MegaGlest Website

[olaus]

Agreed, John, those are nicely organized. My biggest beef with the script to generate the techtree map is that it, to be frank, looks dreadful. Of course, we'll never hit the customization of making a custom techtree map, but for a generic map for factions that the developer did not create a map, it should look a bit better, but the script is a start. Reading the XMLs is the first step.

of course they will never look as good as those:
http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100202000529/glest/images/3/37/Tech_techtree.jpg

but they will never be outdated (like the one above without air units) and immediately be available for any new factions.

Also, a note that 200 frames for a GIF is far too much. 20 frames is more than plenty.

i would prefer the pictures to not be animated because it just makes it harder to concentrate on the text. but if there's a script to generate them animated i would make it configurable, then the wabmaster can decide.

[titi]

In your faction overview you also had also samething called "Unit Details for persian".
First one you show here is the blacksmith for example. What I had in mind is not to have all on one html page, but to have the details on seperate html pages which is referenced from the overview tables on top. When you click on a unit there you get the unit overview ( on a seperate page ) showing details about the unit.
And this is the place where the animated gifs might be nice! You show the icon there too and below the animation....

[Cygal]

in general this shouldn't become a megaglest-tool but should work for GAE and normal glest. maybe it shouldn't generate any headers and footers, just the plain tables. they could then be integrated in whatever webdesign or CMS someone uses (just not into wiki, wouldn't make sense). of course always in a form that they can be automatically recreated if something in the techtree changes (don't know how often that happens but it should happen because balancing out all the factions isn't easy.)

I still was hoping of having it integrated in MegaGlest web site.

[tomreyn]

By the way, the website is now live.

Thanks a ton to Cygal who has actually done most of the work - and is still on parts of it. We're working to complete the missing sections and fix some issues along the next days/weeks. For now, it's just titi, softcoder, cygal and me who have access, but if there is a need to have more people to edit some of the not fully static content then Titi will have to decide who gets access to what.

[Cygal]

The url is http://megaglest.org/

[Omega]

I volunteer to help. I don't have as much time on my hands as I wish at the moment with upcoming finals and a bunch of projects, but I'm skilled with web design and a long time member of the Glest community.

On another topic, it looks like we should be getting the "latest forum posts" section up soon. Cygal finished the script and I have uploaded it to the board (though I may have to change the directory because of permission errors).

[ElimiNator]

If there is anything I can do to help just PM me. (I love the site  )

[-Archmage-]

A longer ChangeLog could be added? The complete log is found in the MegaGlest(MAIN) topic.

[Omega]

Place it in it's own div and give that a fixed width and height and set overflow to scroll. That will let you fit all the change log in the page. I don't think it needs the entire log though, perhaps just a few versions ago or based on a period of time (ie: changes in the last 3 months), then include a link to either a new page or a pop-up div (not unlike the Glest Guide Maps Lightboxes (clicking the map name pops up a lightbox with the image of that map). That is space efficient and doesn't require a whole new page, but doesn't reduce filesize either, just unclutters a bit.

[tomreyn]

Thanks for your offers to volunteer. Right now there's probably not much more to be done, we just need to fill the remaining pages.

Regarding the changelog: the complete changelog can remain in the distribution. I don't see a need to have all of it duplicated on the website at this point.

[-Archmage-]

Thanks for your offers to volunteer. Right now there's probably not much more to be done, we just need to fill the remaining pages.

Regarding the changelog: the complete changelog can remain in the distribution. I don't see a need to have all of it duplicated on the website at this point.

I think a link to the complete changelog would be good then.

[titi]

Licenses of background images:
Glest and especially Megaglest always took care in having proper open source content. I think we should try it with the website too.
The current picture licenses are a bit dubious. Maby simply ask the authors if we are allowed to publish our modified version of their pictures under  our typical cc-by-sa license too. ( with credits and so on of courese )

[Pizza90]

Hey very nice site, looks professional May i do 2 suggestions??
1) say in the description that mg is free software, in my opinion it's an important thing to say to people (especially under gnu/linux) that search for a game.
2) add a button for donations! Im sure people would like to donate to thank the devs, to pay the hosting, etc.

Greetings!

[Omega]

1) say in the description that mg is free software, in my opinion it's an important thing to say to people (especially under gnu/linux) that search for a game.

It does:

MegaGlest is heavily based on the widely known Glest, which it forked from in early 2010. Like its predecessor, MegaGlest is available under liberal licensing terms and can be downloaded free of charge.

Though, it's generally a natural assumption that any game that is available on linux is free and open source. Of course, all text at the moment is working text and yet to be finalized.

[Cygal]

I had already mentioned the "weird" licence of the images, but looks like nobody saw this. I'm working on it though, trying to explain the authors the benefits of doing this.

Pizza90, concerning the donations, I am not a project leader but I don't think it's needed.

[titi]

..... a natural assumption that any game that is available on linux is free and open source ....

oh my god .....

I have added some screenshots and license info to the website and a first video from ultifd. I hope we will have something nicer for showing screenshots soon, cygal already mentioned some great things .

[ultifd]

# Please help translating the upcoming MegaGlest release!

Shouldn't it be "translate"?

Hmm...I wonder if this video would be better. Still doesn't have a lot of action in it, but there will be in the future videos...

[olaus]

just put a new version only:

http://rupp.de/mg_factions/glest_autodocu_summary.html

- the diagrams now look less cluttered because i don't show direct links of there's a multi-hop-link from one node to another
- included most upgrade benefits
- complete cost of morphed units

btw, i wondered about:
- is splash with radius 0 actually doing splash damage or should i leave that out? f.e. fakir
- looks like the worker of tech moves faster if he's loaded?
- why do the tech upgrades for piercing/blade-weapons not affect the battle machine and other bigger units?

[tomreyn]

# Please help translating the upcoming MegaGlest release!

Shouldn't it be "translate"?

That's fixed, thanks.

Hmm...I wonder if this video would be better. Still doesn't have a lot of action in it, but there will be in the future videos...

Nice views!

But... ;-)
- I have no sound when playing it back on Youtube.
- There is no title screen.
- This video seems to start by the time the game is already won and most fighting is over, resulting in a more limited representation of the overall game play than would be neccessary.
- I find the in-game chat about "this is only a little slower than usual - still playable" not so ideal. ;-)
- People don't really need/want to see how to quit the game.

[ultifd]

Yes, I know all of that, but I'm just saying IMO it is kinda better than the present one you are embedding...  
Anyways, I'll just record and edit another one later...

- There is no title screen.

?
For the sound issue, must be something on your comp...

- People don't really need/want to see how to quit the game.

Yeah...I edited that out, but I guess something went wrong.

[tomreyn]

Yes, I know all of that, but I'm just saying IMO it is kinda better than the present one you are embedding...  
Anyways, I'll just record and edit another one later...

Yes, please do! :-)

- There is no title screen.

?

I meant to suggest that you could begin the video showing how the game starts up.

For the sound issue, must be something on your comp...

Yes it was, my mistake, sorry...

[ultifd]

Somewhat better, action wise I guess. It cut off the main menu for some reason though...something's wrong with the converter. I suppose I could re-convert it later. Note: Quality is less than previous video because converter couldn't handle 4 gigs of video...I was actually try to double the bitrate, to 15000.

[tomreyn]

just put a new version only:

http://rupp.de/mg_factions/glest_autodocu_summary.html

- the diagrams now look less cluttered because i don't show direct links of there's a multi-hop-link from one node to another
- included most upgrade benefits
- complete cost of morphed units

btw, i wondered about:
- is splash with radius 0 actually doing splash damage or should i leave that out? f.e. fakir
- looks like the worker of tech moves faster if he's loaded?
- why do the tech upgrades for piercing/blade-weapons not affect the battle machine and other bigger units?

I'm afraid I can't answer these questions, I bet titi could.

While looking at your - nice! - new version, I realized this file is missing: http://rupp.de/mg_factions/attack_types.html
But this is probably related to you asking questions about splash?

[Omega]

Somewhat better, action wise I guess. It cut off the main menu for some reason though...something's wrong with the converter. I suppose I could re-convert it later. Note: Quality is less than previous video because converter couldn't handle 4 gigs of video...I was actually try to double the bitrate, to 15000.

Looks very nice, though I can't help but feel a more "professional" looking video, such as with snippets of the action (short snippets, at that), a few blender generated snippets, and all in all, a true trailer.

Various Examples:





While I know Glest doesn't have the same perspectives or dramatic scenes that these games can, you notice one thing in common: they all display short snippets for scenes and flash through those.

[olaus]

While I know Glest doesn't have the same perspectives or dramatic scenes that these games can, you notice one thing in common: they all display short snippets for scenes and flash through those.

that's a basic film-making trick: quick cutting and a thrilling music always create suspense, no matter what is shown

i think snippets of glest can be perfectly used if the camera perspective isn't the bird's perspective (as in the youtube-videos) but lower (pressing F and W).

and if there's a good trailer it should definitely be used in the intro of the game-start. showing a web-address followed by a temple in depressing british weather is no appetizer for newbies trying out the game. there's no promise of a battle anywhere.