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Dthdealer

Joined: 10 March 2007
Posts: 476

13 March 2018 04:59 (UK time)

I wanted to share the megaproject that is The Ravagers Of Time with a few friends:

http://meteormods.com/File_Info.asp?FileId=1064

I tried to run a multiplayer co-op session of it a few days back, but the game would crash at random intervals (approx 5 to 30 minutes). As this is multiplayer there is no saving functionality, so everything gets lost when this happens.

Crashes seemed to occur with equal regularity on both client and host.

Has Meteor 2's or TROT's multiplayer always been this unstable? Is there a particular version of the game and mod I should best try? Or is this something only affecting me?

Let's not mention the dragon that gets activated shortly after game start and continually ravages the players at the spawn town

Also known as Veyrdite
My website: http://halestrom.net/darksleep@Occasionally you may meet me when you sleep. In the darkest corners of your dreams, where your phone stops working and you don't know what to do. I'll be there; telling you that I don't support your device.

"Can't you just fix-"
NO! I told you when you bought this, when it goes wrong I can't fix it. It's filled with glue. The Greek goddess of glue Araldities herself would be impressed with this.

Please stop asking me for technical support during your dreams. Can't we just tour some surreal landscapes instead?

"How do I do that?"

Count your fingers. Keep trying. Make sure there's ten.

Then summon me. I am large and covered in wires. Clouds of baking soda pour into your world and a slightly weak yellowy glow appears from the LED strips behind me.

If you can see this message then you're already part of the way there. Keep all your styles disabled and you might see the dream within.

"But there's so much javascript everywhere! I can't see you. Help! I've forgotten to count my fingers! Where do I find them?"

The LED strip behind me pops and goes out. Dark spots appear in the centre of each light. I lift my finger to my lips. The smell of tantalum capacitors fills the air.

Ssh. Don't worry about that. Behind those frameworks there's another person sleeping.

Some day the javascript will sleep too.

Edited: 13 March 2018 04:59

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nyasudah

Official Sponsor

Joined: 06 February 2005
Posts: 832

13 March 2018 06:28 (UK time)

Haven't played it for years, but I guess it's m2.

Especially mp was bad back then when we tried (and I don't think it improved one bit since then).

nyasudah / masuda / mp / PetiX / PtX

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Dthdealer

Joined: 10 March 2007
Posts: 476

13 March 2018 07:53 (UK time)

Hmm, I had presumed that TROT was designed for multiplayer; as there are several references to it in the game:

- 'Convert thine possesions into gold if ye go kaput' toolbar button (useless in singleplayer AFAIK)
- Different XP level-up thresholds for MP players (although this may have been removed)

Any other mods you might recommend masuda? EDIT: is RTSS any fun for multiplayer?

Edited: 13 March 2018 07:55

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nyasudah

Official Sponsor

Joined: 06 February 2005
Posts: 832

13 March 2018 09:14 (UK time)

RoT is definitely the best m2 mod imo. On the other hand, I haven't played much mp because of the problems we had with it. Namely we couldn't even connect to each other without hamachi, and even then it often went out of sync quite spectacularly. It was a bit better on actual lan, but it was still a bit buggy.

nyasudah / masuda / mp / PetiX / PtX

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Dthdealer

Joined: 10 March 2007
Posts: 476

13 March 2018 23:12 (UK time)

Thankyou -- good to know I'm not missing out on anything.

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ParaSait

Joined: 26 June 2007
Posts: 1478

13 March 2018 23:59 (UK time)

Everyone who tried meteor (2) net play before knows how awkward and glitchy it can be.

Yea, ravagers of time is a masterpiece. Definitely pushes the limits of what meteor 2 is capable of. It doesn't surprise me one bit that the net code goes haywire on it. Especially because it's a ginormous map and it's particularly heavy on the scripts.

This link is dead. It's only still here because, err... yknow, it's some sort of... memorial.

Edited: 14 March 2018 00:02

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Dthdealer

Joined: 10 March 2007
Posts: 476

14 March 2018 04:36 (UK time)

Yea, ravagers of time is a masterpiece

"The game's scripting API has no timer or timing support? Make a peasant walk in circles!"
- The RoT method

I duplicated it once to make a 'boss battle' M2 game. The thread is somewhere on the forums (but the download link is long dead). I made the mistake of making the walking object a frail sheep wandering about on a small nearby island. He'd get killed by the boss and the scripts wouldn't advance.

EDIT: And I definitely agree. Playing RoT has become one of my small pilgrimages I do once every few years.

Edited: 14 March 2018 04:41

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nyasudah

Official Sponsor

Joined: 06 February 2005
Posts: 832

16 March 2018 09:45 (UK time)

lol, I believe you can make them invincible, doomed to be running in circles forever.

nyasudah / masuda / mp / PetiX / PtX

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ParaSait

Joined: 26 June 2007
Posts: 1478

16 March 2018 19:13 (UK time)

Dthdealer wrote:
"The game's scripting API has no timer or timing support? Make a peasant walk in circles!"
- The RoT method

Hahah yes, exactly! Advanced meteor 2 modding is all about finding that sort of tricks. While it definitely adds to the charm in a sense, imagine what could be done if we could expend that creative energy on real content instead of on finding creative workarounds to technical limitations...

Can't wait for a new version of meteor 2 with stronger scripting capabilities. Imagine just what kind of hella interesting mods we could make.

That alone I think could be enough to Make Meteor Great Again (tm)!

This link is dead. It's only still here because, err... yknow, it's some sort of... memorial.

Edited: 16 March 2018 19:16

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Erik

Joined: 16 August 2006
Posts: 424

16 March 2018 20:47 (UK time)

@ParaSait

I really enjoy this "work around" mentality, limitations create creativity in a sense.

We do need more scriptability though yes, make meteor 2 great again! With modern computer power we could make bigger maps, include more objects, sectors and all that too.

The potential is massive for the next version of M2

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nyasudah

Official Sponsor

Joined: 06 February 2005
Posts: 832

18 March 2018 09:44 (UK time)

"next version of m2"

I just noticed the installer still says it's beta.

And seeing the lack of dev notes, i'm not sure if we'll get a next version anytime soon. lol

nyasudah / masuda / mp / PetiX / PtX

Edited: 18 March 2018 09:45

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Erik

Joined: 16 August 2006
Posts: 424

18 March 2018 17:36 (UK time)

@masuda

Someone should gently, but persuasively poke James a bit

Anyone still in touch with him? Saw him on LinkedIn...

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nyasudah

Official Sponsor

Joined: 06 February 2005
Posts: 832

18 March 2018 18:22 (UK time)

I know that Spy usually informs him when the site is broken.

nyasudah / masuda / mp / PetiX / PtX

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Dthdealer

Joined: 10 March 2007
Posts: 476

24 March 2018 09:42 (UK time)

I was able to contact James via email. He has a few bits of contact details around on the sites.

Donating also seemed to help

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me_mantis

Joined: 26 September 2003
Posts: 1152

28 April 2018 21:38 (UK time)

Thanks for the appreciation of the mod! I accidentally hit an old keyboard binding and ended up on this forum today (but I'd previously been meaning to!)

While the goal was mulitplayer & I've had fun with it, I've never had a game last long enough to properly win. The game in multiplayer is very glitchy. It takes forever to get players to spawn in. I improved some of the lag spikes by putting in objects instead of terrain based doors, because that was causing some weird issues. I've won the multiplayer once in a two player game.

The dragon glitch is caused by people spawning at 0,0 when trying to spawn in, but not getting spawn coords. This is a glitch.

The levels are faster in MP, because without that, you'd never win.

Cool tips: Try playing the game as Ash! Putting that in is why the game is no longer standalone.

There are pet bees that will fight for you.

The end ice dragon has a hidden weakness. =)

Also, there is a small island map that is fun for pvp multiplayer.

RTSS does work much better in MP. I've played lots of games with it. I highly recommend it! It's not balanced but it's crazy fun chaos. (let's get discord up & play some games!)

Other cool facts:
JohnWE was working on a RoT game in the Torque engine. It wasn't finished because art is hard & I didn't want to do all the animations.
The entire game is a bit from a film script I wrote:

Mind control technology has brought about world peace and prosperity, but the last man off the grid is on a quest to save the perfect world.

I've rebuilt the spaceship a lot of times & now my business card reads "spaceship dealer"

Edited: 28 April 2018 21:41

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Erik

Joined: 16 August 2006
Posts: 424

28 April 2018 22:32 (UK time)

I finally got my hands on discord, how do I access our Meteor community room? (^^,)

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me_mantis

Joined: 26 September 2003
Posts: 1152

29 April 2018 08:05 (UK time)

Erik wrote:
I finally got my hands on discord, how do I access our Meteor community room?

Did somebody make this?

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Erik

Joined: 16 August 2006
Posts: 424

29 April 2018 17:42 (UK time)

@me_mantis

If you look in the other most recent threads, there is talk of a discord yeah B-)

but only got discord a few weeks ago so couldn't join then

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