60 Days Later: Art Package for Modders to use (content for use by Modders)

Seconded. But what I want to know about even more is. when will we get the tools to import our own art assets (specifically the 3d ones)? Assets that are given to us are always awesome, but I want to see my own stuff in game!

A couple of months seems reasonable to: get to know the innards of the game, play the campaign, beat Frogboy in multiplayer... several times (not me!), get to know what can be done (exposed to Pyhton) and what still needs to wait...

Plus all the initial days after release eating popcorn while reading the forums with lots of people complaining about how dumbed down and for carebears the game is, how too much micro it requires, how the replayability sucks because it has no different races, how the animations suck therefore the game as a pile of something awful (that cannot compete with King's Bounty: The Legend) how Stardock has no idea of how to distribute their games because they don't have Elemental in Steam, how Stardock must work 24/7 to fix bugs A.S.A.P. or CivV is going to get all the players as soon as released, how Elemental is doomed because it has no hexes in map or tactical combat is not pure RTS feast, how the game doesn't work in a Spectrum, what a shit of beta test was done because a truly beta tested game wouldn't have gone to retail with bug *insert bug name*,....

With all that circus I mentioned, two months will fly before you notice it.

https://forums.elementalgame.com/384315

Looks like we got the same idea Raven...

Theres lots of stuff available to work off of now, so it's time for the modders to get busy!

Actually, my friend, we can already start work on some things. If you'll look at your file structure you'll see plenty of textures and assets that we can begin Modding and changing NOW . Animations, Wireframes, it's all there. Take a look into your system along this path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Stardock Games\Elemental\Gfx . Now you just need the programs capable of changing some of those things. Editing a PNG is easy. The animations are in HKB format and there are plenty of programs that can open those. You just need the tools and we don't really need to rely on Stardock to get the programs we need to start working .

LoL I'm sure we'll have some of those types too, Winter. See, I'm sure we all already know when Frogboy's Mod comes out it's going to be Awesome and a lot of us are gonna be saying "How did you do this? and That?" etc etc. By this point Frogboy will have some minor tools that I'm sure the rest of us won't have yet , but we'll get them in a patch or something after his Mod comes out. He will have already had access to the content we'll be getting 60 days later so he'll have a head start on us. I'm not saying they'd hold it back on purpose or anything, but we won't get access to it until it's all done and ready to be put out. Frogboy will have access to all the little bits and pieces as they're finished in-house.

Besides....time unfortunately Is a factor for me. It's not about me being impatient, it's about me wanting to finish my vision of the Dragonlance Mod A.S.A.P. so it can be my final (maybe..) gift to the community.

I should know in the next 20 days or so if I'll be getting the funding I need to get my surgery. Then I have to find a doctor I trust to do it etc etc, set it up....and hopefully come through it all ok. If for some reason they deny my paper-work (which they like to do) I'll have to redo and resubmit everything and then wait Another 20 days to find out if that one gets approved. It's a long drawn out process the state does so hopefully as many people as possible drop dead before they can get the help they need and cost the state even more money. People who die waiting to be helped don't cost the state anything at all..... so they make the process take as long as possible to save money...

We can open HKB's? I didn't know that. IIRC, Scoutdog tried to open those a while ago, but was unable to, and later one of the devs said they need to give us a tool that lets us convert our models to HKB and vice versa.

Do a Google search on "HKB File Extension" . There are other programs out there that can deal with them or maybe even convert them.

Are you sure? I did a Bing and a Google search, failed to find anything, except that Hot Keyboard Pro also uses an extension .hkb . And, funnily enough, the second result from Bing was the thread from these very forums that I was thinking of; https://forums.stardock.com/377701. Maybe you're right, but I've been unable to find anything to open them.

Here's a link I found on the Colony of Gamers forums: http://www.colonyofgamers.com/cogforums/showthread.php?p=581170

Also, refine your search. Try Googling "HKB file extension graphics animation" . Also, take a HKB file, Any file, and save it to another location. Now rename it to something you know you can open with another program, like Maya3D or 3DsMax. Then try to open it. Some things can be changed just by renaming the file extension. Like a .ISO and a .BIN . I've changed the file extensions on those and made them able to open with different programs. Some-times it corrupts the file, some times it doesn't.

I don't know the details because I haven't taken the time to play around with it yet, but I'm sure there's other programs out there that will open them or something they can be renamed too that will open them. I have a lot of programs to install before I can even try. Right now I need to re-install 3DsMax, Maya3D, and Dreamweaver, and those are just a FEW of the programs I'll be needing to do my work on the Mod. That's not counting various plug-ins, Hex Editors, Scripting programs like Ultra Edit, etc etc. Use what you know about the current HKB's and cross check them against Animations and Textures and things like that. You'll find Something Some-Where that will open them or you'll figure out what you need to re-name them too to get them open.

Note: If I have time I'll do some of those re-installs tonight and see if I can break open one of the files. Hell, maybe we'll get lucky and a Dev would be kind enough to tell us what we Can Use to open them on our own without waiting for the "right" tools. It can't be impossible. Another factor is that a lot of people simply can't afford the software needed to do a lot of these things. Companies can. How many people do you know with a LEGAL copy of both Maya and 3DsMax? Neither of those is what I would call "cheap". The only reason I have mine is because I got them through various jobs I've had, I just kept up with paying for the licenses my-self. A few of the programs I use are also "technically" corporate editions, but, they suite my needs.

Are you sure that's the right link? It took me to a post about Elemental, but I couldn't find anything about opening models, and I even went through all three pages

I tried more searches, still nothing. That post I linked earlier kept coming up though. Not even the Wikipedia list of file extensions has .hkb on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_file_formats_(alphabetical) As far as I can tell, the only way to open them is to try your suggestion of renaming them and hoping some format decides to work, but I don't really feel like doing that just this minute, maybe later

Also, I found out that Autodesk (makers of Softimage, 3DS Max, etc) give free educational licenses, as long as you have a valid college/university/whatever email address. Got Softimage 2011 that way. Of course, if you're not in school you might have a problem.

True. That link I posted only came up because one of the posts in it talking about the changes in release notes says HKB in it somewhere. I've found a few posts that say HKB files are a type of format used in some annimation programs but those same links don't say "What Program" will open them. I'll most likely be trying the re-naming option as well.

Maybe one of us should just "Ask Stardock" what program we need to open them or what we can re-name or convert them too? Then again they might not want us to know that information right now either for fear we'll start spamming the forums with Modding questions they aren't ready to answer yet...lol.

This has already been answered sadly - the hkb files themselves cannot be opened. It's a custom extension for the game engine. However there will be a converter to take 3dmax etc. files and turn them into hkb's in order to put them into the game. At least thats the way I understood it. It's way back in some post by FrogBoy¹. He stated in a much later post that he would see what he could do about getting us a model to play with. I do know that much of the 2D art and textures and stuff are available to work with now.

¹The term "FrogBoy" or any variations therof including but not limited to "Frog Boy" "Froggie Boy" "Frog Girl" "Froggie" "Little miss muffet" "Frogster" "Kermit the Frog" "Frogenstien" and "The Frogmeister" are copyright 2010 by StarDock Mega-Corporation, all rights reserved. Written permission is required to reference, post, blog, spray-paint, or otherwise mention any of the aforementioned terms. Did you know that Milk is good for you? This disclaimer brought to you by Farmer Joe's Dairy.

Hmm. I'm sure that's true, but for some reason I can smell the faint scent of BS in there some-where. Not from you, Strager, from the whole "conversion" thing. There's plenty of games out there with a "custom" file format. The Total War series did this with .Bak files and everyone went nuts trying to convert them and open them and then some random Forum Member on TWCenter made a converter to open them using his own coding knowledge. Then later, Creative Assembly released one due to what they said was "Extreme Community Demand". Extreme Demand my rosey red ass!!! They did it so some random dude wouldn't make them look stupid for not releasing tools to mod their own products.

Nice "Disclaimer" btw

Ok, looking through old dev journals, I found this:

https://forums.elementalgame.com/376437/page/2/#replies

Good Find, brother. Time to start surfing for Havok resources. If these tools are "free" and they were made by the Awesome Code Wizards at Stardock, then it would seem logical that someone else with the right knowledge can make one as well, and maybe get it out to us Before SD gives us theirs.

Or...Maybe...Frogboy will take pitty on us lowly Modders and give us the "tool" early. Please, Brad, PLEASE

Cross you fingers...

As per my March 7th post, neither Scoutdog or I were able to find out how to open them. I asked as recently as April 20th for an early release of the tool because building up graphical assets takes an incredibly long time and it's best if we can get started *right now* so we have something to show when people are still excited about the game in the first few months of release.

We have a very narrow window to really show off what our mods can do before interest in the game wanes. If a sizable modding community is not formed before the interest goes, then it'll be difficult to build it back up again.

Good news! Talking with Cari_Elf on IRC today, and found out some info about exporting hkb files. Turns out they export them directly from 3DS Max and Maya. And also, cycholka directed me to link from Intel http://software.intel.com/sites/havok/ where you can download free plugins for 3DS Max, Maya, and XSI that allow you to export hkb's. Unfortunately, they don't have plugins for the newest versions of those software (ie, no plugin for 3DS Max 2011, XSI 2011, etc). So I'm kind screwed. And there is the problem that none of those are free programs.

A couple more important things. Stardock does have their own plugin, that probably won't be given to us until release. Without this plugin, orientation of your model is likely to be screwy. According to Cari_Elf, their coordinate system has Y being up, and Z into the screen (you can figure out X from there) so you can try to orientate it right. Also, without their plugin, your material ID's are likely to be messed up.

That is EXCELLENT NEWS!!! Great work, man, and Thank You Cari_Elf!!! Luckily I know my version of 3DsMax is old because I could never afford the upgrades..lol. Now I just have to get up off my sick ass and dig through some packed boxes until I find it. It's been so long since I used it or installed it I couldn't tell you what the version number is. I've had it for four or five years now though. I would use it to load models to wrap my skins and textures around to see how they looked. Came in real handy when making skins for "Freedom Force" and the original "Unreal Tournament".

Again, Great Work tracking down the info and talking too people, my friend. Also again...THANK YOU Cari_Elf!!!

Agreed - Excellent information.

I guess you could use trial versions to do the format conversions, and then work in Blender?  I prefer to keep things as "honest" as I can, because otherwise you're learning skills you can't use professionally (unless your workplace has those high-end 3D apps).

Maybe there's an importer/exporter for one of the less expensive apps, like Hexagon ($250), Carrara ($150-$550), or Cinema 4D ($1,000).  Blender would be ideal.

Raven X, I hope things go well for your funding, finding doctor and surgery.  My very best wishes!  (I think it's a measure of a place about how well they treat people who don't have much.  Here in Australia it is better, though not perfect.  My best wishes are with you. =))

Best regards,
Steven,

If you're a student you can get free lisenses of Max and Softimage/XSI. And there is a free version of Softimage/XSI, the Mod Tool, but I wouldn't know if the Havok plugin is compatible with it, or if it can do everything that would be required. Regardless, there should be a free alternative that can be used, like Blender or the Mod Tool or something.

A few weeks to explore the game's assets seems reasonable. And just when those are becoming repetitive/unoriginal, there's the extra packs.

Plus, the first month or two might be for further polishing/patches for the game.

I'm slowly making some progress, finally managed to import a file to the game.

http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/4817/elemental1283735120.jpg

Going to try to get textures on it tomorrow, then take a shot at animations.

What I'm really interested in is exporting files, though. Has anyone else had any success in that area?

Edit: Oh yeah, the flip is definitely there. Imagine if you stood straight up, then fell on your face straight forward. That's the flip. Edit2: Nope, it was straight backwards. Easy mistake to make, falling down.

Oh, nice Any chance you could post the steps you used to get that in? I've been having trouble with my attempts. Can't get it to create an HKB file. Likely there's just something wrong with my model and Havok won't accept it, but without any developer documentation I'm not really sure.

In 3ds max 2010, after you've installed the kit from link above, open your model. Your menu should have "Havok Content Tools". Open it, go to export menu.

Set your screen up like this.

http://img704.imageshack.us/img704/2189/totallol.png

Then click Run Configuration. It should create a new file (same place as your current save location).

Interestingly enough, elemental seems to have no problem reading a straight up hkx file. But if you necessarily want to, you can just change the file ending to hkb.