Brotherhood, unity, and peace, ladies and gentlemen! A new version of Voxel Section Editor III has been released a while ago by yours trully. For those unaware, Voxel Section Editor III is a software that allows users to edit volumetric models (voxels) from games like Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun, Red Alert 2, and OpenRA. The latest beta version can interact with 3ds2vxl to import 3ds models. It can export smooth models as .OBJ with texture or as .PLY using the 3D Modelizer tool. It also includes an advanced Auto Normals generator tool. Here are the updates from Voxel Section Editor III 1.4 Beta (Build 291):

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Hello everyone!

I've been fixing several bugs that I have been tracking in the program, or someone has reported, such as:

- Added an auto-normals button at the toolbar.
- Fixed Invalid pointer operation when saving GIF files.
- Modified voxels are not being saved on the user's request when starting a new one or opening another one.
- Fixed a range-check when you go to View -> Spectrum -> Show Used Colors/Normals.
- Voxel Section Editor III remembers the last used palette when you open it.
- Updated the community links


You can learn more about Voxel Section Editor III by visiting the Forums at PPM, and Official Website. Download the latest version of Voxel Section Editor III Here. That's all, folks! Stay tuned at PPM for more news coverage on Voxel Section Editor III!

Hi everyone! One program that has received a lot of development efforts and releases in these latest weeks was C&C World-Altering Editor. A week ago, C&C World-Altering Editor v1.3.0 was released by ^Rampastein. C&C World-Altering Editor is a map editor for the Command & Conquer Tiberian Sun Red Alert 2, and its expansions. It originally started as a map editor for Dawn of the Tiberium Age. Here are the updates from C&C World-Altering Editor v1.3.0:

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This release brings further rendering improvements along with a lot of bug fixes.

Depth is now rendered at an individual level for each pixel, fixing edge cases where nearby objects like trees were incorrectly drawn above or below buildings that were not square in shape.



WAE also has a new height cursor, which is visually stronger than before. Now, you can see the cell's height from the number of dashed lines.



Full changelog:
  • Implemented pixel-based depth rendering
  • Changed height cursor to be stronger and dashed
  • Improved logic for cloning triggers for easier difficulty levels. The function will no longer create duplicate (based on name) TaskForces and Teams if you clone multiple triggers that use the same instance of a team
  • Waypoints outside of the camera view are no longer drawn. This can slightly improve performance on maps with high amounts of waypoints
  • Base nodes outside of the camera view are no longer drawn. This can slightly improve performance on maps with high amounts of base nodes
  • Fixed a bug where voxel rendering could cause terrain to flicker
  • Fixed a bug where large buildings got dragged and moved on double-click unless they were clicked on the top-most foundation cell
  • Fixed a bug where AITrigger per-difficulty cloning did not save Medium-difficulty AITriggers
  • Fixed a bug where Auto-LAT could cause graphical artifacts (black tiles) to appear
  • Fixed a bug where Auto-LAT was previewed over an area 10 times larger than intended
  • Fixed a bug where overlay was drawn over units
  • (RA2/YR + Ares) Fixed a crash when a building used custom foundation shapes
  • Updated SixLabors.ImageSharp 3rd party library to fix potential security issues


But, as I said, a lot has happened since our last news report about the version 1.1.8.

Version 1.2.0 came with a partially rewritten and much more optimized renderer that should work more smoothly, especially when painting terrain on low-end PCs and a new "Copy Custom Shape" tool.

Version 1.2.1 and 1.2.2 improves the work done on 1.2.0.

Version 1.2.3 implemented precise infantry selection and improved the rendering work from 1.2.0.

Version 1.2.4 fixed a bug where buildings that had no main shape (for example, helipads or service depots that consisted only of a bib) were not rendered at all.


You can check more information about C&C World-Altering Editor by visiting the Topic at PPM Forums, Official Website, and Discord Channel at C&C Mod Haven. Download C&C World-Altering Editor v1.3.0 Here. And this is all for today! Enjoy C&C World-Altering Editor and provide your feedback about it so it can get better.

Catching up with C&C Reloaded 2.6.2!
October 13, 2024 - 21:36
Hello, ladies and gentlemen! Reinforcements have arrived few weeks ago from C&C Reloaded as C&C Reloaded 2.6.2 has been recently released by FS-21. C&C Reloaded is a classic modification that brings together the Tiberian Sun and Red Alert 2 factions into Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge with Ares and Phobos. The changes from C&C Reloaded 2.6.2 were announced with the following words:

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Version 2.6.2, 2024/09/30
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  • Reverted the cncnet 5 version of the dll until I find the cause of the rare crashes without the error window. This means some related features will be lost temporarily.
  • Updated XNA Client executables & libraries.
  • Updated CnC-DDraw to v6.9
  • Fixed: When a non-standard game mode was selected, all the faction's MCVs were spawned at the beginning of the battle & ignored some game options.
  • Added a new console tool called 'CheckModFiles_CnCReloaded.exe' that generates a plain text file with detailed information about the mod folder. In theory, this works with other mods with XNA Client as a launcher & with an updater enabled. It is located in the 'Tools' folder.
  • Updated the "Simplified Chinese" (zh-hans) texts for the Resurgence campaign.
  • Decreased AI attack frequency in all RA2, YR & Resurgence campaigns, especially in "medium" and "easy" difficulty.
  • Some bugs fixed & tweaks.



The full mod changelog is located here:
https://forums.revora.net/topic/15746-mod-features-changelog/?p=99017


You can learn more about C&C Reloaded by visiting the Official Website, Forums at Revora, ModDB Profile, and Discord Channel. You can grab the latest version of C&C Reloaded by clicking Here. And that's all regarding C&C Reloaded for now. Stay tuned at PPM for more news about C&C Reloaded!

Greetings, commander! SWR Productions, the leader of Rise of The Reds, has recently shared some progress done with this project with the public. For those who are not acquainted with it, Rise of The Reds is a classic and popular modification for C&C Generals: Zero Hour that adds two completely new factions: the tank-heavy Russian Federation and the defense-oriented European Continental Alliance. It also greatly expands the three original factions with several new units, buildings, powers, and abilities to explore and combine with your in-game tactics. Here is what you need to know about the progress on Rise of The Reds:

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Good Morning, Generals!
Welcome back to the weekly update! We apologize for the tardy nature of this week's update. With the seasons changing, as are all our schedules, we ask for a bit of patience as we start to cap off the year. Although we still have a boatload of content to bring you all, the point where 1.9 becomes feature-complete is slowly approaching, so be ready for the fact that there may be a few weeks without updates as we get closer to this point.

In the meantime (as stated), we still have a boatload of content to sail into your screens. So before this metaphor starts to sink, let's go full steam ahead.

Originally when the US Drone Control Centre was added back in early 1.87, it was done so as a unique bonus for the US faction. The original thinking of this structure was that it could act as an alternative tech path that would give players more options when it came to how they wanted to specialize their build orders and what units they wanted to focus on. Watching how players adapted to this separated tech tree really interested us, and although the Drone Control Centre was still seen as the "lesser" choice compared to the US Detention Centre (though many would argue this was more due to the drones themselves rather than the tech structure itself), we have decided that for version 1.9 every faction is going to get alternative tier-one tech-paths that each have their own unique bonuses and upgrades. Today, we are excited to show you the new Russian Tier-One alternative, the Infirmary, and its little flying friend, the Medical Helicopter.


From fine to wounded; from wounded to gravely wounded; from gravely wounded to dead or amputee. Mere minutes between each step. The basics of first aid, which defined battlefield medicine, had been gravely neglected in Russia for decades. Stories of horrible mismanagement and callous disregard for life, with few exaggerations, plagued the armed forces - until Suvorov.

The old mantra of "spare no man - the women will birth more" was cast into the garbage heap. In modern warfare, each soldier was an investment, the bearer of training and knowledge rivaling that of officers their great-great-grandparents served under and to whom the saying was addressed. Losing such investments to an unattended shrapnel wound was unsustainable for any nation, especially Russia. Suvorov's military reforms ensured a realignment of the Military Medical Directorate to universally acclaimed standards and procedures, not unlike those of their Western rivals. One key cornerstone of such reforms was the introduction of the Infirmary.

Designed to be quickly set up on the field, the Infirmary served as the forward resupply point for combat medics as well as a stabilization point, where the wounded soldiers would recuperate before being sent further to a proper medical facility by air. The presence of Infirmaries, alongside a general improvement in first aid knowledge, meant that soldiers were better able to tend to their wounds independently, reducing the strain on logistics and allowing them to stay in the fight for longer.

Russia's renewed presence in Africa was marked by these facilities being used for the distribution of humanitarian aid and provision of basic medical services to the people displaced by the GLA, alongside their usual functions. Much of the staff of the African infirmaries were natives; this earned them great favor from the locals, who enjoyed the benefits up until the Russians withdrew from the continent.

Render Description: hanfield




The humble workhorses of the Russian Military Medical Directorate, these helicopters fly back and forth, ferrying wounded from the battlefield to Infirmaries, working around the clock to save as many wounded as possible, as fast as possible. Fielding a variety of models, obsolete for most other tasks, the Medical Helicopters are plentiful and can carry all the necessary life-saving equipment. Their low cost and ease of maintenance make them ideal for maintaining operational pace, ensuring that even the farthest peacekeeping mission or skirmish could rely on a timely evac.

The Russian Medical Helicopter is a purely visual feature of the Infirmary, patrolling the base perimeter at its own leisure.

Render Description: hanfield

As I'm sure you can guess with the medical theming of the Infirmary, this tech structure is based around supporting infantry. All of the upgrades that affect the Russian Infantry (like Medkits and Advanced Infantry Munitions) have been moved from the Weapons Bunker to the new Infirmary. The infirmary is also cheaper than the weapons bunker and has less power-cost, so it allows players to tech up faster, at the cost of having to rely on infantry as their core unit as opposed to Helicopters like with the Weapons Bunker. Don't worry, though. Much like with the US tech structures, there are a plethora of shared upgrades between the two structures, so although the Infirmary is themed on supporting infantry, it's not your only option.

As it says in Hanfield's render description, the Medical Helicopter is a purely cosmetic addition. Originally, when the infirmary was first added, many of the team questioned if the helipad on the roof had a purpose. This sentiment was continued when the infirmary was first showcased on one of Maelstrom's streams, where much of the community voiced similar concerns. As such, the Medial Helicopter was added as a pointless but fun way of giving the model's helipad a purpose, and thus, it has remained so ever since.

So, that's the Russian Infirmary, and that's all we have for you this week...

All right, fine. I suppose seeing the update was a little delayed. You've all earned a little teaser of something coming soon, so here you go. Once again, we shall leave you to figure out what it is.







Have a great week, Generals. We will see you next time!


If you are curious about Rise of The Reds, visit the Official Website, Forums, ModDB Profile, Discord Channel, and YouTube Video Channel to obtain further information about it. And that's all regarding Rise of The Reds for now. Stay tuned at PPM for more news about Rise of The Reds!

Howdy! Freedom Fighter, the leader of The Desolated Future, has recently shared some progress done in the shadows with this project with the public. For those who are not acquainted with it, The Desolated Future is a total conversion for Yuri's Revenge, based on the Tiberian universe, set in a future where GDI and Nod fall to CABAL. The world ends up in the hands of the Forgotten, CABAL, and the invader Scrin.

Let's start with the "rise from the grave" announcement from Freedom Fighter here. I'm glad he is recovering from all the troubles he had recently:

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Hi guys! Sorry that it's been a while. Many things have happened since the last update. Work got the better of me, and I no longer had any motivation, you know, the work. This year has been a much-needed break for me. Early this year, I got a gig job that was not as physically and mentally demanding as my previous job in logistics. Say goodbye to those goddamned parcels coming in every monthly sales time/panic buying during pandemics. The pay's good, and I'm not as tired and stressed out. I got more freedom to manage my time. Unfortunately, late last month I was met with a road accident. The rental I drove, my source of income, was totaled, and it would take weeks for my insurance and rental agents to sort things out Sad

So there was I, still waiting for updates regarding my case, with nothing to do at home. Thought, in the meantime, I should sort out my exercise routine, get a new bike maybe, and clear up some stuff that is overdue soon. Then I looked at the new mod releases and figured that I missed modding. It's been a while, so I am pretty rusty, and the last version I worked on was full of spaghetti coding. So now I decided to restart almost from scratch. Not to worry, tho, as most of the art, sounds, rules, and AI are intact; they just needed some copypasting...

I must say, however, that updates won't be quick. Until I can get back on the road again, I might be able to work on however much I can. I've just finished restoring The Forgotten's common units and the Wasteland Scavengers sub-faction. Their AI was mostly functional last I checked, so I can now proceed to the next subfaction. This time, however, I will work on CABAL before returning to The Forgotten and vice versa, which means Gamma Legion is up next! In the meantime, have a gander at what I've been up to:


Dreadnought



Dreadnought's Battle Box



Sandstorm in standard and barrage fire modes


Hope to work on this mod more Very Happy And please, if you're driving out there, driving safely doesn't always cut it. Always be on the lookout for those who aren't.



Here is one of the posts where the Watch Tower from the Forgotten receives an update:

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The Watch Tower has a new attack. It will visually shine its spotlight at enemies within range, decreasing their armor by 10%, and will eventually sound off an alarm if it focuses on its target long enough, increasing the speed and firepower of nearby units and defenses by 25% for 20 seconds. It will sound off its alarm four times before resuming to shine on its target and will stop when either the target is destroyed/out of range or it gets disabled by EMP/low power. Enemies will also remain debuffed for an additional 10 seconds should they trigger its alarm.


Another structure that has received an update recently was the Forgotten Scrapyard:

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The Scrapyard neither spawns Mongooses for free nor does it provide a support power to paradrop in decoys anymore. Instead, it is now able to make fake copies of most tier 0 and 1 vehicles, including those of other factions and subfactions. It is also able to reverse-engineer captured vehicles, giving you more incentive to use Bandits for hijacking.



Decoys no longer have limited ammo. Thus, they will never suicide bomb the enemy when they run dry. This allows them to keep the facade up longer. You can still order them to self-destruct via deploy, but their bombs aren't very powerful for balance reasons. They also have half the health of real vehicles, and their weapons are one range shorter, enabling them to shield your forces by being in front of them.


And finally, let's not forget about the Engineering Bay:

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The Engineering Bay no longer repairs surrounding vehicles, and the Skycrane is no longer buildable. Instead, it now functions like a classical service depot, repairing vehicles one by one and removing parasites from them. Meanwhile, the Skycrane can be spawned near it via a support power every six minutes or so.

Emergency Repair support power now costs $900 to use and will create a designated repair zone at the target area. Vehicles that enter this zone will be under repair mode. Any damages they incurred will be gradually repaired while the zone is active, but their speed and armor will be halved regardless of their health condition, so be sure to move fully repaired vehicles out. This also applies to the Wrecker and (not shown here) Snakehead Repair.



For further information about The Desolated Future, visit its Forums at PPM and its ModDB Profile. And that's all for now!

D.O.R.F. - Map Editor Timelapse
October 02, 2024 - 02:49
Ladies and gentlemen! The crew from D.O.R.F. has been working hard these days, and they have just shared a sneak peek of the Map Editor that will be included on D.O.R.F. For those who are not acquainted with it, D.O.R.F. is an indie real-time strategy conflict game that uses the OpenRA engine. It brings three factions to the battlefield: the Crumbling Empire, The Barbarians, and the New World Order. It should also bring innovative game mechanics, land, sea, and air combat, as well as interesting graphics. Here is what you need to know about the progress on D.O.R.F.:

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Timelapse of creating a simple scene using D.O.R.F.'s map editor. Note that there are still some missing features that still need to be added, such as a cliff painting tool and a separate painting tool for vegetation.


You can check more information about D.O.R.F. by visiting the Official Website, Steam Page, ModDB Profile, and YouTube Video Channel. And that's all regarding D.O.R.F. for now. Stay tuned at PPM for more news about D.O.R.F.!

Phobos Build 44 has been released!
October 02, 2024 - 01:50
Hello again! Reinforcements have arrived at Phobos. Starkku has recently made Phobos Build 44 available for download. For your information, Phobos extends the modding features from Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge and, unlike Ares, is completely open-source. Here are the changes and the fun stuff from Phobos Build 44:

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Disclaimer: development builds are inherently unstable and may contain improvements that will be changed and adjusted before the stable release (as well as bugs), with fewer stability guarantees.

Phobos development build 44 is up!

Changes compared to build 43:

Migration info:

  • PowersUpNAnim is now used instead of the upgrade building's image file for upgrade animation if set. Note that displaying a damaged version will still require setting PowerUp1DamagedAnim explicitly in all cases, as the fallback to upgrade the building image does not extend to it, nor would it be safe to add.
  • SelfHealGainType value none has been changed to noheal due to none being treated as a blank string and not parsed by the game.
  • Affected target enum (CanTarget, Crit.Affects et al) now considers buildings considered vehicles (ConsideredVehicle=true or not set in conjunction with UndeploysInto & 1x1 foundation) as units instead of buildings.
  • If CreateUnit.AlwaysSpawnOnGround is set to false. Jumpjet vehicles created will now automatically take off instead of staying on the ground. Set to true to force spawn on the ground.
  • DrawInsignia.AdjustPos.BuildingsAnchor no longer has a default value and thus does not anchor insignia by default (vanilla behavior).

New features:

  • Toggle to allow spawned aircraft to attack immediately after being spawned (by Starkku)
  • ZAdjust for OverlayTypes (by Starkku)
  • Allow customizing extra tint intensity for Iron Curtain & Force Shield (by Starkku)
  • Option to enable parsing 8-bit RGB values from [ColorAdd] instead of RGB565 (by Starkku)
  • Customizing the height at which subterranean units travel (by Starkku)
  • Option for Warhead damage to penetrate Iron Curtain or Force Shield (by Starkku)
  • Option for Warhead to remove all shield types at once (by Starkku)
  • Allow customizing voxel light source position (by Kerbiter, Morton, based on knowledge of thomassnedon)
  • Option to fix voxel light source being offset and incorrectly tilting on slopes (by Kerbiter)
  • AI superweapon delay timer customization (by Starkku)
  • Disabling MultipleFactory bonus from specific BuildingType (by Starkku)
  • Customizable ChronoSphere teleport delays for units (by Starkku)
  • Allowed and disallowed types for FactoryPlant (by Starkku)
  • Customizable damage & 'crumbling' (destruction) frames for TerrainTypes (by Starkku)
  • Custom object palettes for TerrainTypes (by Starkku)
  • Forbidding parallel AI queues for specific TechnoTypes (by Starkku)
  • Nonprovocative Warheads (by Starkku)
  • Option to restore PowerSurplus setting for AI (by Starkku)
  • FireOnce infantry sequence reset toggle (by Starkku)
  • Assign Super Weapon cameo to any sidebar tab (by NetsuNegi)
  • Customizing effect of level lighting on air units (by Starkku)
  • Allow building upgrades to use build limit groups (by Starkku)
  • Damage reflection effect for AttachEffect (by Starkku)
  • Additional AttachEffect discard and animation hide conditions (by Starkku)
  • Additional options for CreateUnit, such as spawning height and AI mission (by Starkku)
  • Additional shield options & interactions, such as Warhead removing all shields implicitly or not displaying hit animation (by Starkku)
  • Skirmish AI "sell all buildings and set all technos to hunt" behavior de-hardcode (by TaranDahl)
  • Skirmish AI "gather when MCV deploy" behavior de-hardcode (by TaranDahl)

Vanilla fixes:

  • Weapons with AA=true Projectile can now correctly fire at air units when both firer and target are over a bridge (by Starkku)
  • Fixed disguised units not using the correct palette if the target has a custom palette (by NetsuNegi)
  • Building upgrades now consistently use building's PowerUpN animation settings corresponding to the upgrade's PowersUpToLevel where possible (by Starkku)
  • Subterranean units are no longer allowed to perform deploy functions like firing weapons or IsSimpleDeployer while burrowed or burrowing. They will instead emerge first as they do for transport unloading (by Starkku)
  • Fixed Temporal=true Warheads potentially crashing the game if used to attack Slaved=true infantry (by Starkku)
  • Fixed some locomotors (Tunnel, Walk, Mech) getting stuck when moving too fast (by NetsuNegi)
  • Animations with MakeInfantry and UseNormalLight=false that are drawn in the unit palette will now have cell lighting changes applied to them (by Starkku)
  • Fixed Nuke & Dominator Level lighting not applying to AircraftTypes (by Starkku)
  • Fixed subterranean unit shadow projection when tilting to burrow (by Trsdy)

Phobos fixes:

  • Fixed Shield.Respawn.Amount not defaulting to shield type default if not set (by Starkku)
  • Fixed frame-by-frame hotkey description to read TXT_FRAME_BY_FRAME_DESC instead of TXT_DISPLAY_DAMAGE_DESC (by DeathFishAtEase)
  • Buildings considered vehicles (ConsideredVehicle=true or not set in conjunction with UndeploysInto & 1x1 foundation) are now considered units by affected target enum checks (by Starkku)
  • Fixed Phobos Warhead effects not reliably being applied on damage area as opposed to full weapon-based Warhead detonation (by Starkku)
  • Fix LimboKill not working reliably (by CrimRecya)
  • Fixed SelfHealGainType=none not working (changed to noheal) (by Starkku)
  • Fixed AircraftTypes gaining self-healing from UnitsGainSelfHeal by default (while not displaying the pip) when they should not (by Starkku)
  • Restored vanilla behavior of building veterancy insignia (by Starkku)
  • Fixed an issue that caused Passengers.SyncOwner does not work correctly (by Starkku)
  • Fixed a crash caused by SeparateAircraft=false (by Starkku)
  • Fixed IsPassable=true TerrainTypes allowing vehicles to consider cells passable even if land type or other things should prevent it (by Starkku)
  • Fixed ExtraWarheads not detonating if the main Warhead was nullified by Iron Curtain or Force Shield (by Starkku)
  • Improvements to custom tint code, potential fixes to edge case issues and crashes (by Starkku)
  • Fixed issues with SplashList on both Warheads and IsMeteor animations (by Starkku)

Fixes/interactions with other extensions:

  • IsSimpleDeployer units with Hover locomotor and DeployToLand no longer get stuck after deploying or play their move sound indefinitely (by Starkku)
  • All forms of type conversion (including Ares') now correctly update the warp-in delay if the unit with teleport Locomotor was converted while the delay was active (by Starkku)
  • All forms of type conversion (including Ares') now correctly update MoveSound if a moving unit has their type changed (by Starkku)


For further information about Phobos, visit the Topic at PPM Forums, Official Website, and Discord Channel at C&C Mod Haven. Phobos is available for download Here. That's all, folks! Stay tuned at PPM for more news coverage on Phobos!

Scorched Earth's latest goodies!
October 02, 2024 - 01:45
Comrade Generals! G-E, the leader of Scorched Earth, has been busy recently working on it and shared its progress report with us. For your information, Scorched Earth is a modification for Red Alert 2 that does a massive overhaul with the game, although it retains its cannon and most existing units. AI is brutally harder and more challenging. It also features several new civilian assets, and asymmetric multiplayer maps, among other things. Here is what you need to know about the progress on Scorched Earth:

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Latest goodies...


Diorama time?



For further information about Scorched Earth, visit the Topic in PPM Forums, and ModDB Profile. That's all, folks! Stay tuned at PPM for more news coverage on Scorched Earth!