ZeroVector

Patch 6-24-2009

Written by David
Friday, 10 July 2009 14:52
NOTICE: THE HOTKEYS HAVE CHANGED! up arrow = accelerate hold shift = turbo left / right = turn enter = start chat / send chat WEAPON GROUP HOTKEYS: 1 = weapon group 1 2 = weapon group 2 3 = weapon group 3 4 = weapon group 4 HOTKEYS WITHIN A WEAPON GROUP: space = primary all weapons in current group (unless you are dead, then it respawns you after 2 seconds) a = fire first weapon in current group s = fire second weapon in current group d = fire third weapon in current group f = fire fourth weapon in current group LAND: l = land on friendly station Features include: * Creating / Deleting characters. Each account can have up to 6 characters, each with their own statistics and data held on the server. There are now actual TEAMS! Ian (Tenma) has been working hard on the backstory for the game, and will post up a very abridged version on the forums (along with the team logos) in the next day or so. * Ranking system. We have a first revision of our ranking system (with 13 ranks in the patch) It uses a custom experience system we are working on to calculate the rankings, and soon we will tie it into the forum so your character rank(s) will be visible under your forum avatar! * Overhauled / cleaned up user interface. We have removed the lame "game quitting when the server is down", and made the network errors much nicer. * Graceful server shutdown (meaning you will be warned before the server shuts down). * Weapon grouping system: No more "primary" and "secondary" fire. Each ship can have up to 10 groups of weapons each containing up to 5 weapons. Currently the groups are pre-assigned by the server, but customization will be added in one of the upcoming weekly patches. Weapon groups can be switched using the # keys, and each weapon in the group can be fired individually (using a/s/d/f/g) or all can be fired at the same time by using space. * Overhauled the HUD to be much less intrusive. We went for a minimalist approach that takes up as little space as possible. * VASTLY improved chat. The chat window is now MUCH, MUCH bigger, and if your mouse is not over the window, the chat text fades out over time (leaving you with a cleaner hud view). There is also a much bigger chat history. * On the server end, we have some very cool improvements. We keep detailed kill/death statistics which we will make searchable / viewable later using a website that is in development. * Bots choose slightly better weapons when they have a better chance of killing you. This makes them a bit harder to kill. * Support for 64 bit on Windows (Mac is still in testing) * Smarter bots
Last Updated on Friday, 10 July 2009 17:38

Maintance Complete

Written by David

Monday, 20 April 2009 02:58

All is well in server land now (until we upgrade the front page server next :) ), so feel free to get back to posting on the forum.

We've also put a couple new images like the preview of the new garage below up in this thread as well.

Maintenance

Written by David
Friday, 17 April 2009 17:14
The forums and game server will be down for routine maintenance this Friday starting around 6PM PDT through Sunday (April 17th through the 19th). We will be upgrading the hardware on the server to help reduce future downtime of the forum and game server. The front page will remain up. -Aurash
Last Updated on Friday, 17 April 2009 17:17

What is ZeroVector?

Written by David
Tuesday, 29 April 2008 15:50
Some of you are probably wondering, what the hell is ZeroVector? What does it have to do with Silent Death Online? Will it bring about a new golden age of games? Well, first let me cover what the game is. It is a massively multiplayer top-down space shooter. The client is currently written 100% is java (aside from the Shaders of course :)) using the awesome LWJGL library to pull off the graphics and input requirements not normally achievable in a java environment, and runs on Windows, Mac and Linux. Currently, there are only two main authors, Me (David Wheeler) and Aurash Mahbod. Contributions have been made in the past by others (Misha, Tom). The engine has been developed in house and is currently fairly capable of some nice graphical effects, basic physics (not that we need anything special for this game type, Real time networking through a central server with lag compensation, basic GUI functionality, ect. However, it is far from being as robust as will be required for the final game What does this game have to do with SDO? Not a whole lot actually. No more than what WoW has to do With EverQuest or Marathon with Doom. The truth is the game is continuing a genre that has been neglected for far to long, and it pulls from a larger history of gaming classics including Star Control, Escape Velocity, System Shock, and to many other games to name. The game will not be taking place in the Silent Death universe, and we are in no way affiliated with Iron Crown or Mythic Entertainment. The game is in development indefinitely, which means that it will be done when it is done. No time frame has been given, but know that it is being worked on, and the more you guys push us the more we will push back Right now we don't have any calls for more help, as we haven't fully decided what the destiny of the game is. There such a thing as to many cooks in the kitchen when it comes to a game like this, and once the engine is more stable/robust, there will prob be calls for people outside of the programming department. Feel free to comment or post in the forums if you guys have more questions! -David out
Last Updated on Thursday, 15 May 2008 19:04

Character Selection

Written by David
Monday, 30 March 2009 20:52
Although certainly nothing to write home about, I thought I would post up this little screen shot. It essentially shows what we have been up to, which is character selection and creation. Not shown is all the crazy work Aurash and Steve have been doing server side to get this feature working. Massive amounts of DB changes. As I understand it, about 50% of the server code had to be touched to get it going (since we are no longer working off accounts, but characters.) Hats off to them. The UI is most definitly a work in progress by the way. We know its ugly, but pretty takes time.
Last Updated on Monday, 30 March 2009 20:59

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