The OpenTTD 12 Title Screen Competition - Winner found

[jfs]

OpenTTD 1.11 title.jpg (171.48 KiB) Viewed 12096 times

The OpenTTD 12 Title Screen Competition

Hello everyone, and welcome to the OpenTTD 12.0 title screen competition! This is your opportunity to design and help choose the savegame which plays behind the main menu of OpenTTD; pictured above is Chrnan6710's winning entry for this spring's 1.11 release.

NEW FEATURE: CAMERA CONTROL
There are no major gameplay changes feature in version 12, but there is one other new feature: The title screen can now change between multiple views of the background game, and even have the view pan across the world, or follow a vehicle.

We want a title screen savegame that uses this feature to good effect.

This means the game you submit should have a well built-up world that can show off many sides: From bustling towns and busy industries, to quiet countryside and lonely roads.
Since there are no major new features, this means you can easily choose a game made with version 1.11 and add your camera angles to it. Just remember that title screen savegames are not allowed to use any NewGRF at all.

You can see a demonstration of the feature in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXdDZufLZpM

SCHEDULE

• Submission deadline: Sunday, October 3, 2021, at 23:59:00 UTC.
• Voting opens Monday, October 4, 2021.
• Voting closes: Saturday, October 16, 2021, at 23:59:00 UTC.

ENTRY AND VOTING

All entries will be posted to this topic as a savegame. You may change your entry at any time, but only one entry will be accepted by the close of entries. If updating, please post a new entry and either delete the old entry or PM a moderator to have it removed.

Voting is taking place on GitHub, in the following discussion thread: https://github.com/OpenTTD/OpenTTD/discussions/9607

TITLE SCREEN GUIDELINES

• This will be a first impression of the game for many new players, so create something which you feel summarizes the game. This is usually a busy, exciting scene showing off many modes of transport, but there are no rules about what must be shown. Also consider that new players can learn about the game by watching a realistic, well-running transport network.
• A traditional part of these title games is featuring new features of the release. There are no new gameplay features between 1.11.0 and 12.0, but the ability to have multiple views on the title screen is new, and must be used.
• A map size of 256 x 256 is ideal.
• Use camera control signs to show many views of your game. Remember to test the commands you write, and that the player's screen resolution or window size can affect what gets shown and does not get shown. Test on multiple different resolutions if possible. More information in a post below.
• Note that any signs you place will be visible. This excludes signs used for the camera control, which are removed when the game is loaded.
• Breakdowns will automatically be disabled. Cheating for money is OK. Unprofitable companies are OK. Building with multiple companies is OK. Building the game in the Scenario Editor is OK.
• Do not use AIs, GameScripts, or NewGRFs. These are automatically disabled.
• The game must be created in a clean, master branch version of OpenTTD or its official binaries. The game cannot be created in custom modified versions of OpenTTD or in popular patch packs such as JGR Patch Pack, LtJoker's Patch Pack, Reddit client, CityMania client, etc.

Feel free to check this spring's competition for inspiration.

Good luck!

[jfs]

How to use the camera control

The camera control being introduced in version 12 uses regular signs with a special format. They look like this:

openttd_2021-09-12_20-47-10.png (111.52 KiB) Viewed 12070 times

To be able to try out this, you need a version of the game with the support added. The feature was only merged just today, so you need the nightly build dated 2021-09-12 or later.

The command signs only take effect when the savegame is loaded on the main menu. To do that, you need to replace the file baseset/opntitle.dat with your savegame file: Find the original opntitle.dat file, delete it, copy your savegame to the same folder, and then rename your savegame file to opntitle.dat. Be careful that the file extension does get changed from .sav to .dat, otherwise it won't work.
You can do this while the game is running: Save the game you're working on, delete/copy/rename the files, then Abandon Game to return to the title screen, and your savegame should be playing!

The features

You can do four things with the command signs:

• Place the camera at a fixed position.
• Pan the camera from one position to another.
• Zoom the camera in or out.
• Have the camera follow a vehicle.

Additionally, you can control whether the camera (viewport) attaches to the position with the top, bottom, left, right, or centre. All nine combinations are available.

Basic format

As shown in the example above, all the command signs always start with a T, and have four parts separated by spaces.

After the T is a number that controls the order. The sign numbered 1 comes first, the sign numbered 2 comes after 1, and 100 comes after 2.
The order you built the signs in doesn't matter, only the number you write on them.

The third part are the control flags. This is where you control the camera alignment, and whether to zoom, pan, or follow a vehicle.
These are the control flags available:

• L, C, R for positioning left, centre, and right (horizontal anchor point)
• T, M, B for positioning top, middle, bottom (vertical anchor point)
• + and - (plus and minus) to zoom one step in or one step out (relative to the default zoom)
• P to pan to the next position, instead of staying fixed at this one
• Vnumber to follow vehicle id number instead of positioning over the sign

It's possible to combine one from each of these lines, so you can make a sign that zooms in, pans to next, and follows a vehicle.
Panning and following a vehicle at the same time results in the panning origin moving. It's difficult to describe in words, but the effect is good, and it's even possible to pan between two moving vehicles!

This shows a summary of the common alignments. Note that you don't need to write C or M for things like "middle-left" or "top-centre", just C if you mean actual centre.

alignments.png (2.22 KiB) Viewed 12070 times

Tools, and getting the vehicle id's
The follow vehicle flags can be difficult to set up, since you need the game's internal vehicle id for this. It normally isn't shown anywhere in the user interface, not even the NewGRF debug tools.

To make it easier to find these (instead of trying to guess) I have made a Game Script called Intro Game Tools. Right now it's only available on my GitHub (https://github.com/nielsmh/IntroGameTool) but I plan on uploading it to BaNaNaS later.

This GS adds some tools in the Story Book:

• Show event sequence: Reads all the signs, order them, and describe them. This fills the "goals" list, so you can also find the signs again.
• Renumber all events: Rewrites all the signs, with new ordering numbers. This works similar to renumbering BASIC programs, if anyone remembers that. The number sequence is changed so it increases by 10 for each sign. This lets you easily insert new commands between the existing ones, or re-order them.
• Vehicle info: Click a vehicle to get its internal vehicle id. For trains this is always the id of the first locomotive.

Tip: Avoiding the main menu

Remember that on the title screen, the main menu window will (almost always) be in the middle of the screen, blocking the view.
It's a good idea to try to use the different alignment options to position the camera in a way so the main menu ends up not covering the parts you do want to show. This will of course take some practice to get a good feeling for what works and what doesn't.
Also remember that the main menu's size can depend on whether the player has UI and/or font size doubled or quadrupled, so it may cover more. Try testing with different window sizes/screen resolutions, and both with and without doubled UI and font size.

Idea: Using a train to travel around the map

Instead of making a long chain of P commands, you can also consider making a "tour train" that drives around the map and just follow that. You could even make it run underground in tunnels most of the time.
Also remember that you can pan to, from, and between moving vehicles. This can give a really interesting effect, so do try it out.

[jfs]

We haven't received any submissions yet. Are anyone intending to participate, but haven't finished their submission yet?

[DemianWSE]

Are anyone intending to participate, but haven't finished their submission yet?

Yes, I hope I can finish it on time!

[MasterOktagon]

me too

[jfs]

I made a submission myself, based on EmperorJake's submission for the 1.11 title screen. I decided to use his submission as a base after going over the various, and seeing his had a wide variety of network built up, with many areas to show off. The savegame is used/refilmed with permission.

Here's a demo of three loops of the title screen:

[gebik]

I made a submission myself, based on EmperorJake's submission for the 1.11 title screen.

Really nice!

Have you considered making one for non-major releases? The currently default one is boring and small for today's screens...

[jfs]

One of the reasons the title screen has stayed the same for non-release versions for the past 8 or so years is actually because it exercises the save/load code, it makes a conversion from the old savegame version to the current, so when working on new features for the game it's a good "smoke test" whether the title screen loads and plays correctly. Making a new one would lose a lot of that.

[gebik]

One of the reasons the title screen has stayed the same for non-release versions for the past 8 or so years is actually because it exercises the save/load code, it makes a conversion from the old savegame version to the current, so when working on new features for the game it's a good "smoke test" whether the title screen loads and plays correctly. Making a new one would lose a lot of that.

Then I will raise suggestion at JGRpp GitHub, since there is most annoying example of it.

[Plus C]

Here's my submission:

title_1_12.sav

(253.58 KiB) Downloaded 188 times

https://imgur.com/a/o6VYffS

[DemianWSE]

I think I missed the deadline... It is still sunday here so I'll submit it anyway, but please delete it if necessary.

Here is a video of how it would look:



Cheers

[jfs]

Technically late, but I'd accept your entry regardless, it looks good. We'll set up the voting later today.

[MasterOktagon]

Couldn't finish mine. Maybe for the next Competition. until then im going to look at it on my title screen

[jfs]

Here's my submission: title_1_12.sav
https://imgur.com/a/o6VYffS

I made a recording of your title screen here:

Does yours depend on the AI players to function? We'll need to either patch the game (to force the AI players to be some sort of built-in idler) or ship the appropriate Idle AI with the game for it to work as-is, or otherwise delete the AI companies.

[jfs]

The voting has been opened! Go to this discussion on GitHub to upvote your favorite: https://github.com/OpenTTD/OpenTTD/discussions/9607

[DemianWSE]

Does yours depend on the AI players to function? We'll need to either patch the game (to force the AI players to be some sort of built-in idler) or ship the appropriate Idle AI with the game for it to work as-is, or otherwise delete the AI companies.

No, AIs do nothing, they can be deleted. I'm sorry I left them there!

[Plus C]

I've updated my submission.

• did not change the network
• only changed camera angles
• should look better on different GUI scales
• changed some camera angles that were looking at too much empty space

You don't have to use it if it's against the rules or anything, though.

title_1_12.sav

(253.59 KiB) Downloaded 212 times

[DemianWSE]

Congratulations Plus C!

[GGa]

Well, of course I don't expect you all to take this suggestion too seriously, as it comes from a two-posts user, but please let me try:

Wouldn't it be better if "panning" the title screen were disabled when a dialog box (like options, new game generation, etc.) is open?

*** Why? ***
I just wanted to try the new version 12. Looked at the title screen: really impressive, especially if compared with the old ones.
But then, while setting the options and choosing the NewGRFs, that panning world was giving me some headache.
Is it just me, or is anyone else under the same impression?

P.S. Yes, I know i's not strictly relaed to the contest, but I didn't find the right "thread".
(Maybe this?)

[jfs]

Others have mentioned that too, yes. We might end up reworking the camera to not have panning (at all), and perhaps not zoom-in effects either.