Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert 1 being remastered by Petroglyph!

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on November 14, 2018

Some of you guys might think that this announcement belongs to our friends over CnC Guild than here, but we are truly thrilled to confirm that  Command & Conquer Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert 1 are being remastered at Petroglyph Studios and being published by EA. Frank Klepacki will be doing the music, of course. The announcement comes from the official source and we'll quote it below:

 

 

 

Fellow Command & Conquer fans,

A month ago, we let the Command & Conquer™ community know we were bringing the franchise back to the PC, starting with a remaster initiative.  The reaction from fans has been amazing, with many of you sharing your favorite C&C moments from the past 23 years. We have been reading these comments and listening intently.  And now, we are ready to reveal our first PC offering and how your suggestions are already influencing our approach.

 

Today, I’m thrilled to tell you we are going back to the beginning. We have decided to remaster Command & Conquer: Tiberian Dawn. And while this is incredibly exciting on its own, we’re also aware of how passionate the community is about the Red Alert universe.  So, we will also remaster the original Command & Conquer: Red Alert™.  But what about the classic expansion packs you may ask - Covert Ops, Counterstrike, and Aftermath?  Well, C&C and Red Alert wouldn’t be the same without them, so all three expansion packs will be bundled with the base games into one remastered collection - without microtransactions.

 

In addition to the excitement and support of this remaster initiative over the past month, there has also been a healthy skepticism that we can pull this off. How are we possibly going to remaster these titles while maintaining the authenticity of the original experiences? Bottom line, there is no better way to achieve this than to partner with some of the talented developers who brought these original games to life.

So, after years of the fans asking for their involvement, I am humbled to announce that EA is going to partner with Petroglyph Games to develop the C&C remastered collection.

 

 

Petroglyph Games includes many of the original developers from Westwood Studios, and some of the most influential members of the original Command & Conquer development team from 1995. Joe Bostic is known as the co-creator of C&C, having also served as the Lead Programmer on Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert. Steve Tall joined Joe as a Lead Programmer on Red Alert, and Mike Legg contributed to all forms of audio systems at Westwood, having been an employee since 1986!  All three members helped start Petroglyph Games in 2003 after the closure of Westwood and are joined by a veteran group of RTS developers from the past 15+ years. And don’t think we haven’t noticed the #1 request from the community in all the comments from the past month...  You want Frank Klepacki. So as a cherry on top for the fans, we are thrilled to announce that Frank will be re-joining Petroglyph Games to be our Composer and Audio Director for the remaster collection!

 

On a personal note, I can tell you the past few weeks have been surreal. During my first visit to Petroglyph, I was able to brainstorm “C&C feel” with Joe, sit with Frank and hear him recite Commando lines, and gab with Steve about whether we should fix the Tib Dawn Harvester AI.  Getting to chat C&C with the original developers has been one of the highlights of my gamer journey, and I can’t wait for all the incredible conversations to come.

In addition to the fantastic team at Petroglyph, we will also be partnering with Lemon Sky Studios to help bring these original games to 4k glory. Lemon Sky is one of the premier art studios around the world, with a unique specialty in remastering classic RTS titles.  After meeting their team and hearing their passion for C&C, we are incredibly lucky to have them team up with Petroglyph to develop the highest quality C&C possible.

The exciting part is that we haven’t started development yet. The community is literally getting in on the ground floor of this project and have every opportunity to help influence how we build this remastered experience. Please continue to engage on Reddit and community channels and help us create the best possible remasters of C&C and Red Alert!

Welcome Back, Commander!

 

Jim Vessella

 

Jimtern

 

 

 

Post your comments here and hint your C&C friends .

Phoenix Rising v2.0 Demo

Posted by evilbobthebob at Phoenix Rising News on January 13, 2018

After 5 years, we finally have v2.0 of Phoenix Rising ready to demo, with the Operation Skyhook Campaign.

Download here for a manual installation: http://www.moddb.com...rising-v20-dlt;/a>
Or find us on the Steam Workshop at: http://steamcommunit.../?id=1235783994

Experience the lead-up to A New Hope from both sides of the Galactic Civil War, as told in the Legends universe

Selection of missions provide guidance in the early stages of the campaign. The later stages are up to you!

Command the Rebel Alliance from hidden fighter bases, striking against Imperial convoys and trying to discover the location of the Death Star construction site

Lead the Galactic Empire to victory, protecting the Death Star and crushing the Rebellion across the galaxy

The Galactic Empire is recommended for first time players of Phoenix Rising.


Short summary of changes:

• Sweeping optimization improvements, including a "light" campaign for those having performance problems.
• Rewritten galactic conquests (Demo featured: Operation Skyhook)
• Rewritten AI to be more intelligent and challenging
• All hyperspace travel now done via hyperlanes, with bonus speed and income from different sizes of route
• Complete overhaul of planet locations, bonuses, and abilities
• Over 50 new ground maps for v2.0, many new space maps
• Both land and space skirmish are available (though land skirmish is still unfinished for the CSA)
• Space skirmish has been completely rebalanced to be more of a competitive experience
• New armor/shield/damage system for space combat, bringing it in line with our ground combat changes from v1.2. New space units and ground vehicle
• Improved weather system and atmospheric effect
• New hero system

For a full changelog, see https://forums.revor...-v20-changelog/

Forged Battalion Gameplay

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on January 4, 2018

For those wondering how will the next Petroglyph's RTS, Forged Battalion, looks like? Here's a 20+ minutes video featuring its gameplay, by Smash GaminG!:





Share your comments here. What do you think? Are you interested on joining its early access on Steam on january 16th?

Thanks Houseplant for the news tip.

v2.0 Changelog

Posted by evilbobthebob at Phoenix Rising News on December 18, 2017

Below is a summary of changes to v2.0, as well as notes regarding what will be included in the demo version, coming soon^TM

General

 

• Rewritten AI to be more intelligent and challenging
  • AI now has some factional differences in style
  • AI will correctly build units and structures based on its planetary bonuses
  • Improved AI in tactical mode
• Rebalanced tech trees
• Functional CSA faction (full release only)
• Sweeping optimization improvements
  • Addition of “light” campaign options for those who prefer high performance
• Many quality-of-life improvements
  • Tooltips for all units contain all the statistic information you need
  • Improved advisor hints to introduce you to the mod’s features
  • Building and shipyard tooltips tell you what they can produce
  • Improved research display
• Difficulty levels:
  • Easy: AI gets 10% fewer credits and takes 10% longer to build units
  • Normal: AI is exactly on par with the player
  • Hard: AI gets 10% more credits, takes 10% less time to build units, and units have 20% more damage, 20% more health, and 25% more shields.

Galactic Mode

 

• Rewritten galactic conquests (Demo featured: Operation Skyhook)
• All hyperspace travel now done via hyperlanes, with bonus speed and income from different sizes of route
• Starships now cost population proportional to their crew requirements
• Complete overhaul of planet locations, bonuses, and abilities
  • Planets now provide population carefully calculated from their statistics
  • Bonuses are rebalanced and clarified with improved tooltips
  • Planet info screens notify you of environmental or population conditions that affect production
• Many new planets added
• Overhaul of planet icons and base level display
• New planet textures
• Over 50 new ground maps for v2.0, many new space maps
• Restoration of classic EAW sandbox missions (full release only, not demo)
• Rebalanced freighters

Skirmish Mode

• Both land and space skirmish are available (though land skirmish is still unfinished for the CSA)
• Space skirmish has been completely rebalanced to be more of a competitive experience
  • Units build faster and are cheaper
  • Income scales better with station level
  • Unit costs and build times balanced per unit and per unit class
• AI greatly improved compared to v1.2

Space Combat

 

• New armor/shield/damage system for space combat, bringing it in line with our ground combat changes from v1.2.
  • Damage is now applied after armor subtraction e.g. laser damage 16 vs armor 12 does only 4 damage to a starship hull.
  • Torpedoes and some other weapons can pierce armor.
  • This means that light craft can barely damage capital ships. All weapons do a minimum of 0.5 damage if armor is equal to or greater than weapon damage.
  • Shields absorb a percentage of damage from incoming fire based on unit class
• New space units (* = buildable in demo): Lictor-class Dungeon Ship, Providence-class Destroyer*, Belbullab-22 starfighter, Defender Starfighter*, TIE Vanguard, Diamond-class courier ship, Manka-class war Frigate*, G-1A Starfighter, Sheathipede-class Transport Shuttle, Y-85 Titan Dropship*, YV-100 Light Freighter, YV-330 Light Freighter, YV-929 Armed Freighter
• Rebalanced starship and starfighter weapons for the new combat system, rewriting thousands of hardpoints
• Space Colonies are now armed with turbolasers at all levels, and provide minor fire support to defending fleets

Ground Combat

• New ground combat bunker system, with many civilian structures available to hide your infantry
• New ground vehicles (* = buildable in demo): AAT, HMP gunship, MTT, OG-9, S-1 Firehawke*, V-Wing Airspeeder*
• Improved weather system and atmospheric effects- don’t let infantry get stranded on planets with a Type IV atmosphere!
• Infantry carry appropriately-modeled weapons in most cases
• New ground structures: Bank, Listening Outpost

Heroes

• New hero system with consistent hero ratings and upgrade paths
  • Space heroes now require a flagship to attach to in many cases
• New heroes (* = playable in demo release): 4-LOM, Adar Tallon, Andoorni Hui, Apailana, Appo, Barrow Oicunn, Bevven*, Blitzer Harrsk, Bror Jace, Clyngunn, Cody, Comeg, Corran Horn, Crueya Vandron, Devlia, Erisi Dlarit, Evir Derricote, Gavin Darklighter, Ghorin, Haashn, Havet Storm, Hurst Romodi*, Kirtan Loor, Kosh Teradoc, Laryn Krefey, Lujayne Forge, Male Dee, Mawsh’iye, Meena Tills, Morteos, Nawara Ven, Odd Ball, Onara Kuat, Ooryl Qrygg, Osted Wermis, Peshk Vrisyk, Ragab, Rhysati Ynr, Riv Shiel, Rojahn, Sander Delvardus, Shaak Ti, Shea Hublin, Talon Karrde, Tensiger*, Terrinald Screed, Thaneespi, Theol Drost*, Treuten Teradoc, Tundra Dowmeia, Uwlla Iillor, Verrack, Zel Johans*, Zsinj, Zuckuss

Operation Skyhook- Demo Release GC

• Experience the lead-up to A New Hope from both sides of the Galactic Civil War, as told in the Legends universe
• Selection of missions provide guidance in the early stages of the campaign. The later stages are up to you!
• Command the Rebel Alliance from hidden fighter bases, striking against Imperial convoys and trying to discover the location of the Death Star construction site
• Lead the Galactic Empire to victory, protecting the Death Star and crushing the Rebellion across the galaxy
• The Galactic Empire is recommended for first time players of Phoenix Rising.

v2.0 Demo Coming Soon(tm)

Posted by evilbobthebob at Phoenix Rising News on December 8, 2017

As you may or may not be aware, I am still working reasonably regularly on the mod and have got it to a stage where I feel comfortable releasing a focused demo version of Phoenix Rising 2.0. Currently, the version is in testing, but you can get a sneak-peek from Corey, lead developer on the Thrawn's Revenge series of mods, who has graciously begun a series of videos of the demo test build on his Youtube channel. The first video is here
 
2.0 will include all the changes noted in previous news posts, but there will be a summary of changes around the release time.
 
There is no concrete release date for the demo build, so stay tuned.

Installing mods for Empire at War Gold Pack - Another method

Posted by Digz at Petrolution News on September 10, 2017

I released a video many years ago on how to install mods via Steam for Empire at War and Forces of Corruption. With the release of the new patch bringing back multiplayer and whatnot I thought I'd give the game another go and try out some mods too!
 
I could not install them for the life of me from the steam workshop (game just kept crashing), by my old option or in the game via the "mods" option where people said it'd close the game then restart with the mod. So I went for a final push and created shortcuts instead and used the information you would put into the launch options on Steam but into the "target" box of your shortcut file of the main .exe for the game.
 
Watch the video below, this was the final straw before I just played online and a few campaigns and let the game rest. Fortunately it worked for me and I can enjoy some of the great mods the community has made!

New Patch for Star Wars: Empire at War (Steam)

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on September 4, 2017

It seems that Disney has recently made some kind of deal that made Petroglyph add some interesting updates to the Steam version of the game. Here's their developer note about this subject:

 

A note from the developer.


Hi Everyone,

We have continued to watch the EAW community closely over the years and appreciate all the excellent support you have given us and the game. Thanks to all of you for the great feedback, awesome mod packs, and overwhelmingly positive reviews.

Check out the full press release here.

Here is a list of improvements made to the game.

· Steam multiplayer support in both FOC and EAW
· Enabled selection/list of player mods on hard drive, including mods via Steamworks
· Enabled windowed mode support
· Additional bug fixes and optimizations

We hope you enjoy this special update.

- Petroglyph

 

 

In a small note: the original multiplayer worked with GameSpy, which is gone for a very long time already.

Mike.nl's tools source code are now available on GitHub

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on January 24, 2017

Hello everyone! Our friend Mike.nl, from Petrolution Mod Tools, has posted the source code from pratically all his tools on GitHub. It uses the MIT License, so anyone can fork it follow this license... and yea, you'll need the latest Visual Studio to compile the code and some C++ skills to understand it.

 

 

His GlyphX Tools includes:

 

- alo-viewer

- particle-editor

- lua-converter

- string-editor

- mtd-editor

- animation-converter

- chunk-viewer

- map-preview-extractor

 

 

So, it's a jewel! Everything you need to know about the file formats used in the Alamo Engine, from Petroglyph Games, is there.  Have fun!

AI Breakthrough

Posted by Ghostrider at Phoenix Rising News on June 7, 2016

After weeks and months of testing, and trying to figure out how to get the AI to react as a human does in a galactic environment, the PR team have finally achieved a significant AI breakthrough:

 

The AI now aggressively attacks independent planets, takes worlds, builds fleets, and stomps all over unwary humans if given half a chance. 

 

The AI equasions to do this have been in place do this for years, but for months the AI has lain dormant, effectively asleep. We have tried hundreds of different ideas to get the AI to activate - all to no effect. 

 

And how did we achieve this? 

 

The frustrating answer, familiar to most modders out there is simple. We changed 1 value in the XMLs, instead of increasing the value from 1.0 to 1.25 we should have decreased the value to 0.75. It just took 6 months of testing to realise that is what we needed to do!

 

WOW. Did the AI react or what?

It annihilated one of the testers in Core Worlds in under a quarter of the time taken for a human player to "WIN" Core Worlds if unopposed. 

 

Now that we know the AI is working, I have to go back and undo many of the campaign changes put in place that were an attempt to make the AI respond, but the mod is finally alive and kicking. We need to test and polish a bit more, but this makes us a lot closer to where we want to be. 

 

Ghost

Mega File Editor reads Config.meg from GreyGoo

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on July 30, 2015

Hello everyone!


Mike.nl has released a new version of his Mega File Editor that is able to read the encrypted config.meg file from GreyGoo. That file stores the core rules of the game, such as unit stats, behavior, AI and much more. Humans are able to understand the .XML files and the .CLP files. It is unclear at the moment if the game is really moddable or not and what would be its limitations. Mike.nl has also updated his .MEG File Format document to cover the changes in GreyGoo.



(Click the picture for a high resolution screenshot)


Head to Petrolution Mod Tools Website to download the Mega File Editor and much more. If you have any successful modding experience with GreyGoo, please, report it here and show it to us. It can seriously affect the future of this site.

Grey Goo's 4th patch: the ballance patch

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on March 28, 2015

A couple of days ago, Greybox has released the first ballance patch for Grey Goo. Here's the official notes on it with a long list of changes:

The first balance patch is here!

Here is the finalized list of changes going into the first major balance update released on Tuesday March 24th. These include revisions inspired by the testing done on our Public Test Branch. See the previous balance details here.

Any changes labeled with [PTB] resulted from data collected during the Public Test Branch.

Due to the number of balance adjustments we are implementing with this patch, both 1v1 and 2v2 ranked leaderboards will be reset upon the update's arrival. Your Elo matchmaking rating and win-loss records will be wiped during this reset, allowing you the opportunity to test your skills in a new season.
General

The formed Goo, Repair Subroutine Upgrade, and Sentinel Repair Upgrade regeneration effects now only activate when the units and structures are not actively taking or dealing damage.
Targeting priorities have been re-factored to prioritize units over structures in most cases.



Beta Faction


Air Canister Upgrade

[PTB] Range down from 450 to 350

Stalker

[PTB] Health up from 100 to 110
[PTB] Damage down from 11 to 9
[PTB] Movement speed down from 120 to 115

Stealth Sniper Upgrade

Range down from 500 to 425
Stealth is now always active outside of combat and will reapply 8 seconds after combat ends.

Predator

Health up from 130 to 140

Hailstorm

Damage down from 25 to 20
Range up from 750 to 800
Armor penetration down from 3 to 0
AoE radius down from 150 to 125

Guardian

[PTB] Rate of fire down from 1.75 to 1.5
Range down from 650 to 550
Long-Range Ballistics Upgrade range down from 1200 to 900
Long-Range Ballistics Upgrade damage down from 35 to 25

Cloudburst

[PTB] Damage down from 40 to 24

Stratus

Health down from 100 to 75

Warbird

Rate of fire up from 0.5 to 1
Ammo up from 4 to 5
Cost up from 270 to 315

Nimbus

Ammo up from 2 to 3
Damage down from 75 to 50
Nimbus Napalm Upgrade now lasts 5 seconds down from 5.5
Nimbus Napalm Upgrade AoE radius down from 250 to 200

Avalanche

Shot timings have been shifted to have a smaller cast time and a longer cooldown. Rate of fire remains the same.
Cost down from 675 to 600

Hand of Ruk

Range down from 2000 to 1500

Wall

Armor down from 3 to 0
Build time up from 25 to 30
[PTB] Pillar cost up from 50 to 90
Pillar health down from 1250 to 1000
Straight cost up from 50 to 90

Small Power Hub

Health up from 300 to 400

Medium Power Hub

Build time down from 50 to 45

Large Power Hub

Health down from 900 to 800

Repair Pad

Heals for 15 every 2 sec up from 20 every 5 sec
Build time down from 50 to 30
Cost down from 500 to 300
Health down from 1500 to 1000

Hanger

Rearms aircraft 1 ammo every sec up from 1 ammo every 2 sec
[PTB] Build time up from 30 to 35
[PTB] Cost up from 240 to 245

Extractor

Health down from 1000 to 750
[PTB] Extractor size reduced to match the Human Extractor

Harvester

[PTB] Health up from 80 to 120
[PTB] Movement speed up from 100 to 125

Refinery

[PTB] Creates Harvesters every 20 sec up from 15

"No-Build" Influence Radius

Small Hub radius increased from 400 to 600
Medium Hub radius increased from 400 to 600
Large Hub radius increased from 500 to 600
Headquarter radius increased from 800 to 1000



Goo Faction


Drover

Range down from 250 to 200

Strider

[PTB] Health down from 125 to 115
[PTB] Rate of fire down from 1.25 to 1

Tempest

Damage down from 25 to 18

Small Protean

Health up from 150 to 160

Small and Large Protean

Slow enemies by 50% down from 90%

Crescent

Damage down from 10 to 6
Range down from 1500 to 1000
Projectile speed up from 150 to 200
Projectile Endurance Upgrade AoE radius down from 100 to 75
Projectile Endurance damage down from 5 to 2
Projectile Endurance range down from 1500 to 1000

Destructor

[PTB] Rate of fire down from 1.75 to 1.5
[PTB] Damage down from 42 to 36
[PTB] Health down from 155 to 150
Movement speed down from 120 to 105
Target damage and splash damage have been separated. Splash damage down from 42 to 15 but target damage remains the same.

Purger

Range up from 800 to 1000
Damage down from 400 to 300

Catalyst Vents

Grant 160 health per pickup to the Mother Goo and Proto-Purger up from 85

Mother Goo

Stealth detection range down from 800 to 400
Armor penetration down from 10 to 0
Max health has increased from 1300 to 1600
Health per size has increased from 200 to 320
Catalyst digestion health per second up from 5 to 8
First size max health down from 500 to 320
Initial Mother Goo starting health down from 400 to 240

Proto-Purger

[PTB] Starting health down from 2000 to 200 to maintain build time from Catalyst Vent change.



Human Faction


Trident

[PTB] Health up from 115 to 140
[PTB] Damage down from 8 to 7
Build time up from 20 to 25
Cost up from 100 to 125

Revolver

Damage down from 6 to 5
[PTB] Health down from 100 to 95

Dagger

Armor down from 3 to 0
[PTB] Range up from 350 to 375
[PTB] Damage down from 3 to 2
Health up from 75 to 90

Gladius

[PTB] Range up from 350 to 400
Movement speed down from 95 to 90

Howitzer

[PTB] Cost down from 440 to 385
Damage down from 30 to 23
Range up from 800 to 900
Armor penetration down from 3 to 0
AoE radius down from 150 to 100
Mine (default) no longer has stealth
Mine duration down from 12 to 3 sec
Proximity Mine Radar Upgrade mine duration down from 18 to 9 sec

Longbow

Movement speed down from 130 to 110
Damage down from 42 to 24

Lancer

Damage level one DPS down from 50 to 10
Damage level two DPS down from 60 to 40
Damage levels one and two now last 3 seconds up from 2

Scimitar

Damage down from 125 to 60
Ammo up from 1 to 2
Rate of fire up from 1 to 2
Cost up from 300 to 350

Mine Drop Upgrade

[PTB] Armor penetration down from 3 to 0
[PTB] Mine no longer has stealth
[PTB] Mine duration down from 10 to 6

Monitor

Health up from 75 to 100
[PTB] Movement speed down from 275 to 250
[PTB] Vision up from 1000 to 1200
[PTB] Cost up from 75 to 105
[PTB] Build time up from 25 to 35

Scythe

Movement speed down from 400 to 375
Armor penetration down from 6 to 0
AoE radius down from 75 to 50
Damage up from 13 to 20
Rate of fire up from 0.5 to 1.25

Aircraft Repair Upgrade

Repairs 8% every sec up from 5% every sec

Alpha

Movement speed up from 50 to 75
Explosion interval health threshold down from 500 health to 300 health

Repair Subroutine Upgrade

Repairs 10% every 5 sec up from 5% every 5 sec

Air Pad

[PTB] Cost up from 60 to 80
[PTB] Build time up from 15 to 20
Rearms aircraft 1 ammo every sec up from 1 ammo every 2 sec

Conduit

[PTB] Health up from 250 to 300

Teleporter

Build time up from 75 to 120
Cost up from 750 to 1200
Cooldown up from 150 to 180
Now has a visible 5 second charge up telegraph and an audio queue before activation

Wall

Armor down from 6 to 0
Build time up from 30 to 40
Pillar cost up from 30 to 80
Pillar health down from 1000 to 750
Straight cost up from 30 to 80
Regeneration up from 15/sec to 25/sec

Human Sentinels

Now have a population of 1
Take 10 seconds to teleport up from 5

Artillery Sentinel

Range down from 1750 to 1000
[PTB] Damage up from 15 to 20
[PTB] Health up from 250 to 300
Armor down from 6 to 3

Anti-Heavy Sentinel

Armor down from 6 to 3

Anti-Air Sentinel

Damage down from 8 to 4
Armor down from 6 to 3

Extractor

Health down from 1000 to 750

Harvester

[PTB] Movement speed down from 130 to 125

Refinery

[PTB] Creates Harvesters every 10 sec up from 7.5

"No-Build" Influence Radius

Core radius increased from 800 to 1000

GreyGoo's third patch is online

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on March 13, 2015

Yesterday, the third patch for Grey Goo has been released. It should be a quick hot fix patch with the following changes:

March 12, 2015 Update Notes

AI

Alhazen Human AI will no longer build all air pads and no units

Fixed an issue that could cause the AI to stop attacking

Hotkeys

Fixed an issue were hotkeys were inconsistent when using the Goo interface

Human Teleporter eject hotkey now works properly

Fixed issue where hotkeys were not properly displaying for tech upgrades

Units

Bastion taunt now properly affects Beta units that are mounted on walls

I guess that the issue that could cause AI to stop atttacking was the critical one that needed to be wiped from the history, considering that single player games are played by many people. That's probably the reason that they've made this hot fix in first place. They've been announcing some heavy ballance changes for the upcoming patches and you are able to test it already.

GreyGoo's second patch is online.

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on February 17, 2015

The second patch for GreyGoo has recently seen the light of the day. Here's the official changelog:

February 17, 2015 Update Notes

AI
Default AI is now Lambert instead of Random

Audio
Fixed an issue where the RTS Primer VO audio was incorrect in German

Units
Aircraft will now prioritize empty landing pads first when ordered to land by right clicking on Hangars/Airpads
Further improved the extents shrinking from 50% to 25% to minimize artillery/AoE impact of grouped units

Campaign
Adjusted Easy and Normal difficulty settings. Hard difficulty is unaffected.
Fixed an issue where script-spawned units were not being given the correct health modifiers
Fixed a bug in The Barricade that caused some enemy Guardian units to idle in brush instead of properly mounting wall pillars

Engineering
Added matchmaking improvements to allow players easier access to searching for matches worldwide
Improved logic for detecting players disconnecting to force a win or avoid a loss
Servers will now temporarily pause when connection loss is first detected
Added improvements to performance that prevents certain cases from lagging the client severely
Structures from an eliminated player will now properly clear up passability upon deletion
Fixed a crash local to 32 bit machines
Fixed a crash that would occur while loading a multiplayer match
Fixed a lock that would occur for clients when the host would close the lobby
Fixed an issue where 2v2 Ranked matches were not properly reporting
Fixed crash that would occur when starting skirmish match

Terrain Editor
Fixed crash that would occur when launching a custom map with the spigot marker inside the HQ boundaries
Fixed crash that would occur when loading an untouched custom map

UI
Moved Quick Match window up in the Multiplayer screen while search is ongoing
Added translations for new text
Fixed an issue with compressed Korean text
Added a new Extras section to the menu with a quick launch button for the Terrain Editor
Made various fixes to improve performance in the UI
Fixed an issue where the game would unpause immediately after pausing in single player

I've seen many people complaining at the lack of stability of this game. I hope this patch improves this situation.

GreyGoo's first patch has been released.

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on February 4, 2015

GreyGoo has recently received an official patch. Here's the official changelog:

February 3, 2015 Patch Notes

Art
Fixed issue where some units attacks were appearing through Fog of War

Audio
Fixed bug where the Has been revealed announcement was being triggered whenever a players units were killed
Fixed an issue where the Has been revealed announcement was triggered after a vent plug was destroyed
Fixed issue where sound effects from the impact of Howitzer mines would sometimes not play

AI
Fixed issue where enemy AI Beta units would attempt to use players Repair Pad

Achievements
Glutton for Punishment can no longer be achieved against Idle AI

Engineering
A units extents now shrink when moving through groups of other units to make moving through groups smoother
Disabled units pushing other units to the side to prevent further issues as a result of the change
Fixed a rare issue where refineries could create an island of un-navigable terrain
Fixed crash caused by loading a save game from a previous version
Fixed crash caused by Goo projectiles being shot down
Fixed an issue where a structures deconstruction animation would sometimes not play
Fixed exploit where Human structures would still be teleported after being destroyed
Fixed error that was being given when attempting to save on The Terminal
Fixed cursor disappearing when accepting an invite during a cutscene
Changed agro state generator for Human HQ to prevent a stacking situation that could potentially cause a crash

Design
Fixed the resource display on The Aperture Device to better represent the resource locations
The timed even in The Aperture Device will no longer start if the player moves their Mother Goo away from the node
The Crescent fire objective in The Trench can no longer be triggered before its intended time by restarting the mission
Fixed an exploit with selling Conduits
Fixed an issue where players could hide their Purger in the brush
Added additional target filtering to Tempest Surveillance Virus upgrade to prevent it from targeting ground and air incorrectly
Fixed an issue where Tempest Surveillance Virus Upgrade affected ground units if it hit an air unit that was flying above a ground unit

UI
Fixed several incorrect descriptions in the Encyclopedia
The orange bar in the quick match panel will no longer change size when the player invites another player to a premade team
Fixed issue where timers would sometimes not appear in the German version
Fixed issue where the no power icon was appearing after a buildings construction was completed
Updated the no power icons in Magos Pass to be consistent with the other no power icons in the game

Terrain Editor
Added support for custom user XML and Animations
Fixed several crash issues
Fixed Skydomes not properly appearing in the editor
Fixed issue where props and objects were being visually removed but were still counting in the object count
Fixed issue where Fog of War was not appearing when the user checked the fog box
Improved water shader for user-created maps

It's worth mentioning that the Terrain Editor now support custom user XML and animations. The possibilities of custom user XML files are yet to be seen. How far does the game can be customized with that feature? If anyone decide to play it, we kindly invite you to post your results in a reply to this news post.

Anatomy of a Starship

Posted by evilbobthebob at Phoenix Rising News on June 22, 2014

Probably the best way to introduce the new space combat mechanics is to take a detailed look at our new (WIP) infobox layout. You may recognise many of the elements from the revamped land combat; many of the elements are also new. I'll go through each in the order they appear using the classic example of the Imperial II-class Star Destroyer. Please note that all values shown are WIP.

 

 

Tactical Population Cost

 

This is a new number based on the total volume of the hull (or hulls in the case of a starfighter squadron). It is balanced around the idea that an Executor-class Super Star Destroyer consists of 400 population points, the maximum available space population. For carriers, it also includes the volume of all the starfighter squadrons as in the case of the Imperial II. This means that you can field 5 Imperial II-class and their entire complements at one time. These values are currently in the process of testing and tweaking, and the exact values may be different in the released version.

 

Starship Icon

 

All the starship icons have been brought into lineusing uniform lighting and rendering settings to create a better quality icon set.

 

Starship Name

 

As usual, we retain the full names of all ships, including their upgrade version.

 

Starship Class

 

From Starfighter through to Dreadnaught, a starship's class helps shape its maneuverability and sensor range statistics. It also determines which shipyard type is needed to construct it.

 

Special Abilities

 

With the new version, we have many greatly improved autofire scripts for ship special abilities, so we feel comfortable including more than the two accessible from the GUI. In most cases, the tractor beam will be the hidden, autofired ability, and it will usually target whatever the ship has been told to attack. Note here the Imperial II has a Tractor Beam, Emergency Thrusters (power to engines ability) and Blast. Blast is a new ability we have added to many main-line combat ships. It moves the firepower of the main battery (in this case, the octuple turbolasers and turboions) up a notch, so that has increased range and firepower.

 

Manufacturer

 

We have always included manufacturer bonuses on various appropriate planets such as Kuat. Now you can see exactly which ships will benefit, with the inclusion of the Manufacturer in the infobox.

 

Cost

 

This is the base hull cost, not including complement (which is included in the final cost at a 50% discount). Costs have been modified across the board to provide a more challenging economic planning experience.

 

Time

 

This is the base hull construction time, measured in galactic time. For the Imperial II, this is 15 weeks. Note that building over a world with appropriate shipyard bonuses, or by building more of the same class of shipyard, this time can be dramatically reduced.

 

Dimensions

 

Width x length x height, in meters, the basic size of the hull.

 

Volume

 

The total volume of the hull in cubic meters, often using exponential notation. Here for example, the Imperial II is 121 million cubic meters in volume. This statistic informs hitpoint calculations and has a great effect on the likelihood for a ship to be hit by enemy fire.

 

Acceleration

 

With the change to the new space combat mechanics, we have moved towards a more "realistic" approach. While ships still have a capped top speed, it is directly proportional to their acceleration. This is measured in terms of G-force, the acceleration experienced by a being on the surface of a planet with standard gravity, roughly 10 m/s².

 

Maneuvrability

 

This statistic is the turning speed of the starship, measured in degrees per second. It is primarily class-based.

 

Hyperdrive

 

The class of the hyperdrive in the starship (if any), which determines its ability to travel across the galaxy in hyperspace. The smaller the better!

 

Shielding

 

Here is one of the new statistics. Shielding is now measured in Shield Points (SP) and has an absorption percentage shown after it. This is the amount of damage the shield can absorb from a single shot before it takes SP damage. So for example, a turbolaser shot hitting the Imperial II shield with a damage of 96 will do around 58 points of shield damage.

 

Hull

 

Hull has also changed a great deal. It is now measured in Hull Points (HP), like that of land combat. This value is primarily volume-based. Following the HP is the armour value and type. The Imperial II has 32 Vehicle armour. This means that it absorbs 32 damage from any incoming shot before the hull itself is damaged. For example, the same 96 damage turbolaser will do 64 points of hull damage on impact.

 

Range

 

This statistic shows the maximum and minimum ranges of the weapon systems on the ship, followed by its line of sight range. All values are in meters. In this case, the longest range weapons are the octuple turbolasers, while the shortest are the individual turbolaser cannons.

 

Armament

 

We have greatly condensed the weapons display into a shorthand that provides much more information. We have done away with "light", "heavy" and so on, instead simply telling you the weapon type, their number, and their damage output. So, here the Imperial II has 6 octuple turbolasers with 240 damage per bolt, 2 octuple turboions with 240 damage per bolt, 2 triple turbolasers with 144 damage per bolt, and so on. Note that ion weapons do 200% damage to shields, but cannot damage anything except Droid armour. The number of tractor beams is also noted, which adjusts the cooldown of the tractor beam ability.

 

 

I hope this little snippet has provided some insight to the changes we've been making over the past 18 months. If you have any questions, I will endeavour to answer below, however note that I did not implement these changes myself.

News. Now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time...

Posted by evilbobthebob at Phoenix Rising News on June 17, 2014

Hello Phoenix Rising fans.

 

First off, I'd like to apologise for the extremely long time between news posts. If this was the only way you kept up with the mod, I can forgive you for thinking we'd ceased development. Those of you who read more of the forums see the team members making comments from time to time, and we made a call for alpha and beta testers for the latest version over the past year. Still, this doesn't make up for the silence we've sustained up to now.

 

I'd like to change that myself, primarily because I finally have some free time and partly because our team leader and the prime driver of the mod, Phoenix Rising, is without a computer capable of doing modding right now. This isn't particular cause for alarm, because the current build of the mod is very feature-complete. However, there still remain areas that need polish and improvement.

 

So what have we been doing for the past two years? Our initial plan for the next version of the mod was primarily based on integrating the information provided by the release of The Essential Atlas. As software project tend to do, we experienced some rather strong feature creep, and as one thing led to another, we realised we had a version of the mod that is no longer a mere incremental update. In fact, we have:

• General
  • Made numerous changes to improve performance
  • Remade and rebalanced the hero system
  • Rebalanced tech trees
• Galactic Mode
  • Brought our galactic maps in line with The Essential Atlas
  • Added new planets
  • Entirely rebalanced and remade our core sandbox campaigns (still a work-in-progress)
  • Created a new planetary bonus system
  • Created a new hyperspace system
  • Rebalanced freighters, including the addition of light transports
  • Improved the display of research
• Combat
  • Improved land combat
    • Begun the process of adding infantry weapon models
    • New units
    • Improved weather system
  • Added many new maps in land and space
  • Entirely revamped space combat to be in line with land combat:
    • New armour, health and shield system
    • New weapon balancing and types
    • Better display of unit statistics
    • New units
    • Increase in map size to accommodate the changes

Many of these changes, especially those based around planets and maps, have already been mentioned in prior news posts. Check those for more information on those specific topics. As for the rest, I hope I can bring you more news posts in the near future providing examples and details. In the mean time, I'm happy to answer questions you may have here on the forums.

 

evilbob

Grey Goo, the next game from Petroglyph

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on March 13, 2014

 

 

Petroglyph has recently announced their next real time strategy game: Grey Goo, which should be published by a mysterious company called Greybox. It should feature 3 new factions and all the good and solid mechanisms that makes real time strategy games fun, such as base building, resource collection and a focus on macro-management rather than micro-management. The game will be Windows only originally and it should be sold on Steam. It can be played online and offline (skirmish) and it should feature a story driven campaign. According to Petroglyph, the game should be available on late 2014 and it will feature soundtracks from Frank Klepacki. For more information, head to Grey Goo's Official Website.

Petrolution is fully functional again.

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on November 5, 2013

Welcome back, everyone. Petrolution is working correctly again. We've managed to figure out the server mechanics that were affecting the redirection and they were disabled here. So, feel free to browse the site, submit tutorials, files, mods, etc.

 

We have a lot of sections about games that no longer belongs to Petroglyph or are not longer supported, but we'll keep them for now. Also, End Of Nations is no longer a MMO RTS, but it is rather a multiplayer online battle arena and it is in the sole hands of Trion. I don't know if we'll add content for this game on our own. Probably not, unless we see some interest in the responses for this news post.

 

Anyway, enjoy this place and contribute for it to make it even better.

The site is now browsable.

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on November 4, 2013

Hello everyone. You may now browse all sections of Petrolution as you used to do some months ago. I've done a little workaround that redirects you into something that works. Unfortunately, the redirection problem persists and it may prevent you from submitting some data, except to edit items, which is a big thing. I'll still try to figure out how to fix it, but the problem seems to be beyond the scope of Petrolution at the moment. Have fun.

Broken site links

Posted by Banshee at Petrolution News on November 3, 2013

Hello everyone. If you've been trying to browse this site recently, you might be noticing that some of the site content looks broken. Our problem lies with a redirection rule of apache that is beyond my scope or it's something I'm not being able to figure out where it comes from. But the content itself is fully functional. Feel free to browse it:

 

-> Tutorials

-> Mods

-> Articles

-> Maps

-> Downloads

 

-> Art Tutorials

-> Coding Tutorials

-> Mapping Tutorials

-> Other Tutorials

 

-> Propaganda Downloads

-> Modding Utilities Downloads

-> Community Modifications Downloads

 

-> Skirmish Maps

-> Galatic Maps (EAW)

 

And for anything else, make sure that the link has index.php?page= and the ? are replaced with & until we figure out why things are breaking. Sorry for any inconvenience and enjoy this place.