As far as new levels/mods/patches, I believe the answer is a firm no. I/we have given LEC several opportunities to take us up on possible add-ons, and their response has been consistently unenthusiastic.
Emailing LEC would probably have little to no effect upon them, as their resources are completely reallocated from TPM onto other things. Without allocated resources, nothing gets done in a big company like that.
I'm working on one-and-a-half semi-secret projects right now ;) Doing model/rigging work for a project based on a certain MTV property (don't ask/don't tell), and also doing some hoping that we're gonna land an Xbox conversion of a PS2 game, 'cuz that game is gonna be a BLAST. Reminds me of TPM on many levels with regards to gameplay, but with a totally different license.
Wow, lets have a party!!!
Two things-
How do I get to Jira and recieve the Paddy Frog
and
Is there a code for invincibility. In Big.Lab it says
-You don't deserve to die with opinions like that
Thanx
Gavyn,
Jira was axed late in the project. We kept waiting for photo reference of Jira but never got it. Add to that the fact that Jabba's Porter (which is the OTHER end of the Paddy Frog quest) had a dialogue tree that had a series of bugs, it was easier to amputate both than spend time to de-bug the Porter and come up with some half-assed model for Jira. The whole side-quest didn't give much as a reward, I believe it might have been a rocket launcher or something else unique to the level. However, both characters' lines were left in the dialogue file for some reason, and their .wav files might still even be on the CD.
BTW, I was the one responsible for the bugs in the Jabba Porter dialogue...I set it up in a way similar to Watto's Flunky and some of the speaking characters on the Garden level, where you could leave the conversation any time, yet come back and pick it up where you left off. However, for some reason he kept forgetting who you were - I think his active/inactive distance was set too low.
There isn't an invincibility code. We had one for debugging purposes, but our project leaders decided that they didn't want that code in the final build.
Well actually, there's a debug code in the PSX version. I think you highlight options and Triangle, O, left, L1, R2, Square, O, left (if that doesn't work, try holding select before you do the code, it's been a while since I did it). There you'll find things like invincibility, level select and a SFX library.
Puh... shows what you know Zanzibar ;)
DOH - absolutely right Dave...man, I keep forgetting about the differences between the PSX and PC versions.
Oh well, thanks anyway.
Sorry to keep plaging you with questions, but when I speak to Kreg, he says things like
-Remember, the password is (i forget).
-Make sure you talk to Lim.
-Ananbar has some explosives.
I can find Anabar, but where do I use the password and where can I find Lim?
Oh, and I tried that trick, renaming sithjedi.baf queen.baf. Your character becomes invisible! He still makes sounds and stuff, but you can't see him. Oh well... :confused:
Zanzibar, were you presenting a game at E3 or just looking around?
Also, I'm a computer engineering & computer science major in college. I'll graduate next May. I've noticed at Lucasarts.com and some other gaming developers websites that you have to have game developing experience in order to qualify for a job. If everybody requires experience, how is anybody new gonna get into the industry? Are there any suggestions you might have for soon-to-be college graduates who want to get into the gaming industry?
Also, TPM was great.
DOH - absolutely right Dave...man, I keep forgetting about the differences between the PSX and PC versions.
Hey, everyone makes mistayks.
Originally posted by DanJericho:
<STRONG>Zanzibar, were you presenting a game at E3 or just looking around?
Also, I'm a computer engineering & computer science major in college. I'll graduate next May. I've noticed at Lucasarts.com and some other gaming developers websites that you have to have game developing experience in order to qualify for a job. If everybody requires experience, how is anybody new gonna get into the industry? Are there any suggestions you might have for soon-to-be college graduates who want to get into the gaming industry?
Also, TPM was great.</STRONG>
Dan,
I was just looking around this year. Our current project is waaaay too early to show. Always good to keep tabs on what you're going to be up against, so you know what to include to compete.
If you want to get into the games industry as a programmer, get to know DirectX programming, C++, and try to get involved in a few PS2/Gamecube workshops - I have no idea if you're in any position to get to the PS2/GC stuff or not. I'm not a programmer, so I don't know. There's gonna be a HUGE demand for graphics and physics programmers over the next several years, with 3 high-end game machines plus gargantuan technological advances in the PC market. Also, if you can find out as much as you can about programming for networking/online components, you'll be in GREAT shape to get into the industry.
How to do it? I don't know, other than talk to your instructors - they're paid to field those kinds of questions during office hours. If they don't know who to contact, you're in the wrong school ;) A lot of game companies hire directly out of the schools, and believe me, working for a small company is nice, it gives you a lot of responsibility for seeing various tasks through. Yes, a lot of 'big' companies require experience beforehand, but some also do hire directly out of the tech schools.
Gavyn,
Yes it's a first - you gotta remind me what level you're on and which guy you're talking about. I'm pretty sure you're talking about the Mos Espa Arena level, but as I recall, Kreg is the guy sitting in the bar with Watto's Flunky. Is this the guy you're talking about who is telling you the stuff about anabar etc?
My question isn't really about the game itself, but...
In the little movie after escaping from tatooine, why is Darth Maul's lightsaber actually a longer version af obi-wan's?
Was the 3d modeler too lazy or too busy to make a new model?
I'm back, just so you know :D Ummm...person who just posted last, Zanzibar was the 3D modekler you just insulted (I believe)
Really? BTW, that was no insult, it was more of a question. If the answer really is that the modeler was too lazy, it could be cosidered an insult. My gues is he was just too busy or something (since lack of time virtually KILLED TPM)
They should really make an improved version one of thes days!
Well, personally, I didn't take it as an insult, but then again I didn't build or animate the model anyways ;)
The cutscenes were handled through LEC's in-house artists - with the exception of the cutscene before the Mos Espa Arena level, which I lit and animated the camera and added spectators and racing pods and their crews to an existing Arena model built by the Racer team. Yes, some corners were cut that perhaps shouldn't have been, but all in all, I think the cutscenes turned out a lot better than we had hoped. Which brings me to a story....
We had been sort of helping design the cutscenes, meaning near the beginning of the project we sat down with some of the 3d artists in charge of the production, and we went over shot by shot what we thought we needed. After almost a year, in Xmas of 1998, the cutscene team said they were ready for us to 'sign off' on the cutscenes. We saw rendered 'final' versions, and a LOT of them were absolutely horrifying. There was a tad of model construction that didn't look good, but most of it was just some bad staging problems and cleanup that needed to happen. Initially LEC wanted to go with them as-is, mainly because they had already budgeted most of the 3d artists to start work on other projects. Well, after a little convincing, LEC really made the smart move and re-allocated a lot of manpower to make them work. And quite simply, they did, and my hat is off to LEC and Chris Schultz and the rest of them for sticking with it to make the cutscenes a bonus instead of a liability. Despite a lot of little problems, all in all, they came out rather well.
Ya, actually I enjoyed the cutscenes from TPM (exept maybe the weird looking people, oh well :D ) But not bad. :)
Here's a good question about Lucas and his companies' honesty:
In a magazine I just got, it has a feature on Episode I easter eggs (ETs, etc.) and reads this:
"As a way to link Episode I with previous Star Wars films, the crew also planted a Jawa sandcrawler near the Podrace Arena and Luke Skywalker's landspeeder on the streets of Mos Espa (it's painted green). These two Easter Eggs can also be discovered in the video game Episode I: The Phantom Menace from LucasArts."
So did you include that sandcrawler section because LucasFilm wanted one in the proper film, or was it a coincidence and LucasBooks are making it look like there's lotsa communication between companies? ;)
Also, the same question for the landspeeder, did you inclue it because Georgey did or just to make it look more Tatooiney?
Now THOSE were interesting questions Dave. *bows* ;)
Well, the landspeeder we actually had photo set reference of, we knew it was going to be in the movie, so I made one.
The sandcrawler was completely built by one of our level designers on a whim, just a side-quest for something to do. I think you get some flash grenades if you actually rescue the R2 unit.
No, there wasn't any communication as to the sandcrawler or the landspeeder. We knew there were Jawas, so we naturally assumed there would be a sandcrawler too.
And so the powers of the Lucas companies pull the wool over the eyes of thousands...
*slap*
Wha, sorry, went into 'long speech' mode for a sec ;)
How come there is no level in which you fight
in space or podrace
We didn't do "vehicle" levels because 1. we ran outta time, and 2. LEC had other products that would perform the same function, so they didn't want to be basically 'competing' with their own products.
We had some vehicles in mind, namely a drivable STAP and AAT, plus an underwater sub level after Otoh Gunga, but all of those got axed in December of 1998 when we saw that we would have no tuning time. At that point, it became easier to simply focus on the "human" player aspect than making a playable "vehicle".
Add to that, Ep1 Racer would be hitting the shelves the same day as TPM, so if we actually included some podracing sections, it might lessen the demand for Racer. Some people would buy TPM and play it all the way through before buying Racer, and if TPM had racing action, people might think that "well, there's this podracing game, but I played some of it already." If anything, download the Racer demo, play TPM up until the podrace scene, save the game, exit, play the Demo and then continue ...LOL.
As for why there was no space combat, well, you got me. Same reasons, basically, but I agree that it would have been nice. But not a lot of people would want to play Anakin ;)
ok guys...im gonna try to get darth maul playable through zanzibars method...all i haev is conman, and i cant find a way to rename though....
where can i get that other oen that was menchioned on this thread?
zanzibar, whats the file name of the darth maul file?
ok i tried...it didnt work :(
I used conman, i deleted the obiwan file, and exported the sithjedi file (also tried jawagun file) out of the big file, renamed it to obiwan, added it back to big, loaded the game, got an assault hander message pop up, and the gamed closed...then i tried the level where i am the queen, and did the iamobi cheat, and i got a black screen and quit the program...so i guess other charactors were never meant to be :(
Hmm, ok, well not sure what's going on, but you don't have to re-add it back to big.lab, you can just copy it into the root of your TPM directory (wherever wmain.exe is).
For some reason, we left in the code that would override the big.lab version if a same-name version exists in the root directory. Not sure if that is the reason you're getting an assert handler error, in fact I doubt it. What version of Windows are you running?
I'm not even certain that the sithjedi.baf doesn't contain some specialized code that the program recognizes, and tries to apply it to the player module, which causes the error...I'll look into it further.
Gah. Ok, not sure what happened here, but I keep getting the same error too. Once upon a time, someone said that they actually got Maul walking around, anyone recall that?
It could be a Win98 problem, or even a Win2k/ME problem. In any case, I can no longer get it to run, because it seems to be looking for a lightsaber node, which Maul has, but is named differently.
Whoa...umm...weird...hey Yoda the Dj, I recognize you from the really OLD posts...
Hey Zanzibar, what exactly did you do in TPM? You know, just so next time I play it I can look at something and say, hey, I know the guy who put that there :cool: :D plus I need to keep this thread going ;)
GAH, that's a 3-pager ;)
I built, textured, and animated all of the character models for the game. I also did some of the rendering work for the game sprites, and I helped direct the LEC team putting together the cutscenes.
Plus I did a lot of AI placement, and wrote a lot of the AI dialogue trees (although a lot of our original lines were rewritten 'to sound more like the movie').
Hmm, seems like I did a lot more work that 2 paragraphs worth...ah well ;)
Hey, why indeed were the lines changed? Like in the cutscene for the first game level and the beginning of the TPM movie Obi-Wan says "I have a bad feeling about this." Then, in the game, Qui-Gon says, "Your feelings serve you well, Obi-Wan...but don't let them cloud your judgement."
But in the movie, he simply says, "I don't sense anything."
Was there a particular reason for this?
The lines were written without being able to look at the script. We had an idea of how particular scenes were going to be played, but we weren't allowed to have a copy of the script to base our lines upon, simply because the script was always changing. So, we came up with lines that fit OUR version of the scenes, and then Haden Blackman (current Content Advisor on SW-Galaxies) rewrote our lines to sound more like the movie.
Hmm.. I think it would have been fun to see YOUR version of all the lines :).
OBI-WAN (On Ship): We don't have anything for trade, Master. The Queen's wardrobe, perhaps. But not enough for the amounts you need.
QUI-GON (In Mos Espa): Hmmm... maybe we can persuade them to help us through the aid of a meal. The inhabitants here look hungry.
OBI-WAN: But where are you going to find meat?
(Jar-Jar wanders over)
JAR-JAR: Hey there, Qui-Gone!
QUI-GON: Hmmmm...
HADEN BLACKMAN: No no no! You guys can't kill Jar-Jar, he's in the final... oh... err... I mean... nothing. Just don't kill him.
RAY WEST: (whiny voice) Awww, but he's annoying!
HADEN BLACKMAN: Hmmm... I see this means a lot to you... tell ya what, we'll add a Jar-Jar model into one of the N-1's that gets blown up at the end.
RAY WEST: Result!
:D
Hehehe
Hey zanzi, not sure if I asked this already (I know I meant to at one point) but is there any "easter eggs" in TPM? You know, stuff you would only know that we should look for...
You mean stuff we would only notice if we knew it was there? Hmmmm I haven't noticed anything that I can remember...
Riiight because I'm talking ultra super duper top secret stuff that no one in the Universe would know but the Ultimate Zanzibar the Great... Like d'uh! We wouldn't be able to see 'em with our peasant eyes...
Hmm...well, there was something that I put in that I haven't seen anyone mention, but then again, it COULD have been deleted at the last second by the Level Designers...
On Coruscant, when you're talking to the horned guy (who give you the tour tickets), we originally had a Millennium Falcon model flying around behind him. As I recall, we were waiting for LEC to notice it and tell us to take it out, but that never happened as far as I know. Has anyone seen it? It's pretty clear in the background while you're in conversation with the guy.
I'll say again, it could have been taken out. I know it didn't make the PSX version, because the ship flew into where one of the buildings was on that level version, so it got axed. If you don't see it, don't be too surprised.
Oh yeah, and there's exactly ONE Naboo Pilot that runs across the hangar during the beginning of the Assault on Theed in-game cutscene.
Oh, and there are celebrities that exist as bit parts in TPM, you describe the celeb and where he/she is:
Sean Connery
David Bowie
David Duchovny
Gillian Anderson
WHAT?????? Great, you tell me just when I can't reinstall TPM on the computer for the next two weeks :(
This has probably been asked before but is there a way to take an ingame screenshot?
STUPID FRICKIN' PSX VERSION! *throws stupid frickin' PSX version out of very high window*
<div align="Justify"><font color="green1">Yeah, push Print Screen then past into a graphic editor.
This was a cool thread. I enjoyed reading all the responses. There would have been fewer questions if people had bothered to read, but it was still interesting. I can't imagine how Zanzibar can keep answering the same questions without getting tired of it, but more power to him.
Here's a fun question for you. Sometimes you can get pushed through a solid wall, maybe to another part of the level, but you can't get back because all the doors are closed. Any way around this problem? Without using any codes, I got Obi-Wan to play the queen's part of the Assault level.
I don't know why people complain about all the bugs. I thought they were half the fun. Probably more than that, actually.<font size="-2">
[ July 17, 2001: Message edited by: Master Qui-Gon ]
I second that... some of the bugs sure are fun :D
Master Qui,
Nope, some of the collision issues really foul up the game sometimes, and you're definitely experiencing them. See, a lot of levels basically were built with the EXPRESS INTENT that you NEVER get through Wall A while you're playing Character X, yet sometimes it happens. We never made it possible to get back to where you're supposed to be, because, y'know, you weren't supposed to be where you're at to begin with. We get sheepish grins when we mention those kinda bugs to the programmers nowadays ;)
I got pushed back through the Theed hangar doors once by Darth Maul :D
BTW did anybody know that (using a trainer for invinciblity) thermal detonators can be used to get through the blue-laser wall maze near the "pit room" on the last level? Pretty funny. The shock waves have a propelling force. :D