GSoC update

Hello, last week I almost finished the Supernova engine. All of the bugs I managed to find should be fixed, I added translations to most images and help files, I merged .dat files with translations for each game and tools to create them into one and I also added the "improved" mode. Right now the improved mode:
In the first game

  • Automatically dresses and undresses the player from space suit every time he walks through the airlock (after he first does this on his own).
  • Automatically closes one side and opens the other side of the airlock (after the player first walks through the airlock on his own).
In the second game
  • Enables using go verb alongside with push verb to interact with the puzzle tiles inside the pyramid (that way the player doesn't have to click on push in between puzzle interactions and can focus only on solving the puzzle)
  • Enables using go verb alongside with push verb to interact with the password locked door inside the pyramid
The only thing left to do should be to create one last translated image and then create a pull request.

New project

Because I am at the finish of the supernova engine and there is still 6 weeks of GSoC left, I have to find another project to work on. The project I chose is add text to speech capability. I tried to find the best library to use for this, the dream would be something, that supports at least English, German and French with decent voice quality and runs on as many platforms as possible. Of course the dream didn't happen, so the plan for now is to use SAPI for Windows and speech-dispatcher for Linux (these are the only platforms I can develop for). Finding a good Linux library wasn't easy at all, the speech quality usually isn't very good and quite often the only supported language is English, or there are some other issues, why I didn't like the library. So we chose the speech-dispatcher, because it is a high level interface to whatever speech engine the end user chooses and so in the future it might enable the user to choose an engine, that doesn't exist yet and sounds good. 

Comments

  1. Nor TrebligJuly 9, 2019 at 12:19 PM

    Interesting idea, this improved mode (although personally I'm fine with letting players die who walk naked into space).

    Speaking of improved mode: Would it be possible to have keyboard keys mapped to verbs instead of needing to click them?

    A nice project would also be 'Andromedas Erbe', I suspect the engine being very similar to MS?

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    Replies
    1. VyzigoldJuly 9, 2019 at 2:29 PM

      I like your idea with the keys mapped to verbs, I will add that to the improved mode.

      About the Andromedas Erbe, I was thinking about working on another engine, there is plenty to choose from, but in the end I quite like the change (programming something else than an engine), but maybe after the TTS, if I have the time and mood, I could take look at it :-).

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