It's been a long time, but I've finally uploaded GH2 v0.440 to the SourceForge page. Here is the mighty list of changes:
Several new cities.
Kosaka Spinner is the capitol of the Free Commerce States.
Fuchal Spinner is home to L5's greatest chefs. This city features a unique quest involving CometBurger's head office.
Tohru Spinner used to be an important industrial station until it was damaged in an asteroid strike.
Emerald Spinner is home to the FCS's financial planning division and the Emerald Bank. It features a special activity for characters with the Shopping skill.
New Content
The core story elements have been extensively reworked. There are likely to be quite a number of bald spots; please report plot deadends that begin with a "#A", but don't bother reporting those which begin with either a "#W" or a "#L".
A lot of new quests have been added as well; they were needed to cover all the new locations. Athera Spinner now has a concert quest with a unique reward; speak to Phivos at the Garden Theatre for details.
New Mecha
I've been introducing the mecha one by one on the forum. New mecha that I haven't gotten around to yet include the Galah, the Tauner, and the Picaro.
The Rest
Since it's been a number of months since the last release, the list of program changes is huge. I'll add comments where necessary.
- Added PlotThingSet gear, where prefabs may be stored (playwright.pp)
- Added heavy actuator movement system (ghmovers.pp)
- Multi-part plots keep record of all components used (mpbuilder.pp)
- Fixed info display for sets (glinfo.pp)
- Fixed problems with calculated skill ranks (gearutil.pp)
- All plot states may load an episode conclusion (playwright.pp)
- Oversized modules give +1 bonus to mecha CC damage (gameutil.pp)
- NPCs still involved in quest can't join lance (arenascript.pp)
- Quests will not set skill level of animals (navigate.pp)
- Traveling by shuttle now takes time (services.pp)
- Concert minigame now takes time (minigame.pp)
- Props without teamdata will be assigned to team 0 (narration.pp)
- Fixed a bug with trade items interface (backpack.pp)
- Quests scale random loot to proper level (navigate.pp)
- Encounters may only be spotted within awareness range (action.pp)
- Quest scenes will have monster team threat set (navigate.pp)
- Fixed problem with MetaScene -1 (narration.pp)
- Will no longer drift on oversized maps (action.pp)
I also intend to set things so that flying mecha don't make wide turns on oversized maps. As it is now, getting around town in a Wraith is impossible.
- Added \CHATNPC message formatting string (arenascript.pp)
- Fixed bug in MP element contexts (mpbuilder.pp)
- Terrain included in scene XRContext (playwright.pp)
- Fixed bug in SDL mode self repair (targetui.pp)
- Mecha will start play in lowest legal movemode (locale.pp)
- NPCs will not continue to act after scene finished (arenaplay.pp)
This change needs to be ported back to GH1.
- ForceChat automatically prints contact message (arenascript.pp)
- Alerts are now automatically printed to console (arenascript.pp)
- Changed mechanism for determining if NPCs will join lance (arenascript.pp)
Now the NPC's renown, which in GH2 determines their starting skill level, is used in the calculation.
- Added IfGCanJoinLance, Monologue ASL commands (arenascript.pp)
- Removed +Pen Propp state, added +Psh Propp state (series/*.txt)
- Relationship with PC now indicated in NPC info (description.pp)
- GH2 now uses ANSI strings
- Added persona fragment debugging message (playwright.pp)
- Megaplots will sum the plot points from components (mpbuilder.pp)
- XXRAN_WIZARD allows selection of subplots (mpbuilder.pp)
- AdvancePlot replaced with EndPlot (arenascript.pp)
- XXRan components no longer have return scripts (arenascript.pp)
- CharDesc may set relationship with PC (gearparser.pp)
- Content may request random NPCs (playwright.pp,chargen.pp)
Instead of defining a prefab NPC, plots can now request a totally random NPC generated by mostly the same character generator as is used for the PC. The two inputs for this are the desired NPC faction and the NPC's hometown.
- Combat NPCs automatically get equipment; equipchar deleted (gearparser.pp)
- New NPC equipment selector (gearparser.pp)
- NPCs will select mecha at start of encounter (arenaplay.pp)
- Random stats affected by job type (chargen.pp)
- Fixed some computer handling bugs (backpack.pp)
- Added superprop error checking code (randmaps.pp)
- Changed how space terrain is rendered (glmap.pp)
- Added backdrops for scenes (glmap.pp)
- Props always count as having a power source (gearutil.pp)
- Added many new meshes (ghprop.pp)
- Taunt MP cost reduced, may also cause MP/SP loss in target (arenacfe.pp)
- SF:0 gear gets better sale price from appropriate shopkeeper (services.pp)
- Can now access mecha part editor from ArenaHQ (gh2arena.pp)
So, if you have someone with Mecha Engineering in your arena unit, you can modify your team's mecha.
- Random item generator should produce less junk (gearparser.pp)
Unfortunately, after adding the powered armor it couldn't handle squared weighting of item costs, so it's now changed to a linear weighting which mostly ignores items of too low a value.
- Blinking cursor when inputting text in ASCII mode (vidgfx.pp)
- Fixed a bug in SDL input routine (glgfx.pp)
- Default console height 25 for Windows, 24 for other OSs (ui4gh.pp)
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Whew. My next task will be to add a campaign and unit rewards to arena mode. After that, I hope to continue expanding the L5 region. Once all the major players are represented in the game world I'll start working on sustainable adventure.
Try it out. Let me know if you encounter any problems.
