No, you're not dreaming - Neurotic Conversions is actually being updated, after three years of silence. Now, those of you who know me and have been following my work over on the Inside3D forums know that I haven't remained idle during these last years and that, after a short break, I'm still modding and mapping for Quake1 (even though a little more slowly than in the past), as shown through my recent participation to QExpo11.

Long story short, updating the site had become increasingly difficult due to technical difficulties. First, Skynet, (Belgian) Belgacom's sister company, made it pretty much impossible for me to access my files, since they have no password-retrieving system that actually works and, despite my numerous emails, would simply refuse to help me out. Second, Belgacom itself, which subcontracts its domain name offers to another company, has been unable (or unwilling?) to help me redirect my old domain (planetcocot.net) to another location. I won't go into the details of how poor Belgacom's customer service has been on this issue, I'll just say that, despite my attempts to cancel a domain name system which hadn't been working for months, Belgacom still made me pay for a whole new year. Right now, I'm basically paying to get my old domain name redirect to... google, and there is apparently nothing I can do about it.

Tired of this, I decided to relocate everything to a new host and a new domain on which I can have total control, http://www.planetcocot.COM (update your favorites!). Since I was at it, I also decided to refresh the site by giving it an updated, less clustered design. The site is, in fact, still very much in the redesigning process, so don't be surprised to find out that some of the links in this page's menu don't yet lead to redesigned pages or that there is no working links in my previous news posts...

See you very soon for more news! And, until then, here are some screenshots of my work in the last three years... If you haven't done it so, make sure to check Incas vs Pharaohs, my most recent contribution to the Quake1 modding (and playing) community! :-)

I've been cleaning up the site a little bit. First, there is now an "older news" page (available through a link at the very bottom of this page) that will help make the front page load a little faster. I also moved the Arcade page to the Abandonned Projects (it was about time) and created a new section under my Quake1 mods dedicated to Piranah Quake.
 
I also updated some dead links.
I got rid of the mirrors for Spacewalk that didn't work anymore and reuploaded the mod (with the hotfix) on the new, super cool Quaketastic files hub: click here if you want to download it.
After a couple of years of dead links, I also uploaded Quakability Bot Arena 2.1, also on Quaketastic. You can get it here. Now, this is a slightly different version from the original, as the music tracks have been taken out, but it's still quite fun... and a piece of Neurotic Conversions history! :-)
 
It's not like I have a lot of free time on my hands or anything (I have tons of papers to correct for next week and my own work to write, then I'm flying to Europe for the holidays), but I'm feeling like spending some of that scarce free time in the next few months on Quake1. This is my to-do list (I guess we're getting close to 2009, so I'm already thinking about new resolutions :-)), in order of importance:
- possibly get something done for the next speedmodding event
- work on the release of UQC 1.5 (yeah, I know, it's crazy... I've coded in three (very fun) new game modes since 1.4 - this is the last version, I promise!)
- work on the release of SpaceWalk 1.1. I've worked in taking into account the comments and feedback after the 1.0 release and I'd like to give the mod a nice (final) release.
- go back to mapping for TransloQuake. I spent a lot of time on designing the mapping goodies for the competition. I feel it's time to work on my own maps again. The Checkpoints and Ricochet modes have a lot of potential, I feel. I definitely should make sure to have at least one good-looking map for each mode available in the full release of the mod.
- get my hands dirty in InfraRed again. It's just plain silly to have pushed it on the side for so long.
- then, and only then, start working on new projects. I have a couple of things on the backburner, some silly, some very exciting. Time will tell when they'll see the light, but you, the visitors of my site, will be the first one informed about them :-)

After a few weeks working on and off on "souping-up" demo2 of Transloquake, here is the new demo of my mod in construction. For those of you who don't know the mod, make sure to check the Transloquake page. The new version comes with a lot of goodies, especially for mappers who wish to take part in the second part of the Transloquake Mapping Competition:

- more than 10 new triggers that can create totally new, Portal-like (if needed) situations: teleportable translocator beacons, beacon-destroying triggers, magnetic triggers, no-shoot zones, translocator-affected buttons, self-destroying translocators, range-altering triggers… and many more
- a new game-mode, CLOCKMODE, in which the goal is to get as many keys as possible within a limited time
- a new game-mode, RICOCHET, in which players can only translocate if their translocator beacon bounces on specific walls, a new way to complicate the game!
- a new game-mode, CHECKPOINTS, in which players not only have to get keys, but also need to pass through specific checkpoint portals (see screenshot below), challenging and fun!

As most of you know, QExpo did take place last month and, boy, it certainly did not disappoint. I must admit I have been incredibly busy during most of it (and not with Quake-related stuff, I'm afraid) and I thus had to be a lot less involved in it as I had wished but, hey, that's okay. I was really pleasantly surprised by the amount of new Quake1 projects and mods unveiled, many of which I'll look at more closely in the following weeks. A very nice gust of fresh air in the community, that's for sure... now if only we could keep these people around and if only it made the I3D forums a little livelier, it would be perfect! :-)

Now, I came a little too late to post my mini-mod, Piranah Quake, onto my booth... I was somehow under the impression that QExpo was going to close on the 15th... Anyway, since I can't connect to my booth anymore, here it is! It's pretty simple stuff, really and nothing to really boast about, but hopefully it'll keep you entertained for a couple of minutes...

The other big news (and I was able to post about that on my booth) was the release by Entar of the great Sky Castle map, his entry to the Transloquake competition. As the sole entry, Entar naturally won the first prize and, as we speak, is probably, as a result, enjoying playing Team Fortress 2 with his friends! :-)

As I already hinted at on the I3D forums, there will be a second part to this competition, with a deadline situated some time after winter break. I'm also planning to release an updated version of the progs.dat in order to offer mappers a lot more options mapping-wise. 
So keep your eyes open ;-)

If it hadn't been for a recent post by Scar3crow on this I3D thread, this post would probably have sounded a little more dramatic still, but it does not mean we're suddenly bathing in optimism, either...

It looks like QExpo2008 will be somewhat delayed. Not knowing what is going on behind the scenes, I have no idea why it is so, but cannot help but feel a little disappointed to see many people in the various Q1 communities I check (mainly I3D and Func) being left in a state of uncertainty and, except for Scar's messages, nobody there to tell them what is going on. I believe that most of what made former QExpo great experiences was the hype that builds itself up around it, sneak peaks of designs, exchanges on ideas on how to make it different from the other ones, news on some of the scheduled events, the excitement of seeing the date drawing closer and closer, and finally to work on one's booth a couple of days before the great opening... I hope it's not too late to bring that spirit back into this year's edition.

Anyway... I was really hoping that some booth template would be made available early enough so that I could prepare a little something before heading to California (I'll leave tomorrow and will be back a little more than a week later), if only some screenshots and comments, but I obviously have to give up on that. Sadly, being both very busy with work and not seeing anything coming news-wise about QExpo did not really help me feel I had to be committed to working on my mods in the past few weeks. So I can't really say what my contribution is going to be, whenever QExpo takes place. Work still has to be done on my mini-mod. Uncertainty makes setting up a "schedule" for modding for QExpo difficult and the closer we'll get to the beginning of my classes (last week of August), the harder it is going to be for me.

QExpo being delayed makes the deadlines for the Transloquake mapping competition a little awkward, since we're not even sure QExpo will have even started by then. I decided not to change them, though, if only because it would be unfair to anyone who mapped for it and tried to meet the original deadline. I have reasons to believe there won't be many entries, however, so that make things not as problematic as it seems. I want to thank the mappers who showed interest in the mod but were short of time to map for the competition, as well as the people who said they might participate. Depending on how things go for the original deadline, my setting up a second competition with a later deadline is not excluded (in case, for example, only one of the two games are being given away because of low participation).

Lots of news for you guys! :-)
 
First of all, I'm glad to announce that I've just released the second demo for Transloquake!
You can download it HERE!
This is a short list of what's new in this release:
- Three additional maps : a speed-challenge one (tr13.bsp, shown in the Youtube video below), a "regular" ascention-type one (tr5.bsp, shown in the screenshot above) and a mapping "guide" (not really playable per se, but good if you're interested in mapping for the mod).
- Some new code. It's now possible to cancel translocation if you feel like it (but you have a limited amount of tries). Three bonus have been added: extra cancellation possibilities, "perfect horizontal" shots (enables you to travel in straight horizontal lines) and "sticky" shots (where your translocator sticks onto horizontal surfaces instead of bouncing)
As for the first demo, we're dealing here, once again, with only part of the full mod. My goal is still to include 8 to 10 maps in the full release. At this point, models have also been a bit of a neglected part of my work, but you can be sure that things will change in the future. Last but not least, I'm also planning to include a variety of deathmatch modes into the mod, which should be a lot of fun.
 
The release of this demo was spurred, I must admit, by my desire to set up a little mapping competition around the mod. Yes, that's right, if you download the demo and build a map for it, you might very well win a prize: a brand new, critically-acclaimed FPS/TPS! All information about this competition is available on these four (and only) "official" forum threads at:
- Inside 3D
- Func_Messageboard
- QuakeOne
- QuakeDev
Be sure to participate! Mapping for Transloquake is extremely easy and you have a whole month to offer one or more entries to the competition!
 
 

In a weird turn of events and despite my (extremely) relative "retirement" from the Q1 modding community a couple of years ago, I'm thus ending up working, as I explained on this I3D thread, on several projects simultaneously, all of which, well, show nice signs of improvement (when they are not, like in the case of Spacewalk, pretty much done).
I mean, Spacewalk has been released and all I would like to do about it now is make, at one point or another, a little update available to respond some of the comments and suggestions that have been made about it.  Transloquake is also out there and (to me, anyway) is looking nice. Some maps only need some more polishing up before being releasable, others need to be worked on a little more actively, but the whole project is chugging along nicely. When it comes to InfraRed, coding has been a little slow since last winter, but I think it's more than likely that the project will also see the light. Believe it or not, I've also coded a little bit on what is going to be the very last version of Ultimate Quad Capture, with two additional game modes. Last but not least, I'm also hoping to release a "secret" mini-mod during the upcoming QExpo.
 
I did not think that having several projects on the table at the same time was a good idea, but I guess it hasn't been as bad as I thought. This is very different from my former approach, when I used to code only one mod at a time. I think the benefit of this is that I never really quite get "fried" working on them, as I can continuously hop from one mod to the other when I feel I'm starting to get bored. The downside of it is, of course, that, on the whole, the whole production process is much, much slower. It's a little hard to believe, for instance, that I started coding Transloquake more than a year and a half ago. Granted, the mod requires extra time since I'm spending more time mapping than for any other of my mods before (something that I quite enjoy, in fact), but still...
 
That said, I'm actually a little surprised that, in the last couple of weeks, I have found time for Quake1 modding. Given my work and academic situation, believe me, I should have spent a lot less time on it than I did (modding is nice but, unfortunately, it does not pay the bills). In other words, I feel I'm going to have to slow down a little and concentrate on my studies a little more in the next couple of months. Just a little warning. I'll be around and will be active on the I3D forum, but, modding-wise, my QExpo mini-mod is probably going to be the only thing I really will afford to work on for the rest of the summer. The ball is rolling though, and I hope to see many of you come up with cool maps for Transloquake through the competition :-)

I have been a little swamped with work lately, which accounts for the late release, but here it is at last!

Download Spacewalk here!

Update: Some people have reported issues with teleporting platforms (too much velocity "pushed" them back towards an already touched platform). If that is your case, make sure to turn the "always run" mode off and download this "hotfix" (replace the progs.dat in your Spacewalk folder by the new one)

Mirrors (contain the hotfix) :
on Mediafire
on the Shub-Hub (thanks, Spirit!)
For more info of this new Quake1 mod, check the SpaceWalk page :-)

That's right! Just some polishing to do, some demos to record and help files to write, and Spacewalk should be officially released! Until then, enjoy this promotional wallpaper and this video of the mod's introduction! :-)

While it might not look like it, things have been moving on for my mods and I'm glad to report some good progress on all three Quake1 modifications I have been working on in the past year. You'll also notice that I updated the site a little, adding Transloquake, InfraRed and SpaceWalk to my list of mods. A couple of weeks ago, I also updated my list of Quake1 sites, got rid of the dead links and added some new ones. That should keep us going for a little while.

Transloquake is progressing slowly but surely. I received some interesting feedback on the demo and have been spending some time thinking about new maps to be part of the final release. Among those, one is a forest-themed one, inspired by what can be found in UT2004. It's pretty cool and even has fireflies flying around it. I'm pretty happy with the result. Here is a video of my work in progress on it:

Otherwise, I have also been working on a winter-inspired map (nothing much to show yet for that one, though) and a lego-themed map. The later looks like it will be rather fun. Here below is an early shot of my work on it. I realize it does not show much, but I promise to post better screenshots soon :-)

These last few days most of my energy has actually been focussed on InfraRed. After a long pause, caused mainly by lighting issues I could not seem to be able to resolve under Darkplaces, I finally managed to fix things and development has been going full speed. To tell you the truth, right now, InfraRed is mainly a big, rather complex "editor" that will be used later on to process maps to make them playable in the mod. The editor is a lot more advanced than the "Flagpointing Editor" I had implemented in Ultimate Quad Capture (which some people already found a little too complex) and will make it possible, I think, to create very fun and varied situations. Judging by the current development speed, a first release of InfraRed is likely to take place during or even before QExpo 2008. Here below, a little screenshot of one of the mod's new ennemies... don't you dare meeting that guy's eyes!  :-)

For those of you who have followed the ups and downs of my newest project, Transloquake (no official page on the site yet, but I'll work on it), on this Inside3D forums thread, this does not come as a surprise. Obviously, though, I needed to make it official by announcing it on my site as well, and I apologize for the little delay of a couple of days.

So, yeah, I've been working on a brand-new mod (I had hinted at it in my previous posts) and I'm glad to release a little demo whose goal, as explained on Inside3D, is to give people a little taste of what the full release might be like and, more importantly, to give interested mappers everything they need to start mapping if they are interested in the project. As you will see, the mod is, all in all, rather simple in concept and is also rather easy to map for. I hope you'll enjoy it. For a full description of its gameplay, I'll refer you to the documentation attached with it or, for a summary, to the Inside3D forums. Here are screenshots of the two maps bundled with the demo and links to the files!. Oh, and if you want to watch a video of the bonus map attached with the demo, click on this YouTube link. :-)

You can download this first demo of Transloquake from two locations: via Fileplanet (preferred way, as it gives me stats) or via RapidShare (which doesn't and might not last). Enjoy and make sure to drop your feedback on this thread! The mod is in the making, so all constructive comments will be appreciated! :-)

The other day someone who had visited Neurotic Conversions congratulated me on my nice "blog"... I felt almost offended, thinking, "Hey, this is a development site, not a "blog"". Then I checked my updates, realized I haven't released anything for a while and, well, that I like to ramble a lot. So yeah, I guess this is kind of a blog. Hehe... oh well. So if you're bored and want to know what I have been doing lately, here it is...

I've played some "classic" UT again. Boy, what a good game. Weirdly enough, I had reinstalled UT2004 but left it only a couple of days on my HD before erasing it again. Too much detail, too many vehicules, crowded in multiplayer. I missed the "smooth", "clear" lines of classic UT. There are still a bunch of servers out there. Of course you do regularly bump into the usual veteran players kind of ruining the game for everyone, madly translocating, bunnyhopping, rocketjumping, impacthammerjumping (I hate those two) to finish an assault map (my favourite game mode) in less than 30 seconds. I remember similar frustration when I was playing TFC back in the days. I mean, I know impacthammerjumping is technically possible, but when someone gets on top of the AS-Mason fort with it to short-circuit all the other objectives, well, it just seems the game is not played the way it was meant to be played. I enjoy the objectives, enjoy the mounting tension of the Assault mode, don't like people, be they in my team or not, limit my fun time to 30 seconds just because they know a cool move. There is speedrun for that kind of thing. Someone on a UT forum said about this issue, "it's in the game, so deal with it". It might be in the game, but if developpers had thought this is the way people would play, they wouldn't have build maps the way they did. Anyway, coming back to the idea of detail, it's weird how the newer games fail to appeal to me in the same way the older ones did, and I think it is mainly due to the fact I find them too busy with detail. I find it particularly striking in games with "pure", fast deathmatch modes. I can deal with some detail in more tactical-oriented games, but when the goal is to violently frag away, being surrounded by a zillion details kind of bothers me.

Since I'm in my whiny mood, I might as well go on. I hate CD-keys and Steam gets on my nerves. Before my move back to Europe, I tried to put all my CDs together and, of course, there are a couple of CD-keys I forgot to attach to the CDs. Now I'm left for example with original CDs of Battlefield 1942 which I can't use to play online (I used a serial from the net for installation, but of course that won't work for online play). Frustrating. It would be so practical if the damn CD-keys were printed on the CDs themselves. Then, Steam. For some reason I can't connect to Steam to update my version of Half-Life1 even though my CD-key is perfectly legit. Then, too, what I did is attach a little piece of paper with the CD with the key... who would have thought, at the time of HL's release, that Steam would come! It's so silly that I can totally install the game until that last update, and then that I get stuck (my key is apparently "already in use", I do remember I created a Steam account at the time, but I can't seem to be able to retrieve the info to make it work) and basically cannot play online. I can't contact Steam people with a scan of the booklet, since I don't have it anymore. Bleh!

Ok. Enough. Lately I've fiddled a bit around map conversions in Quake1 and had some fun. I liked the way FTE loads Q2 maps and also some other Q3-derived formats that Darkplaces somehow does not want to load (yet). Had (and still have, despite some of Spike's excellent pieces of advice) some issues running UQC on FTE, but, whatever. I got maps (either directly or via conversions) from Doom2, Elite Force, Heretic2, Kingpin and Return to Castle Wolfenstein (see picture below) loading, so it was fun. I think there is modding potential, there, really. I mean, there are so many different maps available out there (I'm thinking of all the maps of various Half-Life mods, too), I'm sure it could be fun to build new Quake1 mods around some of them. The idea has always titillated me, anyway.

I particularly like the Assault-type maps. To link this back to my comments about UT in the beginning of this post, I think Assault has a lot of potential for fun situations. I loved it in TFC, too. I've recently been thinking about possibly working on a mod (not in the near future, but maybe within the next few years) for Quake1 that would precisely attempt to "reconstruct" the fun I have experienced with those modes. Something that would be class-based, teamplay-oriented, yet single-player, not necessarily balanced, with a lot of flexibility and options ("a la UQC") to make it varied, and of course finely-tuned bots AI. Maybe one day...

Ok, if you've read this far, I think you deserve a little treat, and that treat will be to know that I've been working on a new mod, something I haven't mentionned at all here. During the weeks my wife was away, I fiddled a lot, then worked on a mini-mod I had been thinking for a little while and, well, now it's turning into a mod in its own right. I'd rather leave the surprise as to what the mod is about for its release, but I can say the idea is pretty simple but rather fun. Totally new thing for me, I'm also mapping for this, something I had not done (or I should say "ventured to do") since the infamous Quick Death mod. And to show you I'm not lying, here is bellow a little screenshot of one of the maps. I have purposefully chosen one that does not reveal anything about the nature of this mod... so you can do the guess work, if you want. I have planned to build 8 maps (just because it's a nice number). So far, three are pretty much done and one is in construction. Out of the three, one is a full tutorial on how to play the mod. Kinda cool.

Obviously, this mod has become my priority, but, don't fret, it's worth it and I do not forget about either Quakability or Infra-Red. I will work back on those as soon as this new mod is released, I'm hoping within the next couple of months (I'm trying to be down-to-earth). So, see, this entry wasn't all about me rambling, it also had some real Quake news! "Blog", eh? ;-)