SY meetup

We just had a reunion event! (Well, at least we managed to gather two in the same place. Perhaps we can do better in the future!)

As is immediately obvious to the viewer, it's like time has stood still over the last few decades:

We did make plans to hang out on the TA Universe Discord server and play a few games as well, to verify that our skills have not degraded either (just need to find that nice empty slot in the calendar, but surely any month now).

Nice to see that there is still an active community out there!

-Ekke & Fnordia

Is it spring yet?

The TA Spring project website is now online. You can check it out at taspring.clan-sy.com!

-Fnordia

Site moving

We have once again moved the site to a new server. If you are reading this, it went well. Hopefully it should be as stable as the last one.

-Fnordia

Another year, another newspost!

As usual there is not a lot of actual news to be reported. However, rumour has it that the very final version of XTA is not far from being completed.

Speaking of XTA, if you are in the mood for playing it, you can try dropping by #sy on Quakenet. Lately there's been games played almost daily!

I also signed the site up for the PlanetAnnihilation top100. Should be interesting to see if anyone still actually visits this site. :)

-Fnordia

TA Demo source code

There seemed to be mostly positive comments regarding a release of the source code, so we decided to go through with it!

So for anyone interested, head over to the Demo Recorder section and enjoy!

-Fnordia

TA Demo open source?

Well, should we release the source?

Cast your vote in this TAU poll!

-Fnordia

New server

Well it would seem that we're still somewhat alive! The site has now been moved to a new server and should hopefully enjoy a little more stability. Download links and the message board should be working fine as well.

Anyway, I guess there isn't really much happening to write news about.. There has been a few bugreports about the 0.99b2 recorder and we might fix them sometime in a new version. But no promises.. :)

When transferring the site I found a directory of maps created by the famous abe of the swe clan (I think). I don't know if they are available anywhere else so if anyone is interested they can be found here.

That's it for this time! Stay tuned for the next update coming sometime this year perhaps!

-Fnordia

XTA site

Sensation has created a site dedicated to XTA, containing a forum, faq, recordings and a bunch of other things.. So click here to check it out!

-Fnordia

3D TA Sourcecode

SJ has released the sourcecode for the 3D replayer! You can find it in the demo recorder section.

-Fnordia

TA Demo Recorder 0.99b2

Here is the promised bugfix release of TA Demo 0.99. Click here to download it.

I think we fixed all reported recorder and replayer bugs. If you had problems with the 3D replayer, be sure to try this new version since it prints out more verbose error messages.

-Fnordia

Bugs in TA Demo 0.99

Just to clarify, there are quite a few bugs in the 0.99 version of the recorder. So at this time it is not really recommended that you install it. A fixed version should be ready in a day or two.

-Fnordia

Alright..

Well, it would seem like the teasing is now over..

TA Demo Recorder 0.99� featuring the 3D Demo Replayer!

You really should read the manual about how to use it. If you still have any questions or bugs to report please use our forum to tell us.

If you want to avoid restarting the 3D replayer a lot when you first start using it (since it takes a while before it has found all textures that TA uses) you can download this file and unzip it to the ta demo directory..

Have fun!

-Fnordia

Yet another bunch of screenshots

It's time for another batch of screenshots. This time it is the mod Final Frontier that is shown alongside with the latest progress on the 3d replayer.

Screenshot numero 1
Screenshot numero 2
Screenshot numero 3
Screenshot numero 4
Screenshot numero 5

-Fnordia

Phear the beelzebub

Yeha took a few pictures of the 3p unit called beelzebub:

Nr 1 and Nr 2

-Fnordia

A few more movie clips

Yeha did a few more movie clips, enjoy:

Movie Nr 1
Movie Nr 2
Movie Nr 3

These are encoded with DivX. Visit Divx.com if you don't know what that is..

-Fnordia

The end of missile towers

There has been a few complaints recently that we only show screenshots featuring missile towers.. So, now for something completely different: SWTA in 3D!

Walking thingy burning
A few happy troopers
And some flamethrowers!

And as a bonus, a first try at a short 3d-ta movie featuring a very shaky camera:

Bombs away

It may be a good idea to right-click on the movie and save it on your harddrive before watching it.. And it is encoded with MS MPEG-4 v2 so a recent windows media player is probably neeeded.

Oh, and stop misspelling us :P

From PA: "Yankspaneker Discussion Forum"
From TAU: "Fnorda goes and releases more screenshots"

What is the world coming to..

-Fnordia

Some more 3D-TA

Well, SJ is on vacation and Yeha is lazy so the progress on the 3d replayer has been a little slow lately. But here are some new screenshots showing trees and wreckages which are the latest additions:

Screenshot nr 1
Screenshot nr 2
Screenshot nr 3
Screenshot nr 4
Screenshot nr 5

-Fnordia

New 3dta screenshots and site moved

Here are a few new screenshots from the 3D Demo Replayer project showing off the recently added explosion and smoke effects. Taken from a few recent XTA battles:

Screenshot nr 1
Screenshot nr 2
Screenshot nr 3
Screenshot nr 4
Screenshot nr 5
Screenshot nr 6

Also, we have now moved our site to a more stable host. We have also set up our own forum, be sure to check it out and post comments!

-Fnordia

XTA 0.95

The wait is over! A prerelease version of Yxan's famous mod XTA has been released. Go to the XTA section of the site to download and read up on some of the changes!

-Fnordia

Download latest version of Spring

Maybe you have already seen the screenshots posted a few days ago (see below). Here's the real thing. Go get it on our download page...

Spring small demo is just meant to show how TA could look in 3d. No real interaction capabilites.

-Gnil

It's spring again! Sorta...

SJ has made some progress on Spring and here are some screenshots from the latest version. Click on an image below to enlarge...

-Gnil

3DO import/export for 3D Studio Max

YeHa has created some cool plugins for 3D Studio Max that allows you to import and export TA 3DO models with ease.

Check it out in our downloads section...

There is also a thread on this topic at the TAU message board...

-Gnil

TA Demo Beta 5

Hello again, we've just released beta 5 of TA Demo. Go to the Demo Recorder section and download it if you haven't already!

What's new in beta 5? Well...

• Some ally chat messages could be seen by enemies in previous versions of 0.98. Hopefully this bug is fixed now.
  
  
  
• A bug in tademo.ufo has been fixed. This bug caused TA to crash on the load screen on Win 2000 with Service Pack 2 installed! Maybe it also fixes some of the crash-on-loadscreen problems some people running Win 98 have experienced. We're not sure though, you'll have to try it yourself. Please tell us if it fixed anything for you!
  
  
  
• You can now see the color of the players in the resource bars. It is displayed as a small box. We tried to set the color of the player names also (as requested) but some names were impossible to see so we used boxes instead.
  

-Gnil

Where and how to report problems with 0.98

Well, here...

-Gnil

Beta 4 of the new TA Demo recorder

Ok, as most of you already know, we released a new beta of the 0.98 recorder some time ago. We didn't update the news though - or the recorder page - which caused some confusion. Well, better late than never...here is the news on the latest recorder! :-)

The latest beta, 0.98b4, fixes a number of problems. For example, ".ehaoff" and Ctrl-B should not crash TA any more :-) Check it out in the Demo Recorder section!

For those of you who haven't noticed already, here is a short list of the new features in 0.98...

• Shared line of sight.
  
• Shared map watch positions.
  
• Resource bars for allies.
  
• Whiteboard where allies can share drawings and markers.
  
• Integrated and improved TA hook functionality.
  
• Various other interface upgrade stuff, like selection of idle con units and 100+ unit queuing in the build menus.
  
• Commander warping.
  
• Ingame settings panel.
  
• Anti-cheat.
  
• Other misc. stuff

-Gnil

Next recorder version

Here's a picture showing some of the stuff we have been working on for the next version of the recorder. Click the image for a full size version (size is about 500kb).

Click for a fullscreen picture

-Fnordia

Links & Stuff

Well, not very much happening on the news front these days. But SY is still pretty much alive.

I don't really have anything to say though. Check out the recent news article on the BTU site for the latest happenings. :)

-Fnordia

New download

Yet again we wake up from our arctic slumber, this time with an early beta version of spring a game using some TA art.

-SJ

We have moved...sorta...

We are currently moving the SY site to TA Universe. This means we will finally have decent message board and perhaps even update the news page more frequently :-)

Many Krogoths goes to the TAU staff, especially Screamer, for hosting us and helping out with some stuff...

-Gnil

We are still here... whoa...

This time we're back with a brand new product in the infamous Spank-A-Yank™ series - Visualisatorn! Check it out in the downloads section...

-Gnil

We aren't gone, just a bit smaller. There are still 5 of us active :)
There is a new program in the download section called TNTPack that can shrink TA maps by up to 99% in lucky cases. Go there and download it. TAhook has been updated to version 0.85 too.

-Yxan

We are alive! :) Since it's been almost 3 months since the latest update, here's some fun news to make you all happy.

SY won CBL! And we didn't just win it, we did not lose a single game.. Not even the one we had to replay. :) Unfortunately the cbl page seems to have been removed by now.. ah well. Was fun.

New recorder! The promised small update to .96 got out of hands and became a new version instead. Here are some of the changes:

• Cheats get enabled when replaying games.
• You can see enemy chat when replaying a game!
• Lots of bug fixes :)

-Fnordia

A few small problems with the recorder has been discovered, so we are planning on releasing a patch sometime soon to fix them:

• Cheats usually don't get enabled when replaying games.
• Replaying of old games doesn't start. Try ".pos 1" and see if it works. Otherwise, try replaying with newtimermode disabled.
• Some people get frequent messages of "Exception in..", which of course is annoying. You can try typing ".logpl" in the lobby, that might help.

-Fnordia

The TA Demo Recorder version 0.96� has finally been released! You can get your copy in the demo recorder section. New features and stuff are as always listed in the readme, so don't forget to read it. :)

A brief summary of the new and exciting stuff should be in the old news, or you might go visit the Gnug page which has a nice preview. :)

And btw, we wouldn't mind if you linked to our site (http://welcome.to/yankspankers) instead of directly to the files, if you are planning on such a thing. Thanks!

Update: The download now works!

-Fnordia

Bla Bla Bla... New site up and running on new servers... This site won't look like this in the future, but hey, it works.. (I hope) :)

We have put up 26 of our GLE-pics, don't miss 'em.

We have also put up 23 new pics on some pretty cool hardware... The tech-details will be up soon (I hope again).

-Xagon

There has been quite some controversy at late over at the Strategy and Tactics board over at www.annihilated.com. Since plenty of SY members were involved, we will now provide you with some of the games that caused the sparks to fly. They are located over at the Spanks section.

While I'm at this I might as well say something about the next version of the recorder. My guess is that release 1.0 probably won't be released until Boneyards goes out of beta. But we will very likely release something in the meantime that adds some nice features such as being able to start recording a game while you are playing.. Stay tuned.

-Fnordia

New games to download! Watch SJ take on the strategy master himself, GreyWeasel. Check out the Spanks section for the download.

In other news, the SY page has now been online a whole month.. whee.. (or something)

-Xagon

The wait is over! Version 0.90� is now released. So head over to the download section and grab your copy today. And as always, remember to read the readme.txt

-Xagon

So where's the next version you might ask? Well since the Gnug page has been updated with info about 0.90, I figured it might be nice to actually mention it here too. Most of the stuff we want to include is done, so with a little luck it should be released in the next few days!

Here's some more fun stuff you can look forward to:

• Correct unitsync, no more weird messages.
• Lists what units where used in the game.
• No more memory leaks.

-Ekke

Added some games to download. I need to correct the namnes of the players.

Added some pics under "Cool Stuff" and fixed a "home" function on the menu.
Added the member Mindminder.

-Xagon

PHOTO: Göran Widerberg/Scanpix

The U.S. goalkeeper Bill Pearsson has the name of a Swede but he doesn't play like one. After the 11th goal he's totally finished.


USA easily beaten by Sweden

The yanks threw candy into the spectator crowd and videotaped the "party" in the stands. The Swedish players switched places, forwards played as defenders and vice versa. All this in the Bandy World Championship. It was pure parody when sweden, after crushing norway with 8-1, totally crushed the yanks with 11 to 0.

"You have to view it in the right perspective. The Swedes are professionals, and are worldchampions, we only play for the thrill, and most of us have paid for the trip by ourselfs. I think we played pretty well after all", says US's John Jensen.

For the Swedes the match was as an easy training pass, before the big game with Finland. "We just tried to avoid any injuries", says the assistant coach Kenth Hultqvist.

Eleven goals would have become more if the snow hadn't acted as a extra U.S. defender, and if the Swedes had taken the game even a bit seriously. But there was no need. It took 35 minutes before the USA made their first shot on goal, that speaks for itself.

Henrik Skiöld/TT

-Ekke

Added some more detailed info about the SY members. All members are not added yet, but they will be as soon as they mess some info...
U hear that all SY's :)

There's also been som minor updates on the download section.

-Xagon

New version of the TA Demo Recorder has been released! Get it at the Download page. And be sure to read the readme.txt to see what has been changed and fixed!!

Update by Fnordia

New on the hardware front: Xagon breaks the speed limit. Hits 416 Mhz at 2,2V with his dual Asus mb. Using real hardware tools, with the help of a knife and pure force he went wild on da celeron, tearing apart some of da pins (A121 A119 B119 B120).

Reporting live from the scene

-Ekke

Added a messageboard, not the best perhaps, but this will do until someone else comes up with something cooler...

-Xagon

After some complaints from a SY-member, we added
"The world famous silencers", For u with slower machines
(P2-350 and below, hehe) You should really get these files NOW man..

Finally... SY's site is up and running... Still there is more to come...
Be sure to bookmark this page (CTRL+D)

-Xagon

The readme.txt has been updated, and should now be a lot easier to follow.
Be sure to read it.

A recorder update that works with Microsoft Internet Gaming Zone has been released!
This is not a full release with a custom installer, so follow the instructions in the readme.txt to install this update.

Download version 0.71� (Recorder only) here:
recorder71.zip (44k)

-Fnordia

Start with reading the readme.txt which should answer most questions.

UPDATE: Really, read the readme.txt. We mean it! It's not like it is a complicated procedure to record and replay games.

Remember: It IS a BETA version. So it might not work at all for you.
The only thing that we can say is that it works for us, and all of the early testers.

If you are not happy with this, wait for the final version.

Oh, and don't forget to read the readme.txt.

Sample recorded games:

3ffa on sherwood (351k)	Featuring: Fnordia, SJ and Rock
3ffa on Red Triangle (637k)	Featuring: Fnordia, SJ and R-zrbt

These are test games though. Featured players' real life TA performance may be different.

Mail the authors:
SY_Fnordia <[email protected]> for replayer bugs
SY_SJ <[email protected]> for recorder bugs

-Fnordia