EE "Spodi's version" (updated July 21)

[Spodi]

Updated July 21th

**Left over To Do log:**

> ==============================================
> Key:
> - Untested / untouched
> ? Tested, could not recreate
> * Recreated, unable to fix / have not yet fixed
> ! Need elaborating on the problem
> ==============================================
> ? walk to the top of a map, it pushes the top of your head down
> ? when you login it says you have no characters but when you go back to the main menu and log in again there right there.
> ? If I click thunder and then click none I still hear the storm [Spodi's Note: Thunder? Storm? Huh?]
> ? If you pressed enter too many times, the server crashes with overflow also
> ? Most of my stuff in the NPC editor resets after i've applied it….......
> ? NPC DROP ITEMS - Value is always 1 and not what you set it as. [Spodi's Note: Tested it with stackable currency, it worked fine for me]
> ? I found an item bug. When I choose a sprite to represent the item, save and come back to the item, the sprite has reset to plain black. Help? [Spodi's Note: If you mean that items don't show the right graphic, it works fine for me]
> ? When mapping with the map editor using scrolling maps the tile you click to place is placed one or two squares up and to the left of where you click.
>
> ! Screen Res doesnt save [Spodi's Note: No idea how to set the screen res]
> ! can't see other peoples armor/equips unless they take it all off and put it all back on.
> ! can't go past 2 pages of items in the shop other pages are bugged
> ! Skill menu pages are bugged [Spodi's Note: In what way are they bugged?]
> ! when you open the key config thing and the window comes up with all the keys my little X to close it was off the screen and i could never get rid of it [Spodi's Note: I don't know enough about Eclipse to recreate this]
> ! when u buy or sell an item you should get a confirmation icon for check [Spodi's Note: What do you mean a confirmation icon? Like a messagebox confirmation saying if you want to sell / buy it? Seems like it'd be annoying to me ;)]
> ! Other characters on the screen have the wrong very top of their head on them (using 32x64 sprites w/ custom). [Spodi's Note: Not sure how to use that kind of sprite system]
>
> * can't see people attacking UNLESS they actually hit an npc [Spodi's Note: The way this is programmed in, it seems more like a feature than anything, and makes more sense to only show the attack when hitting something]
>
> ==============================================

**Changes of the last version:**

> Changes:
> - Added a conversion program for the accounts and converted some of the account values to longs to support more than 32767 items / currency, along with not crashing on more than 32767 exp
> - Added code that will track how much bandwidth is used per each packet ID
> - Fixed what I believe was all of the invalid packet IDs, along with removed those that weren't even being referenced by the server but sent to it
> - Fixed some small bugs… forgot what exactly : /

Sorry, I lost my change log when my comp crashed, so I had to try and recall what I did from memory. Seeing that I have bad memory, I couldn't really recall much obviously. :P

**My final suggestions:**
- Not sure if it is planned to be done when the engine rewrite is finished, but it would be very helpful to not only attract people but to show them how it is done and what can be done to give a few demo maps to come with the engine.
- Remove at least 90% of the graphic content, if not more. All that is needed is just that to show a demo, and nothing more. This will significantly decrease the download size, making it much more friendly for everyone, especially dial-up users. But more importantly, this will prevent Eclipse from having such a bad first view since it takes so long to load all of those graphics and allocate all that memory, especially for those who have 512 MB of less memory. If you want to give people those huge tile sheets, give them a separate link to download it and let them add it in themselves.
- More emphesis on the concept of More Graphics = More RAM Used. Some people fail to understand that, especially since that is how EE comes by default (with so many graphics). Even just a friendly little reminder in the graphics folder would work.
- Only use one type of compilation, that being Fast Code with the optimizations I left ticked. I am not sure how Small Code works, but I believe it just makes the code (executeable) itself smaller, not the RAM usage. Theoretically, it would be impossible for Visual Basic 6 to directly decrease the RAM to a point of even being significant since majority of the stuff it can't safely deallocate from memory unless told to do so. The only thing that causes the RAM problems is the graphics.
- A huge amount of bandwidth is taken from the map changing. Game admin should try their hardest to release a copy of the client with all the latest map versions for the client to prevent this.

**Important Notes:**

- There is a variable in the server, DebugPacketsOut, will track what packet ID uses how much bandwidth (going out from the server). This is vital for those of you who want to try and reduce bandwidth!
- You can convert from the EE version I got to this version, but you have to run the account conversion tool. It should be very easy to follow and take less than a minute.
- Some changes I made, those which are worth reading the code changes on, are marked with the prefix **'//!!**.
- In the client and server both, you will see this line of code:

```
    '//!! Temp error checking
    If Len(Parse(0)) > 1 Then
        MsgBox "Error on packet!" & vbNewLine & "Header: " & Parse(0) & vbNewLine & "Packet: " & Data, vbOKOnly
    End If
```
This is here for debugging only. In any release, please delete this or else it may cause you hassles!

**Download:**

http://www.freemmorpgmaker.com/Eclipse3.rar (15 MB)