Mechanized Assault & eXploration Reloaded

Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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Maybe this helps?
What do you think about something like this? Things you could realize with the PNG format.

Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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Looks awesome! So what is your bank account number again?

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Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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how did you made it like this? photoshop? =) it looks very good

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Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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Haha - i could give my bankaccount#! Thanks for the compliment!
And yes, this was done in photoshop, with off course the help of the PCX files from MAX, but with some altered shadows, advanced lighting effects and little detail-tune-ups (small improvements). It's just an idea what i think you could achieve (roughly) when changing everything from PCX to PNG.

I have my thoughs about the graphical user interface (GUI) as well, but it will take up quite some more work to get that figured out.
And the user-interface still is rather good i think.

Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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and a power station with glow effect, awesome.

But are you sure that the shadows are all correct, because the shadow of the habitat looks strange… compared with the other shadows.

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Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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The direction of the one habitat shadow looks a bit off, anything else you see there non ?=)
I really like this enhances gfx!

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Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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WOW, looks great!

Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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@Sal / nonsinn:
The shadow comes directly from the PCX file from MAX.
I think it may look weird, because the angle is different than the other shadows, because the building has angeled slopes (the building isn't straight, the walls are build in a corner). But i could improve the gradually increased blurry-ness a bit better (soft-shadow-look-a-like)

@all: thanks! I think you could get this looks, but practically every PCX must be redone to get hi-quality PNG's. The powerstation for example: i had to refine the edges and make them softer, in order to NOT get hard/ugly pixels that now are in the PCX-files (still some pixels remain there). In the current style and background, they work, but when going to PNG with new shadows you probably need to refine all files. Maybe i can make an automated script for this in Photoshop, so a lot of the PCX files can get done really fast.

Before continuing: i hope someone can make some sort of test-build of MAXR - which support/uses PNG files.
I'm willing to remake the first few PCX files in order to get them in-game and good-looking.
Maybe/probably i can create an automated script to do the rest of the PCX-files.

After that i can also look into the explosions / effects and talk with you guys how to get them in-game aswell.
There are some interesting (transparent) explosion animations/video's downloadable on the net - maybe we can get them in-game?

Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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Hello icexuck,
I really like the example picture of you, too! Thanks for the work. Looks much more modern and lively!

But about integrating... I'm not so much into this topic, but I think it will be a no-go to include graphics files that are very much based on the original MAX graphics files into the maxr package. We have the free graphics set, that is created completely from scratch. The res-installer is only a tool, that gives owners of the original MAX the possibility to use the original graphics. But we don't deliver the original graphics. If you now changed the original pcx to enhanced png files, we probably won't be able to include these in any package downloadable from this website/project.

But what about this (wild) idea: You only make a layer on top of the original graphics, that probably will use transparency heavily. I think we could distribute these top-layer-png-files. For the free graphics set they won't be of any use, but for the players that use the original graphics, it could be a great enhancement (that could be turned on in the preferences for example).

What do you think? And beko, what do you think?

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Subject: Re: PCX format > PNG format

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Really excellent !

Hope we will be able to see this in MAXR