Questions for Rob Wyatt

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machf
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Post by machf »

Well, it depends on who has the rights to the source code, the developers or the publishers...
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Post by Shadow Wolf »

Remdul wrote:Well, even if they had the source, they can't just give it away. You have to realize they all signed a Non Disclosure Agreement, perhaps much more legal papers. They would almost certainly break the law by leaking it, risking prosecution.
meh I guess so, I already kinda knew all of this but even if there wasn't any kind of non disclosure this would make no difference because they DON' T have it so I guess we might as well go back to the topic
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Post by Remdul »

machf wrote:Well, it depends on who has the rights to the source code, the developers or the publishers...
Well DWI was the developer. Which became the EA LA studio. EA was always the publisher. So I'm pretty sure the rights are completely in hands of EA, unless Universal had a share in it, but I think EA bought movie rights from Universal (not the other way around). So all in all, everything should be in hands of EA. Individual persons who worked on Tres surely don't have any of those rights, the EA Spouse debacle almost confirms that. They weren't even allowed go home to sleep ;).

Yeah, back on topic. :)
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Post by TheGuy »

Just thought of another question: Is there a name/code name for the Trespasser engine, or is it just plain "Trespasser engine"?
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Post by Slugger »

Were you responsible for any particular code?

What motivated you to become a game developer?

What was it like working on the Xbox? And who came up with the name?
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Post by Spartan 99 »

Do you ever think that Trespasser will be remade? It's a great game and all, but given todays technological advances, trespasser could be made into a greater game than ever. Just look at Turok.
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Post by chronzerg »

-Would bit be possible for you to interpret any of the unknown T-script values, specifically the Dinosaur AI?

Strange AI Values
-ActDash
-ActTailSwipe
-TerrainPathFinding

-Can Dinosaurs "see" other objects than Dinosaurs. Details on this if possible. Thanks alot Trescom for all these interviews.
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Post by Microceratops »

Here are some of mines:

- Are there any plans to release a sequel of Trespasser?

- Apart from "The Plains" and "Pine Valley", any other levels where cutted off?

And that's by now...
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Post by machf »

Microceratops wrote: - Are there any plans to release a sequel of Trespasser?
That question is more for EA rather than Rob Wyatt...
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Post by tatu »

Ask everything he know about the trespasser levels that got cut out :yes:
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....

Post by Myg »

Well, dont know if you can pass this all on, but I will say as much as I can with this opportunity!



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Anne's hand; the source of much gripe and much praise (unfortunatly, mainly the former) it is a marvel of interaction and a shattered remnant of the pure, growing vision of 'Virtual reality' which existed before the turn of the millenium.

It still hasnt been properly implemented in another FPS since. Yet it weilded so much vision and potential, but seemingly Trespasser dropped it; as it would...

My Questions are:

Who was the brains behind the idea of 'The Hand' system? (Or in the case of the game; lack thereof [no simulated nervous/reflex reactions] ;-) )

What was the general consensus among the team concerning the concept of the user controlling the arm+hand?

Did you see it becomming something which would be standard among games after Trespasser had pioneered it?

How do you feel about it now that Trespasser is the only FPS game (to my knowledge) to have fully used such a system?

What were the biggest issues during the coding and implementation?

Would you ever try to implement the concept again someday?

As a long-time gamer; from flight sims to rpgs, to rts and to fps's, I have never come across anything as unique and as interesting to play with conceptually nor in-game as 'The Hand' based system in Trespasser.

Only now; so many years afterwords and many more years of getting used to the mouse being an 'extention' of my mind, do I really appreciate it (become less aware of your own hand, so having a hand to use in-game feels really cool).

I want to thank you very much for creating such a wonderful, entertaining and compelling experience that has scared me out of my wits, encompassed me with wonder and delight and made me taste the sweet bitterness of it coming to an end (like all decent stories do).

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Post by Slugger »

Well, has everyone posted their questions? If so, I'm going to prepare them and contact Mr. Wyatt to proceed...
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Post by machf »

No, I still haven't had time to post mine... give me a while to do it.
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Tres WIP: updated T-Script Reference and File Formats documents
Sound name listings for the Demo (build 117), Retail (build 116), Beta 103, Beta 99, Beta 97, Beta 96, Build 55, PC Gamer Alpha (build 32) and E3 1998 Alpha (build 22) TPA files
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Post by machf »

OK, here are mine (standard questionnaire):

1.- How did you end up working on Trespasser at Dreamworks Interactive?

2.- As a programmer, what were you tasked with on the Trespasser Team?

3.- How did the various team members get along?

4.- What happened with the team between when Trespasser was finished and when it was finally disbanded?

5.- What projects have you been involved with after that?

6.- Regarding Trespasser, if you were involved in programming the AI routines, would you be able to answer the following?

a.- There are comments in various old interviews and articles about AI activities being disabled in order for the dinosaurs not to just stand there undecided between different choices of behavior. Forum member Big Red, who's analyzed the executables, found out this:
Big Red's ATX ReadMe file wrote: * for all CActivityxxxxxx classes, bit 2 of member
[CActivityxxxxxxx+34h] is boolean for enable/disable act (instance-specific)
Does that mean that it's still possible to re-enable activities which are marked "Not implemented" such as this one?
Big Red's ATX ReadMe file wrote: [CBrain+028h] = Pointer to CActivity class ("Not implemented" - type activity)
(This one in particular corresponds to ActJumpBite. That one and ActJump are of particular interest, as users have been able to get some others working, but these two apaprently not...)

b.- The dinosaur activities currently listed as "Not implemented" are the following: ActJumpBite, ActShoulderCharge, ActJump, ActMoveAway, ActDontTouch, ActStalk, ActCircle, ActDash, ActLookAt, ActTaste, ActBackAway. Could you describe how they were supposed to work, and if they were meant for secific dinosaurs only? And were there any others which were not just disabled, but completely removed? (For example, there is a "ClawReach" parameter which may be all that's left from a removed activity.)

7.- Since, according to your page, you were responsible for the rendering engine, what other features did the Trespasser engine originally feature which had to be "dumbed down" for the final release? Like the "draw distance" (actually, the distance at which 3D objects get replaced by 2-D "impostors") in order for the game to work on the hardware available at the time, for example. I've found several papers from 1997 and earlier which probably you used for reference when designing the rendering engine...

8.- Likewise, being in charge of the audio engine, could you give us a better description of how the Foley system works? I know it uses the two sound materials and the speed at which the collision takes place to mix two sounds (sometimes it wil use just one) calculating the volume and pitch for each of them using a transfer function, and a similar calculation for "sliding" sounds, and each Foley table entry is basically like this:
Each line corresponds to 4 bytes in the table. The first 4 bytes are the first SoundMaterial, the next 4 bytes are the second SoundMaterial. The next 4 bytes are an integer value that shows how many sound effects are to be played, either 1 or 2; besides, if bit 7 is set to 1, it means there is also a friction (sliding) sound effect for these two materials.

Next are two 4-byte floats which I guess have something to do with how the sound effects are to be played (volume and duration, maybe? Or attenuation and volume, like in the "Play sound" action types?). The next three 4-byte entries are the sound effects, both collision ones and the friction one. The entries are 0 if no sound effect is used.

Finally, there are three sets of 10 4-byte floats, each set corresponding to each of the three possible sound effects, apparently. For non-used effects, the corresponding values appear to be just garbage (though they may be something else, but interpreted as float values they are absurd). These 10 values seem to be organized in pairs, similar to the pair that comes before the sound effects.
(See this post: http://trescom.3dactionplanet.gamespy.c ... php?t=5690 )

Could you clarify what each of those parameters is for? And could you give us the names of the various sound effects sored in the .tpa files and the sound materials available? (I've been "reversing" the CRC algorithm used to store sound effects/materials names on the .tpa files, but still have about 10% of unknown names left).

9.- Did you ever play Trespasser after its release to see the results of your work? If so, what did you think of it?

10.- Do you think Trespasser would have fared better if it had been done more recently, with the advances in PC hardware that only became available after that time?

(BTW, I think people should take a look at this page to get an idea of what he was responsible for)
Visit The Carnivores Saga - a forum devoted to modding Action Forms' Carnivores, Carnivores 2 and Carnivores: Ice Age games
Tres WIP: updated T-Script Reference and File Formats documents
Sound name listings for the Demo (build 117), Retail (build 116), Beta 103, Beta 99, Beta 97, Beta 96, Build 55, PC Gamer Alpha (build 32) and E3 1998 Alpha (build 22) TPA files
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Post by Shadow Wolf »

does he have any comment about current work and favorite games he's worked on?

EDIT: his opinion of our work here?
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