Tue, 19 November 2024 19:07

Hello crew.

I got burned by mapping and couldn't make anything for almost 3 months. Two months ago I resumed working and I'm proceeding at a slower, steadier pace reaching 65 maps done, basically half of what I need.
Currently I'm tackling city sectors, the ones that require the longest work. I'm happy I didn't go for huger maps than 160x160, but all in all results are worth it.

Long story short: The possibility to release the mod for Christmas is long gone, but I could make it for Easter.

(Well, let's get back to work!)

Dead is dead mode; Mon, 11 November 2024 03:51

A huge thank you to the Stracciatella team, I recently played the game on dead is dead mode and it was a great (and sometimes frustrating) experience.

I was able to beat the game after a few resets and wanted to share my stats with the community.

General playstyle - Night attacks only - my custom merc was a night ops expert

Merc Deaths - 10 + Robot
Grunty - Alma - close combat 18kills
Robot - Meduna - tank 1kill
Wolf - Near Meduna - 76kills
Miguel - Near Meduna 0kills
Hamous - Bugs - 6kills
MD - Bugs - 1kill
Dmitri - Bugs - 2kills
Stephen- Helicopter Crash - endgame - 80 kills
Maddog - Helicopter Crash - endgame 0kills
Ivan - Helicopter Crash - endgame - 8kills
Scope - Helicopter Crash - endgame -62kills

11 Mercs remain - Hudson (my custom merc) (446 kills), Raven (154 kills), Gasket (1 kill ), Ira (2 kills ), Reaper (3 kills), Scully (0 kills ), Spider (9 kills), Static (6 kills), Carlos (0 kills), Cougar (4 kills), Iggy (10 kills)

Total enemy kills = 890 (Hudson 50% Ravem 17% Stephen 9% Wolf 9% Scope 7%)

Kills
Hudson - 445 - Marksmanship 100
Raven - 164
Iggy 10

1st UV goggles - SAM site south of Cambria (huge for overall win)

Hudson (Custom Merc) Final Stats
Agi - 85
Dex - 86 +1
Str - 80 +5
Ldr - 67 +32
Mrk - 100 +20
Exp - 9 +8
Wounded - 39 times

All towns taken
Meduna - 4/6
No Tixa
No Orta
No Chalice of Chance
No finding Joey
Delivered tourists
Defeated Bloodcat lair
Defeated hicks family
2 winning fights at bar (never talked to Kingpin - still alive at end)
Didn’t take Kingpin’s money
Madlab found
Elixir used
No X-RAY detector
Bugs Quest - Stealth (no goop found after killing everyone in the zone I think this was a bug - no pun intended)

Day - 61  completed - Deidrianna defeated on main level - glitch after coming out of tunnels
Daily Income - $39,464 (Chitzena mine out)

Interested to hear if others collected stats in Dead is dead mode

Historically grown Data is a nightmare; Wed, 06 November 2024 13:41

Hi all.

A recent idea of some modifications escalated into a full XML overhaul.
Before you continue a little bit of context: I have never used the xml editor. Maybe 15 years ago I tried to check it out and just by chance caught it on a bad buggy non-working day and ever since I've been working directly in the xml files. Requires more care, but works. Nowadays I'm on linux and the thing outright doesn't start
If any of my comments don't really affect sb who uses a reliable and efficient and easy to use tool like the xml-editor then please disregard (if you interpret a sarcastic undertone please consider that the editor is a separate piece of SW which may experience its own issues that require manual xml input to continue work).

Item.xml has organically grown. 335 entries for Vanilla, 1000+ entries for 1.13 (please see Items 428, 434, 442, 448 for extra confusion...).

I'd like to propose an internal item management concept for the file Items.xml.
The wiki reads: "uiIndex - the item index, number the items sequentially starting at 1 and ending at 5000. Don't skip numbers or the game will crash. Do not use items #0 and #70. Do not use the same number for two different items."
I don't know whether 5000 is a hard limit for the game but all the better as I had the number 8192 in mind.
You use reserved spaces for certain items.

• 0-255: I have noticed a couple items that are essentially required for the game to run properly(and the editor :'D). 255 should be enough for all essential item for non-human enemies, quest-items, keys and so on for 1,13 and all mod ideas ppl may have. Maybe the editor-required entries can just go here as well...
  
• 256-1279: 1000 spaces for attachments, armors, LBE-gear and all other miscellaneous items
  
• 1280-3071: 1700+ spaces for Weapons(may be sub-divided for the weapon types as well)
  
• 3072-4863: 1700+ spaces for ammo
  
• rest: reserve
  

Tue, 05 November 2024 05:25

I'm stuck liberating towns and can't seem to find the plane that I was tasked with finding.  The hacker I was supposed to deliver the plane package to also mentioned some sort of disk that is supposed to be hidden in the game.  Any idea where these two things are.  Sorry if it seems to have flown over my head.  I'm used to just liberating towns.

Tue, 05 November 2024 00:09

Made a SCI for 7609 + DL-1.13

download SCI 7609 + DL-1.13 (v4.50.1)
-
Combination of 7609 plus DL-1.13 (v4.50.1) and cnc-ddraw
That's the latest available DL-1.13 I found at forum (v4.50 plus v4.50.1-patch, see initial DL-1.13-posts by wil473 at this thread (link in readme) )

Installation

1. install original JA2
2. drop contents of SCI into that
3. overwrite when asked

SCI also contains cnc-ddraw (by FunkyFr3sh), that should solve any issues that come with "old gane + modern OS and hardware"
run "cnc-ddraw config.exe" in ja2 main directory for changing its settings (borderless, windowed, fullscreen, fps-rating, shaders, etc)

-

Wed, 30 October 2024 04:48

I tried my hand at this mod, but it's so hard since I keep running low on ammo.  Am I doing something wrong here or is there a patch that fixes this.

Sun, 27 October 2024 20:45

Hi - returning player. Have just installed the 'Wanton Winter' version from SCI. All working fine (I think) but it appears I cannot use the INI editor to change starting cash - unless I am missing something? Specifically, I can change the figures in the INI editor, same as I've done in previous versions - and I then save the changes. But on starting a new game the default figures are still there. Any ideas?

What it says on the tin; Thu, 24 October 2024 20:40

Hi All

Been away - I was fairly active on the forums a while back, but really only as a consumer and play-tester for mods. The release of JA3 brought me back into the game and then made me want to re-start with (the far superior) JA2. But I've forgotten a few things - and I also somewhere along the way managed to lose both my JA2 and Unfinished Business CDs. Just received my Gold Pack CDRom in the post today.

I'll be looking to starting playing available mods again, but before I do, I thought I'd start by just playing a vanilla/un-modded JA2. However, IIRC, that isn't going to be possible whilst running Windows 11 64 bit. Yes, I can run the game in compatibility mode, but to get anything like a useable resolution, I'm going to need v.1.13. I'm pretty sure I can remember how to play around with the INI Editor to achieve what I want to there. And to make things easy, I'll probably go with the SCI for 7609 to start with. BUT - can anyone remind me how much 'base' v1.13 changes things from the original game (what was it, 1.07 with the Gold patch, I can't remember?). Is there anything I'm going to need to mess around with in the INI editor to play a game that feels like the original? Or is that no longer even possible?

I do want to enjoy everything the v. 1.13 offers and the various mods, but would just like to have an original game run through first....

Tue, 15 October 2024 22:56

I have a proposal for a repair option ( on/off ) to 100% in mods where none of the mercenaries can repair to 100%
Any mercenary or just Mechanical or Engineer (the question is how much to limit the possibility of this option working) who reaches 100% Mechanical or 100% Mechanical and 100% Dexterity (the question is how much to limit the possibility of this option working) can repair to 100% using a special toolbox. A special toolbox (a picture of the current toolbox only in a different color or a completely different picture) would be a rare item in some sectors.

Mon, 09 September 2024 13:54

I suggest making different colors depending on the type of camouflage.
Where the camouflage state is shown digitally, make colored numbers.
Green forest camouflage.
Yellow desert camouflage.
White or ash-gray city camouflage.
You will immediately see what camouflage the mercenary has.