Our ReVolt Pub

ji can send me please the blender plugin?

Kenny @ Oct 17 2013, 09:05 AM wrote:So, did you email that fixed version only to sebr? Because I currently would like to work with trackzones in blender as well but can't load the file because of that bug.

Also do you think it would be possible to add .fob, .fan and/or .lit import support for the plugin? Only a visual support (for now) so one can see where things are positioned in the map.
If you don't want to link to the Re-Volt objects/models then it would be sufficient to use placeholders for objects/nodes/lights.

Yep I sent it to SebR only, since it was still WIP and only him was actively providing feedback. Then I sent it to another French guy as well as they're working a a tutorial to create a track (on NawaKiwi). Oh, and also to a few other guys who recently send me nice supportive emails...

BTW I have to apologise for the all the PM requests I left unreplied for quite some times now. I promise I'll add all the PM who properly include an email address when the next Plugin release is ready.

And I agree it would be nice to add support for .fob, .fan and .lit but I'm afraid adding Import support only would not actually be that useful... Unfortunately adding .fob/.lit Export support means quite some extra work since all the Re-Volt properties have to be supported by the plugin not to be lost in the Import/Export process. And the .fan could be complex to be sure it's done the same way as in Re-Volt.

If I can find the time I could work on it again soon. But I also have to find the motivation, and the recent, hmm... stealing - I think that's the proper word - of our v1.2 work by some Korean companies for the GOG release has noticeably decreased my will to keep wasting my free time for Re-Volt.

Oh, and just for info, I can also mention that the same company - at least one of its member, to be accurate - also tried to get their hands on my plugin quite some time ago, and that the contact guy - who introduced himself as a great Re-Volt fan - surprisingly forgot to mention who he was actually working for. Well... I just asked for a decent offer, and never ever heard of him anymore.
Hmm, I guess my Blender plugin would otherwise be included in the GOG goodies nowadays (since I'm afraid they didn't have much new material to offer).

jigebren @ Nov 10 2013, 12:11 AM wrote: And I agree it would be nice to add support for .fob, .fan and .lit but I'm afraid adding Import support only would not actually be that useful...

Well at least for me it would be useful because for now I need to know at least where these things are located in 3D space within the world

If it was possible to move these things around and display/save their locations afterwards it would of course be even better. And assigning certain game specific attributes to them would be nice too but for now it would be sufficient for me if I could just see their locations.

But I would understand if you don't think its worth the effort or if you are discouraged by certain recent events (trust me, we are just as outraged as you are)

Just a quick word to say that a new release of my plugin is imminent.
Nothing to hold your breath for, but at least it's ported to the last Blender 2.69, and there was quite a lot of internals rewrite / clean up.

There's some new stuff though. I've just finished the new basic support for .FOB file format (the objects in track).
As we discussed above, it simply uses placeholders to show the object position and rotation. But import and export are supported without losing the object flags set in MAKEITGOOD mode. It means you can easily use MAKEITGOOD mode to add objects, then accurately tweak the .fob file in Blender.

I don't know yet if I'll try to add basic .LIT (lights) support as well. Maybe I'll wait be for the next release.

And if you've already sent me your email but still never get an answer, don't worry I'll check my old PM and add you to the list.

That's it. I've finally packed and sent the new release!
I should have included everyone who send me a request to beta-test it (there was some some quite old requests there ). My apologies for the delay.

Well, this release is a better one that I expected. As I said in my last post there's the new world Objects support (FOB), but now there's the Lights support (LIT) as well.

Compared to using the MAKEITGOOD respective Objects and Light modes, the Blender support allows an easier and more accurate location / rotation of the object, and it's also faster to duplicate, delete or move several objects at once.

To edit Object or Light flags I would still recommend using the MAKEITGOOD mode though (since each object has its own set of flags, supporting them all in Blender would mean quite some extra code, and I'm not sure it is actually worth it).

I have also revamped the Re-Volt panel. Based on the idea that most of times we only work on one or two format at a time, each format now has its own section, which can be hidden to free up space in the panel.

I've also added a convenient "Redo Export" for fast exporting. For example, when working on a new track, if you properly set up your mesh so it can be exported both as a W and as a NCP, you just export the W file once, ensuring the "Update .ncp along with .w" option is ticked. Then after each modification you want to try in Re-Volt, you just have to click the "Redo Export" to update both the exported W and NCP files. Simple and fast... And it works with all formats.

The car shadow baking has been improved as well, with more rendering options (eg. the possibility to use ambient occlusion).

Check the changelog in the newsletter for more details.

Let me know if you face any glitch with this release. I decided to release it now not too wait for too long again, but there was some great interface as well as internal modifications this time so it may not be perfectly polished.

PS: I've sent a second email since the first one was missing the new files for the FOB and LIT support.

Yay, finally Trackzones work (again)

Also glanced over the changelog, looks like a great release.
However are you sure that fob and lit are supposed to work? Whenever I try to open a file it says and/or I used only the files from your second mail.

Kenny @ Jan 26 2014, 06:57 PM wrote: I used only the files from your second mail.

Ok, we'll need a third one... New files are still not included, I'm working on it.

Thanks, the files are now loaded properly. I'll need to postpone more extensive testing for later though so it might take a while for me to give proper feedback.

Nice to hear Jigebren! I'll be giving it a try soon - need to test if tracks imported with the older plug-in for blender 2.65 be compatible with this version.

urnemanden @ Jan 27 2014, 11:24 PM wrote:need to test if tracks imported with the older plug-in for blender 2.65 be compatible with this version.

If you work with the blend file, the old TexAnim command will not be available. But if you re-import the W file, there'll be no trouble. And if you really need to work from the blend file, just let me know, we can still update the old values to the new format using a small Python script.

BTW, I forgot to mention one point in the changelog. Not that important, but a small improvement to the workflow with NCP anyway (and it was quite some job to make it work!).

Changelog wrote:ADD: In the NCP panel (in Edit mode), the material of the curent face can be modified directly (before it was only possible using the "selected faces" batch mode). There's also two new shortcut buttons, one to re-apply the last used material, and one to delete the material (set it to NONE).

And a last point, I finally found a way to automatically open the Tool Shelf when needed, so I can add this feature to buttons like Create Shadow Polygon which now use it to tweak the parameters.But this will be for a next release...

I Have Blender 2.66a and this plugin not function! There is a upgrade for this version?

bmascy @ Feb 3 2014, 02:53 PM wrote: I Have Blender 2.66a and this plugin not function! There is a upgrade for this version?

Check your email. And unless you have any reason to stick to 2.66a (which I doubt), upgrade to the last Blender 2.69.

A few questions here:

• Is there a problem with the cubes? When exporting the track in .W and .NCP, cars bypass some of the sides of the cubes except 1. One side is touchable, the other faces aren't. The Plane and the cylinders work well though. Only problem seem to be the cube.

• How to make the object look transparent when mapping? So that it doesn't look black inside blender but transparent, which makes it easier to work with the texture.

• What option adds reflective/transparency effect to a certain object so that it looks like in Glacier Cliffs 3 where you can see through the ice, or like in nhood2 where there is a window. Is MKMIRROR a must-have for this or Blender can avoid the use of it?

• In Blender 2.69 the option Multi-Texture isn't in the same place than previous. It used to be inside Shading panel. Now there is only an option called "Textures" inside Shading, is it the same? Should I select this one only? Should I select all of the other options too (Shadows, Subsurfa, Environ)?

Phantom @ Feb 8 2014, 05:13 PM wrote:Is there a problem with the cubes? When exporting the track in .W and .NCP, cars bypass some of the sides of the cubes except 1. One side is touchable, the other faces aren't. The Plane and the cylinders work well though. Only problem seem to be the cube.

There's no problem with cube in itself compared to other shapes. But I know you can face trouble though if you start from the cube that is displayed in default Blender scene. This cube is already set a default Blender material, which has no meaning for the plugin. So if you don't set manually a material in the Re-Volt Panel, faces will have no collision.
To fix it currently, switch to Edit mode [Tab], select all faces [A], select the NCP edit mode in the RV panel, and use the Set button to apply the DEFAULT material to all selected faces.

Since my last release, I have already modified the PRM helper button so that is automatically remove the Blender default material in such case. This will be available in the next release.

How to make the object look transparent when mapping? So that it doesn't look black inside blender but transparent, which makes it easier to work with the texture.

Blender in itself doesn't support the black colorkey transparency used by Re-Volt, but the plugin is able to convert all black pixels to transparent pixel for all loaded textures. Use the ColorKey button inside the Textures (.bmp) sub-panel.

What option adds reflective/transparency effect to a certain object so that it looks like in Glacier Cliffs 3 where you can see through the ice, or like in nhood2 where there is a window. Is MKMIRROR a must-have for this or Blender can avoid the use of it?

Though reflective & transparency share some properties, there are not the same thing:

To make an object semi-transparent, you have to set the Translucent flag to the face properties AND to pain a cyan (grey is ok too) color to a vertex color layer named "Alpha" (for info this layer is automatically created when you use the W or the PRM helpers in the RV panel). To paint the cyan color, use Blender Vertex Paint mode.

To create mirror, it's a bit more complex. You have to set the Mirroring flag to the face properties AND create a rectangle which will be exported to a RIM file. This rectangle has to be horizontal, at the same heights than the mirroring faces, and should encompass all mirroring faces.
Objects are only mirrored in Re-volt when they're above this RIM rectangle. And the reflections will only be visible for faces whose Mirroring flag has been set (just as a note, because of Re-Volt internal, the Transparent flag may be use as well).

For more details the best is to check an existing stock level.
And no, MKMIRROR is no longer needed with my plugin.

In Blender 2.69 the option Multi-Texture isn't in the same place than previous. It used to be inside Shading panel. Now there is only an option called "Textures" inside Shading, is it the same? Should I select this one only? Should I select all of the other options too (Shadows, Subsurfa, Environ)?

Playing with the Multi-Texture setting should not be needed when using my plugin. In fact, you should have almost no need to use neither the Material panel nor the Texture panel in Blender (that is to say you should not do as it's done in the Marv's tutorial).
The Re-Volt material are set in the RV panel (NCP sub-panel in Edit mode)
To set the texture, as I PMed you you just have to:

• split the screen to open an UV / image view aside the 3D view
• in the 3D view, select a face in Edit mode
• open or select an image in the UV view --> this image is automatically applied to the selected face (switch to Textured display mode [Alt+Z] to see it).

Phew, finished typing...

This is Awesome! Thanks for the detailed answer.

(that is to say you should not do as it's done in the Marv's tutorial)

LOL. I almost thought Marv's video was the Bible. My mistake. Well.. it indeed is the only video resource over there, I hope there are more like that.

I'm trying this new version of the Re-Volt plugin and... it's basically the most beautiful thing i've ever seen!

Nice job Jigebren, keep working on!

Greetings from Alias Re-Volt Master.

Hi Jigebren, just a question: what can you tell me about this add-on? Is it the same and this guy has stolen from you, or is it another one?
http://sourceforge.net/projects/revolt-io-blender/

Is it possible, that the re-volt import/export plugin doesn't work with blender 2.71

Currently, i have this problem.

As far as I know, jigebren made his plugin always for a specific blender version and did not guarantee it to work with other versions.

where is the difference between blender32bit and blender64bit?

I ask, because i am not an expert.

The main difference between 32-bit and 64-bit operative systems is the amount of RAM memory they can handle (detect & administrate).

A 32-bit edition of Windows supports a maximum of 3GB of ram memory. If you have only 2GB of ram a 32-bit operative system (like Windows XP 32-bit or Windows 7 32-bit) is perfect for you, but if you have 6GB of ram the 32-bit system won't detect all the memory, it won't use more than 3GB because that is the limit for 32-bit.

A 64-bit system has a higher limit and supports a maximum of 192GB of ram memory. If you have 4 or 6GB of memory a 64-bit operative system (like Windows 7 64-bit) is perfect for you. It also uses the memory in a faster way.

You can check if your Windows is 32 or 64-bit from Control Panel, System Properties.

Blender 32bit edition is the Blender editon specially designed for 32-bit operative systems. If your Windows is 32-bit edition you must install the Blender 32-bit edition, you don't have a choice. Blender64-bit won't install on a 32-bit Windows.

Blender 64bit edition is the Blender editon specially designed for 64-bit operative systems. If you have a 64-bit edition of Windows and 6GB of RAM, you can choose to install Blender32bit or Blender64bit, but only the Blender64bit edition will be able to administrate (handle) all the memory efficiently. That is why a 64-bit edition is obviusly recommended for a 64-bit edition of Windows.

I hope this clears your doubt.

Thanks for your answer Phantom.

I don't want to be the boring guy but.. I've been waiting years (Literally) for the public release..
I really don't understand why it isn't public since it seems so freaking awesome already!
can anyone explain it to me? Does Jigebren want it to be restricted for a certain public? Did you stop testing it?
Sorry about this post, but I think I might not be the only one arround the world wondering about this. thanks

I've just released a new version of my plugin. Beta-testers, check your email.

Here's a summary of the main changes (detailed Changelog can be found in the readme file).

The TexAnim support should be total now. That is to say that:

• any world should be imported and re-exported without loosing Texture animation,
• any texture animation (within the limit of the Re-Volt engine of course) can be created with the plugin.

Data are generated with the help of a Python 3 script. There's some basic example included. After learning the basis of Python, writing a script to generate TexAnim should be rather straightforward.
A new TexAnim section appears in the Re-Volt panel in Edit mode. Keep in mind though that the old code has not necessarily been cleaned-up yet.

An advanced Vertex Color layer mode, to be able to draw face color on one layer and shadows / lights on another, and merge the result before exporting for Re-Volt (keeping the faces color and shading separated makes further editing easier).
Additionally, a predefined palette of grey in the RV panel can be used to quickly draw shading on an object in Edit mode (without having to switch to Vertex Paint mode).

A better degenerated faces support when importing files with broken faces / data. Now, all cases should be fixed when possible or properly rejected otherwise.

A clearer way to specify the type of Re-Volt object in Blender with a checkbox for FIN, FOB, HUL, LIT, RIM, TAZ and VIS formats.

A button to directly check and select all non-planar faces, with an adjustable threshold (in the NCP section in Edit mode).

And several other clean-up and improvements...

Realy interesting ...
Is it for Blender 2.72 only or can it work with 2.72a and 2.72b ?

Hey jigebren, really nice to see you again and thanks for the new plugin!

Hope everything is ok with you.

Great work, thank you!

sebr @ Oct 31 2014, 03:29 PM wrote:Is it for Blender 2.72 only or can it work with 2.72a and 2.72b ?

To my shame I was not aware of those releases but yes it should work without any issue. Thanks for pointing it out.

@RCBandit
In fact I actually got a new motivation to update the plugin while checking your last track (The bunker), so you can be thanked as well.

BTW the advanced vertex color layer has been updated (and now documented in the readme file), you can have a look and tell me if its purpose and use still don't sound obvious.

About your track I remember I made a quickly-optimized NCP out of the one you released (in about 15 min, mostly out of curiosity). I have not send you this file yet, but the interesting part is primarily the NCP simplification method, which can (in best cases) be semi automatic, just with the help of Blender modelling tools. I'll have to write it down sometime.

PS: and I'll manage new PM requests soon (except those who forgot to include their email address).

Bug with Blender 2.72b

with "Texture Paint" and "Weight Paint" mode we get "Missing Data" error message on "Tools" tab

but work perfectly with 2.72 and 2.72a

Weird, for me "Texture Paint" mode instantly crashes as soon as I select it without a single error message.
I have no error with "Weight Paint" though... Where do you see the "Missing Data" message? The panel, the console?

here is a picture

and weight mode work now on 2.72b since i tried 2.72a ???

edit : i only use 32bit blender (never 64bit)

I still can't try "Texture Paint", even after disabling the Plugin. I presume it has something to do with the horrendously old card I'm using (Radeon 9000). If I run "blender -d" I can see the message:
Not enough texture slots. opengl error: énumérant non valide

I used this GFX card because it has a better DVI output than my NVidia one, but I'd better switch back to the NVidia which is a bit more powerful for anything else than DVI.

Anyway this issue is likely not related to the plugin directly. In your screenshot it seems that you have no texture assigned to the selected faces, maybe that could be a reason why Texture paint can't be used and displays this error message...

EDIT: Ok, I switched back to the NVidia FX 5500, I can now use the "Texture Paint" mode. As far as I can see the error message (Missing UVs or Missing Texture Slots) is normal, and you could use the button to fix it - in case you need it. But as we don't need this mode as far as Re-Volt editing is concerned, there's likely no reason to care about it.

The test is with supermarket 1 W

world file in "Object Mode"

"Texture Paint" with blender 2.72

"Texture Paint" with blender 2.72b

From Blender 2.72 Release_Notes :

Texture painting has a new system to determine images and UV maps that will be used during painting. The old workflow of switching to the UV editor and assigning an image is replaced by a workflow more tied to the mesh's materials or by explicitly specifying the texture image to use. The two painting modes are named "Material" and "Image".

This seems clearer now, this part has been updated in Blender 2.72. To get back to what I think is the old behavior : under the Tools tab you can see a Slot tab. Here in Painting Mode select Image. In Canvas Image select the texture used for this face. Then go back to the Tools tab and the error message should be gone...

jigebren , please can you send me the plugin for blender , i will thnak you with my whole life ! !

AnimePad1999 @ Dec 3 2014, 05:13 PM wrote:jigebren , please can you send me the plugin for blender , i will thnak you with my whole life !  !

Check the first post of this thread, it says that you have to PM me your email address. Though given the lack of activity in this topic it may takes some time before I'll check my PM again...

Jig, may I ask you what do you think is the cause of the inactivity in this topic?

Phantom @ Dec 9 2014, 03:45 AM wrote:Jig, may I ask you what do you think is the cause of the inactivity in this topic?

Yep, the same reason that led to the inactivity of this forum, I guess.

Or RV users just have no interest in this plugin, in that case I have not reason to work on it any longer.

I still don't get what is that reason that you mention.

jigebren @ Dec 10 2014, 02:09 AM wrote: Or RV users just have no interest in this plugin

Of all the reasons that I can think of this sounds like the most unlikely one to me.

Here's what I think are the problematic points (in case anybody cares):
1) people either don't know that it exists or can't / don't want to work with blender
2) the plugin is not publicly available and people don't want to go through the hassle of registering here, contacting the author and wait for a response / new release to get it
3) due to longer inactivity people start to lose interest (this is not the same as having generally no interest)

Note that 3) isn't meant as a criticism of some kind (no one expects you to frequently release updates) but you can't deny that its true.
I actually brought up this argument as well for the 1.2 project (or rather the online collision bug) which is also why I think that this forum is getting more inactive every day.

Its simply a fact that once any kind of new features, bugfixes or changes stay out, there is only a limited range of topics to discuss for the users.
For 1.2 we've discussed pretty much every possible suggestion to death (just take a look at the suggestions thread) and actually even encountered a few bugs here and there along the way, yet the projects state remains moreless unchanged for more than a year now.

For the plugin I'm guessing people are just too inexperienced with blender to be able to discuss any possible improvements in-depth or even suggest new stuff, so the only thing left to do is point out bugs/problems that we encounter along the way.
But I'm pretty sure that anyone who uses the plugin will always be glad about any updates that happen, be it new features, any kind of improvements or bugfixes.

However the worst thing about point 3) is when the developers themselves start to loose interest/hope (which is currently the case as far as I can tell) because then this whole thing turns into a vicious circle and the death of the project becomes pretty much inevitable.
Its even worse when the sources are not publicly available for other people to possibly revive it at a later point in time and all the work is lost forever.

Last but not least, please keep in mind that this is just my point of view of this whole situation and doesn't (necessarily) reflect the opinion of the whole community.

Phantom @ Dec 10 2014, 03:10 AM wrote:I still don't get what is that reason that you mention.

Well, leaving aside the fact that the whole RV community is likely rather small and inactive anyhow, In think an obvious reason was the split of the community induced by the creation of RV-Live quite some years ago. BTW I'll make it clear right now, I don't mean to sound rude for the RV-Live creators and this is by no mean the beginning of a turf war. Anyway the creation of RV-Live was rather useless and unfortunate as:

1) there was not the slightest added value compared to ORP. The major drawback of ORP is that it is based on the invisionfree stuff, with the adds (for people not using Adblock) and the database being "held hostage" without the possibility to export it for free. Not to mention the lack of update/support from invision. And RV-Live was created on exactly the same basis. Yet another invision RV forum... What was the point, really? (except for its founders to proudly have their own forum to lead instead of being simple users in the one(s) that already existed, which I believe was the main reason for RV-Live to ever exist)
2) when a community is as small as the Re-Volt one, spreading people and effort is just as counter productive as one can imagine (and you can see the result right now).

At the creation of RV-Live the ones who migrated there tried to attract the most new and old members with them. And I think they achieved it quite well, mostly for newcomers, preventing the regular flow of leaving members being replaced by new ones here on ORP, thus leading to the inactivity of this forum. If they simply had put the same effort to attract people on the already existing ORP, or if the project were to finally create a real independent ReVolt forum instead of another invision-based one, things would have been far better now.

Now, I'm sorry to say that but let's face the facts, aside of the v1.2 and this plugin I don't see a lot of other promising projects for the future of Re-Volt. And both projects have always been on ORP, still all newcomers are encouraged to go to RV-Live, where there is not much real stuff to discuss about... This is kind of ridiculous. Some guys/gals have been forced to open the same topic on both forum, but since most ORP users have also subscribed to RVL, they have no reason to answer in ORP as well, leading to split discussions, artificially inactive topics on ORP, etc.

The situation being what it is, I think it's too late to make people understand that creating RV-Live the way it is was a mistake, and I'm personally not going to proselytize members of other forums to come back on ORP. I would have gladly left this forum for a better one to host this plugin project, the v1.2, etc. but there is no reason to replace an existing forum by a new one with exactly the same defaults. The current situation is that both v1.2 and this plugin are stalling because of lack of interest/support (the plugin) and bad/inefficient/useless feedback and endless list of suggestions (v1.2), and this is not going to improve with the member drain from ORP (except maybe for the endless list, Haha).

Even though I agree with the fact that there are too much forums out there for this relatively small community and that we should rather focus on keeping everything more centralized, I have to admit that I wouldn't have developed such a great interest in this community if it weren't for RVL (though of course I can't say what would have happened otherwise).

And I don't know if this is true since I was a new member myself back then but I think in its starting stages RVL even boosted ORP, especially around the time the beta patch was released.
Nowadays of course the popularity has somewhat shifted but I think thats also due to the fact that ORP is more of a technical forum where RVL targets the general audience, there were simply never efforts in ORP to attract these more casual users (at least as far as I can tell).

And please don't be offended by this but you can't just argue with "this forum is getting more and more inactive everyday" when no one from the forum staff is making efforts to change something.

Btw why did the RVDev forum die out? Or rather why was the 1.2 project moved from there (since there are still some posts regarding source research to find there from pre-2010, so I assume everything started there)?

bad/inefficient/useless feedback and endless list of suggestions (v1.2), and this is not going to improve with the member drain from ORP (except maybe for the endless list, Haha).

I wouldn't say that all feedback that you find here is bad/inefficient/useless, it just needs to be filtered out. Thats why I made a suggestion some time ago (I think it was in the online collision bug thread?) to hire mods to do cleanups if necessary.

Hi jigebren,

I just wanted to let my 2 cents here since I don't answer often on the forums.

I started to write another 200-lines post, but I think that would be useless, there's too much talk in this forum

I already said it but, I'd really like to see a "final release" of v1.2.
I'm still working on tracks and other rv stuff, I just need a game to work for.

I have this "unfinished product" feeling when I use the latest recommended release, help me !
Don't add every ideas, just a "final" v1.2 release. Something you would consider as "final".

And maybe let someone else be interested in adding some of the other ideas.

Anyway, I'm also interested in some of the features you added in your plugin (even if I'm a max user), but here again I would like to see a 1.2 to finish track to test these out.
This seems to be also a vicious circle ^^

Oh, and finally, another 200-lines post. Inevitable

Thanks jigebren for clarifying your point of view.
This is the first time that you are as clear as water about this subject and I have to say that now for the first time in many years I finally understand what all the fuss between both forums was about.
Even if I don't agree with everything, I respect your point of view.

About revolt 1.2 and your plugin, Kenny summed up everything that I wanted to say in his last posts.

Kenny wrote:Here's what I think are the problematic points (in case anybody cares):
1) people either don't know that it exists or can't / don't want to work with blender
2) the plugin is not publicly available and people don't want to go through the hassle of registering here, contacting the author and wait for a response / new release to get it
3) due to longer inactivity people start to lose interest (this is not the same as having generally no interest)

Kenny wrote:However the worst thing about point 3) is when the developers themselves start to loose interest/hope (which is currently the case as far as I can tell) because then this whole thing turns into a vicious circle and the death of the project becomes pretty much inevitable.
Its even worse when the sources are not publicly available for other people to possibly revive it at a later point in time and all the work is lost forever.

I am interested in this plugin,but you still haven't sent it to me

Mladen007 @ Dec 11 2014, 09:33 AM wrote: I am interested in this plugin,but you still haven't sent it to me

There's about 10 more ppl with the same message.

In think an obvious reason was the split of the community induced by the creation of RV-Live quite some years ago.

The creation of RVL had nothing to do with the split. ORP was still relevant and active back then and I'd agree making that forum was unnecessary at that time.
However, shortly after the creation of RVL, while that forum continued to grow thanks to (mostly) its active staff and being aimed towards a younger audience, ORP (and RRR) started to stagnate and get stale as RVL did everything those two did much better. There was more activity on RVL, more topics, more things to talk about. The staff was and is a lot more active than the staff here will ever be, and they weren't Nazi dictators like RST from RRR.
The only thing that made ORP relevant again was the 1.2 patch. That was its only source of activity in recent years. Until then it was practically dead. Anything you posted on ORP would be replied to on RVL a lot sooner. Had Huki posted his 1.2 patch on RVL, we wouldn't have this discussion.

Anyway the creation of RV-Live was rather useless and unfortunate as:

It was very useful and very fortunate as the forum's users had staff that they could relate to. Instead of having some inactive, older staff which only login to remove spambots and complain about the situation of the forum and their creations rather than doing anything about it, RVL has staff around the same age as most of the forum's members who regularly post; the age gap between staff and members is lower; and as a result, you get somewhat of a community. A very small one, but one that you can look forward to visiting again. ORP doesn't give me that vibe. ORP is simply a site where people simply look at if there's any news about the 1.2 patch or your Blender plugin. If you and Huki aren't going to do anything, you can't expect us to run after you.

The situation being what it is, I think it's too late to make people understand that creating RV-Live the way it is was a mistake

Huki posting the 1.2 project on this forum was the mistake; RVL was more active back then, so it was only logical to post it there. But having posted here instead, he "split" the community, as you would say.

The current situation is that both v1.2 and this plugin are stalling because of lack of interest/support (the plugin) and bad/inefficient/useless feedback and endless list of suggestions (v1.2)

Are you actually doing anything about it?

Kenny wrote:I have to admit that I wouldn't have developed such a great interest in this community if it weren't for RVL (though of course I can't say what would have happened otherwise).

Nero wrote:... pretty much everything ...

This is precisely missing the point of the matter. Correct me if I'm wrong but the fact is that all founding members of RVL were originally members of ORP. Any effort that have been put in creating RVL could have been put in updating ORP just the same way, and there would have been no community split. As far as I'm concerned I had nothing to do with the ORP staff when I came here, but since no one was maintaining the forum anymore I decided to give it a little update. I have asked TheMeandMe the rights to do it and he gave them to me, it was as simple as that. And I'm still an admin here just because no one better qualified has asked for it. Believe me, I would gladly pass the torch, I have a lot of other/better things to do.

Kenny wrote:Btw why did the RVDev forum die out

Because the project never really started.

Phantom wrote:I finally understand what all the fuss between both forums was about.

Well, I don't think there was ever any fuss between ORP and RVL. At least nothing coming from ORP members, I can't talk for RVL ones, though I'm afraid the competition is kind of unavoidable when a community is that small. And I can see from Nero's answer the typical "our forum is better and bigger than yours" or "this is all your fault not ours", which are so much off the mark I'm afraid I can tell right now that this discussion will be leading to nowhere...

@Mladen007
Yep, sorry. Lack of motivation... Not to mention you didn't send me your email so I couldn't do much.

Huki posting the 1.2 project was the mistake; RVL was more active back then

The mistake was to think that attracting all people away from the only alive RV projects was a good idea.

If you and Huki aren't going to do anything, you can't expect us to run after you.

What do you expect then, that we are going to run after you?

Are you actually doing anything about it?

No, absolutely nothing. But feel free to tell me what you did, or what you're planning to do, I'm all ears.

Correct me if I'm wrong but the fact is that all founding members of RVL were originally members of ORP.

Yes. However, at the time the ORP staff was inactive, so I'd assume Miro and ZR assumed that the staff wouldn't have responded to their requests. I'd say ask them if you're motivated enough to do so, since I'm not.

Believe me, I would gladly pass the torch

Moving any active topics to a much more active forum would be a good start.

The mistake was to think that attracting all people away from the only alive RV projects was a good idea.

RVL was around long before the 1.2 patch. Hell, it was around long before even WolfR4.

What do you expect then, that we are going to run after you?

We've been running after you for quite a while now, and since the community realised none of you budge, what's the point? I have to admit you did the best you could when it came to damage control after that disastrous 14.0208 patch, but the way you expressed your lack of motivation wasn't the best. The community has been in a decline ever since; we can't do anything about it because you two won't bother giving the source code to trustworthy individuals who could potentially do something with it. Maybe that's the issue here; who else is good enough to do anything with the code?

The constant bickering about versions aren't helping either, but until 14.0208 came out we didn't really have that issue.

No, absolutely nothing. But feel free to tell me what you did, or what you're planning to do, I'm all ears.

I don't know, you two are the ones with the 1.2 source code, not me; all eyes are on you.

nero @ Dec 14 2014, 06:51 PM wrote: Maybe that's the issue here; who else is good enough to do anything with the code?

I rather think the main issue is the one everybody has (me included) - lack of time and motivation (especially around this time of the year).
There are some people in the community who would be skilled enough to at least modify small code pieces and eventually accomplish some things but I'm afraid that even if more people had access to the source, not much would change (at least regarding the frequency of the updates) due to said issues, several community projects from the past have shown that.

Worst case could even be that other people mess up the source due to being inexperienced or adding some things that they personally want to add but not the general user which would of course lead to even further splitting the already small community.
Though a positive side effect of involving more members would be of course that any eventual future revival has a greater chance of happening (the more people that have it, the less likely it will get lost later on).
Unfortunately it is also out of question to give public access to the source, at least as long as the rights are owned by WGI (or any company that might take legal action against such a thing).

nero wrote:The constant bickering about versions aren't helping either, but until 14.0208 came out we didn't really have that issue.

The "version bickering" was an issue ever since some people complained about physics/network problems (which started somewhere in the 12.x patches I think) and to this day it is unclear what exactly the problem is or if there actually ever was one (if not then I wouldn't be surprised if one was created by trying to fix something that wasn't a problem to begin with).
14.0208 only increased this issue by making even more people think twice about updating or sticking with an older version that they consider better.

However as nero said, ultimately it depends you guys (huki, jigebren) what happens next. You spent all that time working on this project (and the plugin) and its up to you to decide which path will be chosen for the future.
I'm sure the community will always be glad about updates and more involvement but it would be understandable for me if you have something different in mind.