Wintermute Engine Forum
Wintermute Engine => Technical forum => Topic started by: Igorrr on April 15, 2004, 04:11:49 AM
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Hello everyone,
first of all I found out about WME just some weeks ago. I am working on a project called "Struggle for Life and Honour". It is going to be similar (but not totally alike) to Sierra's Quest For Glory Series. It's a 2D Adventure Game with RPG elements.
Usually it was planned to use AGS and it does work ok. But on trying out WME I would prefer using this engine instead. Alone how the sprites are handled and how you are able to create your own GUI in WME is much better than in AGS imo.
I don't know if these questions have been asked before (I already searched the forums, but maybe I overlooked something)
I would choose to use WME at once if I knew that these options are possible:
- Character Stats management (actually I guess using global variable for stats and using math functions in character actions to manipulate these should have no problems. Anyhow your opinion would be great)
- Day and Night Transition (In the Scene Demo I already saw the timer running, so I can use that to manage an ingame time for the days, but is there a plugin or way to make my scenes fade from day into night images as the day passes?)
- Able to implement a combat system. As it is a quase RPG game there has to be a fighting system. I am not sure at the moment how to implement this, but do you think there are no problems.
btw. I saw in the TODO List that a new function will be added (-actor.SetSprite()). Does that mean that at the moment I am not able to have my character switch sprites. For examples if in the game my character decides a new dress-up, that is not possible at the moment?
Thanks
~Igorrr
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Hi Igorrr,
- Character Stats management (actually I guess using global variable for stats and using math functions in character actions to manipulate these should have no problems. Anyhow your opinion would be great)
Yes, exactly. You could use either the global variables or even properties of the actor object to store any additional information about the character. Plus, displaying a character stats screen could be fairly easily done using the GUI layer.
- Day and Night Transition (In the Scene Demo I already saw the timer running, so I can use that to manage an ingame time for the days, but is there a plugin or way to make my scenes fade from day into night images as the day passes?)
That's right. There's a counter running, counting the time elapsed since the game started (in milliseconds). The timer is paused when the game's frozen, it's saved with the saved game etc.
As for the fading, WME provides FadeOut and FadeIn methods for scenes. Basically you can fade the scene to any color you want. This has been used in Five magical amulets and works pretty well. The only disadvantage is that the fading only works when the game's running in accelerated mode. It would be too slow in software mode.
- Able to implement a combat system. As it is a quase RPG game there has to be a fighting system. I am not sure at the moment how to implement this, but do you think there are no problems.
Well, you'd have to describe what exactly are you expecting from a combat system. But in my opinion anything could be done with actors walking within the scene, playing animations (for attacks) etc.
btw. I saw in the TODO List that a new function will be added (-actor.SetSprite()). Does that mean that at the moment I am not able to have my character switch sprites. For examples if in the game my character decides a new dress-up, that is not possible at the moment?
No no, not really. The actor.SetSprite was meant for occasions when you need temporarily change actor's appearance, like the actor's showing some item to other character, while the other charater is talking for a long time.
Currently you can switch actor's sprites by simply loading another .actor file. You can think of it as loading another "costume" for the actor, to use the LucasArts terminology.
I hope that helps. If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.
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Thanks for your quick reply. It was very helpful, I will try out the fading methods ASAP!!!
About the combat system. I was thinking about implementing it in the way of the old Mindscape game "Moonstone". So basically you keep your scene and have 2 actors walking around hacking and slashing at each other.
You would use the cursor keys to move and 1-4 assigned combat buttons to attack and block.
I thought about using the coordinates of the characters and when they are close enough they are able to reach each other. Calculating the combat stats with the random dice roll your oponent blocks your hit or not, while you have to either walk away or push your block button when he hits at you.
I am more concerned about the AI, though.
Well in Moonstone the boars just ran from left to right at high speed. Can you actually have the oponent actor go to to your coordinates in a loop, meaning that wherever you go he follows? And thus when he is in range he will attack you. And thus you could also implement a random action concerning the way he attacks. I was also thinking about ranged attacks, if your enemy has the same height coordinate as you but is too far away concerning the width that he will throw daggers, cast a spell or something.
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Welcome to out little internet corner Igorrr ;D
I have your project in my bookmarks for a LONG time and I am glad to see that you have (almost) decided to use wme.
For anyone that is interested to check this RPG/adventure you can find it here http://www.sflah.com/
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I see. Well, to have the monsters follow the player should be easy to do. Something like:
monster.GoTo(actor.X, actor.Y);
Of course it would be called from some endless loop, handling other AI actions, depending on the distance between player and the enemy etc.
Controlling the player with keyboard will be a bit more tricky, but I have an idea how to do it quite elegantly. I'll try something when I get home in the evening.
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- Day and Night Transition (In the Scene Demo I already saw the timer running, so I can use that to manage an ingame time for the days, but is there a plugin or way to make my scenes fade from day into night images as the day passes?)
Well, you can check the "technology demo" I made some time ago featuring day/night transitions (with smooth sound transitions along with the image transitions as well). It's not timed though, it depeneds of the sun's position, and I don't use the fade methods, it switchs smoothly between three images, one for day, another one for sunset and sunrise, and another one for night... It has some advanteges, because you can customise the scene graphics to really look like night, and like me, make sunset effects as well (maybe fading the scene to orange or red would make a simillar effect though...), but it's more work, and will mess up things at SceneEdit with more layers and stuff. Anyway, check the sourcecode, maybe you can get something useful by adapting the code of the transitions between images to apply it to fades...
It's here: http://www.dead-code.org/forum/index.php?board=12;action=display;threadid=274&start=0 (http://www.dead-code.org/forum/index.php?board=12;action=display;threadid=274&start=0)
Hehehe... I knew that someday that thing would be useful!!
Note that you'll need the old Jerrot's Math DLL (http://www.dead-code.org/forum/index.php?board=12;action=display;threadid=196), because it was made with an older version of WME without the new embedded math functions, but I can't find it anywhere (well, I have it in my HD just in case... and I think it's included in the compressed file for downloading?? I can't remember, but it's very likely) because when the new version arrived, it became obsolete and was -as long as I know- removed from the net... So you can edit the sourcecode and change it so it'll use the new engine's native maths functions, it's very very easy, I'm just too lazy to do it and ask odnorf to upload the files again...
And about your project, I think it can be done with WME perfectly, the script language is very, very powerful, and moreover, you can always ask Mnemonic to add new functions for future releases ;).
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..it was made with an older version of WME without the new embedded math functions, but I can't find it anywhere (well, I have it in my HD just in case... and I think it's included in the compressed file for downloading?? I can't remember, but it's very likely)...
It's included inside the archive.
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wow you guys really work fast :D!!!
This is also a good argument for deciding to use WME!!
Thanks very much for your replies.
@Odnorf: Thanks for putting the link for the SFLAH site. I don't know if you have seen that it has been completely updated.
@McCoy: Thank you, I am currently downloading the Sunny Demo. I gues the math.dll will not be included in that package?? Otherwise I was not able to find it on my own, if you could send me an email with the dll file would be swell.
@Mnemoic: I guess there are problems concerning having your buttons pressed all the time to have your character walk around. Maybe like in old Sierra SCI games you press the button once and the character starts moving until you press that or any other button again. It may be kind of tricky for a player to get used to that but I think it could still work.
But I am curious to hear about your elegant solution!!!
Again
thanks guys.
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Note that you'll need the old Jerrot's Math DLL (http://www.dead-code.org/forum/index.php?board=12;action=display;threadid=196), because it was made with an older version of WME without the new embedded math functions,
Have you ever considered updating the demo to utilize the internal math functions? ;)
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wow you guys really work fast :D!!!
This is also a good argument for deciding to use WME!!
And you can always ask questions in real-time in the irc.
Check http://www.dead-code.org/forum/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=260;start=0
@Odnorf: Thanks for putting the link for the SFLAH site. I don't know if you have seen that it has been completely updated.
Yeah, I noticed it. Keep up the good work Igorrr.
@McCoy: Thank you, I am currently downloading the Sunny Demo. I gues the math.dll will not be included in that package?? Otherwise I was not able to find it on my own, if you could send me an email with the dll file would be swell.
As I said it's already included inside the archive. But it should be pretty easy to change the code and make it work with the internal math functions as well.
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Ok, try this demo:
http://dead-code.org/misc/direct_control_test.zip (1.7 MB)
It turned out to be a little less elegant than I thought :) but it works.
I'll release the sources later, once the new WME build is out.
There's a little glitch though, the character walks around the obstacles the way it does in a normal point'n'click scene.
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Thanks again guys :-)
I am still downloading the sunnydemo (56K Modem... I MISS my DSL!!!). I will check into the source code and try to change it using the internal math functions.
I tried out the FadeIn and FadeOut Methods. It's nice, but it looks more like wearing too dark sunglasses than giving the feel of night. But maybe I have to tune it more. I can't wait until the SunnyDemo is finally downloaded.
Is there a way to make a FadeThrough? (I mean imagine you want to fadeout your screen to one colour and after that fading to another colour from this one.) I was thinking about this when trying to do a reddish dusk and fading from the reddish dusk into the dark blue night.
Thanks for the direct control test. I am currently downloading this one, too.
I already started making a small combat demo. It is very basic right now. I called it "Spank The Hero". You play the Blue Knight from Moonstone and have the hero sprite from Quest For Glory 1 (EGA Version) following you. With the left mouse button you move and with the right you strike.
Very simple but extremely stress relieving ;D
I don't know if there are any copyright problems if I just post a download link here in the forums for anyone interested. It is no great achievement, but I always had the wish to spank that hero sometimes ;-)
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I'm interested in seeing it ;)
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I am still downloading the sunnydemo (56K Modem... I MISS my DSL!!!). I will check into the source code and try to change it using the internal math functions.
I'ts very easy, it only uses Sin, Cos, and DegToRad, for the sun's circular motion, that's it. I've not updated it not because of the difficulty... it's just because I don't want to deal with the nuisance of having to upload it again... 56k modem around here too :'(
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You REALLY are fast workers!!! :D
I have managed to download both the Sunny Demo and the Direct Control Test and play around with them.
@Sunny Demo:
- math.dll
- 1. The math.dll was included with the sources ;)
- 2. Yes it was extremely easy to exchange them with the internal math functions.
- Ahhh why didn't I think of using 2 backgrounds (day and night) and have the overlapping background slowly change it's alphacolor in a loop. It looks really sweet that way, only the other objects are not affected by this transition method as with the fade methods. Maybe a good solution is a mix between both methods. I am sure with more playing around I will find a really good solution.
@Direct Control Test:
I don't know what you meant with elegant, but it worked very fine with me. I can't wait to play around with it myself.
Thanks again guys, just a few days I posted and received a bunch of answers that really brought me far indeed. Looking back at my first post it seems all my problems are solved :-)
I am happy to announce that WME is GOING TO BE the engine for SFLAH. I will make the official announcement on the SFLAH page, soon!!!
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I am happy to announce that WME is GOING TO BE the engine for SFLAH. I will make the official announcement on the SFLAH page, soon!!!
Wise choice ;D. Congratulations and welcome to the ever-growing WME community. We'll try to help you as much as we can. And I'm really waiting for your game, because it came to my mind to make some sort of RPG with WME too... someday... who knows, so I'm very very interested in seeing something like that working for real.
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Well ok here is what I have done so far...
http://www.igorrr.com/files/spank_the_hero_sources.zip (711kb)
It is extremely simple and can only be seen as a stress reliever.
At the moment I am working on a better day/night transition, trying to find out how I can make the oponent character move around independently, making him attack you, using ranged attacks and an online stats window.
Actually I am not sure how to acomplish all this, but seeing that I just started using WME a bit more than a week ago, I guess I'll be fine...
If you have suggestions on how to implement the other ideas please tell me.
If you are a curious person and look at the code and want to criticise it or make suggestions, please DO SO!!
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Hehe, I only looked up the sources yet, can't wait to try it when I get home :)
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Hey Igorrr!
welcome from me, too, I'm glad to read you're going to realize your game with WME.
Of course I checked the sources (hehe) and hey - you're doing fine and obviously learning fast.
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Ou, I missed one thing - you use my snowflakes script. Hooray! ;D
(The drops were so small, I didn't notice them...)
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Igorrr I like the example too much!
The day/night transition's still a bit rough but works fine. The snowflakes effect is perfect... Maybe some "street-fighter-like" background music??? hahahaha
I'm impressed of what can you do with only "a week" of knowledge ;)
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Wow the week starts and suddenly all reply. Yes I really love the snowflake script and I was playing around with it, too.
It is true that I started with scripting with WME 2 days before I joined these forums. But I did try out other engines and I studied engineering in IT, so I do have some (if small) programming background.
IMO the scripting language is easy to use and the documentation is very good (can't wait until it's completed, though ;)).
The new night/day transition has been implemented and the hero following you works better if I attach a script to that actor which runs in a infinite loop (but he still reacts too slow).
I have encountered 2 minor "problems".
In the WME.log file I get the error message:
"02:21: CBObject::AddScript - trying to add script 'actors\hero\hero.script' mutiple times (obj: 'hero')
02:21: Error opening file ''
I really don't know what that is? I have been searching the code for a reference but nada.
Also the moves are stored in the scene.script file. But if I want use the "On Mouseclick" events in other scripts it does not work. Also I don't know from where actually scene.script is called. Is it a basic script that is called with the first scene that is being loaded in the game?
I also noticed while I was trying to do new scenes that the contents of this script don't apply anymore. Can someone give me more info on this?
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In the WME.log file I get the error message:
"02:21: CBObject::AddScript - trying to add script 'actors\hero\hero.script' mutiple times (obj: 'hero')
02:21: Error opening file ''
I really don't know what that is? I have been searching the code for a reference but nada.
Are you attaching the script inside an infinite loop ??
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"02:21: CBObject::AddScript - trying to add script 'actors\hero\hero.script' mutiple times (obj: 'hero')
02:21: Error opening file ''
I really don't know what that is? I have been searching the code for a reference but nada.
You should find the script call in the hero.actor file, no idea why it should be called twice though.
Also the moves are stored in the scene.script file. But if I want use the "On Mouseclick" events in other scripts it does not work.
You have the object hierarchy Game -> Scene -> Entities/Actors. So if you want to use the events independent from your scene, you can define them for the Game object. In the WME demo you can find these events in the game.script.
Maybe some general information (as far as I understood it up to now ;) ):
The game starts off with the default.game. By default there is an entry of the first script that is called ("scripts/game.script").
game.script (again - by default! You can change all this...) calls the game_daemon.script, which is running in the background AND it calls your first scene by e.g. Game.ChangeScene("scenes\room\room.scene");
Ok, and in room.scene you will find two attached scripts (be default... ;) !):
SCRIPT="scripts\scene.script" and
SCRIPT="scenes\room\scr\scene_init.script"
That's it in general. The scene.script is for some general purpose, the scene_init.script is especially for THIS scene. You can find all this in ProjectMan, too, but since I only use the source files I couldn't tell you where... heh.
I also noticed while I was trying to do new scenes that the contents of this script don't apply anymore. Can someone give me more info on this?
Sorry - I didn't get you ?
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What happens is that all the mouse events are defined in the screen.script.
It works fine for the first scene.
Later I have added other scenes to try out different scenarios.
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What happens is that all the mouse events are defined in the screen.script.
You mean scene.script? Check if you have the (correct) scene.script attached to the other scenes. In SceneEdit click the Properites tab and then the "Scripts" button. You'll see what scripts are attached to that particular scene.
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Well... uhm... ahem....
gfdsag..sdafas
(*scratches his head*)...
I used the scene_tut sources for this. And I changed and deleted everything that was not needed. I just used the scene.script script as it was implemented there.
Now I did not see any scripts attached to the scenes. And I thought that a script called "scene.script" is always loaded for all scenes because I did not see any place in the code where it was referrenced, but still it must have been started somewhere.
Does what I say make sense? Maybe just tell me how scene.script is implement in the scene_tut (and sorry for stupid asking).
Oh and btw... what is CBSprite? I also have a file not found error in my WME.log because of that.
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And I thought that a script called "scene.script" is always loaded for all scenes because I did not see any place in the code where it was referrenced, but still it must have been started somewhere.
No, any script is only executed if it's attached to some object. Game, scene, entity, actor etc. By default, there's a "scene.script" in the "scripts" directory attached to every scene. This script has a very simple on "LeftClick" handler, which sends the actor to the point where the player has clicked.
If you add a new scene in ProjectMan, it will have this script attached by default. In other words, this script is shared among all the scenes (again, *by default*).
Other than that, every new scene has one more script attached, the "scene_init.script". This script should contain any initialization for that particular scene.
To sum it up: every scene has, by default, two scripts attached - the global shared "scene.script" and one private "scene_init.script".
Of course you can add as many other scripts as you want, this is just the default scheme.
Oh and btw... what is CBSprite? I also have a file not found error in my WME.log because of that.
CBSprite is the internal C++ class holding WME sprites. This error is probably caused by the snowflake.entity, because it references an empty filename.
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@MMR: No I did not attach the script in any loop. Maybe it has to do with the reloading the scene when you press F9.
@Mnemonic: thanks for the info. I still don't understand why in my new scene the content of the scene.script did not apply. Generally I have problems with the Mouse and Keyboard handlers. They only seem to work when I use them in the game.script and sometimes in the scene.script. But in all other scripts it does not work. At first I thought it was because you shouldn't have the same events handled many times. But when I deleted them from the scene and game script and added them only in a single script...nothing worked.
I guess I should look deeper into this before I ask anymore questions.
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Ok, sorry sorry sorry, now I understand (finally). The mouse and keyboard events are primarily received by the game object (i.e. by event handlers in scripts attached to Game). The default scripts route the clicks to the scene object, unless the player clicked some active object. So if you want to handle keypress events directly in scenes, you'll have to add something like this to your game script:
[code]
on "Keypress"
{
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THANKS!!!
All problems solved (for now;-)).
I have added a new monster to the demo which actually attacks you as well. I think one or two days and it will be time for another upload.
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OK here it is:
http://www.igorrr.com/files/Spank_The_Hero_v0.20_sources.zip
I was faster than I thought... I had the whole day...
In this demo you can actually be killed by the new monster. The day and night transition has been improved.
I converted the PNG images to JPG to make the download (and upload ;-)) smaller.
@MMR: Maybe soon I will also implement sounds/music, even if my modem screaaaaams while uploading!!
Can't wait to play around with the direct control....
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WOW!!! I really like the BLOOD effect ;)
Day/Night transition now is perfect!
Maybe soon I will also implement sounds/music, even if my modem screaaaaams while uploading!!
I hope I could see "sound" effects at least in the final demo/game :D (or maybe when you have ADSL or Cable)
BTW: How many razes will be in your game??
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Thanks MMR,
of course the real demo will have sounds and music. Thanks for the graphics complement, but I have to admit it's all ripped. It was a lot of work (and more time consuming than the scripting in WME actually) grabbing the screenshots from Moonstone and editing them as sprites.
I am working on the first Chapter of SFLAH which will have actually only the human race (later dwarves and elves). You will be able to choose between playing a fighter, ranger, thief or magic user character. Monsters will be undead (flesh golems and zombies).
If you like this kind of fighting you will love Moonstone. You can download it at Home of the Underdogs (http://www.the-underdogs.org). It runs good in DosBox.
But I would advise you to get the Amiga version and play it with WinUAE.
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Ok, here's my direct control script. Don't get scared by the messy code at the end :)
Just attach to Game and play.
[code]
#include "scripts\base.inc"
#include "scripts\keys.inc"
var TargetX, TargetY;
var LastDir = -1;
var CurrentDir = -1;
while(true)
{
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Thanks Mnemoic. I implemented the script and it works fine.
When using it the game stops to be interactive very often. In the attack script I used Game.Interactive = false when you attack (so you cannot interrupt this movement) as soon as the sprite is played it is set to interactive again. With mouse it worked fine (but also sometimes getting stuck), but with the keyboard implemented it starts to get stuck more often.
I am trying to fix this right now.
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Phew... IT WORKS NOW.
The keyboard control may not be as smooth as wished but works errorfree.
There is a status bar on the top of the screen showing your and your enemies life points.
The day and night transition is in sync with the ingame clock.
Enjoy:
http://www.igorrr.com/files/SpankTheHero_v0.30.zip
Well, now I should continue to concentrate more on the adventure part ;-)
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Fantastic ;)
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Gee, I finally had the chance to test it on a working computer. :)
Great, it works like a charm. Although the monster has no chance if you simply keep pressing the space bar, but I guess we had that topic in the irc chat. (hint for all readers who didn't discover it yet. ;) !)
But has everybody found all the cute hidden features on the keyboard ? 8)
I found time jumps, a nightly storm effect, the same scene with the "kid" (? prince ? hero ? anyway - you can kill him, too, hehe...)
and how to jump back to kill a new monster. ;D
Ok, I just looked up the source code, it seems I really found all easter eggs. ;)
Keep on! Please! :)
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Do you know how to tell a difference between a programmer and a casual user? The programmer is searching through the source code, while the user reads a readme file ;D ;)
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Do you know how to tell a difference between a programmer and a casual user? The programmer is searching through the source code, while the user reads a readme file ;D ;)
Uh-err... readme file !?! Oh no, there was something like that... uhmm..... (darn, what an awkward situation!)
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No no no... the version Jerrot downloaded did not have any readme file!!
My server had the following script running:
If (http_download_attempt_by_user=="Jerrot") ZipArchive.exclude("README.txt");
I just love to play practical jokes on some people ;-)
@Jerrot: Sorry I played that download prank on you this time.
Anyway GREAT job on finding all the easter eggs!!!!
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It's really working! ;D
Thanks for sharing the code with us Igorrr.