C on non hostile targets. Even then, it's on a first detect basis. Will probably change to high priority target select. 047$ Difficult to line up target in PTA for surface strike. This is not R4C a bug. Will probably change to use yaw model for arrow keys. You can currently use ins and del to yaw. Use numeric 5 to level craft. 048* Shield and laser systems still being updated even though menu is R4C active. 049 Shuttle indicators mapped wrong. Should be mapped to power, shield, armor cargo. ATV should be power, laser, shield, cargo 050 Various anomalies in shuttles including menu appearing outside clipping region, firing lasers produces sound, main menu active, unable to manually deploy personnel etc. 051 Ejected ic pod should drop to surface with increased pitch angle to prevent it from flying out of the surface region 052 Player should not be able to control any craft if it does not have any personnel in it. Ships on planets should drop to the ground under gravity. In space, they should remain stationary. 053 Ships not being destroyed on surface when they collide with a water texture resulting in a -tive altitude 054* IC pod is autoejecting when ic destroyed. This should NOT happen. R4C Pod should only autoeject if initiated by player or pilots in ai mode 055 Ships under ai control taking off when player switches out. This is accurate but may not be desired under certain circumstances. Requires a HOLD mode. 056 Recalling an ATV or drone results in them being immediately extracted regardless of location on planet. This needs to be changed so that extraction operations are based on distance to object on current planet. 057 VTOL needs some more work and the lift keys are mapped wrong 058* Collision detect has some bugs in it RD7 059* Shields on when leaving station with tractored ship. In general, shields R4C should be down when tractor beam is engaged. 060* Unable to select RTB order for shuttle from tacOPS R4C 061 Ship sometimes moves backward when hyperdrive activated. This is NOT a bug but a restriction in jump sequence. The game tries to slow down to intercept the jump anomaly. However, depending upon your speed, the ship may have breached the jump anomaly position _before_ it's activated and therefore moves backwards to intercept it. To do this, it has to slow down, hence the backward movement. To fix this, the ship will have to do a proper roll/pitch/yaw orientation to face the anomaly and execute forward thrust into it. The result: a slower transition jump resuling in your ship being perhaps destroyd in a high combat theatre. 062* Possible to activate jump engines though not fully recharged. FO, R4C if onstation will now display a message. 063 Nuclear/Solar reactor and engine models don't work based on installed type 064* Unable to extract drone/ATV using shuttle from BC main menu R5C 065* Switching from a turret to a ship that is NOT ready to launch causes R4C a GPF due to the way the ship switch works. 066$ Bridge command menu for shuttle 2 does not work from main menu R4C 067 When shield, armor, reactor, engine are upgraded, they become active once installed even before the installation is completed. 068* Incorrect turret mapping. R4C 069* Unable to leave nullspace if you have NOT jumped to a region. It uses the R5C last jump region to relocate the ship _but_ if you had not jumped, it doesn't have this reference to use, ie, you just started a game. This is NOT a duplicate of 045 because the code was actually modified then to make nullspace fluxfields work the first time they were activated. 070* Unable to destroy own ship (ic,shuttle,atv) if it's in DIRECT mode due R4C to the way the logic works. The integrity of a ship is the average of all it's systems. In AI mode, this works fine but if the ship is in DIRECT mode, this is NOT used, instead the AILOG/API values are used because this has to be preserved due to repair operation etc. Once this is fixed, any support ships in DIRECT mode will be destroyed if the hull or reactor reaches 0. In ai mode, the pilots will auto-eject the ic pod based on damage level and their ai. 071* Distance cue for exploding objects seems wrong as no matter how far, it's R4C not played. Sounds usually play based on your distance from them. I think this problem is also related to SEC-5 013. Dunno. 072 Require restrictions in the tractor beam feature to prevent players from towing certain objects from the game world, tractoring the BC to a planet surface and similar illegal tasks. May use speed, integrity, size, orbital status or similar factors to impose such restrictions. 073* Sending RTB orders to a support ship and jumping into that ship during R5C the RTB process if the BC is in a different region results in a GPF. 074 If a probe is linked to the BC radar system in TACLINK mode, there is a bug which allows the player to tractor, target and dock with targets though the BC is in a different region. 075* Interceptor 'defend all' command only launching interceptor #2 C5(2) 076 Unable to collect cargo pods if flying shuttle. Need to use the alt+d docking command for the shuttle or ATV which allows it to collect the currently target person, cargo pod, drone or atv. Similarly if you alt+d from the atv with the shuttle as target, it put the atv in the shuttle and switch to the shuttle. 077 Starstations not launching missiles due to aspect ratio restrictions which makes it difficult for them to get a lock solution 078 Unable to manually deploy/extract personnel from ATV and shuttle 079 Ships which crash into the ground are unable to take off due to inability to achieve enough thrust to breach gravity model 080 The ATV is not at present usable. Ground vehicles or ships when in contact with the ground are currently using an unstable kinematics model. The ATV uses a turret control method (like the decoupled IOD) that has insufficient control authority to overcome slope/gravity effects, and there is no modelling of ground friction to damp these forces, so it's somewhat similar to skidding on ice. (It occurs to me that in an ice climate, this is what is wanted if the player attempts to drive the ATV too forcefully). 081* Bridge menu for ATV misaligned. Also misaligned when deployed RD5 081* Doing multiple tractors of the same object should not be allowed since it RD5 causes a weird anomaly. 084* Multiple tractors of the same object results in a strange anomaly RD5 085* If a shuttle is sent to collect a cargo pod and it is destroyed, the RD7 shuttle still collects the pod contents and broadcasts the collected msg 086* A GPF occurs if a shuttle is in hyperspace & sent to collect a pod that RD7 is destroyed before it gets there. 087? Being killed in an IC with the BC in a different region, seem to end the RD7 game if playing from a saved file (?) 088* Objects in fixed orbit, ie orbital defense systems and stations entering RD7 'flee' mode and attempting to escape when badly damaged. 089 A target which hyper jumps out of the current region, still shows up on TACSCAN radar though it has jumped to a new region. ============================================================================== SEC-3 : VISUAL REALITY ENGINE =============================================================================== 001* Various palette problems fixed R3C 002* Jump anomaly offset bug fixed R3C 003* Buildings and all objects can now be destroyed on the PTE surface R3C 004* More work done in perspective correct texture mapping. Select from CONFIG R3C menu or with <alt+shift+p>. It's a little slow and needs more optimizing. 005* Night/day transition modified (first pass). At night, the terrain fades to R2C COMPLETE black. This is NOT a bug. This will change later so that it's not as dark. Even the infra-red scope in the IC is not penetrating this once the planet goes completely black. 006* Crash when selecting texture mapping for external planet rendering 007 Flying North far enough on the PTE results in a GPF due to numeric precision restrictions 008* For some reason the shaded and flat rendering options do not match the RD0 palette map. 009* Cloak effect not working in texure mapped rendering mode. RD0 010* Surface hazing doesn't work right in some rendering modes RD0 011* Buildings and surface objects not being rendered under 'terrain objects' RD0 option 012* tacOPS orders menu for shuttle not displayed when target selected. R4C 013* Strange anomalies in Perspective Correct texture mapping mode. Prevents RD0 clouds from being implemented correctly 014 Corruption in Time Of Day, TOD palette when clouds active on planets with a different time zone than Earth. 015* Some planetary maps disappear, ie, Saturn RD3 ============================================================================== SEC-4 : FRONTEND ============================================================================== 001* Tactical: ATV section info is inconsistent with the ATV info in the RD7B shuttle section. 002* CONFIG options are now saved when accessed from within the game. R2C 003 Random screen corruption in Roster save/restore screen. Probably related to the .PRO file created when a game is saved. 004* Navitron condition is not being reset if damaged and repaired at a R5C starstation. 005* Corruption in Navitron/Miscon/Commlink menu options at CENTCOM. Selecting R4C Navitron executes Miscon. Selecting Miscon executes Commlink. You can select Commlink though it is not highlighted 006* Selecting NAVITRON button from menu when docked should return and NOT R4C activate MISCON. 007* Selecting CONTINUE from menu if current profile is invalid, ie player R5C killed in action or courtmartialed results in game attempting to load scenario, realizes it's an invalid move and returns back to main menu. 008* Corruption in Tradecom screen when displaying cargo bay capacity R4C 009* Selecting CONTINUE from main menu with valid game causes crash. Use R5C save/restore for now. 010* Missing parts required by CE for repairs no longer indicated in TradeCOM RD7B 011* Combat induced palette manipulations results in screen corrupt for Tactical, Logistix etc 012* Selecting CONTINUE from main menu displays scenario as FF instead of ACM R5C in Roster. 013* Unable to modify ATV assignment from ATV screen in Tactical though it RD7B can be done from the shuttle->cargo screen in Tactical 014* Wrong 'death' message being displayed when player killed in XC R5C 015* Able to access normal menus in XC via the COMMLINK access R5C 016* Strange bugs regarding drones... RD7B If you click on "drone 1" the drop down list appears listing the rest of the drones. What I have noticed is that once you deploy a mining drone, you can load another with the same name in any shuttle. However, if the named drone is actually in one of the shuttles, you will get a message "Drone 138623485 Not Available". Also, if you go to the tactical loadout screen and view the drone status with all of the drones deployed...it always says "drone 1 deployed" for each shuttle. I'm not sure if the stats only referred to drone 1 but it says drone 1. Nothing is listed for drones 2-4. 017* Selecting COMMLINK after messages are recorded will cause a crash. This RD1 is probably related to the multi-language support which is new in D.0 018* Selecting weapons image in Tactical results in a crash RD2 019* Incorrect damage factor for Vagrant missile in Tactical RD5 020* Roster STATS screen misaligned RD5 021* Unable to assign personnel to an ATV from the main ROSTER->CREW screen RD7B 022* Screen corruption in Tactical drone->unload screen RD7B 023* Frame for Navitron computer missing RD7 ============================================================================== SEC-5 : MISC BUGS. ============================================================================== 001* Joystick calibration no longer has any effect if device is not a joystick R3C 002* Locked down sound data to prevent swap to VMM R2C 003* Save/restore now more secure. For some reason, this problem only occurs R5C when saving from the bridge menu. If it persists, simply got to Roster and save from there. But it seems to save/restore ok now. 004* Duplicate entry. Moved to SEC-1 065 R4C 005* Lockup after BC destroyed transition when hull fully breached R4C 006* Starting XC after playing FF or ACM results in lockup R4C 007* Game exit on auto-evacuation resulting in invalid option passed to R4C commlink message. Also associated to game erroneously starting the current invalid game when a new game is started in Roster. 008* Selecting 'save' from bridge returning to main menu instead of bridge R5C 009 There are some problems in the transition states which need to be tested The rules are as follows: - BC Evacuation (auto/manual) When the evacuate sequence is initiated, you can use either auto or manual evacuation and an option MUST be selected before the timer expires or it will default to auto. Auto puts all personnel in shuttles in interceptors and ATVs, then launches them. After the ship self destructs IF the player's alter-ego survived, ie, was NOT on the BC when it self destructed, COMMLINK is displayed and lists surviving crew members. On exit from COMMLINK, you are then taken to GHQ or the next GALCOM starstation where you are given a new ship. Only surviving crew members over. You can get a new ship up to 3 times before you are retired from active duty. The system will always try to ensure that the alter-ego is evacuated. If for some reason this fails, you will be listed as KIA and the game will end. You are allowed 3 ships before GALCOM retires you from active duty. If you evacuate the ship under court-martial orders, the trial will proceed when you arrive at GHQ. TO DO: The system should pick another friendly station if GHQ is destroyed Currently, you are docked there regardless of it's status. - BC SOS tow request A tow can be requested at anytime. This takes you to GHQ or the nearest starstation for a fee since it is handled by subcontractors. Prices may vary. If you request a tow ship when under court-martial orders, the trial will proceed when the tow ship docks at a GALCOM station. Once you get to the station, you can then initiate repairs. If there are no functional friendly starstations available or if you don't have the funds, the SOS request will fail. You will have to keep trying until an active station is found. There is no limit on the number of times you can request a tow ship. If you call for a tow and don't have the funds you will get a violation. The fee is higher if the tow ship has to enter a hot area. TO DO: The system should pick another friendly station if GHQ is destroyed Currently, you are docked there regardless of it's status. A tow request should present a menu of valid stations showing the name and price. You then pick one. - BC Destroyed If the BC is destroyed during combat, the game will end regardless of whether the alter-ego is on board or not. TO DO: If the alter-ego dies IN the ship, the status should be KIA. If the ship is destroyed and he's NOT in it, the status should be MIA. - IC/ATV/SH destroyed If the IC is destroyed, both pilots will be killed. If the pod is ejected (under ai or manual control) first, it will seek the BC in space and dock with it. If on a planet, it will drop to the ground. On impact, 3D objects representing the pilots will be created at the crash site so that they can be rescued. Only surviving pilots will be created (NYI). If a shuttle or ATV is destroyed, all personnel on board will be killed. Evacuating the shuttle or ATV will only work on the planet and this ejects all personnel to the surface where 3D objects for them are created. Only surviving personnel are created as those without jetpacks will certainly die if you evac a shuttle in mid-air. You cannot evac a shuttle in space (NYI). - Player alter-ego states (ACT/KIA/MIA/CMA) TO DO: Pod should drop to ground and 3D objects of surviving people created Active - alter-ego alive and on active duty Missing In Action - ship destroyed and alter-ego NOT in it Killed In Action - ship destroyed and alter-ego IN it Courtmartialed - found guilty of GALCOM violations. Games ends if player docks at a GALCOM station once the courtmartial finds him guilty. 010* Game loops in joystick calibration screen if joystick not supported. R4C Unable to exit screen. Will implement ESC to exit calibration. 011* Last item on menu is off-screen if mouse pointer located near edge of R4C screen when menu activated. 012* Unable to exit out of 'cd-rom check' screen if invalid drive detected R4C 013* Soundfx disappearing. Traced to sound system running out of channels if RD7 a lot of sounds are queued. 014* Moving the mouse to the lower left corner of bridge causes GPF C5(2) 015* Strange anomalies with the 'evac' transition RD7B 016* Reports of game crashing with repeated save/restore RD0 017 When a Sidewinder 3D Pro is used with a Thrustmaster, the calibration for the hat switch will cause a crash if the user forgot to change the SW mode to TM before calibrating the stick. 018? Switching from one IC to another in different regions sometimes results RD7 in loss of engine sound for the first IC when switching back to it. 019* GPF caused if INVERSE TACTICAL camera target goes out of scope RD5 020* ATV incorrectly configured with shields RD5 021? Sometimes going from XC to a normal FF or ACM game will result in an XC RD7 queued message being played on launch. Usually happens if you died in XC and mother was playing damage messages. If you quit/die and start a new FF or ACM game from the main menu, the anomaly occurs. 022* A graphics anomaly prevents the co-pilot SSD from displaying the status RD6 023 New problems with SAVE/RESTORE causing you to quit and restart in order to avoid corruption. 024* Pilots messages repeating even after they are docked RD7 025 In the SH,IC,ATV which don't have 3 dedicated systems, the SUL mode of the TACSCAN is preventing the use of the NID. In fact, any key should override the current MFD operation. The SUL filter should not affect the NID. 026 Detaching a TACLINK probe causes noise interference even though BC is in region 027 During EVAC if pilots are not in ready interceptors, the game will crash when the transition ends ============================================================================== SEC-6 : SCRIPTING SYSTEM (FF/ACM/XC) ============================================================================== 001* ACM will now report on mission success whenever it can. This is NOT true R2C for most missions since ACM is not mission orientated and in some scenarios, a success is an 'abstract'. Several event triggers are now used to signal a new scenario without the need for an extended downtime. Some of you are going to start moaning now that you won't have a lot of time between assignments, especially advanced scenarios in which you are certain to take a pounding. You are a galactic cop and in most scenarios given a 'beat' in the form of a patrol zone. All you have to do in some scenarios is survive until the next assignment. This is why there is no mission success or failure in most ACM scenarios. Once you reach ACM scenario #30, these training scenarios will end and you will be required to defeat the Gammulans using whatever means necessary. See the FAQ for more on this. 002 Extended testing required for the location and use of all game artifacts 003* XC scripts updated to be more streamlined and better structured RD2 004* The IC shields will now be raised when XC starts up RD2 005* When the IC is initialized in XC at the end of a level, the indicators RD7 are not updated. ============================================================================== SEC-7 : MISC FEATURE UPDATES/CHANGES ============================================================================== 001* Changes (rank/salary) R3C Salaries are now paid every 7 days instead of 15 Rank Salary Experience Points required ------------------------------------------------------ Supreme Cmdr 500,000 200,000 Tacops Cmdr 300,000 100,000 Strategic Cmdr 200,000 50,000 Fleet Cmdr 125,000 25,000 Commander 75,000 0 002* Changes (HUD symbology) R3C The FTOL/VTOL modes in the HUD have been changed FTOL - when airborne and in normal flight mode VTOL - when airborne and in vtol flight mode BRAKE - when stationary on planet surface TAXI - flashing when touching the planet surface and moving XXXX - when engine is shutdown ORBIT - when in orbit 003* Experience points and finances are now awarded for delivering various R3C types of ships to friendly stations. Gammulan ships have the highest price, next to insurgents, then any hostile ship. Delivering friendly disabled ships gives higher experience points than finances. 004* The game will end if the player's alter-ego ever dies, ie FF =< 0 R3C 005* Pause <pause> command has been changed to <ctrl+p> R3C 006* Debug <ctrl+alt+a> mission bypass had been disabled in distribution R3C version 007* The cd-rom is now required to be in the drive during game execution R3C 008* Several ACM scripts updated for playability R3C 009* Added version number in shift+capslock display R2C 010* Modified BC3000AD.EXE so that extender allocates 20MB swap file when R2C needed instead of creating it in 8MB chunks. 011* Changed from v2.01 to v1.97 of the DOS xtender R2C 012* Time compression enabled using ctrl+a and ctrl+shift+a are back in. These R2C compress and divide time ie 2x, 4x, 8x and /2, /4 and /8 013* Debug commandline options now only available in interim 'tester' versions. R2C 014* Sound on/off support added. To disable MIDI support, run SETUP from the R2C BC3K directory and select 'no MIDI device'. Do the same to disable digitized sound. If they are turned on and wish to disable them from within the game, simply turn SOUNDFX:OFF in CONFIG. This will disable both soundfx and MIDI support if they were enabled. 015* Changes (personnel) R3C Each person consumes 1 Nutripak per day 1 Medpak heals a person by 25% Personnel go offstation if LF =< 10 or FF => 90 Personnel go to Medibay if LF =< 15 Celestial Orb updates LF of personnel faster and FF will not increase J.A.C randomly repairs systems at the rate of 1 every 10 minutes 016* CREW/CARGO/FUEL CAPACITY R4C ------------------------ Cargo Cargo Weapons Weapons Personnel Reactor Shield Cloak Bay1 Bay2 Bay1 Bay2 Max Radine Plutonium Iridium ----------------------------------------------------------------------- BC 7500 7500 250 250 237 25000 10000 1000 Shuttle 2000 - - - 20 - - - ATV 500 - 10 - 4 - - - Drone 1000 - - - - - - - The drone and ATV each take up 750 units of cargo space which will reduce the cargo capacity of the shuttle they are loaded in. 017* An atv and drone are now loaded into all shuttles at startup R4C 018* Personnel Scan, PerSCAN, computer implemented for tracking ship's personnel R5C 019* Support for 70 video card chipsets. Use bc3000ad /v? command to see options RD0 020* Probes can now be detached causing them to be destroyed and a slot made RD0 available for a replacement. Select the desired probe and send it the 'DETACH' command. 021* Multi-Lingual support. This is NOT included in this patch and can only RD0 be obtained from the publisher. Supported languages are French, German, Italian & Spanish. 022* Extensive speed optimizations and improvements in all renderers RD0 023* The planetary object is now rendered using triangles and supports high RD0 res or high definition textures. In order to keep the patch file down, only the Sol system has high res map support. You can download high-res map support file (BC3KMAPS.ZIP) when it becomes available. This will provide high-res map support for all planets and removes the cloud cover from planets which do not require them. 024* Since all the rendering modes are now perspective correct, the CTRL+t RD0 command is now obsolete. These have also been removed from CONFIG 025* Rendering options have been revised in CONFIG. Refer to manual for RD0 an explanation of the new options. The patch file will delete this file and allow BC3K to create a new one on startup. Go to CONFIG and change your settings as desired. 026* Cloud layers implemented with view fogging at cloud layer. Further RD0 optimization is required to reduce speed drop when banking at certain angles 027* You can now turn shadowing on/off for the planet's external view RD0 028* Revised ship cloaking effect. It is now transparent. Try it against the RD0 backdrop of a planet or from any turret view. 029* Implemented lens flare effect complete with solar white-out. Watch for RD0 spectacular effects during flybys, view controls and in tacOPS view modes. 030* The planet surfaces are now segmented into friendly, neutral and hostile RD0 regions based on alien nation and castes. 031* Keyboard commands modified. Please refer to new BCKEYS.TXT or Appendix A RD0 of the manual for new commands. 032* Intruders will no longer beam onto the ship if it is FULLY cloaked RD0 033* Revised object explosions. Still needs some synchronization RD0 034* Revised jump gate object RD0 035* Tilt control added to external views and tacOPS, tilt adjusted by INS RD0 and DEL on the numeric keypad. 036* External F8 & F10 view keys now toggle between LOCKED/FLOATING camera modes RD0 037* As of v1.01D.0, save game files are now backward compatible RD0 038* MIDI music not looping when done due to problem in the sound files RD7B ============================================================================== SEC-8 : V1.1 TASK LIST ============================================================================== 001 Fix all *detected* bugs 002 Implement orbital model 003 Implement probe ORBscan model (requires 002) 004 Revised dogfighting model 005 Add surface starbases filter to SUL mode and dynamically create waypoints so that they are easy to locate. 006 Better handling for turrets. Auto-tracking ? 007 Revise ATV driving model 008* Complete perspective correct texture mapping and put clouds back in RD0 009 Implement terrain following and revise surface model to prevent (a) ships from crashing into ground and (b) not being able to attain enough thrust to take off. 010 Native support for CH Combat and F16 Fighter Stick 011 Left-Right mouse clicks for personnel assignment switching in Tactical