Xenomorphing and other hobbies

[thePhilanthropy]

DISCLAIMER: I may come across as arrogant. But I'm really not. Just tired. Just wanting SOME validation. Or not. Idk, f***...

 

Hi, I did some ALIEN/predator stuff years ago.

I no longer feel like I will ever finish those projects in particular. Because live gets in the way, doesn't it?

 

Anyway, I got a lot of requests (in SOME round-about way or another) to please just finish my f***ing xenomorph stuff over the years.

Well, I can't. Or I won't. No difference, really. Point is, I don't have that freedom any more. The freedom to sit there, working on a mod for 12 hours straight. It's gone, done away with. Dead. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. Just fell victim to a different set of priorities.

 

That's just reality. But I don't want the effort I once spent to be completely wasted and forgotten about,

So if any of you are at all interested in this type of mod, here's the deal (http://www.nexusmods.com/oblivion/mods/24197/?tab=1&navtag=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nexusmods.com%2Foblivion%2Fajax%2Fmoddescription%2F%3Fid%3D24197%26preview%3D&pUp=1)

 

Several people have asked me over the previous couple of years if I would be willing to share my assets with them, with regards to a number of independent ALIEN/Predator-type mods.

I no longer consider myself an active modder and probably won't for the foreseeable future. As such, I cannot guarantee that I can respond to such requests any longer.

So instead of risking utter silence, here's a chance to get my (from now on) default response to such requests:

First of all: My answer is always basically YES. I do not hold any kind of creative ownership over the ALIEN license. As far as I know, Fox Entertainment owns the ALIEN license. As such, I would not (and cannot) claim ownership over any part of the ALIEN creature design or any derivates thereof, and neither should you if you elect to use any part of my assets. Just use common sense.

However, the fact remains that I invested a lot of time and effort to create actual, functional and beautiful ALIEN creatures for Oblivion, and it would be almost sad if the results, as bare-bones as they are, would simply fade into, well, oblivion (bad pun is bad), without anybody even having a chance of knowing about it.

So I scavenged my old, semi-functional backup DVDs from way back when, and... this is what's left:
https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0B1nDrHFm-Vu_NnpDVUVHOHNwUTg&export=download

I don't have the means to properly test these files. It has been some years since I last did so, but these videos might serve as a reasonable showcase of my work:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xl-dcS8oAPs

The files included basically cover what is shown in these videos.

In detail:
Working skeletons, meshes and (very limited) animations for the Facehugger, Drone and Queen.
Servicable sounds.
Bare-bones everything else.
A test esp. that may or may not work (I don't remember). Try "coc arena",I don't know.
Most importantly: my 3d assets in 3ds Max format. If you have 3ds Max installed, you can open these files and export them using any contemporary NifTools plugin (if there still is such a thing [it's been a while...]).

A few words of advice/my experience with this:
In my experience custom* creature mods are the most difficult type of modding to pull off successfully in any TES game. You need to know EVERYTHING. You need to know 3d modelling, skinning/rigging, animations, texturing, etc.... how to do havok data without any tools making that even remotely feasible, you need to know how the engine handles all these files (models, skeletons, animations), how those files are structured, how to set them up in the CS. You need to know this stuff when there is no documentation. When the game simply crashes intstead of giving you meaningful feedback. When creature corpses flail like idiots and fly off into the sunset or fall through the floor when all you did was change a single decimal digit on some parameter in some branch of some skeleton file.
Worst of all: You need time and patience. I worked on this stuff for TWO years. It never got to a stage where I was happy with it. It's just effort, effort, effort. And then more effort. And experimentation. And effort. And failure. And then even more effort.
In short: Don't do it. By the time you're finished, you're no longer interested, because progress is too slow to maintain motivation. And once you do have a breakthrough, nobody else cares any more. It's an isolating affair at best.

But I survided it. And my files yet persist. And they kind of work. Yay.
Nobody else will have to do this kind of crap for these particular creatures, IF they decide to build upon my files.
Because all that's really missing is:
More animations.
Good textures.
Sounds.
Sensible integration into the game.
?
Profit.

*custom as in: actually a new SORT of creature. Not a re-texture or color-swap, not a new mesh haphazardly attached to an ill-fitting existing skeleton. The real deal: With a new skeleton, new physics data, new animations, etc...

Anyway, feel free to use these files however you wish. Just don't be a jerk about it (don't claim ownership and do give credit).

Thanks.

Oh, and have fun and good luck!

 

What I would like to see is either some ridiculous amount of enthusiasm (unlikely) or some person interested in taking over for me. Someone willing to host my old files and do their own thing with it.

 

I just don't want my old files to waste away.

 

Thanks,

 

The Philanthropy

Edited March 11, 2016 by the_philanthropy

[FOCookie]

You should put this post in various other forums. Seeming as this one is pretty dead. Though I don't know if you already did just that.

 

OH! And there was a girl (I think?) who made an oblivion realm retexture not too long ago with the theme/vibes of aliens to it. (like THIS kind of Aliens... not Aliens in general) If you find her she'd probably be all over this.

 

Hell try throwing this into the fallout 4 forums. Plenty of good talent that would take over and it's a new game so more than enough "attention and praise to effort ratio" to spread around.

Edited March 15, 2016 by FOCookie

[Legotrash]

FOCookie, I don't mean to be rude but why aren't you in the fallout 4 forums then instead of here?

 

the_pilanthropy, I can't work on this either but I can rehost them and have them available for others if you want. Let me know.

[DrakeTheDragon]

Perhaps Elbethien might be interested. Worth a try contacting them.