Balkans News

[Washout]

Hi All

Just to let you know what is happening with the Balkans theatre.

Currently we have been getting the features that were available in the Balkans V1.0 release ported over to SP2a (betas at the moment).

Progress has been pretty good and most of the core functionality is in and the theatre in the internal test version works with the in game switching. However, we have a few biggish things to sort out before we can release it. They are:

1. tlk file - we need to create a Balkans tlk file for the ATC voices which had Balkans specific voices in. This will be an interim measure pending the creation by the F4UT Voice Team creating a master tlk file.

2. Texture/skin package - In a similar fashion to the tlk file the tex file needs as many Korean theatre skins replaced with their relevant Balkans equivalents. This won't be just for aircraft but for a great many entities e.g buildings, ground units etc etc

3. The release of SP2a itself

Of course there are many other enhancements also being worked on and these will be inlcuded as and when they are ready.

Later


Chris "Washout" Carter

[Ender Wiggin]

How about those who wanna test is that possible?

[Washout]

Hi

Not yet as we don't want to distract the beta test group from the main effort at the moment.

As soon as we get SP2a out the door it'll be available to the betatesters and should have some better features than it does at the moment.

Later

Chris

[Snake Man]

Can you list some of the data edits that come along with Balkans?

PMC TFW
Snake Man

[ccc]

ya, im curious about that too.

say, F18 may have 4 CT records in default koreaobj hdr, but we could need 8 or more in ods, plus tons of skins..how Balkan handle this? switch whole hdr? append new ones? texture use swapping? appending? internal file links?

i feel...you switch files with whole new theater foler, right? should be easier, but huge DL size for each theater, if their content is different from each other.

[Washout]

Hi Guys

Sorry I don't have alot of time at the moment other than to say that we are looking at shipping a new .tex file for the skins for the Balkans. I considered starting down the path of a master tex file but as a 5th squadron in Korea would use the same skins as a 5th squadron in the Balkans I can't see any other way of doing it unless we get a eally clever texture replacing program which the installshield exe can use to insert the new skins (which of course still leaves the problem of switching).

As far as the CT records are concerned I thought (maybe I'm wrong) that you only need a new CT record for the same aircraft being flown in a different country eg F14's in US and Iran.

BTW - For the Balkans we won't be adding any new objects/weapons etc other than those already in the database as the idea was one LOD/CT file set fits all.

That's not to say we won't in the future but this will be by adding to the master database rather than by trying to insert our own on installation.

Hope that helps.

Later


Chris

[Ender Wiggin]

Hows the Balkans?/ i see they fixed it so the sounds folder switches as well.

[Cooler69]

Hi Ender,

Chris is sunning (?) himself in Scotland for a few days, but should be back very soon. He has just released a new beta which I haven't loaded just yet, but I think it contains some updated campaigns among other things. So I would say it is progressing nicely.

[Ender Wiggin]

thanks for the info, cant wait till its thrown at the Beta testers. Its always fun to try something new.

[Cooler69]

Yeah - Chris is waiting until after the SP3 release before the Balkans beta is released to the F4UT beta testers (or those who want it anyway). We don't want to distract anyone from the main task in the meantime.

[BelgianTiger_5]

If somebody wants I can send them my notebook of material used by the yougslav armies when the war was going on.
These notebooks were issued by the Belgian Army to all troops being assigned to the region.

I was in the area for 12 months in tours of 4 months and I would'nt mind sharing any experiences I had.

BT_5

verbist.paasch@pandora.be
icq 127758150