[Danukem]

PIGCOP BOSS and CYBER ENFORCER BOSS version .90 .92, February 3, 2018
sprites by sebabdukeboss20, code by Dan Gaskill
thanks to JBlade for extracting and arranging sprites

Download:
https://www.dropbox....BOSSES.zip?dl=0

Instructions: Dump all included files into a virgin vanilla Duke 3D folder with the most recent version of EDuke32 in it. The included EDUKE.CON will load the code for the new boss. All the code for it is actually in the PIGBOSS.CON file, and you are free to copy it and modify it into whatever project you want. Obviously, you need to pay attention to things like the path in the sound definitions and the CON load order if you move shit around. The code is mostly standalone, but it does use state standard_jibs, so it has to load after that. This boss supports standard Duke 3D features such as being freezable, shrinkable, and respawning on DIG difficulty. EDIT: minor update, now works properly with expander

The PIGBOSS is tile 5120. Pal 0 is big and tough, other pal variants are smaller and less tough. I did not make it end the game when you kill it, since in most cases that is not desirable (a trivial addition if anyone wanted that though). Tile 5121 will make it stayput in a sector. It will work that way but it is is not optimized for that.

I will update this post later with more notes. In the meantime, a caution: While I will fix reported bugs, I can verify that the boss works with the most recent Eduke32. Since this is intended for creators to use in their projects, it is assumed you have a basic knowledge of how to put something in the game. I will not be sympathetic to people posting about how they can't get it to work if they are not following directions and seem to have no knowledge of how the game works, and I may even delete such posts.



______________________________________________________

Some Notes on the Pigcop Boss

This is a relatively barebones version because it is made to be compatible with vanilla Duke 3D or ported to other projects. Extra bells and whistles may not be desirable in a given project, or they may require putting code in various places (such as the player, the hud or other enemies) that would complicate porting the enemy. One obvious example would be giving the pigcop boss a shout that buffed nearby pigcops and/or had a status effect on the player. Another example would be giving the boss some pathfinding AI. On the cosmetic side, it would be nice to have some effects sprites (e.g. for when he hits the ground) -- but the project it is ported to might already have good sprites or systems in place for stuff like that. One feature I did want to include, though, but ended up leaving out was having it fire a modified mortar from one of its barrels. The reason I didn't is, no matter what offset I put on the projectile definition, I could not get the projectile to spawn on the correct side of the boss sprite, despite following the directions in the wiki on PROJ_OFFSET. I know a hackish way around this, but it was too hackish for this project.

From a gameplay coding standpoint, what makes the pigcop boss interesting is that the sprites have not only a firing animation, but also melee, roar, taunt and stomp. I ended up not using the stomp, but if it were added I would recommend putting it in as a random variation on the taunt. If you are coding an enemy you have to think about the enemy in terms of both presentation and gameplay. If an enemy looks amazing with varied animations, but the player is able to cheese it and kill it without the enemy being able to do much, then all that work on animations is wasted. Likewise, if you code an attack for the enemy, but the player is never going to be in a situation where the enemy would use it, then it was a waste of effort. In the case of the pigcop boss, this presents something of a problem because: (1) taunt and roar animations make the boss helpless, possibly giving the player quick kill opportunities, and (2) the player will generally try to avoid getting near the boss on general principle, making it unlikely that the melee can be used. My solutions were (1) give the boss damage resistance during the taunt and roar animations, and (2) make the boss sprint towards the player and use the melee offensively. Then it was just a question of balancing the elements properly, so the boss still threatens with a normal gun attack, and taunts/roars enough but not too much. The knockback effect on the melee is based on a force push that I coded for Duke Forces. It makes the attack seem powerful, but also it moves the player away to allow for a reset so the boss doesn't spam melee.

[-=SomeThingEviL=-]

This shit is boss, PIGBOSS!!!!!!!!!!!!

[sebabdukeboss20]

Wow. It's seriously awesome to see him come to life. I really appreciate it!

[Danukem]

sebabdukeboss20, on 28 January 2018 - 05:33 PM, said:

Wow. It's seriously awesome to see him come to life. I really appreciate it!

It was fun! By the way, what kind of gun is it supposed to be? I went with automatic shotgun, but I don't really know.

[sebabdukeboss20]

Trooper Dan, on 28 January 2018 - 06:00 PM, said:

It was fun! By the way, what kind of gun is it supposed to be? I went with automatic shotgun, but I don't really know.

The concept art showed a bunch of guns chained together. In the 3d model I created, it ranges from ak47, m4, shotgun, double barrel shotgun, grenade launcher so he would technically fire random different weapons. The pick up was optional for modders. To be honest though it doesn't make sense for Duke to wield giant chain of weapons so it might as well be a super ammo pickup or something.

[Danukem]

sebabdukeboss20, on 28 January 2018 - 06:03 PM, said:

The concept art showed a bunch of guns chained together. In the 3d model I created, it ranges from ak47, m4, shotgun, double barrel shotgun, grenade launcher so he would technically fire random different weapons. The pick up was optional for modders. To be honest though it doesn't make sense for Duke to wield giant chain of weapons so it might as well be a super ammo pickup or something.

It helps to know that. I can make an update where there is a different kind of gun firing on each of the firing frames.

Also, while I have some momentum, I think I'll try my hand at your cyber-enforcer. All I have is the sprite sheet, though.

[sebabdukeboss20]

I'll do the extracting this time.

[Zaxtor]

Pretty cool.
I like when he whacks the player with his police baton and throws the player far..

[Jblade]

awesome stuff, really cool to see it in motion now

[Fantinaikos]

Well since his drop is a conglomerate of weapons the AMC TC is the only which can take full advantage, having a so varied arsenal. You take ammo for any single weapon if not the weapons (including the chain as a melee weapon?).

Don't forget to code even the stomp attack.

When I will publish my simple variant you will have to come back to coding table.

[NightFright]

Now someone talk to Gearbox, replace the crappy Alien World Order boss with this one and enjoy the sudden awesomeness.

[Danukem]

I updated my original post with some notes: this should explain some decisions and a bit about the process to anyone who is interested.

[Jblade]

Quote

I could not get the projectile to spawn on the correct side of the boss sprite, despite following the directions in the wiki on PROJ_OFFSET. I know a hackish way around this, but it was too hackish for this project.

Yeah I think there's something wrong with offset, I did make a post about it but didn't get any replies IIRC. Setting it doesn't seem to have any effect.

[Danukem]

Jblade, on 29 January 2018 - 12:59 PM, said:

Yeah I think there's something wrong with offset, I did make a post about it but didn't get any replies IIRC. Setting it doesn't seem to have any effect.

Changing the numbers does have some effect, but I could not get the projectile to spawn on the sprite's left side (right side from player perspective), even after dozens of tries spanning a large range of numbers both positive and negative. I doubt the devs would be willing to rework this feature, since it would likely break existing mods that did manage to use it successfully. The hack I was referring to and decided not to use was manually resetting the coords of the enemy right before and after the shot.

[Jblade]

Yeah the projectile I was trying to utilise just didn't fire centred from an enemy no matter what I tried, but there may be some esoteric combination of flags that was breaking it. It's something I'll have to look more indepth towards. As for the gameplay comments, I think one utility for the stamp would be for it to potentially knock the player around a bit if the player is say above the pig boss (maybe on some spritework or whatever) I think that's what I'm gonna do when I tweak this over to the AMC TC Thanks again for doing this for us - if you need any more enemies added to the art tiles and aligned, just let me know and I'll get on it for you asap.

[Danukem]

Jblade, on 29 January 2018 - 01:32 PM, said:

Thanks again for doing this for us - if you need any more enemies added to the art tiles and aligned, just let me know and I'll get on it for you asap.

It looks like I'll be doing the cyber-enforcer next. I have the sprites as separate PNG files, but if you wanted to put them into tiles020 after the pigcop boss, that would certainly be appreciated -- I can send you the PNGs when I'm home from work.

After that, I don't know, but possibly the pigcop SUV. I already have some code for a vehicle that follows a path (an improved RECON), which would make a good starting point. The vehicle is lacking damage/destruction sprites though.

[sebabdukeboss20]

Trooper Dan, on 29 January 2018 - 05:35 PM, said:

After that, I don't know, but possibly the pigcop SUV. I already have some code for a vehicle that follows a path (an improved RECON), which would make a good starting point. The vehicle is lacking damage/destruction sprites though.

I was thinking the Pigcop SUV would just explode and wield 2-3 pigcops similar to the tank.

[Danukem]

sebabdukeboss20, on 29 January 2018 - 05:50 PM, said:

I was thinking the Pigcop SUV would just explode and wield 2-3 pigcops similar to the tank.

Yeah but the original tank kind of sucks for that reason. I'm pretty sure that the community has at least one destruction sprite for it (made by Jimmy?) Also consider that your SUV has way more frames than the tank. It's kind of strange to have a vehicle with a large number of detailed frames just disappear when it gets destroyed.

[sebabdukeboss20]

Trooper Dan, on 29 January 2018 - 06:32 PM, said:

Yeah but the original tank kind of sucks for that reason. I'm pretty sure that the community has at least one destruction sprite for it (made by Jimmy?) Also consider that your SUV has way more frames than the tank. It's kind of strange to have a vehicle with a large number of detailed frames just disappear when it gets destroyed.

Ok. I can make some more frames for you. What should I make? A totaled SUV?

[Fantinaikos]

Two good SUV detruction pattern:

1) Driver lose control of the vehicle (or it is dead so he still has his foot on the accelerator) and it explode as it crash into some solid object or wall of the level. Then presumably explodes.

2) It simply explode jumping and rotating in the air in a blanket of smoke and flames, and then return to the ground like a mass of steaming scrap.

Plus, like the LARD tank, sometimes one Pigcop survives the crash somehow.

It would be nice to implement both cases of destruction. Easier to say than translate it into image though.

Quote

What should I make? A totaled SUV?

A destroyed car body, maximum an implosion transition, should be enough. The rest will be standard DN3D effects or any new one added by the mods.

[Danukem]

sebabdukeboss20, on 29 January 2018 - 06:44 PM, said:

Ok. I can make some more frames for you. What should I make? A totaled SUV?

Yeah, burnt and badly damaged with parts of it missing. There will still be a big explosion when it "dies" -- what we need is what would be left over afterwards. And then it would be good to have a few chunks of debris from it as separate sprites that can be coded as projectiles flying from the explosion. However, I already have some generic metal debris sprites that can work for that well enough.

You don't necessarily need to make frames for different angles, though.

[XThX2]

I could see some pink pixels on its attack frames with the chaingun. I'd also like to suggest one thing: Give him an extra aggressive stance if shot during taunting process. It seems like a bullet sponge at that point.

Other than that, great boss.

[Danukem]

XThX2, on 29 January 2018 - 07:05 PM, said:

I could see some pink pixels on its attack frames with the chaingun. I'd also like to suggest one thing: Give him an extra aggressive stance if shot during taunting process. It seems like a bullet sponge at that point.

Other than that, great boss.

The pink pixels definitely need to go -- good catch.

I don't think he's going to get any new stances, though. If he seems like a bullet sponge, just edit his health value (currently set to the normal boss health amount) or comment out that little block of code that gives him 50% damage resistance when he is taunting. Or just wait 1 or 2 seconds until his taunt ends before shooting him.

[Jblade]

I'll fix the pixels on the pig cop boss, just adding in the cyber lizard now - also I definitely suggest having a destroyed license plate sprite that flies toward the player (purely cosmetic) when the vehicle is destroyed

[sebabdukeboss20]

Thanks jblade.

Back on the SUV, I can make damaged/burnt frames, but should I keep the turret face forward or do all angles because if I do all angles that's a lot of frames if you're willing to code that.

And what should the plate say? Any good puns?

[Fantinaikos]

sebabdukeboss20, on 30 January 2018 - 06:49 AM, said:

And what should the plate say? Any good puns?

P0RK?

P0RKC4OP?

H0GR1DE?

[Jblade]

One of those would be great - I think just make 1 set of wrecked frames, no need to make lots more work for yourself.

[sebabdukeboss20]

Fantinaikos, on 30 January 2018 - 07:01 AM, said:

P0RK?

P0RKC4OP?

H0GR1DE?

I can't pick. I'll just do all 3. It's pretty easy to make.

[sebabdukeboss20]

I got a few

P1G5 F1Y
B4C0N

Maybe it can be coded so a random plate flies at the player for each enemy.

[Danukem]

Just a little update: I now have the cyber enforcer art arranged in the same file with the pigcop boss art, thanks to seb and Jblade. I have not yet started coding the cyber-enforcer, but hopefully I'll be able to do it this weekend. The next update will include both bosses, with a few improvements to the pigcop boss. This thread is now for the general project of putting new sebabdukeboss enemies in game.