DN & Devs ~ About a stable release

[Freedom]

Kind and wise Developers,

Could you give us a little insight on our quest for a stable release?
A little guidance perhaps, and an understanding of where we are and where we should be going at this point?
Perhaps a general time frame, things you feel we testers should be looking at, maybe a little goal towards saying "this version is good enough, lets go for it".

Most of the bugs being reported now seem to be very minor, and many people reporting them seem to still have the mindset of worrying about what's not there instead of what IS there, like inconsistencies.

I imagine inconsistencies are important enough, but they don't hold a candle to the need for a finished stable release, and after all, any inconsistencies that are there have been there since day one and it hasn't hurt the product or the community thus far.

I've spent the last few days going over enemies, and the editor, I have to say L did a fine job and it seems pretty tight to me, but it would be nice to have others look for things I may have missed.

It would be nice to see people focused on making sure what is there is right instead of still worrying about what isn't there.
It would also help if you Devs could point out areas you may have concerns with for people to check out, and if we had that, and a goal towards a time frame it might give others incentive to jump in and help.

Thoughts?

[beefster09]

I agree. Inconsistencies usually don't matter unless it's between ZC and ZQ. I think we should stop wasting time on correcting inconsistencies and focus solely on the bugs. Then we should be able to finish 2.50 by September. (though I think it should be called ZC 2.40)

In fact, the only fix that would require an addition would be variables that save, which is totally necessary.

We should also gray out or comment out all minor unfinished features. (Such as certain "element types" in the subscreen editor)

And feel free to beat me up for starting the vertical scrolling inconsistency topic.

[DarkDragon]

2.50 will be released, uh..., last December. ;)
Though I appreciate your desire to see 2.50 as soon as possible, it would not be a good idea to have it rushed - remember the fiasco that was 2.10.

Here are some areas which historically have been notoriously bug-prone, and could use a good hard look:
1) Z3 movement
2) Tile grabber
3) String editor
4) Big Link
5) Preview mode
6) Subscreen editor

[SpykStorm]

4) Big Link
Big Link? Theres a big Link?:confused:

[Freedom]

2.50 will be released, uh..., last December. ;)
Though I appreciate your desire to see 2.50 as soon as possible, it would not be a good idea to have it rushed - remember the fiasco that was 2.10.

Here are some areas which historically have been notoriously bug-prone, and could use a good hard look:
1) Z3 movement
2) Tile grabber
3) String editor
4) Big Link
5) Preview mode
6) Subscreen editor

My post wasn't meant to "rush" you guys, but to try and see some kind of direction laid out which would probably end with a little quicker release.
Since it took all day today to get some answers to a couple of enemy editor questions it seems as though nobody is quite sure how things work or what to do to get them working, and as such are probably afraid they will be criticized for being wrong.
Testers can't report it if they don't know weather it's broke or not and you guys can't fix it if you don't know it's broke.
I'd hate to see this drag on forever with everyone waiting for the other guy to speak up because they aren't sure themselves.

[Gleeok]

Dark Dragon pretty much took away my reply to this, which would've been basically the same thing: Don't rush, yada yada. 2.10, blah, blah.


I've spent the last few days going over enemies, and the editor, I have to say L did a fine job and it seems pretty tight to me, but it would be nice to have others look for things I may have missed.

I'm still convinced there's plenty of bugs left in the subscreen and enemy editor, and if not i'll have to see it to believe it. I'm just getting around to seriously turning these two inside out.

Also: The big link hit box...how exactally does this work?


EDIT: It does feel like it's close though, with 492 being awesome and all.



And feel free to beat me up for starting the vertical scrolling inconsistency topic.

Done. :whap: :cry::gavel:

[Petoe]

Freedom isn't rushing anyone, he never has, he just wants to know the status of the ZC and what it takes to get a stable and full ZC release out some day.
I have to say it is quite unnerving to see that instead of adding new features, the new obsession for everyone seems to be 100% LoZ consistency..... meh. :(


Anyhoo, I will definitely concentrate on the 6 points DarkDragon pointed out when I resume ZC testing somehwere during next week hopefully.

[Freedom]

Dark Dragon pretty much took away my reply to this, which would've been basically the same thing: Don't rush, yada yada. 2.10, blah, blah.



I'm still convinced there's plenty of bugs left in the subscreen and enemy editor, and if not i'll have to see it to believe it. I'm just getting around to seriously turning these two inside out.

Also: The big link hit box...how exactally does this work?


EDIT: It does feel like it's close though, with 492 being awesome and all.




Done. :whap: :cry::gavel:

The big hitbox changes links walkability from half a tile to a full tile.
Example;
Right now most doorways and passageways have only a half tile of walkable area, going to large hitbox you would need to change all those areas in your quest and open them up to all the full tile.
It also effects pushing blocks, with large hitbox he starts pushing the block the half tile sooner going up.
It also effects where enemy projectiles start hitting him.

I had a "special" quest I was testing this in back when Jman was working on it, but with the shuffle and changes and all, that quest now could be anywhere, the fixes where coming so slowly in that area that it basically just got left in the dust, and then L came along and wanted to do away with big link all together in favor of sidescrolling, so bug testing in that area stopped for me all together.
I'm sure there are still some large hit box issues.

and...

Don't rush, yada yada. 2.10, blah, blah.
So instead of "rushing" we should all just set on our asses and hope it fixes itself in our lifetimes?
I want a stable release.

[Dark Nation]

So, should further LoZ consistency issues be shelved for the time being (for 2.51 or whatever)?

As for preview mode, that thing's a bit of a monster and it should be noted that it doesn't run scripts and it wouldn't be possible to make it do so in a timely manner. Other than that, though, what else needs to be fixed in it?

I'll go ahead and pull the unimplemented subscreen objects out so they can't be used.

[Freedom]

It seems like the consistency issues are dominating the testing and other testing has come to a standstill.
I just wonder how important they are compared to actual features not working.

As for preview mode, they way I use it, it's working just fine.
ShadowTiger said something about wanting warps to show or work or something, but I never use it for that so I don't really know what he wants.
I use it to see the secret combos, and when I see the warp tile pop up, then I know it will warp, and the destination I use the warp windows (go button) themselves to check.

as for this...

not be a good idea to have it rushed - remember the fiasco that was 2.10.

It's not the rushing that causes bugs to be missed, it's testers looking at the wrong things.
If people are looking solely at inconsistency issues by playing the 1st quest over and over again, then they are hardly going to find the shop bug or the map bug, that caused so much trouble with 2.10.
I was testing when 2.10 came out, and I didn't know 2.10 was coming out until it was setting there on the page for download.
IF people (testers) had known it was going to be released on that day, perhaps more effort would have been put into checking those issues?
Even so, like the map bug, it didn't show up for several months because certain conditions had to be met to trigger the bug, for one the player had to go through a passageway before using the map, otherwise the bug didn't occur.
So it may be that a stable release is released and then needs a fix at some point down the road huh?
Wouldn't that make more sense than just NOT releasing it because there might be a bug that nobody caught?