Unofficial Arcanum Patch (Original Thread)

[Earth Nuggets]

Finally, after all these years...

God fucking damn you want to fix this game bad.

...I love you, bro'. No homo'.

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

Considering the magic-tech penalty icon. Earth Nuggets tried to improve an existing one, but it still has jagged edges and overall doesn't look very good, I'm afraid. I think, in order to achieve a good result, we need to make another one from scratch. Also, there's no need to give a "gritty" feel to it, originals look pretty smooth.

 

[Faceless]

Not a bug perse, but it has always bugged me that the flow spectrometer appears as a shield when you enter combat. I think it would look much better if it simply didn't appear on your character at all - like the lantern and electric light.

This next one I cannot be 100% sure of as I had no save that I could use to verify it, but in conversation with a woman in a blue dress in Dernholm, I believe I was given the option to say "Yes mum" as opposed to "Yes ma'am".

 

[Earth Nuggets]

If the Half Ogre in the bar in Stillwater reveals he is from the Molochean Hand and attacks you, some of my party members become angry when I fight back. Pretty much everyone reacts negatively to me simply defending myself. I assume his alignment is messed up.

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

Yes, he had +25 alignment, quite ridiculous. Thanks for reporting!

BTW, any thoughts/opinions on this one?

Another thing. Dragarons don't use any soundbank, and there's no soundbank for them in the game. How about giving them, let's say, hell beast's one? Any suggestions on this one?

 

[Kavax]

Hey Drog, do you know about the Dernholm ending that plays a voice file of Joachim? In Terra Arcanum's forums someone said that this was supposed to be the ending where the older brother of King Praetor is found, and the woman warrior that you send to rescue him is dead. If the voice file doesn't actually exist, maybe one could be created cutting off the part that speaks about that woman, much like the Shrouded Hills' good ending if Doc Roberts is dead.

 

[Shambelle]

I made a cleaner icon for the tech-magick penalty:

What do you think about it ?
I can, of course, make the edge (dark red) a little brighter to get more contrast compared to the target.

Keep in mind that the icon must be:
-small to be inserted in a 37*20 image (format of the .art used)
-with few detail due the low dimension of the icons
-linked somehow to magick and technology
-circled with a black trait like the other icons
-not too bright (or dark) to get in contrast with the other icons

If the model really don't suit you, well then, have you an idea for another ?

 

[Ander Vinz]

K'AN HUA PWNS NASRUDDIN

[real in-game situation - i have a savegame]

This and more bugs in my next report. Look forward to it!

 

[Neuro]

God, someone get this guy the source code and an army of helper monkeys. Stat.

 

[Earth Nuggets]

Hey Drog, do you know about the Dernholm ending that plays a voice file of Joachim?

Huh, so someone actually had that audio play with the ending slide?

If this can be confirmed, I actually just edited the sound file so there's no mention of Lianna: http://media.putfile.com/Dernholm-Lianna-Dead

 

[Grump]

It's possible to get locked inside one of those shacks surrounding Pelojian's Pool. If you or your party doesn't happen to have something like a scroll of exiting on them you're screwed.

There's a typo in Simeon Tor's speech I think I don't have the exact line number so someone else can look it up.

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

I made a cleaner icon for the tech-magick penalty:

What do you think about it ?
I can, of course, make the edge (dark red) a little brighter to get more contrast compared to the target.

Yes, the edges should be brighter, they blend with the target now, and look more like a circle than a gear.

Hey Drog, do you know about the Dernholm ending that plays a voice file of Joachim? In Terra Arcanum's forums someone said that this was supposed to be the ending where the older brother of King Praetor is found, and the woman warrior that you send to rescue him is dead. If the voice file doesn't actually exist, maybe one could be created cutting off the part that speaks about that woman, much like the Shrouded Hills' good ending if Doc Roberts is dead.

Yes, I know of this problem. It's very unlikely though that Lianna dies (why would you kill her?), so I don't think anybody has ever seen this one. But yes, we may cut off the part about her from other sound clip and use that, or disable the ending altogether.

If this can be confirmed, I actually just edited the sound file so there's no mention of Lianna: http://media.putfile.com/Dernholm-Lianna-Dead

I see, that you reencoded the file. We need to cut it off with out reencoding (in order to not lose quality), there are programs that do this. Unfortunately, I don't have such a program right now, but I'll look into it later.

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

A little bit more about sprite mirroring.

It was implemented quite late in the development, not long before the demo and the beta test builds. Earlier versions didn't have it, as you can see.

Arcanum looked really awesome with full frames, didn't it? I still feel depressed that they did this in 2001, perhaps if sprite mirroring was an option, people wouldn't complain that much that Arcanum had crappy graphics. Because, really, if you turn off sprite mirroring, the whole game experience changes drastically.

I disabled sprite mirroring in WorldEd as well, so here are some examples of rotation #3:

All animations were included in the final game, it's almost 200 mb of extra animations (around 40% of all animations), but were never used. Until now. It's really ridiculous and saddening that they disabled it all at the last moment. I'm pretty sure, that if Arcanum had a proper patch back in 2001 (that would have fixed this and many other important bugs), it would have much more fans.

And I wonder, why nobody else noticed and turned off sprite mirroring.

 

[Faceless]

Super quick edit:

>

This any better?

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

Super quick edit:

>

This any better?

Yes, this is perfect. Edges look great, and the magick symbol isn't too dim. Can you post the icon alone? Preferably in 8-bit bmp.

 

[Faceless]

This right?

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

This right?

If you post it in PNG, then post it with transparency at least. The one in the picture has black outline, which must be preserved.

 

[Faceless]

Sorry about that, ImageShack won't let me upload a .bmp (automatically converts it to .png).

 

[Earth Nuggets]

I see, that you reencoded the file. We need to cut it off with out reencoding (in order to not lose quality), there are programs that do this. Unfortunately, I don't have such a program right now, but I'll look into it later.

I went ahead and found such an application (found here) and redid the cut: Link

Be assured, the quality is identical to the original.

[Edit - Other link stopped working]

For Faceless:
8-bit BMP
GIF with transparency

 

[Noceur]

Hat off to you, DBT. I've gotta replay Arcanum when your next patch version is out.

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

Here's how Faceless' edit of the icon looks in the game:

This will be included in the next version if there are no objections.

I went ahead and found such an application (found here) and redid the cut: Link

Be assured, the quality is identical to the original.

Excellent. You saved me quite some time.

BTW, both of you (and Shambelle) will get credited for your efforts. Thanks for the help.

 

[Claw]

Hot damn, Drog! You're patching this game faster than I can play it. Will sprite mirroring already be turned off in the next patch?

 

[Drog Black Tooth]

Hot damn, Drog! You're patching this game faster than I can play it. Will sprite mirroring already be turned off in the next patch?

Of course. I didn't find any "unforeseen consequences" with it turned off, so this change will be included.

BTW, added the thanks section to the first post.

 

[Faceless]

Couple of things I've found whilst playing.

1. After Gildor Nightwalk (of Stillwater) tells you about the demons and how his companions would not have died had they just read the stone tablet, you are given the option to say "Such irony." This ends the conversation with him which seems odd to me. Is this how Troika intended it?

2. After telling Cynthia Boggs that you will help her to escape from the Isle of Dispair you have the option to say the following: "Here's a pistol they gave me to give to you," but the pistol is not removed from your inventory or added to hers.

3. As your price for helping Cynthia Boggs you can demand that she give you her locket (something she seems very reluctant to do) however later - in the brief time you have her in your party for and if you have chosen to help her for nothing - you can take it from her freely without so much as a batted eyelid.

4. This might be considered a balance issue, but I think Reanimators should be worth more than the pittance you can sell them for.

 

[Pussycat669]

How exactly were you able to hack the engine if one may ask?