State of Zelda Classic 2.5

Quit yer spammin, Shoelance!

j/k

Shoelace wrote:I noticed ZC progress has been getting a little slow. I know that the developers have lives and this is just for fun thing and not a job, but for the past like 6 months, the only developer doing anything is _L_ (God, bless his soul). So what happened to the other developers?

Saffith and pikaguy900 are in unannounced retirement. jman2050 said about a week ago that he might soon have more time to work on the interface, so we'll see. Dark Nation? No idea.

Shoelace wrote:The point is, I just really want a progress report on what you think is the state on ZC 2.5. Because at this point it doesn't look like it is coming out in the next year or two.

Shoelace wrote:I noticed ZC progress has been getting a little slow. I know that the developers have lives and this is just for fun thing and not a job, but for the past like 6 months, the only developer doing anything is _L_ (God, bless his soul). So what happened to the other developers?

Saffith and pikaguy900 are in unannounced retirement. jman2050 said about a week ago that he might soon have more time to work on the interface, so we'll see. Dark Nation? No idea.

Shoelace wrote:The point is, I just really want a progress report on what you think is the state on ZC 2.5. Because at this point it doesn't look like it is coming out in the next year or two.

ut oh.
The freedom and Petoe generation has passed away and now the next generations are in their life throws.

I believe DarkDragon is only on holiday over seas, he has not gone away for good.

_L_: Consider it "unnanounced retirement" if you want, but I plan to do work. I'm just...not confident in my ability to work with the code well at all. Right now, I really want to do something with the code, but there's so much thrown all over the place, and I have absolutely NO real experience working with the code.

While we are on the subject of ZC 2.5's release, I have a question. What about NeoFirst. I believe it was supposed to be packaged with ZC 2.5 as an example quest. However, 2.5's release is drawing near, and NeoFirst is nowhere near completion. Will a first quest remake be made for 2.5 or something like that?

2.5 and NeoFirst are both pretty much in the same boat as Duke Nukem Forever.

Sorry guys 😞 😞 😞. That I got a job is partially right (grad student), which has been taking up a lot of time. In addition, I've found NYC a lot more conducive to having a social life than Kentucky. These factors, combined with me getting a little bummed out that, despite our best efforts, 2.50 stability appears to have become a Sisyphean task, have caused me to completely neglect ZC lately. Right now I'm working towards a paper deadline and won't have the time to get back in the swing of development, but do hope to do a spurt of work on ZC once my schedule becomes more leisurely. Again, I'm sorry to have let you guys down, I know how long everyone has been patiently waiting for 2.50, and as one of the few who can do something about it, share a lot of the blame.

Again, I'm sorry to have let you guys down, I know how long everyone has been patiently waiting for 2.50, and as one of the few who can do something about it, share a lot of the blame.

DD, won't blame yourself at all. Like _L_ said you did a lot to get ZC 2.5 this far. Even if you were to retire right now, I still respect the hell out of you and thank you for all of the hard work you put into ZC. So again, don't you dare think you let us down.

This thread was just so I know, and everyone else for that matter, where everyone and everything stands. Because like you guys do, I put a lot of work in my quests. I devout a lot of time and care into my quests, and that is why I want to know the progress. Because I want to see my quest released some day, and the waiting and waiting for years is starting to take its toll on me. I am just trying to find hope because I don't want my hard work to go to waste, because there is no telling what I will be doing in 2 years and I don't want my game to be canned.

What do you mean? Other than the aforementioned HR problems, things are going better than ever. The bug forums only have 52 open bugs left! (The NES compatability bugs have been marked "Deferred to post-2.50" by DarkDragon) And the new bug reports have shrunken to about 2 per week. Even two committed devs could plough through those in 4 months. And after that is just the business of finalising ZScript and tidying up the ZQuest interface.

Thanks _L_ for the response. Yeah, I do see that there are only 52 open bugs. So that sounds great. However, the thing in the back of my mind was the Large Mode. To me, it seems like the longest part of the wait now is Large Mode, as everything has to be made and then tested still. And it has been going kinda slow. Yesterday, I was ZCing for about 7 hours and a lot of the time was using a magnifying glass to see the Tile Page. lol. I see that you put it on the next build, so I am crossing my fingers that there will be a new downloadable build soon as I have been switching back and forth from the normal and large mode constantly.

History repeats itself 😛 How many tens of times has a thread like this emerged? Not that it is without justification.

It sure is boring around here -_-

waiting for the new version

2.50 stability appears to have become a Sisyphean task, have caused me to completely neglect ZC lately.

So you're in New York City now? Where in, may I ask? There are a bunch of people here who would actually love to visit you. 😊 (I'm maybe 15 or so miles east of the city, though that's a highly estimated measurement.)

bigjoe wrote:It sure is boring around here -_-

My boy, this peace is what... *gets pummeled by bricks*

russadwan wrote:While we are on the subject of ZC 2.5's release, I have a question. What about NeoFirst. I believe it was supposed to be packaged with ZC 2.5 as an example quest. However, 2.5's release is drawing near, and NeoFirst is nowhere near completion. Will a first quest remake be made for 2.5 or something like that?

Well, NeoFirst is supposed to showcase the new things in 2.50, and it's, admittedly, a bit tricky to do so when 2.50 is technically not completed yet.

And furthermore, NeoFirst is, now at least, intended to showcase the new storytelling and gameplay potential of ZC as compared to First Quest. I intend it to be a full-fledged adventure of its own - not very long, but not too narrow.

Consider NeoFirst's completion a priority for 2.60.

I shall rename ZC 2.5 as Zelda Classic Forever! 😉

And now that Peteo and Freedom are gone (too bad for the community), it is fun to see who will be the next Peteo/Freedom. I'm sure at some point someone will get fed up when they waste all their freetime for a program that is a piece of shit. 😊

Oh and pikaguy900, I'm honestly fed up with ignorant comments like you're making. Freedom is the only reason there ever was hope for a stable ZC 2.5. He raised questions, he made things happen, he tested more than any of you slackers ever did, and now he's gone and that's a big effing loss to the community, get that? ZC community needs more Freedoms but none of you people seem to get it. "Freedom is bad, Freedom is shellfish, Freedom is annoying..." silly people, he had the interest of the whole community in his mind, not just his own. Where's the respect he deserves?

Whatever, you guys can keep dreaming of ZC 2.5. Maybe in 2 or 3 years I'll drop by to see what's going on and say to you all "what did I tell you, haha". 😉

pikaguy900 wrote:_L_: Consider it "unnanounced retirement" if you want, but I plan to do work. I'm just...not confident in my ability to work with the code well at all. Right now, I really want to do something with the code, but there's so much thrown all over the place, and I have absolutely NO real experience working with the code.

I've been throwing around an idea to actually address the deeper-rooted problems of ZC for a release, but I've been afraid of making everyone mad again. Although really, with all the mistakes I've made so far, I pretty much don't care anymore how much I am disliked if it means getting something out the door that is reasonably complete AND not crippled.

Petoe wrote:I shall rename ZC 2.5 as Zelda Classic Forever! 😉

And now that Peteo and Freedom are gone (too bad for the community), it is fun to see who will be the next Peteo/Freedom. I'm sure at some point someone will get fed up when they waste all their freetime for a program that is a piece of shit. 😊

Oh and pikaguy900, I'm honestly fed up with ignorant comments like you're making. Freedom is the only reason there ever was hope for a stable ZC 2.5. He raised questions, he made things happen, he tested more than any of you slackers ever did, and now he's gone and that's a big effing loss to the community, get that? ZC community needs more Freedoms but none of you people seem to get it. "Freedom is bad, Freedom is shellfish, Freedom is annoying..." silly people, he had the interest of the whole community in his mind, not just his own. Where's the respect he deserves?

Whatever, you guys can keep dreaming of ZC 2.5. Maybe in 2 or 3 years I'll drop by to see what's going on and say to you all "what did I tell you, haha". 😉

In order, the underlined parts:

Don't flatter yourself.
Make a not-shit program, then you get to bash ZC. (Same goes for Freedom)
He make make "ignorant" (which is in quotes because I disagree) comments, but when you constantly say "ZC is shit, 2.5 is never coming etc." it's kinda hard to take you seriously.
The bold speaks for itself... *lol*
Apparently the key word is "Had" in that whole sentence (starting at 'silly people'😉
Yea, we'll dream. Now go ride a bike or something.

I may have done little (I DID actually do stuff) for the ZC community, but I don't sit around and complain waving my giant ego around maiming people with it.

I going to say this.

Devs, face the truth. The current ZC is unstable because of the lack of understanding its code. Phantom Meanace may have made the first ZC, but he knew how it worked to the best of his knowledge. Now that he's not here anymore, and he left no real archive of the code except the code itself, it's all guesswork for the others on deciding how it works.

At this point, sometimes when the plan isn't understood, and not explained, sometimes we must restart with a representation that does make sense. And this, I must say, is a direction we might as well take; this way, we can pinpoint what causes certain problems, and we know what ends are open and not break others by pure accident.

After all, I know a lot of suggestions made require a whole new engine, and the fact is that you might as well make a new one. You got some parts you can start from, but otherwise it be the only viable chance left to get a stable ZC running. After all, I know some of you want to ditch Allegro anyhow, and go with a more flexible library.

elise wrote:Then PLEASE don't even touch it and get out the developers team :uhoh:

Comments like this won't be tolerated. Don't do this again.

Linkus wrote:I going to say this.

Devs, face the truth. The current ZC is unstable because of the lack of understanding its code. Phantom Meanace may have made the first ZC, but he knew how it worked to the best of his knowledge. Now that he's not here anymore, and he left no real archive of the code except the code itself, it's all guesswork for the others on deciding how it works.

At this point, sometimes when the plan isn't understood, and not explained, sometimes we must restart with a representation that does make sense. And this, I must say, is a direction we might as well take; this way, we can pinpoint what causes certain problems, and we know what ends are open and not break others by pure accident.

After all, I know a lot of suggestions made require a whole new engine, and the fact is that you might as well make a new one. You got some parts you can start from, but otherwise it be the only viable chance left to get a stable ZC running. After all, I know some of you want to ditch Allegro anyhow, and go with a more flexible library.

This is actually what precisely what I want to do, except it doesn't come from not understanding the code, it comes from understanding the code enough that you realize that trying to patch things would be more trouble than its worth.

The problems with ZC extend beyond what's reported in the bug forums. I evidently gained some fans by doing everything that the community wanted me to do, but if these years and experience have taught me anything, it's that the problem IS pandering to a fanbase. You want a stable release? Let us do our jobs and it'll get there when it gets there.

Of course, that's just my view of the whole matter, the other devs and I will have to consider what we want to do in the future, especially regarding this build of ZC we're working on now.

The big question is (and it's been raised before): "How good is good enough?"

To completely rid ZC of bugs would probably take a lifetime. Currently, we have 28 critical (corrupt quests/crash the program) and mechanical (make quests unbeatable or make things have to be done in a different way than was intended) bugs. Would releasing after these are fixed be "good enough"?

Also, less than half of the current code was actually written by PM. Much of the code has been heavily modified, completely rewritten, or added outright.

Finally, in regards to patching problems vs. rewriting: A rewrite is necessary at some point. To give an analogy, we need a bowl but we have a sieve. We are currently trying to plug up all the holes in the sieve to make a nice, pretty bowl, but it takes time and sometimes the patches that we have to hammer in place make some of the other patches fall off or break new holes into the sieve that have to be patched as well.

Finally, in regards to patching problems vs. rewriting: A rewrite is necessary at some point. To give an analogy, we need a bowl but we have a sieve. We are currently trying to plug up all the holes in the sieve to make a nice, pretty bowl, but it takes time and sometimes the patches that we have to hammer in place make some of the other patches fall off or break new holes into the sieve that have to be patched as well.

Along with your question, is it really worth it to keep patching up the sieve when we could be spending our time making a new bowl? and it doesn't even have to be a prettier bowl, it can be the same bowl everyone is used to, except more sturdy and less likely to break. I doubt people would be willing to wait, but like I said, I don't care about that anymore.

Well, we could patch the biggest holes in the bowl (the ones that can cause the bowl to break or allow all of your food to spill out) while leaving the smaller holes and scratches for later, if ever. Then, we can make a new bowl, though it won't hold a small percentage of the things that the old bowl held without modifying those things (the new bowl has nice compartments, perhaps, and some of the more messy items have to be folded neatly to fit in the pretty compartments, maybe).

I suppose, but will that be worth it? After all, we already have bowls we've given out that don't have those big holes that we created trying to improve it further. Couldn't they just use one of those instead of waiting for something that's only a marginal improvement?

(On a seperate note, this analogy is fun)

Well, one of the problems with our current bowl is that some types of food containing certain ingredients, if taken out of the bowl and placed in the refrigerator, will be free of those ingredients when put back into the bowl: http://www.armageddongames.net/forums//thread/102928/

Another issue is that when mixing colors in the bowl, sometimes the bowl will become nonresponsive and not allow you to use it anymore (you have to stick the bowl in the refrigerator after dumping the contents in the trash, then take the bowl out of the refrigerator and putting a new copy of the old contents back in it from the refrigerator.): http://www.armageddongames.net/forums//thread/102921/

The bowl also has a food processor built in. Sometimes, if you put a lot of things with the same name into the food processor (egg[0], egg[1], etc.), certain actions with the food processor will cause the food processor (and the bowl) to stop working, forcing the trash/refrigerator remedy above: http://www.armageddongames.net/forums//thread/103734/

That's just 3 of the problems.

I hate to interrupt this Super Bowl, but... I just wanted to point out some parallels in other projects.

I used to be the jman on another project. Though I've since retired from that project, in my time, I shook up the code base quite a bit.

Quite a few bugs were introduced with my new features, but even more bugs were shook out of the carpet. Alas, all of these bugs were attributed to me. The Freedom of that community expressed similar concerns to those in this thread.

Most of the bugs have since been worked out, either by me or by the _L_ and the Dark Nation. (Some bugs haven't, as they are artifacts of having been ported from Dos to Windows with as few changes to the code base as possible... bad idea, but not mine.)

Anyway, a major view during the whole fiasco was that "Why not just start over?". Well, I did just that.

Turns out, replacing 9+ years worth of work takes, well, 9 years. My replacement project never got off the ground, nor have any others, either ports of the original code, rewrites or independent projects. Only the original code base is still active.

Moral of the story: If anyone wants to see a stable release any time this decade, then a rewrite is not in the cards.

pkmnfrk wrote:I hate to interrupt this Super Bowl, but... I just wanted to point out some parallels in other projects.

I used to be the jman on another project. Though I've since retired from that project, in my time, I shook up the code base quite a bit.

Quite a few bugs were introduced with my new features, but even more bugs were shook out of the carpet. Alas, all of these bugs were attributed to me. The Freedom of that community expressed similar concerns to those in this thread.

Most of the bugs have since been worked out, either by me or by the _L_ and the Dark Nation. (Some bugs haven't, as they are artifacts of having been ported from Dos to Windows with as few changes to the code base as possible... bad idea, but not mine.)

Anyway, a major view during the whole fiasco was that "Why not just start over?". Well, I did just that.

Turns out, replacing 9+ years worth of work takes, well, 9 years. My replacement project never got off the ground, nor have any others, either ports of the original code, rewrites or independent projects. Only the original code base is still active.

Moral of the story: If anyone wants to see a stable release any time this decade, then a rewrite is not in the cards.

There are cases of it working, so I suppose it depends on the project. Not like I would be doing this on my own anyway, though even working to fix the existing code is difficult with _L_ being the only real active one over the past few weeks.

DarkNation wrote:Well, we could patch the biggest holes in the bowl (the ones that can cause the bowl to break or allow all of your food to spill out) while leaving the smaller holes and scratches for later, if ever. Then, we can make a new bowl, though it won't hold a small percentage of the things that the old bowl held without modifying those things (the new bowl has nice compartments, perhaps, and some of the more messy items have to be folded neatly to fit in the pretty compartments, maybe).

Amaster42 wrote:QFT!!! This is exactly what I mean, put far better than the kind of convoluted way I put it.

I find it hilarious that you found an extremely thin bowl metaphor less convoluted than what you said