XIII-The-Game : what next ?
Finally, on the 23th april, we got the answer : Ubi.com is definitively down for XIII.
" ...Unfortunately this game will not work anymore in multiplayer because of the age of it ...Sorry"
And the Ubisoft support to add that we have to find on our own way if we request a masterserver tool...
Indeed, I agree that everyone can be fed up of the bugs of XIII...
Paradoxically, in the earlier months of this year, the XIII background has never been so active, while the online scene was falling apart, and recently i got this conversation with Arthur :
Hello Arthur, now that is official, ubi's servers are definitively closed for XIII. Through this sad decision, do you think there is an alternative to host again a server online?
There is indeed an alternative solution by creating an own master server for XIII and implementing a connection for it in-game. The necessary steps can be accomplished by using the TCP/UDP UnrealScript classes of the Unreal Engine to communicate out of the game.
I intend to get on this way, as I originally had in mind. But after Ubisoft's server went down, I tried out UDK and lost the motivation on the custom server as first priority. I think it is just a favor for a very small number of players, so not that worth for now.
As Ubisoft's decision is definitive, there will arrive for sure a custom master server to connect to. Just hold on.
Around this community, there were lots of discussions about creating customized contents like other Unreal Engine games provide. We know it has been a kind of difficulty to merge out some workable mods or to improve the lag issues. Besides, the level design and the XIII editor abilities are limited, due to the lack of features of such a 8 years-old game. What does your current project consist in?
Instead to play around with a solution about the master server issue for a not-too-big audience, short time after the XIII blackout I started a much more ambitious project: the remake of the game using the Unreal Engine 3.
The goal is to have a nearly free adaption of the original XIII gameplay with all its characters and ambience, providing support for missing features like ridable vehicles, native 4/CTF support, and sound management. Known bugs will be easier removable and potential security leaks can be fixed within the core instead by doing ugly hacking around it.
One thing I consider for a better coherence among the community, is to implement a chat lobby to the online multiplayer. When looking to the XIII beta build code, you can find there such a functionality too, which obviously had been abandoned in the retail version.
By all means, however, the first commandment is to keep the common XIII spirit in the remake, designing it not just as an addition, but rather as an up-to-date version of the known first-person shooter "XIII" and a framework for those willing to create the actual sequel which many people are striving for.
What is the current UDK project status? What are the XIII objects you can import successfully and make them working?
Currently I have saved 3119 textures, 129 skeletal meshes, 43 (of 96) animation sets, 5567 sound pieces (themes & story dialogs in five languages) and, with eventual help, soon or later I am going to recreate the 5066 static meshes from the original game. Additionally, sounds will be added for the weapons, items, footsteps, pawns and so on (actually about 4 Gb total size).
Beside static meshes and sounds, the probably most challenging task will be the scripting part. Containing more than 1300 classes, the XIII UnrealScript classes foundation is full of Unreal Engine 2 syntax and dependencies that need to be adapted to Unreal Engine 3 conformable code. This will make one busy for a while.
And we think about the amazing networking capabilities too.
Here, a couple of pictures to have a better look of this ambitious project :
skeletal mesh import http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/560/xiiiwcelshadingudk.jpg/
end-map video import (Bink) http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/163/cinexx.jpg/
staticmesh conversion http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/406/blenderstaticue3xiii.jpg/
UDK sound browser http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/339/soundsue3xiii.jpg/
staticmesh from XIIIEd to Blender http://img850.imageshack.us/img850/5963/batacastill01.jpg
Jones as you've never seen her before http://imageshack.us/f/803/jonesudkwocelshading.jpg/
Stay tuned ! |
