1  |   Order by index

Feb 4, 1999, 5:45am

Weather bots: moving clouds (maybe even a morphing algorythm or two to give the effect of actual clouds), storms (rain, snow,
hail, cats and dogs, whatever), fog, etc. Woo! Sure would look more realistic than animated textures on polygons that go too fast
or are too jerky if repeating frames...

Feb 4, 1999, 10:09pm

I agree with this one, we really need the worlds to become more dynamic. . .the staticness that surrounds them now is both boring,
and totally unneeded . ..we have the technology now to do this. . .why doesnt someone do a weather boit ? It could have several
differnt aspects. . .changing the backdrop when storms come . ..it could go back for nice sunny times. ..a tornado disaster that
ruins buildings, and of coruse, eeps rain an such. . .

someone msut be able to do this. .instead of writing those boring damn greeter and advertising bots (which do jack in my opinion),
you should all get along an do this. ..mm, *sigh*. . if only I could program . ..but maths pisses me off so i never did get into it
besides JS and HTML .. .

[View Quote] > Weather bots: moving clouds (maybe even a morphing algorythm or two to give the effect of actual clouds), storms (rain, snow,
> hail, cats and dogs, whatever), fog, etc. Woo! Sure would look more realistic than animated textures on polygons that go too fast
> or are too jerky if repeating frames...

Feb 4, 1999, 11:21pm

I was considering working on a weatherbot but I wasn't sure where I could get some decent weather objects. :)
- Ima

[View Quote] > I agree with this one, we really need the worlds to become more dynamic. . .the staticness that surrounds them now is both boring,
> and totally unneeded . ..we have the technology now to do this. . .why doesnt someone do a weather boit ? It could have several
> differnt aspects. . .changing the backdrop when storms come . ..it could go back for nice sunny times. ..a tornado disaster that
> ruins buildings, and of coruse, eeps rain an such. . .
>
> someone msut be able to do this. .instead of writing those boring damn greeter and advertising bots (which do jack in my opinion),
> you should all get along an do this. ..mm, *sigh*. . if only I could program . ..but maths pisses me off so i never did get into it
> besides JS and HTML .. .
>
[View Quote]

Feb 5, 1999, 12:43am

hay man, yuo build the bot and i'll mkae the objects, or make sure that you GET the objects for weather. .seriously =)

[View Quote] > I was considering working on a weatherbot but I wasn't sure where I could get some decent weather objects. :)
> - Ima
>
[View Quote] -

Feb 5, 1999, 3:32am

As I have been spending a great deal of time working on my world which is
themed as a very traditional medieval/fantasy setting, the question is
starting to nag at me. . .

Why are we dead set on creating replicas of the "real" world? (Or previously
imagined ones) Isn't part of the point of this medium to do things that are
not possible? Perhaps we can create environments that have internally
consistent rules that are completely different from those that we expect of
a "world." Shall we do more "virtual" and less "reality"?

And for heaven's sake, don't do just a weather bot, at the very least if you
are going to get into hyper-realism, do an eco-system bot.

Archon Manus
Vizier D'Magienne





[View Quote]

Feb 5, 1999, 1:54pm

Archon,

Eep²'s comments notwithstanding, I think you have made a very interesting
comment! With a little imagination, a little technical know-how and *very*
little attention to what appear to be the apparent limitations of AW, I
should think there could be many possible interpretations of your idea!

Much of this needs to be done at the SDK level, though, which is what the
SDK newsgroup is for. This newsgroup, 'bots', is for the use and users of
the products of SDK - the HamBot scripts, etc.,

Oh, btw, Eep², yours is an interesting idea, too - you're right, there is
too much SDK effort aimed at 'standard' (read 'humanoid') bot creation, and
we should be expanding our horizons! You've already got me thinking of how
I could do this with HamBot...

Feb 5, 1999, 6:34pm

[View Quote] > As I have been spending a great deal of time working on my world which is
> themed as a very traditional medieval/fantasy setting, the question is
> starting to nag at me. . .
>
> Why are we dead set on creating replicas of the "real" world? (Or previously
> imagined ones) Isn't part of the point of this medium to do things that are
> not possible? Perhaps we can create environments that have internally
> consistent rules that are completely different from those that we expect of
> a "world." Shall we do more "virtual" and less "reality"?

With a single, static, white light source, hardly any environment interaction, shitty avatar collision detection, limited object collision detection, and all the other restraints, limits, and shortcomings of AW, what's possible has for the most part already been done in AW. Look at all the other 3D games out there, for example, say, Zelda 64. Now that's supposed to be THE 3D game for now. Multiple, dynamic, colored lights, extensive environment interaction, much better avatar/object collision detection (than AW), etc, etc, etc make AW look like shit. Even Tomb Raider (TR) 1 (and 2 and 3) make AW look like shit, and TR isn't even that innovative since when it first came out over 4 years ago (AW is about as old as TR, too)! http://tnlc.com/eep/tr/compare.html for a comparison between TR and AW.

So until AW provides enough customization to do "reality" well enough, "neo-realistic" environments can't be created because they'll just be shotty representations of "pseudo-realistic" environments which fall short of even ATTEMPTING to "surpass" said known "realistic" environments. Dig? It's a catch-22, really. Can't move beyond what you can't already achieve...

> And for heaven's sake, don't do just a weather bot, at the very least if you
> are going to get into hyper-realism, do an eco-system bot.

Considering a "simple" weather bot would be complicated enough, an ecosystem bot would be way more complicated. I mean even the deer bot someone is working on doesn't sound very realistic. Not ALL deer run away when people are x meters away from them.

[View Quote]

Feb 5, 1999, 9:03pm

[View Quote]


Indeed, the features of AW are far from the state of the art, the attraction
for me is that is a (near) real-time, persistent, sharable "universe" over
which I can have significant control with minimal investment. I can create
stuff that I can enjoy and perhaps others can as well.

My point tho was to do entirely different things with AW than make what is
recognizeable as a "world." One idea that I am considering, but have not
taken the time to execute is to host the object path on a web server under
my control and to have a utility that renames all the object files every 5
minutes or so in a predetermined or even random :) cycle. If the objects in
the "world" are created and layed out with care, this would have the very
odd effect that every time you bounce, you are looking at a completely
different "world" than you were 5 minutes ago. I would guess that it could
be like being inside a giant 3D kaleidoscope. There needs to be more to it
than just this novelty, but that's one direction away from the standard AW
world that we know and love.



you
>
>Considering a "simple" weather bot would be complicated enough, an
ecosystem bot would be way more complicated. I mean even the deer bot
someone is working on doesn't sound very realistic. Not ALL deer run away
when people are x meters away from them.
>




Heh, what I'm implying is that if you take on a LARGE challenge, perhaps
boredom will disappear. On the other hand it may be offset by frustration :)




give

Feb 5, 1999, 9:33pm

[View Quote] ch is
is
eviously
hat are
y
pect of
[View Quote] That would be annoying because the downloads would take forever if the ob=
jects were COMPLETELY new every 5 minutes. Plus everything would look mor=
e like chaos and probably only TRULY "enjoyable" unless frying one's ass =
off. No, I'd rather have structure and identification. Also, be glad AW c=
alls them "worlds" and not "levels". Personally I don't like the idea of =
"worlds" anyway. I don't like all the disconnectedness of all the worlds.=
Modularity is good, but only when the modules are part of a greater whol=
e and allow for connectivity. With teleporting, having "external" worlds =
is unnecessary since, say, one large "world" (universe) could hold all th=
e other "worlds" (countries). This is a tad confusing but would be great =
for a world like America. The owner, Jetta Lewis, has many other "worlds"=
named after the states. All these states should be in America "world" (c=
ountry) and allow gradual transition from one to the other (not to mentio=
n keeping the state layout). This would require something to the effect o=
f "zones" within "worlds" to differentiate between the different "states"=
=2E Each zone would have its own "world features and rights", similar to =
state laws. The world/country would also have its OWN world features/righ=
ts, but hopefully they wouldn't be changed too much since it would affect=
all of the states...or the state features/rights could overrun the count=
ry's. Woo, this is just like how the US government works...well, sorta a=
nyway. Anyway, call it democratic Active Worlds or something. OK, now my =
brain hurts...heh.

t if you
system bot would be way more complicated. I mean >even the deer bot someo=
ne is working on doesn't sound very realistic. Not ALL deer run away when=
people are x meters away >from them.
>
> Heh, what I'm implying is that if you take on a LARGE challenge, perhap=
s
> boredom will disappear. On the other hand it may be offset by frustrati=
on :)

Unfortunately, I don't enjoy programming, and as I have yet to see ANY ot=
her SDK application other than a silly bot, I thought I'd make my weather=
"bot" suggestion relatively simple to start.

Feb 6, 1999, 3:58am

I like your zone idea, it'd be really nice. . .especially since I don't have
anything to do with coding it :)

Archon Manus

Feb 7, 1999, 3:33am

This ecosystem idea reminds me of an idea I had a while back, and I believe
other people have talked about it as well....

Sort of a "sim life" program that will allow cetrain objects to "grow".
You could have the bot cause plants and trees to grow and reproduce at a
given speed. (the growth would obviously would have to take place at a
much accelerated rate :)

The idea is simple - you build an "acorn.rwx". The bot checks the timestamp
on it and when its x minutes old, it replaces it with "z_oak_sapling1.rwx".
Then "z_oak_sapling2.rwx" and so on as the tree grows. Once it gets so big,
it has a certain chance of "spawning" an "acorn.rwx" nearby.

Plants that grow naturally could belong to cit #0 so anyone could come along
and cut 'em down when they wanted to build in a given area.

If done in a public building world, it would give much more meaning to the
concept of gardening - if you planted flowers and deleted weeds, you would
have a nice garden. If you let your land go and never took care of it, it
would beome overgrown. This would entice people to return to their homes and
care for them even after they have finished building.

If you made the plants themselves "z" objects, then you couldn't just place
full-grown plants - you could only place "seed" objects that would grow into
a full plant over time. So, you couldn't just put a line of mighty oaks
around your house, but would have to plant then and wait. :) Since its a z
object you can't move it once it starts growing - you can only delete it or
let it grow.

This would make for quite a dynamic world. Anyway, its another one of those
ideas that has been in my head forever and will never see the light of day
'cause im too dang busy. :)

Shamus Young
Artwork / World Developer
Activeworlds.com, Inc
Email: shamus at activeworlds.com
Personal Homepage: http://users.penn.com/~shamus/
================================================
- - --= A C T I V E W O R L D S =-- - -
See the future of the net in a 3D interactive world!
http://www.activeworlds.com


[View Quote]

Feb 7, 1999, 4:53am

Kudos!

This idea and variations on it make for very interesting thinking. . .thanks
:)

Archon Manus
Vizier D'Magienne


[View Quote]

Feb 7, 1999, 5:30am

Played Zelda64 yet? It's got plants that grow back SMOOTHLY after Link slices 'em up. AW looks outdated more and more with each new game release. Sad...

[View Quote] > This ecosystem idea reminds me of an idea I had a while back, and I believe
> other people have talked about it as well....
>
> Sort of a "sim life" program that will allow cetrain objects to "grow".
> You could have the bot cause plants and trees to grow and reproduce at a
> given speed. (the growth would obviously would have to take place at a
> much accelerated rate :)
>
> The idea is simple - you build an "acorn.rwx". The bot checks the timestamp
> on it and when its x minutes old, it replaces it with "z_oak_sapling1.rwx".
> Then "z_oak_sapling2.rwx" and so on as the tree grows. Once it gets so big,
> it has a certain chance of "spawning" an "acorn.rwx" nearby.
>
> Plants that grow naturally could belong to cit #0 so anyone could come along
> and cut 'em down when they wanted to build in a given area.
>
> If done in a public building world, it would give much more meaning to the
> concept of gardening - if you planted flowers and deleted weeds, you would
> have a nice garden. If you let your land go and never took care of it, it
> would beome overgrown. This would entice people to return to their homes and
> care for them even after they have finished building.
>
> If you made the plants themselves "z" objects, then you couldn't just place
> full-grown plants - you could only place "seed" objects that would grow into
> a full plant over time. So, you couldn't just put a line of mighty oaks
> around your house, but would have to plant then and wait. :) Since its a z
> object you can't move it once it starts growing - you can only delete it or
> let it grow.
>
> This would make for quite a dynamic world. Anyway, its another one of those
> ideas that has been in my head forever and will never see the light of day
> 'cause im too dang busy. :)
>
[View Quote]

Feb 7, 1999, 1:59pm

Zelda 64 does make aw look like a junk yard, and the day night passage is a nice effect to...

[View Quote] > Played Zelda64 yet? It's got plants that grow back SMOOTHLY after Link slices 'em up. AW looks outdated more and more with each new game release. Sad...
>
[View Quote]

Feb 7, 1999, 2:02pm

Thats a good idea :)

maybe I can do it or get someone to do it, it may go good with some other ideas
I've been working on,

Such as a AI simulator where you put a few animals into a world, than eventually
they will mate and spawn other bots with the whole predator prey food chain
thing going on at the same time, and also I was thinknig if there was only a way
to get around avatar restrictions not only could the animals evolve mentally but
also physically were the program could edit the rwx file to include a new gene
and than upload that file ot the server and use it as its avatar...

[View Quote] > This ecosystem idea reminds me of an idea I had a while back, and I believe
> other people have talked about it as well....
>
> Sort of a "sim life" program that will allow cetrain objects to "grow".
> You could have the bot cause plants and trees to grow and reproduce at a
> given speed. (the growth would obviously would have to take place at a
> much accelerated rate :)
>
> The idea is simple - you build an "acorn.rwx". The bot checks the timestamp
> on it and when its x minutes old, it replaces it with "z_oak_sapling1.rwx".
> Then "z_oak_sapling2.rwx" and so on as the tree grows. Once it gets so big,
> it has a certain chance of "spawning" an "acorn.rwx" nearby.
>
> Plants that grow naturally could belong to cit #0 so anyone could come along
> and cut 'em down when they wanted to build in a given area.
>
> If done in a public building world, it would give much more meaning to the
> concept of gardening - if you planted flowers and deleted weeds, you would
> have a nice garden. If you let your land go and never took care of it, it
> would beome overgrown. This would entice people to return to their homes and
> care for them even after they have finished building.
>
> If you made the plants themselves "z" objects, then you couldn't just place
> full-grown plants - you could only place "seed" objects that would grow into
> a full plant over time. So, you couldn't just put a line of mighty oaks
> around your house, but would have to plant then and wait. :) Since its a z
> object you can't move it once it starts growing - you can only delete it or
> let it grow.
>
> This would make for quite a dynamic world. Anyway, its another one of those
> ideas that has been in my head forever and will never see the light of day
> 'cause im too dang busy. :)
>
> Shamus Young
> Artwork / World Developer
> Activeworlds.com, Inc
> Email: shamus at activeworlds.com
> Personal Homepage: http://users.penn.com/~shamus/
> ================================================
> - - --= A C T I V E W O R L D S =-- - -
> See the future of the net in a 3D interactive world!
> http://www.activeworlds.com
>
[View Quote]

Feb 7, 1999, 2:40pm

I second that Ima... will make weather objects for ya, clouds, whatever
;-)

Casay

[View Quote]

Mar 20, 1999, 3:22am

Hi All!

[View Quote] > As I have been spending a great deal of time working on my world which is
> themed as a very traditional medieval/fantasy setting, the question is
> starting to nag at me. . .
>
> Why are we dead set on creating replicas of the "real" world? (Or previously
> imagined ones) Isn't part of the point of this medium to do things that are
> not possible? Perhaps we can create environments that have internally
> consistent rules that are completely different from those that we expect of
> a "world." Shall we do more "virtual" and less "reality"?
>
> And for heaven's sake, don't do just a weather bot, at the very least if you
> are going to get into hyper-realism, do an eco-system bot.
>
> Archon Manus
> Vizier D'Magienne
>
[View Quote] Umm.........................RIGHT ON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-JWT

--
Life is too short to use HIGH-LEVEL LANGUAGES!
http://www2.crosswinds.net/winston-salem/~ticklejw/

1  |   Order by index