[XYZ_ABC_123]Deckard

It's a good thing Iggy posted as his opinion should carry more weight and credibility than mine anyway (due to being a Moderator and, well, Iggy )

While playing around with 3DSMax, I noticed that it had a great "Pen and Ink" shader that makes everything rendered look cartoon-like. This set me thinking about Vice City and how much fun it would be to export the models out, re-shade them and re-integrate them into the game. While not adding any new features, this would certainly add a new "feel" to the game. Anyone know if this has been attempted before? (there's no point dedicating countless hours of rendering time to it if someone's already done it)

I didn't phrase that right Jon, of course the government don't directly run the BBC. What I was referring to was; So the government have some influence over them it can be summised. The BBC after all is a Public Service Broadcaster whose agenda is to "inform, educate and entertain". The inform and educate part they are largely doing from their website where I pulled the info. The article I quoted, called something like "What is MI6?" not only had details about what MI6 do, and what jobs you can get there, but also the location of their HQ and a photograph of it's location. If they didn't want to confirm that they exist, why would they allow details of where they are based to be widely available? Anyway, all that is pretty much beside the point, as MI6 is named and thier duties laid out and confirmed in the Intelligence Services Act 1994- copies of which are available on the internet and in all good law books.

How exactly have I proved that I am an idiot? I'm not the person going around making sarcastic off-the-cuff remarks to anyone who does anything that slips slightly out of your own personal set of rules. If you want there to be a limit on how long after a post is made, that it can be replied to, then put it in the forum rules. As for :- (especially cause the reply you made) I am not asking for Mad_boy's seal of approval of what I choose to write about. As far as I am aware, we do not live in a stalinistic dictatorship, therefore I an entitled for my input to be respected as is everyone elses. By responding in this way, as you often do, all you are accomplishing is the overall impression of this board and those who run it being lowered. Being a moderator is a responsible position, so be responsible and start acting more professionally.

Just had a check at the forums rules http://mtavc.com/forum.php - there is nothing about an expiry date on the permitted posting on a topic. Instead it covers stuff like flaming and spamming... you know, like posting "you're an idiot" - probably for the sole reason of getting your post count up.

That's not even remotely true. MI6 is no secret - their details are laid out in the Intelligence Services Act 1994, which states that the role of the MI6 is "to obtain and provide information relating to the actions or intentions of persons outside the British Islands," There are also details about MI6 on various government websites, and even a huge feature on the govenment run BBC's site, at http://www.bbc.co.uk/crime/fighters/mi6.shtml If you read the message, he actually said.. NB- if anyone finds a way of using these vehicles in MTA, let me know. I WANT TO STRING YOU UP! Which is a clear condemnation of using mods in MTA.

I cannot comprehend why everyone is getting so worked up in this posting- as far as I can make out, all {DBC} Lance was trying to do was make public some of the latest developments in the Vice City Multiplayer arena. There is no reason to go on an all out flame-fest. It's pathetic really. Fair enough, you prefer MTA (so do I as it happens), but that doesn't give you the right to act like bratty 5 year olds. Surely everyone wants decent multiplayer support for the GTA series. So why then do you all insist on crapping all over the people who are trying to make it happen, just because they aren't part of the project of your preference? GTAT might not playable in the way that you would wish, and MTA might not have had much visible progress, but that's because they are Beta versions, developed by people giving up their own free time. Developers like DracoBlue and Eai aren't providing you a service, they are allowing you the privelige of using GTA in a multiplayer context in return for constructive critical feedback If you are dissatisfied by the slow progress of coding groups like these or the lack of features that you wish to use then you should not be using the program or posting in these forums. Basically put up or shut up- if you think you can do a better job then by all means go ahead and do so. My opinion (and that is all it is, an opinion, which I am entitled to) is that Vice City multiplayer will become less important in half a year or so. The more work done on developing multiplayer and other mods for VC and GTA3 in these coming months the better, as it will better prepare us all for when San Andreas finally rolls around. We should all do our best to positively encourage these developments, be they in the form of GTAT, GTA:C or MTA:VC, not crap all over them in pathetic flame wars.

I'm afraid that this seems to resonate all the characteristics of a virus. The only way i can explain this is that you have a TSR styley virus (terminate and stay resident) which is running in the background of windows and appends itself to whatever executable you run. Do a search for AVG Free Antivirus 6.0 on google and download it (i think its from http://www.grisoft.co.uk) and run it to clear out whatver is screwing up your computer- i'm almost certain other stuff isnt running properly either. Failing that, you could need to reinstall your motherboard drivers (but you need to know what motherboard you have which can sometimes be tricky to work out) or windows has messed itself up (especially xp) so you'll have to install sp1b at least to correct the issue

under the latest build or the previous one?

Last night i decided to have a peruse of the olde favourite google in search of other multiplayer gta stuff to find out what is out there, their spin on it all - pure curiosity really. I stumbled across GTAT - which i think i've seen before tied to the mythical GTA World Online project (which by all accounts seems defunct now...) No disrespect to Draco Blue, but i wasn't overly impressed. The decision to do away with ASE for one and opt for an all inclusive server selection function obviously wasnt doing the mod justice- maybe its just because mtavc with it large amount of media coverage of late has roped in everyone, but all i was presented with was a list of 5 servers, 3 of which would only accomodate a max of 2 player, then two others which could take up to 96 (wishful thinking i think). The problem with this is that one I selected which only had one player (the other had none) was disconnected shortly after i joined. In my opinion doing away with ASE is a very bad thing (please never do this Mr Bump, Xerox etc) as it allows not only people who have other multiplayer games to easily have a bash with gta within the same interface, but also allows people to set up their own servers relatively easily and get them published on the net- something which is sorely needed to take off the strain of hosting a non profit project. I should add that I found their comments about the producers of other mods ddos-ing their servers ill informed and a tad niave- given that the people slaving over the development of this one are all for the production of a gta mp in whatever form, i find it highly unlikely that anyone involved in the development of this project would waste their time by trashing someone elses attempt at achieving something good. I know their is a history between mtavc and gtat (you guys originally used to work together i believe) as i've been involved with this mod (as a user/consumer/whatever) since 0.1 first reared its genetically modified head, but i really cannot appreciate that there could be some kind of 4 year old petty schoolground mentality going on. I'm not an obsessed MTAVC/GTA3 devotee- to be honest if another team like GTAT produced something quite spectacular like the GTA:WO promised then I would jump on that bandwagon as fast as an alcoholic teacher would a whiskey laden apple- but i guess i just dont appreciate the sentiment, especially when its blatantly directed towards a project that over the last year I have deemed much enjoyment and satisfaction from, no matter how basic or how many crashes appear (i'm obviously talking about mta 0.1 here) Grrr... glad I got that off my chest... The one thing I will say which I feel they have a damn good idea about is that once they get a decent core together, they will release it under PD, opensource, GNU (i think, could have the acronomn wrong there..) so that people can submit and add to push the project forward. Perhaps when MTA reaches 1.0 status you would consider the same? At that stage the core would be stable enough to be able to be altered and adjusted suiting whatever requirement, and maybe the whole Cudda Kline mod ramp issue could be encompassed in dedicated versions with dedicated servers...? Just an idea- just chucking them around here. Ok, a few things I should mention now which aren't relavant to my post- Ransom, I need to catch up with you soon- can never catch you when you are online... What the **** has happened to my clan? I caught some random references to Ransom pulling out and the VCP disbanding while I was at work last month and im not sure what to make of it... Where are all the VCP's? Are you all still playing 0.3r2? I've jumped on the 0.4 minibus and have been taken to a world of pure aiming pleasure (lets not talk about stunt tho- its the same, thats fine, i know people were expecting more but im happy with tally up the green) but i can't find the rest of vcp or even the recruits under ase? I know ive been off for a while (if anyone else has an ntl service then they will probably understand the hell ive been through the last 6 months with them.... had to take a soldering iron to my cable modem last night to keep my connection on- they kinda realised today......) but its kinda strange that no-one seems to be online ever.... Has anyone noticed how mtavc had degraded into a 12 year old american chatroom on geocities (when it was still around) filled with "u r gay" "your momma" "you S**k mr bump's nob"- (yes ive had that one a few times from the same clan - A*X - the * is to stop the supponeas and shite)- what is going on? Last note= aside from the bandwith issue which makes even this p4 3.0gz 1024 ram lag like a donkey full of heroin, 0.4 seems to be a major step forward, i'm impressed.

I guess there are two ways that this can go- because a lot of the work has already been done twice before, you could argue that the game would be overwhelmingly good because a lot more of the development time can be dedicated to coming up with fresh ideas to keep the whole gta 3 concept worth continuing for a third time - although there is the unavoidable danger as Prokopis rightly stated that covering the same ground for a third time could stifle anything creative and intelligent out of the francise (take Terminator 3, Alien 3, Batman Forever, Matrix Revolutions as examples..). It's true that they probably have to do it more than they want to- preferring maybe to completely redesign the concept as they did between GTA2 and GTA3, but I'm pretty sure that GTA3:SA has been on the cards as long as GTA3:LC has (LC/SA/VC all being cities in GTA1) so they should have a fair idea of where they want to go with it already. As for re-using the same engine over again, I wouldn't worry about it too much, the Renderware engine gets updated all the time (as with most decent engines, it keeps on top of new developments) just take the transition between GTA3:LC to GTA3:VC for example (yes I know they didnt bother too much with LC, just doing a straight port from the PS2, but the argument still stands) we should still expect great things. If nothing else, the work that all the Modders have done (with an incredible explosion of gta modding during vice citys lifecycle) should provide some perhaps much needed inspiration to Rockstar of what they should be thinking about.

Unfortunately there isn't a fix for this until Rockstar themselves release one. You see this problem isn't purely with MTA:VC, I've had it many times with the normal standalone release of Vice City- it happens when you pass through the [loading] screen while crossing different map areas a few times in succession. All the radio stations slow down and sound like a walkman with low batteries (or they jump about). Its something to do with when Vice City pages information from the hard disk.. and unfortunately MTA:VC is more of a drain on resources on your computer than GTA:VC was causing more paging. The only thing I know that will make some sort of difference is to disable write ahead caching on your hard disk and to put it in DMA mode (either in the BIOS somewhere or by pressing the right hand button over your hard disk in My Computer and selecting [properties] - its in there somewhere

See my previous post...

I generally do for moving around, but when it comes to aiming, the arrow key controls lose out. Also for some reason Dell laptops seem to have this infuriating problem of recognizing only one keypress at a time, so I can no longer do stoppies (sob...)

Maybe we could have an alternative mta version with other skins- then you just d/l the skins along with the installer?