First I would like to say that as most of you know, I haven`t been around much the last couple of months, but as far as I know no one has already finished decoding the animations files, but if someone else has already done that then I must of missed it and everyone can ignore this post.

Next: I know this isn`t really the correct place to put this, it`s existing mesh with a NEW animation added to it, but as there isn`t yet a place for new animations and I just want a few people to test that it works in their game, then I think this is as correct a place as any.

After a few very busy months during which I haven`t had any time to work on anything related to the sims2. Today I`ve at last been able to get back to working on finishing off decoding the animation files. And I`ve now got to the point where I can create new animations for objects (animations for the sims themselves should work on the same basis, I just haven`t created or tested any new animations for them yet.)

So this is the first basic animation I`ve created for a object. It`s just the snowman`s hat but with a new animation file added to it. I was going to make a rocket but as I`m not any good at making meshes, it will have to stay the way it is for now. (Someone else might change the mesh to a rocket or something and then upload that version)

So all it does is it has a new action called "Fire" which shoots the hat up into the air while rotating.
Then there is another action called "Reset" which brings it back to it`s original position.

You can either place the hat onto the original maxis snowman or just place it on a table (surface).

So as I`ve said this actual object is nothing special, neither is the animation which is does, which is different is that the animation is a new one which I created. So before I work on any more and on a editor, I`m hoping a few people will try this to check it works in their game. Also I don`t have the expansion pack so have been unable to check it works in that.


I do hope that I get time to work on a editor, but even if I don`t I`m sure that someone else will as I`ll be updating the wiki with the things I`ve worked out.

I`m not quite sure how best to make the editor, either make it so that animations can be made in it, or just so it converts other animation files to the format the game uses. So if anyone has any ideas on what they think the best way for it to work is, please tell me. Also a list of common animation formats which people are using would help.

Now a bit about the way animations work:

As a lot of people will know, objects have a number of "bones" (even those with no actual bones have two default ones called root_trans and root_rot).
The animation files tell the game how to move and rotate these bones, and they are made up of a number of keyframes which tells the game that at a certain time what the positon and rotation of a bone will be. The game then interpolates between these keyframes.

The new animation in this object just effects those two default bones, so it should be possible to take it out of this package and use it with any object.

These are still a number of parts of the animations files which aren`t fully decoded/understood, such as how the animations trigger a event at a certain point during them, and also I believe some of the animations for the sims themselves use inverse kinematics.

Finally I`d like to say, as with most of the other files which the games uses, most of the work on the original decoding the formats was done by Datafarmer. Without his work, we would all be much further behind in the things we can create and modify.

EDIT: I`ve updated the animation so now the hat actually goes up and comes back down rather than just going up and staying in the air.

Thank you this is a big step.. I will try it out I have UNI so will let you know how everything goes...

Animation has been done a bit, but this is stull big step.

Sounds impressive. You seem to be the right guy to ask, so I have a question. If you notice when you turn the head of a sim with longer hair, some of the hair (normaly in the middle) moves as if it has physics applyed to it. The same goes for the bunny ears on the hat for the mascot outfit. If this is physics, can we eventualy get our hands on it, so sims with long hair can have it move realisitcly?

What has been done? All I was aware of was the mesh swapping which I posted about back in febuary or march. That and the ability to take existing animations from other objects and use them in new objects.

So has someone already made a new animation ?

As far as I know, that's all that has been done (see your post #5)

Wow that is an amazing development keep up the could work.

Ps. earlier i saw a animating clock so yes anmation has been touched upon

Okay, I tested it with University. It worked only if I put it on the snowman's head. It wouldn't work on the ground or on a table, but that's probably fixable. As far as the animation goes, it looked excellent, fired & reset everytime. Nothing even close to this has been done yet, so THANKS Miche!

Brasstex

Yes. In Grand Trianon, there was an animated bunkbed. The Sim would clclimb upa ladder and then go to sleep.

That's (climbing ladder) not a new animation. This is totally new.

Brasstex

i have it testet in university and dont own the snowman it works on a sidetable, and wow a new anim.
PS: It stucks always in table after return only reset make it as before fire. And has (in my game) little animationglitches (rotate is not smooth).
Anyways its great and work fine. :clap:

I didn't try a side table, only a dining table and a coffee table. I'm going to try a side table.

Brasstex

I have University, and I tried it on the snowman... "Fire" worked. "Reset" worked, and "Switch Hat" worked!!!
:bow:
You are AMAZING! I hope this ushers in a new era of Sims 2 animation!!!!!

Yeah I know the rotation isn`t smooth(and even the movement isn`t right). I didn`t spend too much time trying to get them right as I created this in a hex editor so for each keyframe I had to enter the time and rotation and position by hand. So the timing and positions of those keyframes could be improved greatly.

Once I (or someone else) have a editor/converter working then of course it`ll be much easier.

This is just a proof of concept that I have the details of how to set the keyframes (and other parts) correctly.

Hello! I wanted to throw something into the ring regarding editors and art paths. I’m a 15+ year games tools and engine developer that’s recently left the games industry to build something cool. Among other things, I’m in the process of releasing a high-end art path tool set as open source - the same sort of tools I used to write for EA, Accolade, Bethesda, etc., except using a much more open, flexible, and extensible format.

This is possibly relevant here since it might provide some elements that could help people get higher quality mod data. Specifically, the geometry tools include binormal and normal map generation, and I’m about to port in the tools to perform skeletal animation optimization (key compression, etc.)

I already have code to convert static textured geometry from Sims2 .package files into my VML file format, which is the format my tools run in. Its actually two file formats, one human readable XML, the other reasonably well packed binary, and both are interchangeable. An incomplete description of this format is at http://www.vscape.com/opensource/vml/index.html, I’m still writing docs, and am in the middle of bringing up a new website and code release process, so the source links are down, will be back up this week. More relevant, the examples at this page http://www.vscape.com/opensource/vml/dataexamples.html are out of date!

I’ve got code to export data from Maya, have an incomplete 3DS Max exporter, and am looking at exporters for lower end packages like Milkshape and Blender. Milkshape is problematic in not supporting more than one bone per vertex, and Blender has the strangest UI paradigm I’ve ever seen.

I plan to complete the code to convert Sims2 animation into VML animation myself once all the data I need is published in the Wiki (haven’t looked in a while), the only missing piece for use by the Sims2 mod community would be a VML -> .package (GMDC, etc) converter. All the tool elements also provide C++ library APIs, so they are pretty simple to drop into existing code.

In any case, if anyone is interested in having pluggable code to do some of the harder aspects of a good art path, let me know.

As a side note, I’ll also be releasing a freeware game client later this year that loads this data, and lets people play around with it in a highly moddable environment that also provides massive multiplayer support over a secure back end. So Sims2 mod content can be used to create networked, interactive versions of what you have in the Sims2 client, as well as more advanced games. Should be fun.

please i have it not meant as critcism only as report so dont slap me for this its a great find i love the hat by the way have testet now all surfaces works only on sidetables and stuck in them.

I know you didn`t mean it as critcism, I was just saying (mainly for other people) that I`m aware that the animation is far from perfect, I don`t think I`ll be creating many good animations myself even once a editor/converter is working. (I`m not good at 3d modelling or animation)

Thanks for testing it on all the different sufaces.

The reason is sticks into the sidetable is because I didn`t add a extra keyframe to rotate it back to the original position (just added the reset action instead).

If there is demand, I guess I can work on trying to improve this animation, just didn`t think there would be much demand for the actual animation (of something shooting up into the air and rotating) past the fact that it`s a new animation.

If anyone who knows how to add BHAVS to objects, wants to try an experiment. I`d be interested to know if this animation works when added to a chair with a sim sitting in the chair (and if the sims moves and rotates with the chair). If no one else tries then I`ll get round to trying it eventually it just won`t be for a while as I`ll work on the converter before I get round to that. (if it does work, and I think it will, then new vehicles (maybe go-karts or something) and elevators etc shouldn`t be hard to do.

The animation which is moving the hat is called "o-snowManHat-ayiy-ayiy-anim".

Hi Miche!

Fabulous work you've done! Actually I couldn't yet to test the animation. But you asked about animation formats. It would be nice to create new animations in an editor, but it would be nicer to use a 3D programm like 3dsmax, Maya or Cinema.
I'm very interested in new animation, so I'm looking forward. :D

yay - this means we're one step closer to better 'woohoo'! lol

It works the same on a Mac...same problem with the end tabe...about it sticking through but hey even getting to animations is one of the biggest steps for the modders of the sims!

In Simantics for Sims1 the later EPs all used animation triggers for sound... or was it sound triggers for animation? Whatever it was, I bet they stuck with this combination so it's not very informative but it gives a possible way of thinking about it maybe leads to a clue.

:lion:
Deedee

Thanks for the info.

A lot of things have changed been changed since the sims1 when it comes to animations, but yes it does seem that sounds are played from a animation event. but this doesn`t say anything about how events are encoded in the animation files. We are making progress with them but there is still some way to go yet.

How events work (or seem to work) is that certain keyframes can trigger a animation event which will then run a certain BHAV (you can set the BHAV that is to be run when you play the animation), then it`s upto this BHAV what to do about that event, so it might play a sound for example or start a new animation (maybe on someother object). (it also seems that it might be possible to play a sound directly in the anim file ...starting to play it at a certain keyfram but I`m not sure for certain yet)

In some instances it used to be that randomly used choices of object interaction entry slots triggered which animations and sounds to play so it starts to matter how many slots an object has and understanding each one individually what goes on in any particular slot/path/slot on to exit. The only reason I ever was able to do maxis quality animations was because of this understanding of slots I think. I really have no idea why nobody else had smooth on/smooth off custom animations so that is my guess anyways.

I read somewhere a chair was being used, might be for learning but I always steered clear of objects with globals lording it over them and stuck to mostly fun driven objects with multiple slots so I could keep all of them or delete some I didn't want and just keep the entry/path/exits that worked best for me or the number of simultaneous users that I wanted or combo thereof.

I haven't "kept up" as it were so I don't know if I should be butting into this conversation at all but at the risk of being useless I do, just in case I accidentally say something useful. I haven't been around much this year but Phervers alerted me that I should read the animation threads yesterday so I spent a couple hours trying to mostly read most of them trying to catch up a little bit but I'd still need to get back into simantics and revisiting something like that would take real motivation and I know you understand that is hard to come by at times. Looks like exciting progess so far though, congrats.

:lion:
Deedee

:jaw: :moo: i praise thee