Difference between revisions of "User:Zeracles"

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G'day fellas, for a long time I've been an interested observer of changes to the ultronomicon. Still young (although, I'm not sure if it's still ''very'' young, as it says on the main page), but already great! I'm a research student in astrophysics. Star Control II was one of the first games I ever played. I am a unix stalwart and protoss executor - [http://www.baggygreen.com.au/ cricket] is my [[Frungy|frungy]].
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G'day there. I hang around here and on the forums ([http://www.star-control.com/community/ PNF/SCDB] and [http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/ UQMF]) chatting about Star Control, its community and occasionally doing stuff for the projects that good folks have started around the place. Star Control II is one of the first games I ever played, and if you're a Star Control fan too, I hope to see you around. Although I haven't done much work here for a while, I'm interested in helping to make things better and clarifying what can be improved in the main body of articles on this wiki.  
  
[http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~asmith/ My page at the school of physics]
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In real life I have an interest in [http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~asmith/ astrophysics] and some experience (in order of decreasing competence) with matlab/octave, python and C. Although I'm not much of a gamer, I also like Doom, StarCraft and [http://www.baggygreen.com.au/ cricket]. I can be reached via my [[User talk:Zeracles|talk page]], or by PM on one of the forums. Cheers!
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==Current Projects==
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===History of the Star Control Fan Universe===
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Some speak of the internet as a collective intelligence, with its denizens as the neurons, etc. And every intelligence needs a memory. Of course the threads are still in the forum archives, but left like that, it isn't very well organised, and is effectively forgotten because it's not easy to find stuff. While some of what happens on the forums is mostly there for currency, some of it is worth remembering, and I think it would be good to make those threads easily accessible to any who may find them useful. It's a big job and I'm really just getting started. If you have some input I'm happy to hear it.
  
I can be reached via my [[User talk:Zeracles|talk page]], or by email (see my page above). Cheers to everyone for all the great work so far!
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[[User:Zeracles/History of the Star Control fan universe/Thread Catalogue|Thread Catalogue]]
==Current Projects==
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===Miscellany for Dragon's SC1 Remake===
===Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula===
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This is some procedurally generated art, and starmaps I worked on for [http://www.star-control.com/community/viewtopic.php?t=42 Dragon's SC1 remake]. Death 999 contributed part of the link-generating algorithm I'm about to demonstrate.
[[User:PsiPhi|PsiPhi]] first mentioned this idea [[User talk:PsiPhi/StarBox|in 2005]] (not that I was around, or even knew the ultronomicon existed at the time), and in october 2007 got us working on it [[Talk:Planet landing risk-reward formula|here]]. This is an excellent idea, but as he said back then, it's ambitious. We ([[User:PsiPhi|PsiPhi]], [[User:Fyzixfighter|Fyzixfighter]], [[User:Valaggar|Valaggar]] and yours truly) have been discussing it since, and many interesting and challenging issues have come up. This is one of those problems which I think gets more interesting the harder it gets. From my perspective it's great that some of the things I've learned in research are finding a use in Star Control.
 
  
[[Talk:Planet landing risk-reward formula|Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula Discussion]]
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[[User:Zeracles/Background|Starry Background]]
===History of the Star Control Fan Universe===
 
History interests me. I have written a complete history of the world and I actually update it based on current world events (I don't really know what I'll do with it). I think it would be cool to do a history of the Star Control Fan Universe (SCFU). I'm a relative newcomer though, and only appeared in mid 2007. Sure, anything I write is unofficial and actually it doesn't really concern the ultronomicon. But I'm not a controversial figure and never will be. But hey, write your own history! Below I discuss a tool which would help any aspiring historians.
 
  
What is the SCFU? Currently its online presence seems characterised by the [http://starcontrol.classicgaming.gamespy.com/ Pages of Now and Forever] (PNF), [http://starcontrol.classicgaming.gamespy.com/forum/index.php Star Control Discussion Board] (SCDB), [http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/index.php Ur-Quan Masters Forum] (UQMF), [http://uqm.stack.nl/wiki/Main_Page Ultronomicon], the [http://sc2.sourceforge.net/ SourceForge page for the UQM remake] and apparently also a [http://www.livejournal.com/interests.bml?int=star+control+2 collection of LiveJournal communities]. I think those are the main ones. Apart from the aesthetic reasons, a history is useful to gauge progress and catalogue the various ideas which have come up - threads in forums don't do a great job, though they are good for currency. How does one know if a question or idea has been posted before?
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[[User:Zeracles/Starmap|Starmap]]
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===Project 6014===
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Like many others, I'm doing a little on this sequel mod for UQM. I'm working on concept, dialogue and whatever else time permits for a species new to 6014's plot.
  
As far as this does concern the ultronomicon, there are some things which would go in anyone's history, and so can be included objectively. Still, I don't think this could go in the main body of articles, so it could be time for some user pages.
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[http://forum.uqm.stack.nl/index.php?topic=4863.0 Demo Release (UQMF)]
  
[[User:Zeracles/History of the Star Control fan universe|History of the Star Control Fan Universe]]
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[http://www.star-control.com/community/viewtopic.php?t=279 Demo Release (SCDB)]
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==Projects On Ice==
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I don't really have a lot of time for Star Controlling, which stops me from doing stuff and it sucks. I don't have time for these projects right now.
 +
===Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula===
 +
[[User:PsiPhi|PsiPhi]] first mentioned this idea [[User talk:PsiPhi/StarBox|in 2005]] (not that I was around, or even knew the ultronomicon existed at the time), and in october 2007 got us working on it [[Talk:Planet landing risk-reward formula|here]]. This is an excellent idea, but as he said back then, it's ambitious. We ([[User:PsiPhi|PsiPhi]], [[User:Fyzixfighter|Fyzixfighter]], [[User:Valaggar|Valaggar]] and yours truly) have been discussing it since, and many interesting and challenging issues have come up. This is one of those problems which I think gets more interesting the harder it gets. From my perspective it's great that some of the things I've learned in research are finding a use in Star Control.
  
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[[Talk:Planet landing risk-reward formula|Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula Discussion]]
 
===Balancing the Prices of UQM's Ships===
 
===Balancing the Prices of UQM's Ships===
 
This was initiated by [[User:Valaggar|Valaggar]]. Valaggar's implementation is clever, though he acknowledges the input of Elvish Pillager. See [[User_talk:Zeracles#Balancing_the_prices_of_UQM.27s_ships|here]].
 
This was initiated by [[User:Valaggar|Valaggar]]. Valaggar's implementation is clever, though he acknowledges the input of Elvish Pillager. See [[User_talk:Zeracles#Balancing_the_prices_of_UQM.27s_ships|here]].
===Deconstructing the UQM Source===
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==User Pages==
[[User:Zeracles/Deconstructing the UQM source|Deconstructing the UQM Source]]
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[[User:Zeracles/History of the Star Control fan universe/Thread Catalogue|Thread Catalogue]]
 
 
This one is supposed to be a helpful guide for any who would like to mod the game or simply know how it works. I don't know anything about C, so if it's all up to me, it will get done but really slowly. Also, this is a prerequisite for two of the above projects
 
*Completing the planet-landing formula, as we need to know exactly how everything works.
 
*Balancing the prices of UQM's ships, because it will be useful to have solid quantitative ship-to-ship data. This is so whether we obtain this data with iterative modeling or some kind of learning AI.
 
===Miscellany for Dragon's SC1 Remake===
 
This is some procedurally generated art, and starmaps I worked on for [http://www.star-control.com/forum/index.php/topic,1660.0.html Dragon's SC1 remake].
 
  
 
[[User:Zeracles/Background|Starry Background]]
 
[[User:Zeracles/Background|Starry Background]]
<BR>[[User:Zeracles/Starmap|Starmap]]
 
  
==User Pages==
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[[User:Zeracles/Starmap|Starmap]]
[[User:Zeracles/History of the Star Control fan universe|History of the Star Control Fan Universe]]
 
  
 
[[User:Zeracles/Deconstructing the UQM source|Deconstructing the UQM Source]]
 
[[User:Zeracles/Deconstructing the UQM source|Deconstructing the UQM Source]]
 
==Admin?==
 
You've been doing a lot of good work protecting the Ultronomicon from spammers.
 
Would you like to be an administrator, so you can ban them too? &mdash; [[User:Svdb|SvdB]] 19:55, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 
:Okay, and I should probably get back to doing real work here too. Cheers --[[User:Zeracles|Zeracles]] 20:57, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 
::Even better. You're now an administrator. Good luck. &mdash; [[User:Svdb|SvdB]] 23:32, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
 

Revision as of 07:35, 24 February 2011

G'day there. I hang around here and on the forums (PNF/SCDB and UQMF) chatting about Star Control, its community and occasionally doing stuff for the projects that good folks have started around the place. Star Control II is one of the first games I ever played, and if you're a Star Control fan too, I hope to see you around. Although I haven't done much work here for a while, I'm interested in helping to make things better and clarifying what can be improved in the main body of articles on this wiki.

In real life I have an interest in astrophysics and some experience (in order of decreasing competence) with matlab/octave, python and C. Although I'm not much of a gamer, I also like Doom, StarCraft and cricket. I can be reached via my talk page, or by PM on one of the forums. Cheers!

Current Projects

History of the Star Control Fan Universe

Some speak of the internet as a collective intelligence, with its denizens as the neurons, etc. And every intelligence needs a memory. Of course the threads are still in the forum archives, but left like that, it isn't very well organised, and is effectively forgotten because it's not easy to find stuff. While some of what happens on the forums is mostly there for currency, some of it is worth remembering, and I think it would be good to make those threads easily accessible to any who may find them useful. It's a big job and I'm really just getting started. If you have some input I'm happy to hear it.

Thread Catalogue

Miscellany for Dragon's SC1 Remake

This is some procedurally generated art, and starmaps I worked on for Dragon's SC1 remake. Death 999 contributed part of the link-generating algorithm I'm about to demonstrate.

Starry Background

Starmap

Project 6014

Like many others, I'm doing a little on this sequel mod for UQM. I'm working on concept, dialogue and whatever else time permits for a species new to 6014's plot.

Demo Release (UQMF)

Demo Release (SCDB)

Projects On Ice

I don't really have a lot of time for Star Controlling, which stops me from doing stuff and it sucks. I don't have time for these projects right now.

Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula

PsiPhi first mentioned this idea in 2005 (not that I was around, or even knew the ultronomicon existed at the time), and in october 2007 got us working on it here. This is an excellent idea, but as he said back then, it's ambitious. We (PsiPhi, Fyzixfighter, Valaggar and yours truly) have been discussing it since, and many interesting and challenging issues have come up. This is one of those problems which I think gets more interesting the harder it gets. From my perspective it's great that some of the things I've learned in research are finding a use in Star Control.

Planet Landing Risk-Reward Formula Discussion

Balancing the Prices of UQM's Ships

This was initiated by Valaggar. Valaggar's implementation is clever, though he acknowledges the input of Elvish Pillager. See here.

User Pages

Thread Catalogue

Starry Background

Starmap

Deconstructing the UQM Source