Burning Sands: Africa '42

[Stewy 1]

They look sensational MehMan - I love the Bren and the .303 and bayonet - awesome stuff!  

A very humble sugestion though, would you consider tipping the guy's helmet a bit more forward?  

I think they'd look a lot tougher with their helmets like that

My 2c - it looks great

Stew

[Bracken 0]

Have you thought any more about what your going to do for your island?

If so, is it still going to be fictional?

Don't know much on the subject but with google earth and such do you think maybe it would be easier to do one from that?

For missions, do you have any battles in mind, you want to mimic in particular, at this early stage?

Regardless, keep up the great work!

[abs 2]

I've told you this on MSN, but I might as well as say it here too:

FANtastic work, mate!

Abs

[BraTTy 0]

Mehman that is some amazing work ! I'm speechless.

Mod is looking very good, I'm impressed.

[sphoenix 11]

That's really great!

Keep it up man

[DaV!d Armstrong 0]

That's really great!

Keep it up man

[sander 14]

The infantry and weapons look excellent, I look forward to recreating some H&D2 battles in Arma with these units.

Regards,

Sander

[Kristian 47]

looking great mehman! now they dont have evil mutanted hands

[BigDave 0]

Looking fantastic those mate, keep up the good work!

[Hawkins 8]

Damn mate, looking damn good! You've seem to have cracked it. Those models look great. Can't wait to see all the "candy" on them that ArmA offers.

[Warrior Xâ„¢ 0]

Damn mate, looking damn good! You've seem to have cracked it. Those models look great. Can't wait to see all the "candy" on them that ArmA offers.

Ditto! You got some talent going on there MehMan! Whatever you are doing that is producing that buzzz that gives you your talent, keep doing it!

[Stag 0]

Nicely done, though a minor criticism; It may just be my eye, but the helmets look more like the WW1 pattern, with a broader brim than the later pattern.

Like I said, may just be my eye.

[R0adki11 3945]

impressive British units

[POPKA 0]

These units look very promising, (Im presuming you will be producing German Afrika corps units to?) Its also very nice to see that you are using your own weapon models rather than Vilas's ww2 weapons.

[MehMan 0]

@Stewy: I'll test that out and post some screens.

@Bracken: Well the island will be fictional in terms of historical accuracy of it being near the NA coast. I'm going to get some real island, as it's much easier to get real topograhpy data and then edit that.

Battles? Well something, but I'll have to wait to see what I can do.

@Wardog: Could be, but most likely isn't. The helmet was very nicely modeled for me by Col. Faulkner(thank you again), but I broaded the brim a bit more which was most likely a mistake. Well luckly it's a three second fix.

@POPKA: Yes, the german troops will also be represented here, can't have a war mod with just one side can we? I'm just collecting info about the germans at this moment, putting the expirence I gained with making the brit to good use. Preparations save nerves, time and work.

@Warrior X: no talent here, just some work.

@everybody else:

Happy new year and thanks for the support.

[wolfbite 8]

Whatever happened to the days of sporting a fine mustache and and shorts into battle and then stopping at midday for tea. Great looking units btw dude keep it up

[Mylae 0]

MehMan those units rules!

very well done!

I have however a little remark and a question/suggestion....

1- seems like the shirt collar is unexistent in the model.... is it intended? i'm sure it could be fixed.

question: since the mod will deal on north african WWII, there will be represented the units of just the major powers (e.g. afrika korps / brit soldiers) or the mod aims to a more complete range - thus including italian (do not forget that north africa - lybia - was italian at that time), neozelandese, and southafrican troops?

I hope the second option will be the better and best appreciated among players.

In the case you will need it, i can give you a load of info on italian colonial army, weapons, equipment, organization

[MehMan 0]

MehMan those units rules!

very well done!

I have however a little remark and a question/suggestion....

1- seems like the shirt collar is unexistent in the model.... is it intended? i'm sure it could be fixed.

question: since the mod will deal on north african WWII, there will be represented the units of just the major powers (e.g. afrika korps / brit soldiers) or the mod aims to a more complete range - thus including italian (do not forget that north africa - lybia - was italian at that time), neozelandese, and southafrican troops?

I hope the second option will be the better and best appreciated among players.

In the case you will need it, i can give you a load of info on italian colonial army, weapons, equipment, organization

The shirt collar is there, textured but not modeled, which one of the things I've been toying in my head with for the past few weeks, to model it or not. This is perhaps enough of a cause for me to actually model it, along with the pockets, to make it more seen.

Well, for now I'm only going to do the german and brit troops with a tank and APC per side, with planes, arty and some trucks and jeeps for later. So I'm pretty swamped as it is, the italians are being pushed backwards. The Australian, New Zealand and SA troops could be done, IIRC they wore pretty much the same as everybody else in the 8th army. The indians would however require a bit more work, so again, later on perhaps.

[Mylae 0]

thank you for the answer.

I think it will be better to do as you say - do things step by step.

by the way, keep your work! is great!

I guess you will use possible the addons created by AtStWalker (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=69;t=69365;st=30)

when they will be released....

[Col. Faulkner 0]

Here's a suggestion. When I was doing my abortive

commandos "mod" (which I'd really like to resurrect now,

having been totally inspired by this, and having learned a bit

more about modding in themeantime) I configured my WIP

Lee-Enfield to have two firing rates; "Fire" and "Rapid

fire". "Fire" included a careful bolt cycling sound. "Rapid fire"

included a fast bolt cycle sound. That meant that when

the AI took "Vilas'" dirty huns under fire at range they'd

take careful shots, but if the enemy were close by then

the lads would switch and blat away at them rapid fire

"Bangclickabangclickabangclicka I got him!". When a

whole rifle group did it it sounded brilliant! Sgt. Snoxall

would have been proud! 

It's a shame that you can't really model the Bren properly in

the game (ie. the bipod is just for decoration and gun teams

are not supported - the Bren in WW2 when used as a section

weapon was operated by two men). Will you at least try to

config' the bren gun so the AI fire it in single shots and very

short (2 or 3 round) bursts?

[sparks50 0]

Amazing, more wip please

[MehMan 0]

Here's a suggestion. When I was doing my abortive

commandos "mod" (which I'd really like to resurrect now,

having been totally inspired by this, and having learned a bit

more about modding in themeantime) I configured my WIP

Lee-Enfield to have two firing rates; "Fire" and "Rapid

fire". "Fire" included a careful bolt cycling sound. "Rapid fire"

included a fast bolt cycle sound. That meant that when

the AI took "Vilas'" dirty huns under fire at range they'd

take careful shots, but if the enemy were close by then

the lads would switch and blat away at them rapid fire

"Bangclickabangclickabangclicka I got him!". When a

whole rifle group did it it sounded brilliant! Sgt. Snoxall

would have been proud! 

It's a shame that you can't really model the Bren properly in

the game (ie. the bipod is just for decoration and gun teams

are not supported - the Bren in WW2 when used as a section

weapon was operated by two men). Will you at least try to

config' the bren gun so the AI fire it in single shots and very

short (2 or 3 round) bursts?

@Faulkner: Whoops, sorry for replying to this so late, must've missed it earlier. But yeah, I'm thinking about the rapid fire, although I'm not quite sure yet. I'd like to have some anims to go with it, but I haven't gone there yet. I've done the whole bolt cycle, just the cocking piece needs to be fixed, then I'd like to make the arms and fingers move so that the soldier himself would actually cycle the bolt.

About the Bren, definatley, it's very easy to do that. About crew served weapons, I'm thinking about making a mortar that would be carried by three men, and then when they would be together close enough you could order them to deploy it and you'd have an actual mortar. If not I'll just make the smaller 2in mortar. I'd have to see how it works. It'd probably work on the player side but not so good for the AI so a bit of testing is needed first.

@sparks50: You'll get WIPs when they're ready.

[Col. Faulkner 0]

@Faulkner: Whoops, sorry for replying to this so late, must've missed it earlier. But yeah, I'm thinking about the rapid fire, although I'm not quite sure yet. I'd like to have some anims to go with it, but I haven't gone there yet. I've done the whole bolt cycle, just the cocking piece needs to be fixed, then I'd like to make the arms and fingers move so that the soldier himself would actually cycle the bolt.

Does ArmA actually support that sort of thing!? That'd be

cool! This is one of the biggest things turning me off doing

the WW2-era weapons again; manual bolt-action rifles in

the ArmA universe all work like self-loaders (and all have

an "invisible" pistol grip).  Even a matchlock arquebus would

be semi automatic in the ArmA-verse.    It's why I've

rather reverted to trying again with the more modern British

stuff (although there are still problems with that - especially

the stupid "rifle butt in the armpit" firing posture the ArmA

bods adopt)

I have retrieved most of the Boys A/Tk rifle model I was

making - I seem to have lost all the other WW2 models I'd

made (or I just have very early backups). The Boys model is

not absolutely complete but most of it is there. I think you

just need to finish off a small part of the breech. Do you

want it to see if you can do anything with it? It'd be a .p3d

file.

I presume a 2" mortar would work the same as an ArmA

grenade launcher, with the AI managing it in the same way;

they seem to be good enough at flinging those damned 40mm

grenades about.

[Kristian 47]

any awesome updates mehman?

[MehMan 0]

@Faulkner: Whoops, sorry for replying to this so late, must've missed it earlier. But yeah, I'm thinking about the rapid fire, although I'm not quite sure yet. I'd like to have some anims to go with it, but I haven't gone there yet. I've done the whole bolt cycle, just the cocking piece needs to be fixed, then I'd like to make the arms and fingers move so that the soldier himself would actually cycle the bolt.

Does ArmA actually support that sort of thing!? That'd be

cool! This is one of the biggest things turning me off doing

the WW2-era weapons again; manual bolt-action rifles in

the ArmA universe all work like self-loaders (and all have

an "invisible" pistol grip).  Even a matchlock arquebus would

be semi automatic in the ArmA-verse.    It's why I've

rather reverted to trying again with the more modern British

stuff (although there are still problems with that - especially

the stupid "rifle butt in the armpit" firing posture the ArmA

bods adopt)

I have retrieved most of the Boys A/Tk rifle model I was

making - I seem to have lost all the other WW2 models I'd

made (or I just have very early backups). The Boys model is

not absolutely complete but most of it is there. I think you

just need to finish off a small part of the breech. Do you

want it to see if you can do anything with it? It'd be a .p3d

file.

I presume a 2" mortar would work the same as an ArmA

grenade launcher, with the AI managing it in the same way;

they seem to be good enough at flinging those damned 40mm

grenades about.

Believe me, in the midst of the battle even the simple bolt cycling animation is good enough. The whole anim will be icing on the cake. But that depends on how hard and how possible it is. The pistol grip anim will not be removed because that would mean modifying each and every anim. The bolt cycle and reload anim could work with just three anims, but I'm not sure yet, might be more of 18+3 anims, with the 18 representing where you walk and fire, and the 3 standing still. It'd be quite annoying to have the player stop after every shot just to cycle the bolt. But then again, if you're walking and firing, it might not be such a big deal. I'll have to see.

I'll also have to see if it'll work at all, perhaps with a few scripts it can be a reality.

Well, a quick shitty update, another render. WIP ofcourse: