Variants and Graphic Tiles

[pkraem]

I went through the "Current Variants" on www.thangorodrim.net and looked
for the following for "Windows" versions:

Supports ASCII mode, 8x8 tiles, Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles, easily resizeable
info windows, and sound.

the ONLY version that listed this was Zangband! I consider this to
be abysmal. So I went and downloaded 15 of the variants and tested
them to see if they had tile support of some kind. some of them
required that the tiles be downloaded and added to the correct folder.
others did have the above support even though it was not stated on
the web site! the following are what I saw:

Alexband:
had to add graf files to the graf directory.
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
OK.

Animeband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
OK.

CathAngband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
OK.

Cthangband (sentimental reasons; Cthulhu Ftaghn!)
Had Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles. did not allow window resize and did
not allow tile width/height adjustment. the darkness of the colors
made it look terrible! Font changes screwed up variants run after
it till I rebooted the box (fonts worked horribly!).
Bluh!

Eyangband
Tiles? what Tiles? No graphics changes were allowed. added graf
files to the graf directory, but it didn't change a thing! all
you got was colored squares!
Boooh!

Hengband
BEAUTIFULL! LOVELY! Programmers please take notes!
I did have to add the graphics files to the graf directory.
So What! Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles worked Great! It had Bigtile
mode! Increasing the window size increased the dungeon viewing
area! The map command showed a well done map of the area with
Good color! It Looked Great!
Yaaaaah!

Kamband
Tiles? what Tiles? just ascii and thats it!
Boooh!

Kangband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
the map command had a good view and good color. This should be
the minimum they all should have!
Allright!

NPPAngband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
the map command had a good view and good color. This should be the
minimum they all should have! It also included support for D.G.'s
32x32 tiles! I think that the 16x16 tiles probably looked better
however since you cannot set the 32x32 tiles to their proper size.
the 32x32 tiles had to be added to the graf directory.
Allright!

Oangband
Tiles? what Tiles? No graphics changes were allowed. added graf
files to the graf directory, but it didn't change a thing! all
you got was colored squares! What a waste of a perfectly good
variant. (Try OangTk!)
Boooh!

Sangband (nice starting graphic anyway)
Tiles? what Tiles? No graphics changes were allowed. Changing
to other tiles set it to plain ascii mode! all you get is
colored squares.
Boooh!

sCthangband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
Increasing the window size increased the dungeon viewing area, Good!
Thought the colors were lousy though. the map command showed a view
with interesting text information! Needs an Artist's touch and Bigtile
mode. Beats the hell out of Some of the Others anyway!
Good.

(be sure and get that latest download, creating a character was hell
before I did! the new one still had bugs.)

Steamband
had to add graf files to the graf directory.
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
OK.

Xband
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
Increasing the window size increased the dungeon viewing area, Good!
Didn't care much for the colors. the map command showed a view that
was good. Needs an Artist's touch and Bigtile mode. Beats the hell out
of Some of the Others! allows move around in the map mode!
Good.

Zangband (to compare!)
worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
Increasing the window size increased the dungeon viewing area, Good!
Didn't care much for the colors. the map command showed a view that
was good. Needs an Artist's touch and Bigtile mode. Beats the hell out
of Some of the Others! allows move around in the map mode!
Good.

To sum Up:
clearly I am a graphics snob (bite me!) I think the big differences were made in

using big tile mode and good colors. having the screen resize add to the view-
ing area was a big plus as well! I also liked having an area around the town.
just having the town and the dungeons is not as good as having the wilderness
as well.

Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the variants that
have it?

peter kraemer
***@us.ibm.com

p.s. my opinions do not represent those of ibm blah blah blah.
#include <standard.disclaimer>

[VALIS]

On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem <***@bluebot.austin.ibm.com> wrote:

> I went through the "Current Variants" on www.thangorodrim.net and looked
> for the following for "Windows" versions:
>
> Supports ASCII mode, 8x8 tiles, Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles, easily resizeable
> info windows, and sound.
>
> the ONLY version that listed this was Zangband! I consider this to
> be abysmal. So I went and downloaded 15 of the variants and tested
> them to see if they had tile support of some kind. some of them
> required that the tiles be downloaded and added to the correct folder.
> others did have the above support even though it was not stated on
> the web site! the following are what I saw:
>
> Steamband
> had to add graf files to the graf directory.
> worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
> OK.

Boy if you try to use those tiles are you in for some _NASTY_ surprises. It
should already be untenable in the current beta to use tiles, and if not - I'm
going to insure an oversight like this happening again. I'll have to yank this
silly legacy support out. I won't try and change your mind - but thanks for
bringing this to my attention. It is my sincere wish that tiles are never used
with Steamband. And while I still live I will do everything in my power to
ensure that stays the case.

> To sum Up:
> clearly I am a graphics snob (bite me!) I think the big differences were made in
>
> using big tile mode and good colors. having the screen resize add to the view-
> ing area was a big plus as well! I also liked having an area around the town.
> just having the town and the dungeons is not as good as having the wilderness
> as well.
>
> Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the variants that
> have it?

Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without running in
fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the same reason all
commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse system. Raw ASCII is
simply the clearest way to transmit information in a rl.

> peter kraemer
> ***@us.ibm.com


--
-Campbell

- Join the steamband group by sending an email to
steamband-***@Yahoogroups.com !
- Visit the Steamband web page, and follow the progress of Steam! (and view my
art!) http://angband.oook.cz/steamband/

[Velvet Elvis]

On Sat, 14 Feb 2004 09:03:30 +0000, VALIS wrote:


>> Steamband
>> had to add graf files to the graf directory.
>> worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
>> OK.
>
> Boy if you try to use those tiles are you in for some _NASTY_ surprises. It
> should already be untenable in the current beta to use tiles, and if not - I'm
> going to insure an oversight like this happening again. I'll have to yank this
> silly legacy support out. I won't try and change your mind - but thanks for
> bringing this to my attention. It is my sincere wish that tiles are never used
> with Steamband. And while I still live I will do everything in my power to
> ensure that stays the case.

/me applauds

[Mars]

On 2004-02-14 10:03:30, VALIS <***@oook.cz> wrote:
> On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem wrote:
<snip>
> Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
> sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without running in
> fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the same reason all
> commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse system. Raw ASCII is
> simply the clearest way to transmit information in a rl.

Okay I'll bite even tho it's not entirely ontopic :P. I don't agree here. I've
played (almost) exclusively with tiles, I think ascii is just sucky and it
looks like crap :P. The only problem with tiles is that since many people
*don't* use them, they are rarely maintained, updated, and adjusted to fit
variants and all to show correct and most recent info. I'll give you your point
on mouse support though which is utterly pointless in a *band (unless maybe you
were to make a realtime 1st person roguelike :D)

--
Mars

Of course there is no formula for success except perhaps an unconditional
acceptance of the RNG and what it brings.

[VALIS]

On 2004-02-15 03:01:02, Mars <***@hotmail.com> wrote:

> On 2004-02-14 10:03:30, VALIS wrote:
> > On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem wrote:
>
> > Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
> > sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without running in
> > fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the same reason all
> > commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse system. Raw ASCII is
> > simply the clearest way to transmit information in a rl.
>
> Okay I'll bite even tho it's not entirely ontopic :P. I don't agree here. I've
> played (almost) exclusively with tiles, I think ascii is just sucky and it
> looks like crap :P.

Well, then I guess we should use .bmp tiles to communicate across usenet - Oh
wait, we don't. Why not? Because tiles are hard to read, difficult to keep up
to date, and aren't nearly as efficent at transmitting information.

How can you have any more clairty in information transfer than 'D'?

> The only problem with tiles is that since many people
> *don't* use them, they are rarely maintained, updated, and adjusted to fit
> variants and all to show correct and most recent info.

There are good reasons for why _most_ people don't use them. You might switch
over for a while and see how much your play improves.
--
-Campbell

- Join the steamband group by sending an email to
steamband-***@Yahoogroups.com !
- Visit the Steamband web page, and follow the progress of Steam! (and view my
art!) http://angband.oook.cz/steamband/

[Chris Wesling]

VALIS wrote:
>
> On 2004-02-15 03:01:02, Mars <***@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On 2004-02-14 10:03:30, VALIS wrote:
> > > On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem wrote:
> > >
> > > Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
> > > sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without
> > > running in fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the
> > > same reason all commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse
> > > system. Raw ASCII is simply the clearest way to transmit information
> > > in a rl.
> >
> > Okay I'll bite even tho it's not entirely ontopic :P. I don't agree
> > here. I've played (almost) exclusively with tiles, I think ascii is
> > just sucky and it looks like crap :P.
>
> Well, then I guess we should use .bmp tiles to communicate across usenet
> - Oh wait, we don't. Why not? Because tiles are hard to read, difficult
> to keep up to date, and aren't nearly as efficent at transmitting
> information.
>
> How can you have any more clairty in information transfer than 'D'?

Let's see, how many kinds of dragon are there? Baby, young, mature,
ancient, and great wyrm, that's five. And all five are represented by only
two letters, 'd' and 'D'; to find out exactly which kind you're currently
facing, you have to 'l'ook at it. Whereas with tiles, I can instantly tell
exactly which kind it is with a single glance, because five different tiles
are used. What was that again about transmitting information more
efficiently?

Chris W.
--
Replace the spamblock with sbcglobal [period] net to email me.

"His educational career began, interestingly enough, in agricultural
school, where he majored in animal husbandry -- until they caught
him at it one day..." - Tom Lehrer

[R. Cliff Young]

On 2004-02-16 13:26:18, Chris Wesling <***@nospam.invalid> wrote:

> Let's see, how many kinds of dragon are there? Baby, young, mature,
> ancient, and great wyrm, that's five. And all five are represented by only
> two letters, 'd' and 'D'; to find out exactly which kind you're currently
> facing, you have to 'l'ook at it. Whereas with tiles, I can instantly tell
> exactly which kind it is with a single glance, because five different tiles
> are used. What was that again about transmitting information more
> efficiently?
>
> Chris W.

I have yet to see a tile set for *band that I would feel comfortable using in
place of ASCII graphics.

With your precious tile set, can you distinguish between a normal dragon and a
unique like, say, Smaug the Golden? Looks like you'll be using e'x'amine a lot
anyway, eh?

Oh--'l' moves right. Anything else ('l'ook?!?) is blasphemy.

--
R. Cliff Young <***@roguebard.com> /\/ Chaos Never Died

[Joshua Rodman]

On 2004-02-17, R Cliff Young <***@roguebard.com> wrote:
> On 2004-02-16 13:26:18, Chris Wesling <***@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> I have yet to see a tile set for *band that I would feel comfortable using in
> place of ASCII graphics.

Fair enough.

> With your precious tile set, can you distinguish between a normal dragon and a
> unique like, say, Smaug the Golden? Looks like you'll be using e'x'amine a lot
> anyway, eh?

Yes, trivially. It's blindingly obvious in fact.

-josh

[Neodymium]

In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
rec.games.roguelike.angband, Mars <***@hotmail.com> set up us
this post:

> On 2004-02-14 10:03:30, VALIS <***@oook.cz> wrote:
>> On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem wrote:
> <snip>
>> Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
>> sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without
>> running in fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the same
>> reason all commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse
>> system. Raw ASCII is simply the clearest way to transmit information in
>> a rl.
>
> Okay I'll bite even tho it's not entirely ontopic :P. I don't agree
> here. I've played (almost) exclusively with tiles, I think ascii is just
> sucky and it looks like crap :P. The only problem with tiles is that
> since many people *don't* use them, they are rarely maintained, updated,
> and adjusted to fit variants and all to show correct and most recent
> info. I'll give you your point on mouse support though which is utterly
> pointless in a *band (unless maybe you were to make a realtime 1st
> person roguelike :D)

Disagree with you about both tiles and mouse. :P (At least you seem to
recognize that when speed is of the essence, for locating objects on the
screen (e.g. targeting in a *band) the mouse is superior to the keyboard;
a fact not widely known.)

I experimented with tiles once. Once. You can't tell WTF you're looking
at, leading to much more need to use 'l'. That "hound" in among all the
others might be a dragon:

Graphics:
@
####+###
#XXXXXX#
#XXXXXX#
########
#Y WW #
1400'

X -> looks like some sort of doggy?
Y -> looks like a guy?
W -> looks like something translucent?


Text:
@
####+###
#ZZZZZZ#
#ZZdZZZ#
########
#p WW #
1400'


Z -> Fire hounds
d -> Mature Red Dragon
p -> Castamir the Usurper
W -> a couple Barrow Wights

You have picked the lock.
The Mature red dragon breathes fire.
The Fire hound breathes fire. <x4>
The Mature red dragon breathes fire.
LOW HITPOINT WARNING!
Note: Oh, shit!
You have 3 scrolls titled "bmobeht suputes" of Teleportation (j).

...
You have picked the other lock.
Castamir, the Usurper wakes up.
Note: Oh, DOUBLE SHIT!

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

[Jiamat]

On 2004-02-15 06:50:22, Neodymium <***@127.0.0.1> wrote:

> In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
> rec.games.roguelike.angband, Mars set up us
> this post:
>
> > On 2004-02-14 10:03:30, VALIS wrote:
> >> On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem wrote:
> >
> >> Because tiles are a tool used to get people who are intimitdated by
> >> sophisticated effecient ASCII displays to play roguelikes without
> >> running in fear. Since most people start with [v]. . .This is the same
> >> reason all commerical roguelikes use a _terrible_ graphics/mouse
> >> system. Raw ASCII is simply the clearest way to transmit information in
> >> a rl.
> >
> > Okay I'll bite even tho it's not entirely ontopic :P. I don't agree
> > here. I've played (almost) exclusively with tiles, I think ascii is just
> > sucky and it looks like crap :P. The only problem with tiles is that
> > since many people *don't* use them, they are rarely maintained, updated,
> > and adjusted to fit variants and all to show correct and most recent
> > info. I'll give you your point on mouse support though which is utterly
> > pointless in a *band (unless maybe you were to make a realtime 1st
> > person roguelike :D)
>
> Disagree with you about both tiles and mouse. :P (At least you seem to
> recognize that when speed is of the essence, for locating objects on the
> screen (e.g. targeting in a *band) the mouse is superior to the keyboard;
> a fact not widely known.)
>
> I experimented with tiles once. Once. You can't tell WTF you're looking
> at, leading to much more need to use 'l'. That "hound" in among all the
> others might be a dragon:
>

I use 8x8 graphics. Once you see the monsters a few times you get to recognise
them.

> Graphics:
> @
> ####+###
> #XXXXXX#
> #XXXXXX#
> ########
> #Y WW #
> 1400'
>
> X -> looks like some sort of doggy?
> Y -> looks like a guy?
> W -> looks like something translucent?
>
>
> Text:
> @
> ####+###
> #ZZZZZZ#
> #ZZdZZZ#
> ########
> #p WW #
> 1400'
>
>
> Z -> Fire hounds
> d -> Mature Red Dragon

or baby or young

> p -> Castamir the Usurper

you would be guessing

> W -> a couple Barrow Wights
>

I could recognise all those monsters instantly apart from Castamir who i don't
see enough of. I can identify nearly every monster in the game except for a few
orc and human uniques who look and act similar.

I can tell Azog and Bolg apart without 'l'ooking. Can you.
Bolg is blue. Azog is blue with a red sash on.


It annoys me that Oangband has no graphics, for example

G:p:y gives (8x8 graphics in brackets)

Beastmaster (can't remember)
Druid (green)
Ninja (black)
Dagashi (grey)
Ar-Pharazon the Golden (can't remember)

I know exactly what 3 out of 5 of these monsters look like, beastmaster i would
learn in time, Ar-Pharazon i wouldn't see very often.

and again G:D:r

Ancient red
Great hell
Itangast
Smaug
Glaurung

+ any mulihueds

I can't tell the difference between Itangast and Glaurung but i would know it
was one of them. The rest i know.

I could go on but i won't. At the moment using ASCII you do need to 'l'ook at a
lot of monsters every time otherwise you are guessing, with graphics you don't
need to.

Tome has well over a 1000 monsters in it. Imagine.

Btw in answer to another point elsewhere, i don't care if some of the graphics
are not complete as a letter in the middle of graphics, though ugly, is fairly
distinctive.

[Neodymium]

In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
rec.games.roguelike.angband, Jiamat <***@lycos.com> set up us this
post:

> I use 8x8 graphics. Once you see the monsters a few times you get to
> recognise them.

Indeed. Meanwhile. omce you see the ASCII *once* you get to recognize
them. I'd rather not have to encounter eight or so Ancient Dragons before
recognizing them on sight; one 'D' suffices for me, thank you very much.
:)

> I could recognise all those monsters instantly apart from Castamir who i
> don't see enough of. I can identify nearly every monster in the game
> except for a few orc and human uniques who look and act similar.

And people have memorized the phonebook, obviating the need ever to look
something up in it again. That doesn't exactly mean it ought to be the
recommended approach to not needing to look things up. :)

> I can tell Azog and Bolg apart without 'l'ooking. Can you.
> Bolg is blue. Azog is blue with a red sash on.

A sash? Oh, is that what that red pixel is supposed to be? I thought it
was a speck of dust on my monitor dating back to the Great Nasal
Hemmorhage of 2003. (For unknown reasons, I spontaneously bled out a quart
or so of blood via my nose, then equally spontaneously healed, early this
winter, in November or December I think. It may have been October though;
I'm not sure. I might have attributed religious significance to this
event, if it had come from wounds in my hands or something instead of my
nose, or suspected Ebola Hemmorhagic Fever if my eyes, asshole, and so
forth had hemmorhaged as well. In neither case would I have considered it
a "miracle" however, and I consider those stigmata-worshipers in South
America to be certifiable mental cases, masochists, and blatant idolaters
too. :))

> Beastmaster (can't remember)
> Druid (green)
> Ninja (black)
> Dagashi (grey)
> Ar-Pharazon the Golden (can't remember)

But presumably something other than yellow, otherwise surely you *would*
remember. Instead you remember that it's not the obvious but forget what
it is instead, it would seem. :P

> I could go on but i won't. At the moment using ASCII you do need to
> 'l'ook at a lot of monsters every time otherwise you are guessing, with
> graphics you don't need to.

No, with graphics you simply need reading glasses made of glass of a
thickness more normally used for high-pressure portholes in deep ocean
submersibles like Alvin, along with a savantlike memorization ability and
an obsessiveness that implies full-blown autism rather than the mere
Asperger's Syndrome tendencies of the average angband player. And a lot of
trial and error.

> Tome has well over a 1000 monsters in it. Imagine.
>
> Btw in answer to another point elsewhere, i don't care if some of the
> graphics are not complete as a letter in the middle of graphics, though
> ugly, is fairly distinctive.

Yes -- IMO tiles should be failsoft, with absent tiles rendering as a
letter and inaccurate tiles flagged to be ignored, a flag that makes them
also render at letters and is only removed when that particular flag is
updated.

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

[g***@gsmack.net]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004 00:49:06 GMT, Neodymium <***@127.0.0.1>
wrote:

>blah tiles
>>blah text
>>>blah tiles
>>>>blah text


It's simply a matter of personal preference. I can play either, and I
will let you know for a FACT that given the number of items PERIOD,
the first time someone plays the game in either tile OR text, they're
not going to remember half of what they are seeing until after a few
plays. It's just fact. People are not born with knowledge that ? is
a scroll or ! is a potion or O is an ogre, or whatever...

As for mouse/keyboard issue...i think targeting and 'l'ooking benefit
emmensly from having mouse support. Everything else supported by
mouse is good to get the hang of the keys because you can look at
hotkey in menus and eventually learn them, but I agree using just
keyboard is more enjoyable and comfrotable after getting into any
complex rl.

Just my opinion, though, on the last point...

[Neodymium]

In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
rec.games.roguelike.angband, ***@gsmack.net set up us this post:

> As for mouse/keyboard issue...i think targeting and 'l'ooking benefit
> emmensly from having mouse support. Everything else supported by
> mouse is good to get the hang of the keys because you can look at
> hotkey in menus and eventually learn them, but I agree using just
> keyboard is more enjoyable and comfrotable after getting into any
> complex rl.

Continuous look, anyone? Monster/item info appears in the top message line
on mouseover of a square. Roll the mouse pointer over a row of monsters in a
GCV and watch the names flicker by at the top of the screen. Uh-oh, did it
just say Ancalagon the Black on that dark 'D'? YIPES!

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

[VALIS]

On 2004-02-15 13:15:56, Jiamat <***@lycos.com> wrote:

> On 2004-02-15 06:50:22, Neodymium wrote:
>
> I can tell Azog and Bolg apart without 'l'ooking. Can you.
> Bolg is blue. Azog is blue with a red sash on.

Yes, I can. Monster viewable window.
--
-Campbell

- Join the steamband group by sending an email to
steamband-***@Yahoogroups.com !
- Visit the Steamband web page, and follow the progress of Steam! (and view my
art!) http://angband.oook.cz/steamband/

[Neodymium]

In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
rec.games.roguelike.angband, VALIS <***@oook.cz> set up us this post:

> On 2004-02-15 13:15:56, Jiamat <***@lycos.com> wrote:
>
>> On 2004-02-15 06:50:22, Neodymium wrote:
>>
>> I can tell Azog and Bolg apart without 'l'ooking. Can you.
>> Bolg is blue. Azog is blue with a red sash on.
>
> Yes, I can. Monster viewable window.

I wish *that* would get merged into vanilla soon. I refuse to shell out
around $400 to M$ for VC++/Studio/Developer .Net Virus Factory
Deluxe/WormMaker PRO/Whatever They're Calling It This Week just to recompile
my own Windows binary to include the patch.

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

[awldune]

On 2004-02-16 04:08:27, Neodymium <***@127.0.0.1> wrote:

> In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
> rec.games.roguelike.angband, VALIS set up us this post:
>
> > On 2004-02-15 13:15:56, Jiamat wrote:
> >
> >> On 2004-02-15 06:50:22, Neodymium wrote:
> >>
> >> I can tell Azog and Bolg apart without 'l'ooking. Can you.
> >> Bolg is blue. Azog is blue with a red sash on.
> >
> > Yes, I can. Monster viewable window.
>
> I wish *that* would get merged into vanilla soon. I refuse to shell out
> around $400 to M$ for VC++/Studio/Developer .Net Virus Factory
> Deluxe/WormMaker PRO/Whatever They're Calling It This Week just to recompile
> my own Windows binary to include the patch.
>
> --
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
> Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
> "One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
> One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."
>
>
>
>

You don't have to. Just install Cygwin and compile using gcc from there.

[R. Cliff Young]

On 2004-02-16 20:29:49, awldune <***@hotmail.com> wrote:

> On 2004-02-16 04:08:27, Neodymium wrote:
> > I wish *that* would get merged into vanilla soon. I refuse to shell out
> > around $400 to M$ for VC++/Studio/Developer .Net Virus Factory
> > Deluxe/WormMaker PRO/Whatever They're Calling It This Week just to recompile
> > my own Windows binary to include the patch.
> >
> > --
> > http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
>
> You don't have to. Just install Cygwin and compile using gcc from there.

Or mingw for a lighter alternative. You'd imagine someone linking gnu.org in
his sig would be aware of the M$-free alternatives. :)

--
R. Cliff Young <***@roguebard.com> /\/ Chaos Never Died

[Caradhras]

> On 2004-02-15 06:50:22, Neodymium <***@127.0.0.1> wrote:

>> I experimented with tiles once. Once. You can't tell WTF you're
>> looking at, leading to much more need to use 'l'. That "hound" in
>> among all the others might be a dragon:

Hounds and dragons look quite distinct from each other, at least in
every tileset I've used. Are you honestly surprised that on your very
first use of tiles, you didn't recognize everything? Why would you expect
to? When I first used ASCII I recognized very little, just as with tiles.
Both have a learning curve. The advantage of tiles is that once you learn
them, in a fully-updated set of tiles you can tell any monster apart from
any other (except for identical monsters like solo novice warriors versus
packs of novice warriors) without having to use 'l'.

--
Matthew Furrow
mfurrow at mail dot md

[Velvet Elvis]

On Sun, 15 Feb 2004 12:15:56 +0000, Jiamat wrote:


> I could go on but i won't. At the moment using ASCII you do need to 'l'ook at a
> lot of monsters every time otherwise you are guessing, with graphics you don't
> need to.

Actually, you just need to hit / and the character you want ID'd and you
get a full description. This is a lot faster than using (l)ook and then
dicking around with the courser the way you have to if you're using
tiles.

[R. Cliff Young]

On 2004-02-16 21:18:22, Velvet Elvis <***@REMOVEsofthome.THISnet> wrote:

> Actually, you just need to hit / and the character you want ID'd and you
> get a full description. This is a lot faster than using (l)ook and then
> dicking around with the courser the way you have to if you're using
> tiles.

That won't necessarily precisely identify the 'D' sharing the screen with you,
unless it's the first/only 'D' (of the given color) you've come across.

Some tile-users seem content with their ability to identify monsters by
tile--I've yet to use a tile set that gives me the confidence to utilize tiles
in place of ASCII.

Either way, e'x'amine is my friend regardless (my little laptop doesn't have the
screen real estate to display a monsters in view window unless I were to use a
smaller font for my main window).

--
R. Cliff Young <***@roguebard.com> /\/ Chaos Never Died

[pkraem]

>Boy if you try to use those tiles are you in for some _NASTY_ surprises. It
>should already be untenable in the current beta to use tiles, and if not - I'm
>going to insure an oversight like this happening again. I'll have to yank this
>silly legacy support out. I won't try and change your mind - but thanks for
>bringing this to my attention. It is my sincere wish that tiles are never used
>with Steamband. And while I still live I will do everything in my power to
>ensure that stays the case.

clearly some of you guys prefer ascii and are perhaps fanatic about it.
I believe
though that "Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the
variants that have it?" still needs to be addressed. Clearly for the above
Variant,
Steamband, I think it should state "ascii only". At least let people know what
each variant has. Hengband clearly supports tiles. it doesn't say anything on
Thangorodrim about it. Zangband supports tiles and it is stated.

Still looking forward to tcl/tk on Angband and full support on Zangband!
Suggestion: instead of saying none on the graphics menu put ASCII as a choice!
(choice is all I am asking)


peter kraemer
***@us.ibm.com

p.s. my opinions do not represent those of ibm blah blah blah.
#include <standard.disclaimer>

[Julian Lighton]

In article <***@bluebot.austin.ibm.com>,
pkraem <***@bluebot.austin.ibm.com> wrote:
>I believe
>though that "Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the
>variants that have it?" still needs to be addressed.

Even if the code support is there, that doesn't mean the tiles are
supported. If nobody's drawing new tiles, and making the appropriate
mappings, it might look like they're supported, but they probably
aren't.

[Ernest Huang]

On 2004-02-14 09:10:43, pkraem <***@bluebot.austin.ibm.com> wrote:

> Animeband
> worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
> OK.
>

I'm slowly but surely replacing the tiles so that they correspond to the actual
Animeband monsters. Right now it's about 20% complete. When the next version
comes out, it should be roughly 30% complete.

--
AKA Yumi_Saotome on #angband

[Atriel]

I am kinda of a newbie... play ang for a year...
but i agree with Valis.
I played with tiles in the first three months of Angband, and then
strived a little bit to play in ASCII and can never go back to tiles
again...
In fact, almost nobody goes from ASCII to Tiles, but a lot of
ppl goes from Tiles to ASCII and canŽt go back.
There should be tiles in variants that attract mass newbas, like V
and Tome thu.....
People that plays ASCII arenŽt fanatic. TheyŽre just enlightened.
I thought exactly that when i asked why there werenŽt
tiles in OAng and some other harder variants...
Tiles in angband looks like ***@P! and force the player to accept
what is in the screen and generate an image based on that.
With letters there are 2 big advantages:
* i recognize immediately each monster/item
* i can create an image of the situation (imagination) completely
umbiased by (crappy) graphics. I donŽt see a bunch of dumb
16x16 images, but when i close my eyes, i see the slimy, dripping
dungeon walls, and can fell the chilling air the ancient white
is emanating from the end of the corridor.
But "understanding" letters is hard, it is like a final step in angband
enlightment. ItŽs just like being able to see the "blondies and the
brunnetes" in the matrix screen lol.
There r 2 friends of mine that started playing angband thanks to
me... one of them still play tiles... another one already plays like
me, and canŽt go back to tiles anymore too.
Instead of trying to fix tiles in a variant, try to use
your immagination a lil bit more.
IMHO, effort that is focused in making tiles for ang variants (other
than V and tome maybe) should be focused in more important
things to make them better.

Cheers
--
I will hold the candle till it burns up my arm. I'll keep taking punches until
their will grows tired. I will stare the sun down until my eyes go blind. I
won't change direction and I won't change my mind... How much difference does
it make?

[Joshua Rodman]

On 2004-02-15, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> wrote:
> With letters there are 2 big advantages:
> * i recognize immediately each monster/item

I apologise for adding to this thread, but you must have used some awful
tiles if you couldn't immediately recognize each monster/item. With
David Gervais' tiles I can instantly recognize most uniques, and most
subtypes of monsters, let alone the category.

> * i can create an image of the situation (imagination) completely

This, I grant you, is a plus.

-josh

[Matthias Kurzke]

Joshua Rodman wrote:
> On 2004-02-15, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>With letters there are 2 big advantages:
>>* i recognize immediately each monster/item
>
>
> I apologise for adding to this thread, but you must have used some awful
> tiles if you couldn't immediately recognize each monster/item. With
> David Gervais' tiles I can instantly recognize most uniques, and most
> subtypes of monsters, let alone the category.
>
>
>
They just happen to be too big for many screens. Unfortunately, only the
*TK bands ever had scmallscreen support that can make tiles of a decent
size appear in nice windows. Most *band ports make tiles look needlessly
ugly (e.g. Adam Bolt tiles are only recognizable at 16x16 per tile or
larger, and in the Windows version there is no font that you can use
well at that size and aspect ratio).

Matthias

[William Peterson]

Matthias Kurzke <***@gmx.de> wrote in message news:<c0ssrv$6p5$***@news.uni-leipzig.de>...
> Joshua Rodman wrote:
> > On 2004-02-15, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >>With letters there are 2 big advantages:
> >>* i recognize immediately each monster/item
> >
> >
> > I apologise for adding to this thread, but you must have used some awful
> > tiles if you couldn't immediately recognize each monster/item. With
> > David Gervais' tiles I can instantly recognize most uniques, and most
> > subtypes of monsters, let alone the category.
> >
> >
> >
> They just happen to be too big for many screens. Unfortunately, only the
> *TK bands ever had scmallscreen support that can make tiles of a decent
> size appear in nice windows. Most *band ports make tiles look needlessly
> ugly (e.g. Adam Bolt tiles are only recognizable at 16x16 per tile or
> larger, and in the Windows version there is no font that you can use
> well at that size and aspect ratio).
>
> Matthias

Have you looked at TomeTik (http://pousse.rapiere.free.fr/tome) to see
what has been done with tiles to support ToME? He does support sizable
windows, as well as using both Gervais and Bolt tiles. I'd like to
hear your opinion regarding how this looks campared to the AngbandTk
that you've complimented. I'm a big fan of the *Tk variants, but
unlike you I'm prety satisfied with the Gervais tiles in bigtile mode
in Vanilla. FYI, ToME 3.0 also has variable sizing on the main window,
but I don't know if the code comes from TomeTik or some other source.

The iso development on Vanilla and ToME uses the SDL rendering engine.
One would think that this newer technology would look as good or
better than Tcl/Tk

Bill

[Neodymium]

In 2101, war was beginning and we got signal. In
rec.games.roguelike.angband, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> set up us this
post:

> But "understanding" letters is hard, it is like a final step in angband
> enlightment.

It's no harder than learning the bloody alphabet, and nobody who posts here
has failed to do that. Obviously. :)

> ItŽs just like being able to see the "blondies and the
> brunnetes" in the matrix screen lol.

Cute. :)

--
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Palladium? key escrow? DRM? FBI? Microsoft? Sauron.
"One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them
One ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them."

[lj]

On 2004-02-15 07:04:03 -0800, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> said:


> In fact, almost nobody goes from ASCII to Tiles, but a lot of
> ppl goes from Tiles to ASCII and can´t go back.
> There should be tiles in variants that attract mass newbas, like V
> and Tome thu.....

I'll refrain from commenting on tiles vs ASC, which is better, because in
the end it's like arguing which OS is better-- it all comes down to
preference, and you're not going to change anyone's mind no matter how loud
you argue.

But it seems to come up now and then that "tiles attract newbies". Is this
really true? I can only speak for myself and the handful of people i know
who play, but I don't really believe there's a large number of players who
used tiles from the first game on day one-- if only for the fact that ASC
is the default, and you have to muck around and know a little bit about
what you're doing just to get tiles to work... And I assume most people
just load up the game and start playing. And since even at their best
(e.g. the upcoming iso-view ToME) tiles still aren't state-of-the-art, I
can't imagine that the graphics alone would bring in players from, say,
Neverwinter Nights... ASC, in it's on way, is timeless in a functional
and utilitarian way, where graphics make it look at best like a game from
the mid-90's.

Again, I'm not knocking tiles or suggesting they be removed-- if that's
you're thing, go for it. I just wonder if the "newbies" argument really
holds any weight.

[awldune]

On 2004-02-15 16:04:03, Atriel <***@hotmail.com> wrote:

> * i can create an image of the situation (imagination) completely
> umbiased by (crappy) graphics. I donŽt see a bunch of dumb
> 16x16 images, but when i close my eyes, i see the slimy, dripping
> dungeon walls, and can fell the chilling air the ancient white
> is emanating from the end of the corridor.

Well said!! Sort of like reading LOTR versus watching the terrible 1978 cartoon
version.

[David Gervais]

yah! another discussion about the use of tiles or not in Angband and it's
varients.

Ok, time to put this in perspective..

1) Angband and it's Variants are Great games right? [YES] [NO]

2) There will always be people that prefer ASCII right? [YES] [NO]

3) There will always be people that would like Graphics right? [YES] [NO]

As far as I can tell, there is only one answer to these three questions, YES!

So, If this is true then ALL Variants of AngBand should have the 'Option' to
play with or without Graphic Tiles. (and if what someone said is true,.. "Some
people start with graphics and then move to and prefer ASCII but new players
who start with ASCII never move to and prefer GRAPHICS." then the 'Option' to
have graphics is the best way to infuse new blood into the Angband worlds.

Pesonally I think there is no reason for a Great game like AngBand to NOT have
Great Graphics. (Why do these two things often become mutually exclusive? I
have no idea.)

Nuf said, Cheers!

David E. Gervais
___________________________________________________
One voice, one mind, many thoughts and always kind.

[R Dan Henry]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004 06:32:59 -0500, in a fit of madness David Gervais
<***@hotmail.com> declared:

>So, If this is true then ALL Variants of AngBand should have the 'Option' to
>play with or without Graphic Tiles. (and if what someone said is true,.. "Some
>people start with graphics and then move to and prefer ASCII but new players
>who start with ASCII never move to and prefer GRAPHICS." then the 'Option' to
>have graphics is the best way to infuse new blood into the Angband worlds.
>
>Pesonally I think there is no reason for a Great game like AngBand to NOT have
>Great Graphics. (Why do these two things often become mutually exclusive? I
>have no idea.)

So, you'll be keeping graphic tile sets up to date for all variants
then? GREAT!

--
R. Dan Henry, Emperor of the Universe
Are Time Hounds watch dogs?
Please note my new email address

[David Gervais]

...
>So, you'll be keeping graphic tile sets up to date for all variants
>then? GREAT!

Hah! very funny, wishful and optimistic. I have created more than enough RPG
Tiles that can be used for *bands. Check out this link..

http://pousse.rapiere.free.fr/tome/index.htm

In the Graphic Library section, you'll see that my tiles from Dungeon Odyssey
are also available to the public.

I'm currently busy on 'Other things' so wouldn't have the time to make new RPG
tiles.

Has anyone ever thought of modding the monster data files to make full use of
my tiles? there are a whole lot of unused monsters in my various files. (And
isn't it much easier to modify a text file than to draw new monsters?)

Sorry, that was just me being wishful and optimistic and funny. :P

Cheers! :D

David E. Gervais
___________________________________________________
One voice, one mind, many thoughts and always kind.

[R Dan Henry]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004 16:43:59 -0500, in a fit of madness David Gervais
<***@hotmail.com> declared:

>...
>>So, you'll be keeping graphic tile sets up to date for all variants
>>then? GREAT!
>
>Hah! very funny, wishful and optimistic. I have created more than enough RPG
>Tiles that can be used for *bands. Check out this link..
>
>http://pousse.rapiere.free.fr/tome/index.htm

Okay, you did *that* set. Not badly done, but the style is way to cute
for my tastes. (I'm not sure how much one can actually avoid cuteness
with little tile graphics, but they sure work against the mood I want to
create.) And I don't see any guns, anyway. Or Nazis. And especially, no
Nazi tyrannosaurs with guns. I can't use a set without Nazi tyrannosaurs
with guns for Dangband, my as yet unreleased variant. Plus I need guns
and technology in items. And other things that you don't have.

As for Gumband, just considering my recent additions, the horses don't
have horns; I see a cow, but no bull; nobody in a clock-mask; no
flamingos; no hedgehog; I could maybe accept an eagle or gryphon as a
stand-in for an ornithoper, although a proper tile would show it as
mechanical; in fact, nothing much but a few fairly non-descript humanoid
types match up to your existing tiles and the more I actual progress in
making Gumband a distinctive variant, the less useful such tiles will
be.

And the other variant I've signed on to help a bit with, Steamband,
would need more chickens, as well as guns and more modern clothing.

>In the Graphic Library section, you'll see that my tiles from Dungeon Odyssey
>are also available to the public.

Those are even more cute.

>I'm currently busy on 'Other things' so wouldn't have the time to make new RPG
>tiles.

So, who exactly do you think does? You say that all variants "should"
have tile graphics support. That implies someone "should" be making
tiles for them. If not you, who do you think "should" be doing this?
Most maintainers don't have the skill and it would not be constructive
for them to divert available time from actually developing the game.

Think about it: You obviously put a lot of time and effort into your
existing tiles. For a few variants, there are a relatively small number
of additional tiles needed, say 10-20% of the work you originally put
in. For others, however, one would pretty much have to duplicate the
original task. Do you really expect there are enough individuals with
the time, skill, and will to do so, especially for any but the most
popular variants?

How long do you think it would take *you*, someone who has the
experience of having done it before, to do a new tile set, with let us
say 150 new monsters and 70 new items? Seriously, I'd like to hear your
estimate. That we can consider a *minimum* for a variant with any
serious setting differences and a maintainer who isn't willing to use a
half-assed match of graphics to descriptions. Some variants will require
even more tiles and someone even with equal skill, but lacking your
experience in making a tileset, will take longer.

>Has anyone ever thought of modding the monster data files to make full use of
>my tiles? there are a whole lot of unused monsters in my various files. (And
>isn't it much easier to modify a text file than to draw new monsters?)

That would need somebody who cared more about using the tiles than in
shaping the game-setting to match an existing vision. That may be the
case for some variants, but for many including monsters just because you
made tiles for them would go against the basic concepts of the variant.

For someone who was (a) planning tile support for their game and was
thinking of using yours and (b) looking for monster ideas, I think that
would be a fine idea.

--
R. Dan Henry, Emperor of the Universe
Are Time Hounds watch dogs?
Please note my new email address

[Jonathan Ellis]

"David Gervais" <***@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:***@4ax.com...
> ...
> >So, you'll be keeping graphic tile sets up to date for all variants
> >then? GREAT!
>
> Hah! very funny, wishful and optimistic. I have created more than
enough RPG
> Tiles that can be used for *bands. Check out this link..
>
> http://pousse.rapiere.free.fr/tome/index.htm
>
> In the Graphic Library section, you'll see that my tiles from
Dungeon Odyssey
> are also available to the public.
>
> I'm currently busy on 'Other things' so wouldn't have the time to
make new RPG
> tiles.
>
> Has anyone ever thought of modding the monster data files to make
full use of
> my tiles? there are a whole lot of unused monsters in my various
files. (And
> isn't it much easier to modify a text file than to draw new
monsters?)

No, actually. Drawing a new monster is simply a matter of putting
pixels together. *Making* an actual new monster is what requires
intelligence, and real creative work... it's the bit that involves all
the REAL decisions: what level it should be, how many hit points it
should have, how hard it should hit for up to four attacks per round,
what types those attacks should be, and a whole *host* of other
things.

Angband is made up so that all the REALLY IMPORTANT stuff - the
*decisions* about how a monster or item actually interacts with
GAMEPLAY - are in the plain text files. Graphics are, naturally, not
in plain text files.

Modding the monster data files so as to fit with YOUR graphics, is
YOUR job. For YOUR variant.

Modding your graphic files to fit with an existing variant is "nice",
but not "required", for any given variant. Angband is playable without
graphics: it was designed that way: therefore, it us up to those who
want graphics, to either (a) supply the graphics for their graphical
versions of existing variants, or (b) create their own variant with
their own graphics.

Jonathan.

[Jeff Greene]

"David Gervais" <***@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:***@4ax.com...
> yah! another discussion about the use of tiles or not in Angband and it's
> varients.
>
>
> Pesonally I think there is no reason for a Great game like AngBand to NOT
have
> Great Graphics. (Why do these two things often become mutually exclusive?
I
> have no idea.)
>

This reply had a slightly different tone to it, until it hit me where I had
seen your name before. :)

I suppose in an ideal world they would be, but I guess they are not for
several reasons,.....


1) Because creating tilesets is a different creative ability than coding.
It uses different sides of the brain (as I understand it). While the
following statement is a generalization with no doubt plenty of exceptions,
a person very interested in one probably isn't going to be as interested in
the other. I don't think any of the tilesets that vanilla supports were
created by variant maintainers.
2) Personally, I am not even sure how to do it. I know how to assign tiles
to monsters and objects, but what software is used to actually edit or
create the tiles and how is it done? I've never even opened the actual
graphics files.

Currently, there are at least several dozen monsters in Vanilla Angband in
all 4 tilesets that don't have tiles assigned to them. Not to mention the
new higher-res ISO-view being developed for TOME could easily be adopted to
vanilla (I think a less graphics-intensive ISO view already is). That is,
provided somebody felt like creating or converting, at a minimum, the 800 or
so tiles that would be necessary to play the game this way. I am sure RR or
almost any variant maintainer would welcome anyone willing to take on the
graphics side of any of these tasks.

--
-Jeff

replace the ".spam"s with comcast.net to reply

Author of NPPAngband. Check it out at:
http://home.comcast.net/~nppangband/

--
-Jeff

replace the ".spam"s with comcast.net to reply

Author of NPPAngband. Check it out at:
http://home.comcast.net/~nppangband/

[Hansjoerg Malthaner]

Jeff Greene schrieb:

> Currently, there are at least several dozen monsters in Vanilla Angband in
> all 4 tilesets that don't have tiles assigned to them. Not to mention the
> new higher-res ISO-view being developed for TOME could easily be adopted to
> vanilla (I think a less graphics-intensive ISO view already is). That is,
> provided somebody felt like creating or converting, at a minimum, the 800 or
> so tiles that would be necessary to play the game this way. I am sure RR or
> almost any variant maintainer would welcome anyone willing to take on the
> graphics side of any of these tasks.

I had started an isometric view for Angband early 2001. There have been
great breaks in development. It seems I'm able to spend only a few weeks
on it, once a year :)

http://www.simugraph.com/simutrans/iso_angband/

There are efforts to convert Davids tiles to be used in Iso-Tome.

I wanted to have different style in Iso-Angband, so I didn't use them,
except a very few tiles that I slighty modified to fit better.

I've got a few other projects running, so I assume progress with Iso-Angband
will occur very sporadic only - you see, it's still based on Angband 2.9.1
which was up to date when I started.

I have started a yahoo group to organize creation and exchange of tiles
for CRPG style games (IMO the RL genre is a subcategory of CRPG). It's
also pretty dead, but this is just a question of the members activity:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crpg-gfx/

I thought there'd a supply and demand, and the only thing needed was a
place to meet. But it didn't work out yet. Well, it's still there to be
used :)

c.u.
Hajo

[Paul Murray]

In article <***@4ax.com>, David Gervais wrote:
> Pesonally I think there is no reason for a Great game like AngBand to NOT have
> Great Graphics. (Why do these two things often become mutually exclusive? I
> have no idea.)

In general, because the sort of person who enjoys/is good at programming games
such as Angband is not the sort of person who enjoys/is good at graphical
design. It is a completely different skill set, and while there is a large
number of programmers prepared to give their time away, there are not the same
number of grahical artists.

[Rubinstein]

Paul Murray wrote:

> In article <***@4ax.com>, David Gervais
> wrote:
>> Pesonally I think there is no reason for a Great game like AngBand to
>> NOT have Great Graphics. (Why do these two things often become mutually
>> exclusive? I have no idea.)
>
> In general, because the sort of person who enjoys/is good at programming
> games such as Angband is not the sort of person who enjoys/is good at
> graphical design. It is a completely different skill set, and while
> there is a large number of programmers prepared to give their time away,
> there are not the same number of grahical artists.

Additionally there are still lot's of players (me included) thinking that
roguelikes don't need anything else than ASCII grafics. Keeping this in
mind, thank heaven (or better: the artists) there're nevertheless some
kind of grafics around.

Rubinstein

[Robert Ruehlmann]

pkraem wrote:
> I went through the "Current Variants" on www.thangorodrim.net and looked
> for the following for "Windows" versions:
>
> Supports ASCII mode, 8x8 tiles, Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles, easily
> resizeable info windows, and sound.
>
> the ONLY version that listed this was Zangband! I consider this to
> be abysmal. So I went and downloaded 15 of the variants and tested
> them to see if they had tile support of some kind. some of them
> required that the tiles be downloaded and added to the correct folder.
> others did have the above support even though it was not stated on
> the web site! the following are what I saw:

<snip>

I'll add this info to Thangorodrim in the next update.

> Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the variants
> that have it?

Because I don't have the time to download, install, and test every single
release to get this info.  I know what is supported by the Windows versions
I compiled myself (Angband, ZAngband, and various older releases).  But I
simply don't know what kind of graphics are supported in releases by other
developers.  Help in this regard is always welcome.

--
Robert Ruehlmann ( ***@thangorodrim.net )
"Thangorodrim - The Angband Page" : http://www.thangorodrim.net/
Visit the #angband chat channel at irc.worldirc.org

[lj]

On 2004-02-14 00:10:43 -0800, pkraem <***@bluebot.austin.ibm.com> said:

>
> I went through the "Current Variants" on www.thangorodrim.net and
looked
> for the following for "Windows" versions:
>
> Supports ASCII mode, 8x8 tiles, Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles, easily
resizeable
> info windows, and sound.
>
> the ONLY version that listed this was Zangband! I consider this to
> be abysmal. So I went and downloaded 15 of the variants and tested
> them to see if they had tile support of some kind. some of them
> required that the tiles be downloaded and added to the correct folder.
> others did have the above support even though it was not stated on
> the web site! the following are what I saw:
>
> Alexband:
> had to add graf files to the graf directory.
> worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
> OK.
>
<snip>
>
> Kamband
> Tiles? what Tiles? just ascii and thats it!
> Boooh!
>
> Kangband
> worked with Adam Bolt's 16x16 tiles and had tile width/height adjustment.
> the map command had a good view and good color. This should be
> the minimum they all should have!
> Allright!
>

Considering that these are basically dead variants (not sure about
Alexband, actually, but I haven't seen it mentioned in years) I don't think
you can expect support of any kind.

<snip>
>
> Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the variants
that
> have it?
>

Two things to keep in mind... One is that *band is very much a
multi-platform game that doesn't cater to the latest version of Windows.
Two is that it's a non-profit, community effort. Thangorodrim,
Angband.oook.cz and the various maintainers are all hobbyists, in the end,
and noone has any obligation to do anything except tinker and fill needs as
they see fit and as their time allows. If tile support wasn't listed, it's
because Robert doesn't know, doesn't care, doesn't have the time or the
information. So it's up to you to, well, basically do what you're doing
and test the tiles out and send the information to the various tile,
website and variant maintainers, as well as posting it on the r.g.r.a.
The squeaky wheel gets the grease...

[Jiamat]

I don't want to feed you individually so here goes.

Monster viewable window. I don't like looking outside my main window. Ok, so
whats stopping me from using one of those. What about variants that support
bigscreen mode.

Not a complaint i know, but you can tell individual from pack monsters in
graphics mode. 8x8 pack monsters have a red spot on them. 16x16 monsters are in
a different stance.

Actually, you just need to hit / and the character you want ID'd and you
get a full description. Yes thats so much quicker than accessing the memory
parts of my brain. Believe it or not i can remember that d means dragon in
addition to recognising what several hundred tiles are. 'l'ooking at a monster
is still quicker than cycling through monster memory. You still need to 'l'ook
at a monster in ASCII mode because its impossible to tell apart an ancient red
dragon and a hell wyrm. Oh right, monster viewable window. Bigscreen mode.

Imagination. Yeah whatever. I don't know where the rest of you get your mental
images of dragons from but mine come from pictures. Thousand words apparently.
You have a good think about what cthulu looks like while i think about my
equipment.

ASCII looks better. Of course it does. We call that an 'opinion'. Im sure when
rogue was being written they had the option of using graphics but decided
against it.

Missing tiles. Actually over 99% of monsters are covered by tiles. For the
missing ones i use my imagination. Only joking. Stray p's on the screen are
pretty easy to recognise because of their rarity.

Thats all folks.


Before you reply i want you to think whether you have any valid reason why ASCII
is superior to graphics. None of the above please, you have no arguments there.
In fact try and put forward a convincing argument for removing graphics
altogether.

And as for the 'newbie' stuff, just shut up about it already, nobody cares how
l33t you ASCII players are okay.

/hoping i can avoid returning to this thread

[R. Cliff Young]

On 2004-02-17 02:14:57, Jiamat <***@lycos.com> wrote:

> I don't want to feed you individually so here goes.
[...]
> Before you reply i want you to think whether you have any valid reason why ASCII
> is superior to graphics. None of the above please, you have no arguments there.
> In fact try and put forward a convincing argument for removing graphics
> altogether.
>
> And as for the 'newbie' stuff, just shut up about it already, nobody cares how
> l33t you ASCII players are okay.
>
> /hoping i can avoid returning to this thread

Your arguments and stance would be a lot more persuasive if you had utilized
graphics instead of ASCII. I mean, if you're gonna go on for a thousand words
harping on how your precious pictures are better than our text, you're kind of
digging yourself into your own grave, you know?

Why do you even try to read USENET if the alphabet is too much for you to deal
with?

Oh, and you misspelled 'n00b'. ;)

--
R. Cliff Young <***@roguebard.com> /\/ Chaos Never Died

[pkraem]

>I'll add this info to Thangorodrim in the next update.

>> Why doesn't Thangorodrim list Windows tile support for all the variants
>> that have it?

>Because I don't have the time to download, install, and test every single
>release to get this info. I know what is supported by the Windows versions
>I compiled myself (Angband, ZAngband, and various older releases). But I
>simply don't know what kind of graphics are supported in releases by other
>developers. Help in this regard is always welcome.

>--
>Robert Ruehlmann ( ***@thangorodrim.net )
>"Thangorodrim - The Angband Page" : http://www.thangorodrim.net/
>Visit the #angband chat channel at irc.worldirc.org

Thank You!

peter kraemer
***@us.ibm.com

p.s. my opinions do not represent those of ibm blah blah blah.
#include <standard.disclaimer>