Dubstep: Bigger Playlist Edition

Xarathos

Xarathos

Dunno if this is the right place to put this but I figured as long as I'm experimenting I might as well post about it. I had a request about this but seeing as nobody jumped on it, I thought I'd try my hand at it myself...

So my goal (no idea yet whether it will work or if I'm going to run into huge roadblocks of the tech involved) is to move all the dubstep DLC tracks from the Special-Dubstep-2 weapon to the Special-Dubstep weapon - one gun, one set of upgrades, all unlocked at the same point in the story (with the exception of the Christmas track, because that should ideally still unlock when that DLC is completed).

So far I've successfully moved one track.

2014-08-13_00001.jpg
2014-08-13_00002.jpg
2014-08-13_00003.jpg


Which feels like a worthy success.

The problem is, when I tried to follow up that success by moving the Dethmettal costume as well, it disappeared entirely - not on the DLC version of the gun, but not on the core dubstep gun either.

All I've done is found the costume entries in both the Weapon_Costumes.xtbl and the dlc3_weapon_costumes.xtbl and changed the <Costume_Slot_Index> and <Weapon_Entry> fields - the special-dubstep gun doesn't have anything higher than 3 as of DLC2, and adding the Swingtime costume to 4 seemed to go off without a hitch. But I'm at a loss as to why the next one doesn't work. Unless Costume_Slot_Index has an undocumented maxvalue...

Will post again if I make any further progress. Any insight into what I might be missing would be greatly appreciated. :)
 
Seems like I can only move one at a time at the moment.

Moving the Dethmettal costume by itself worked just as well as the Swingtime one:
2014-08-13_00004.jpg


But I can't get anything higher than 4 to work yet. Odd.
 
I would assume the reason they created a new weapon slot for the DLC dubstep guns is due to data limitations or something rather. Maybe four entries per weapon is the max due to the gun being so music based? Audio files are big. Then again, I might be over thinking. I hope you figure this out! Would be really cool to have! The special weapons roster is kind of a mess as it is..
 
The highest number of costumes assigned to any weapon in the weapons.xtbl file I have is 5, with index values ranging from 0-4.

The thing that irks me is, there's nothing in any of the files indicating that's a technical limit... but so far, it does seem to be a practical one. The code that defines the data type only says:

Code: 
        <Element>
            <Name>Costume_Slot_Index</Name>
            <Type>Int</Type>
            <Display_Name>Costume Slot Index</Display_Name>
            <Default>0</Default>
            <MinValue>0</MinValue>
        </Element>

So unless there's something that tells the game to ignore Int values higher than 4, I don't quite know what to think. I suppose only Volition knows for sure, but... maybe more experiments and poking through the files can reveal something I'm missing. I hope so.
 
So, by your logic the limitation isn't exclusive to the dubstep gun? What defines a costume? While shotguns, pistols, SMGs, etc. can have 9+ costumes, others can't? I'm just not understanding, it's fine if you don't feel they need to explain to me. This whole dubstep gun issue is just something I've thought about too. I'd like to know as much as possible.
 
What you're talking about as far as I can tell is the line between costumes and skins.

A weapon costume defines the specialFX, the model, inventory icon, sounds used, etc: for instance, the phaser costume for the quick shot pistol.

Skins define variations within that costume — change of textures and so on. Like the red, gold, and blue versions of the phaser costume.

The dubstep gun has a costume for each "track" — "Dubstep Gun" is the default, with a costume index of 0. Then Industrial, Pop Star, the Christmas DLC track has an index value of 3 for a total of 4 costumes on the default gun. There aren't any skins, which is why under the costume names above you can see only one choice— "Default."

Think of it like

  • Costume1
    • Skin (Default)
    • Skin
    • Skin
  • Costume2
    • Skin (Default)
Etc.

Every weapon has to have at LEAST one costume at index 0, but skins appear to be optional.

I don't know what the upper limit is on skins, if any, just that the game seems to have trouble adding entries there as well (probably because it's hard to add new textures to the game?). They're defined in a separate file that also tells them which costume they're assigned to. The most skins I know of attached to a given costume is four, I think the most that actually appear in the game right now is three. Correct me if I'm wrong.

In the dubstep gun's case, skins wouldn't be that helpful re: the function of the weapon - too much changes with each costume/track, particularly the sound (makes sense, right?). But they could probably be used later down the line (after the SDK comes out for instance) to add, say, Saints Purple retextures of each variant.

Still haven't found anything in the files to explain the cap on costume numbers, but I'll keep digging.
 
i guess it's time someone makes a tool to (at least) change (if nothing can be added) the songs and fit the wups to the music

Fine design tho
 
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