Murakami Steamworks

Working USS Monitor Steam engine model

2011-07-21T23:44:00.001-04:00

Found this recently and thought it would be nice to share.

USS line officially updated

2011-06-27T23:55:00.003-04:00

All of our USS series is now updated to use all the improvements we have developed so far. These include...

Dial controls for all weapons and cameras allowing for 360° of turret and camera rotation

Eject button allowing crew to exit vehicle safely

Engines now have a simplified system of SLOW,HALF, FULL speeds reducing key presses needed to get to full speed

Flagpoles and other prims that obstruct firing are now phantom making it safer for ships like the USS Passaic to fire forward

Steam whistle added and activated by pressing UP or E

Ability to cut engine power by pressing DOWN or C

Arm/Disarm feature has been removed, ships are now armed at all times

Wake effect added for forward and reverse movements

We have a medium-class airship coming next to accompany our heavy Fafnir ship. After that the MSS Tyrann and MSS Fishkill will get a huge overhaul both visually and how they operate.

Also Sidney Arctor has finally released his destroyable ICS cannons and is donating all the proceeds to Relay for Life.

These cannons are a huge improvement over our ICS artillery, featuring dial controls for rotation and angling and awesome death & damage effects. It also scans to see if people are close and won't fire or repair unless you are close enough. You can find them here and I suggest you take advantage of this offer as he is offering both cannons and bunkers as a set for this event.

USS line gets massive overhaul

2011-05-09T22:40:00.005-04:00

Due to my concerns with the state of our current ironclads I have started work on doing a massive overhaul to all the ironclads. Currently the USS line is the first to get the makeover, and below you can see how much they have improved aesthetically ...

Sculpted hulls give the ships a more smooth, streamlined shape

More detailed and historically accurate texturing

The combination of sculpted prims and the fact that vehicles can now be 32 prims regardless of passenger count means ships can have more details like anchors and vents

Not only have the ships been upgraded visually, but huge improvements have been made to the HUDs and internal scripts. Some of these improvements include...

Dial controls for all weapons and cameras allowing for 360° of turret and camera rotation

Eject button allowing crew to exit vehicle safely

Engines now have a simplified system of SLOW,HALF, FULL speeds reducing key presses needed to get to full speed

Flagpoles and other prims that obstruct firing are now phantom making it safer for ships like the USS Passaic to fire forward

Steam whistle added and activated by pressing UP or E

Ability to cut engine power by pressing DOWN or C

Arm/Disarm feature has been removed, ships are now armed at all times

Wake effect added for forward and reverse movements

All of the USS line is complete save for the USS Queen of the West, however that should not take long as that is one of the simpler ships. Once that is complete these will all go into the update server. The MSS Ugly Duckling has also received the same makeover and will be updated at the same time as well.

After the USS line will naturally come the CSS line, followed by the fictional ships. I had wanted to start on some other things like the Miniclads game but as this is our staple product it takes priority, but don't worry I will eventually finish the game as it's 80% complete.

I also want to announce that we are discontinuing our line of coastal artillery, mainly because I have not had the time to keep up with upgrading it but as well as the fact that Sidney Arctor has already finished a much improved ICS artillery. Once he actually releases them I will have more details for you regarding this, but suffice to say from what I have seen they are a giant improvement.

Goblin update complete

2011-02-07T23:03:00.004-05:00

The Goblin has officially been updated to the new control system and received some very nice upgrades in the process. For starters the tank now has a machine gun, so you can deal with infantry or other unarmored targets. Also included is a better light with a nice looking light beam.

Another nice addition is the commander's position. Whoever decides to be the pilot can now take the commander's position at the turret and can steer the tank effectively in mouselook. Just be warned that you will be vulnerable to explosives and small arms.

Below is the new HUD for the tank. The new dial control method allows for more finer control over the camera and weapon systems. We also included a gunners HUD as well, which has only the basic controls needed for gunners. Technically they can use the commanders HUD if they want but it's better for gunners to use a simpler HUD if they can.

The Goblin now also comes with BNWCS and can toggle between that and ICS. Switching to BNWCS will turn ICS off and vice versa. We are new to BNWCS so not sure how well the HP value stacks up with other vehicles, but that is what we have updates for.

Fafnir Complete

2010-12-24T22:53:00.003-05:00

Murakami Steamworks first airship is now available at our shop. Many weeks went into this ship and now that it is complete all the new advancements it received will trickle down to all our other vehicles in the coming weeks as we slowly update everything.

Next on our list is the Goblin light tank which is getting a massive overhaul. In addition to the weapon and camera control improvements from the Fafnir, it will also be getting a machine gun installed on the turret for taking care of infantry. It will also be able to hold a third crew member who will take position at the turret hatch, such as a tank commander would. This makes driving in mouselook very fun, but on the flipside you will be exposed to enemy fire. Should be interesting...

For those curious what our roadmap is currently...

1. Complete Goblin overhaul (75% done)
2. Update artillery and AA guns to new dial controls and to re-balance them. -not started
3. Updated Miniclads game for sale (25% done)
4. Wyvern fighter plane (needs to float on pontoons correctly, 60% done)
5. Update naval vessels to use new Fafnir technology (huge update) -not started
6. Ammo swap system for all combat vehicles (shot, shell, grapeshot) -not started

Murakami Steamworks Returns

2010-12-16T13:30:00.007-05:00

Well after a small break Murakami Steamworks is back! We have been working on many projects in the backroom and now is a good time to show you what we have. First on the list is our airship Fafnir we talked about awhile ago... The ship has gone through many evolutions and is 99% complete...

The Fafnir is not only our first airship, but also carries with it many new enhancements to our vehicles as a whole and some of these are quite revolutionary (for us at least). For starters, the ship now has sculpted turrets in place of the 2 prim ones, saving us a massive 6 prims which we used to enhance the look of the ship. I have been able to grasp how to make complex sculpted prims as well as texturing thanks to Sidney Arctor who is an expert sculpter and indeed one of the best I have ever met. Check out his shop here if you would like to see his work. With my new skills I should be able to go back and reduce the prim count on many of our ships, allowing me to add some details I could not before.

We also changed the way movement controls work, in which instead of having engine speeds 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9... etc etc we simply have SLOW, HALF,FULL. This reduces the amount of times the pilot needs to press the forward/backward keys to get to their desired speeds as well as reduce the amount of overhead between the ship and HUD. We also got rid of the automatic turning so now you must hold down A or D to rotate the ship. This again reduces some overhead and makes turning more smooth and controlled. Ascending and descending work just like our submarines do.

Weapon controls are the biggest change, heavily reducing the complexity of aiming and firing. If you look at the picture above and zoom in on the HUD, You will see there are no aiming buttons for the cannons. This is because it uses a new dial method taking advantage of llDetectedTouchST. This means instead of having to click on say...6 buttons to control the angle, you can now just click anywhere on the dial to aim them and have 45 different angles instead of 6. Suffice to say this is huge, and it will make our monitor type ironclads 10 times easier to operate. MrBunwah originally had something like this rigged up way back when llDetectedTouchST was first introduced but because many of our customers were still using older clients they could not actually use this new method as it required a client upgrade.

The next big improvement also uses this new dial method. If you look at the center of the HUD you should see a circle dial with a smaller blue side dial next to it. This is the new camera system. The way it works is you press anywhere on the circle to rotate the camera in that direction relative to the ship, then you use the blue dial on the side to adjust your camera pitch. So instead of having to click on all those buttons for limited camera angles, you now only have 2 dials which can move the camera almost anywhere you want. This is huge, as the way SL utilizes cameras is terrible. Our ships have always been plagued with camera problems but with this new system we have finally fixed it and made it a viable alternative to simply using the click drag camera in SL.

Last but not least is the implementation of BNWCS into the ship, making this our first real dual combat system ship. It might take some updates to get it balanced right for BNWCS, but what we have now works very well and seamlessly with ICS.

Up next is our first fighter plane, the Wyvern. This plane will be unique in that it will not have 1 but 3 combat systems implemented. ICS,BNWCS, and TCS. This will make it a very versatile fighter that can engage almost anything else it comes across...except perhaps for VICE equipped vehicles (future update perhaps?). The Wyvern will also have an auto pilot mode that stays in the sim, useful if you need to go afk or type something up while in the air.

The picture above shows it with landing gear, but the final version will have pontoons allowing it to take off and land on the water. I may also incorporate our advanced camera system mentioned above if it proves to be useful, however I would like to have this be a HUDless vehicle if possible for ease of use... but who knows.

The final version will also have ICS/BNWCS bombs that it can drop on larger targets, as it's ICS machine gun rounds can't damage ships above 250HP. Like I mentioned before, I want this to be a very versatile fighter...

Last thing I want to show you is our medium tank, the Trollkin. Both our tanks will be getting a huge upgrade that will incorporate all the enhancements mentioned above. The Trollkin is the 2nd of a series of 5 tanks we plan on making. Light, Medium, Heavy, Mortar, Amphibious. The Trollkin will sport 2 machine guns for dealing with infantry, and a large howitzer for armored targets.

That's it for now! Will keep you posted when these are released.

Fleet Week 2010

2010-11-07T23:22:00.003-05:00

This year Fleet Week will be held in Steeltopia. If you are not familiar with this event, it's an annual gathering of all the steamland's navies in Second Life. There will be a shipbuilders expo and contest, races, mock battles, a naval review, and a uniform ball at the very end of the event. In other words if you have any interest in 19th or 20th century naval warfare in Second Life you have little reason not to attend. Below I have pasted the revised schedule of events...

FLEET WEEK 2010

The Second Annual gathering of
Second Life's Steamland Navies

Shipbuilder's Exhibition * Submarine Races
Tall Ship Races * Epic Ironclad Battles * Naval Review
Social Events and Uniform Ball

Steeltopia * November 13-20, 2010

************************************************
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 13

* Fleet Week Opening Ceremonies - 4:00 PM SLT
Excelsior Airship Docking
Hosted by Steeltopian Emperor, SteelCobra Calamari

A special event honoring the peacefully-gathered naval forces of the Steamlands.

* Shipbuilders' Expo and Shipbuilding Contest Begins
Port Tiburon

Shipbuilders offering ironclad-era nautical vessels will be set up along the piers and wharves of Steeltopia, offering their wares to the Public. The public may vote on their favorites throughout the week.

Harbor Master: Rachire Andel - Rachire will assist vendors in displaying their ships in an orderly manner. Please assist her by registering your intent to participate as a vendor.

Ship Building Contest Chairman: Wrath Constantine - Contact Wrath for details. Builders will show their skill and imagination, to be judged by a panel, TBD.

*Seaman's Ball - 11-13-10 Saturday at 6pm PST SLT
Pneumatic Revolution Lounge
Hosted by SteelCobra Calamari

A Celebration to open the weeks festivities. Music, dancing and merriment!
Uniforms and period dress encouraged.

**********************************************************

SUNDAY 11-14 thru WEDNESDAY 11-15

Shipbuilder's Expo continues... Random unplanned events may take place in the spirit of celebration!
We ask all vendors to vacate the docks by the end of Wednesday to accommodate setting up for the Melee Events.

**********************************************************
THURSDAY 11/18

* Ironclad Melee, 5PM SLT.
Port Tiburon
HOST: Steel Cobra Calamari

An epic naval skirmish featuring the navies of the steamlands, slugging it out on the open ocean. Behold the power and glory of the assembled navies. Rumor has it that the latest examples in lighter-than air naval support vessels will also be supporting their nautical units...

Participant navies are asked to register with Robin Sprocket or SteelCobra Calamari prior to the event. SteelCobra will make available the Rules of Engagement to participants. Please direct scheduling concerns, etc. to SteelCobra Calamari.

*********************************************************
FRIDAY 11/19

* Belly Up Performance - 12:15PM
Excelsior Airship Docking
HOST: Elleon Bergamasco

Please come enjoy a performance by the renowned mermaid dance troupe, Belly Up. It's a cultural treat and a fitting prelude to the spectacle of the Fleet Review!

* Fleet Review, 1PM SLT.
Obsidian Sea Event Seating
HOST: Justinian Huszar

The state-based navies of the Steamlands, in their finest regalia, proceed on a course taking them past reviewing stands. The Public is invited to attend.

**************************************************************
SATURDAY 11/20

* Windjammer Race, 12 noon SLT.
Port Tiburon
HOST: Aevalle Galacia
CHAIRMAN: SteelCobra Calamari

Tall ships and wind-powered vessels to compete in this yachting race, before cheering crowds gathered on viewing stands. Trophies will be on hand for the winners.

Please register for this event with Robin Sprocket or SteelCobra Calamari. SteelCobra will make available the rules for competitors.

* Submarine Races, 2PM SLT
Obsidian Sea Event Seating
CHAIR: Rachire Andel

The finest submariners - and their daring mechanical marvels - will line up to compete against each other in this underwater tournament. The Public is invited to view the races from the specially-built underwater viewing stands. Appropriate dress is encouraged.

Please register for participation in this event with Rachire Andel. Rachire will make available the rules of the contest to participants.

* Highland Ball at Piermont Landing , 6PM SLT
Wheatstone Waterways
HOST: Breezy Carver

The public is invited to attend a inter-Steamland nautical-themed Ball hosted by Breezy Carver at Piermont Landing in New Babbage. Naval uniforms for officers and sailors are encouraged. Shipbuilding awards and race winners will be honored.

Murakami Steamworks takes to the skies

2010-06-17T02:03:00.003-04:00

We at Murakami Steamworks have almost finished construction of our first airship Fafnir! We currently have a working beta being tested by several people right now and will have it ready for release soon. The ship will be a medium sized airship armed with a total of 12 guns on 6 rotating turrets. Once the Fafnir is complete, it will serve as a base for the rest of our airships. Along with this ship we are looking to construct a light scout type, a heavy type, and a carrier type with fighters to go along with it. Also we will probably need to update the AA gun, as tests show it's balanced against fighters but is overpowered against slower airships.

Ship changes in our latest update

2010-04-27T12:03:00.004-04:00

Our update of ships to ICS 3.1 made some subtle and not so subtle changes. Below is a list of some of the more radical changes that were made.

Universal changes

- All ships and artillery now use the new splash and explosion effects. This applies to cannonball splashes, mortar explosions, spar torpedo explosions, and underwater explosions

-All ships now have their scripts recompiled back to LSL for improved performance

-All ships now use ICS 3.1 combat cores. ICS 3.1 has new minimum damage rules meaning if you do less than 1% damage to a ships core it rounds to zero doing no damage at all. This rule resulted in numerous ship changes and put some of them temporarily out of commission. These will be listed below

-All ships have had their speeds adjusted to be much more realistic. Calculations were done to convert SL m/s to knots more accurately, meaning all ships going at speed 5 will all be going roughly 5 knots and should not be able to pass each other. This change will make some ships slower and some faster as a result

-All surface ships now have the ability to do at least some damage while ramming, such as the monitor class ironclads (Note that ships not specially designed for ramming take massive risks in doing so). This does not apply to the CSS David, Goblin tank or the submarines

Tank changes

- Goblin tank had its HP increased to 350 and had it's medium cannon switched out for a heavy. The HP change was made so that the tank would not be as susceptible to small arms fire and the medium cannon was proven to be too weak during later field tests

Ironclad Ship changes

- CSS Atlanta's spar torpedo now has it's own arm/disarm button so you can raise/lower it while still keeping the guns out. Also, the spar torpedo is now a one use weapon with no reload. The scripts actually delete them selves when it is used, meaning you need to rerez the ship to use it again. This was done for balancing purposes (Note the CSS David and H.L Hunley spar torpedoes can still reload and be reused)

- MSS Fishkill's double gatlings were replaced with double medium cannons. This was done due to the new minimum damage rules that came with ICS 3.1 that would have made it unable to defend itself from medium to large ships

- INS Redemption's single gatling gun was replaced with a single medium cannon for the same reasons as above

- USS Essex's small cannons were upgraded to mediums and it's mediums were upgraded to heavies as a result of the minimum damage rule specified above

-USS Queen of the West's small cannons were upgraded to mediums as a result of the minimum damage rule specified above

-MSS Menkar can now ram using both Stern and Bow

Submarine changes

- MSS Holland had it's machine guns removed for two additional torpedo launchers, giving it four total now. Also ammo count was increased to 26 torpedoes. This was done due to the new minimum damage rule specified above

- MSS Fiskdale was finally released. A demolition type submarine equipped with two torpedo launchers and 8 explosive charges that can be detached from the hull to act as depth charges or floating mines. Explosive charges should work in all types of sim water levels now

- All subs have new torpedo and depth charge explosion effects

Steelhead ships

-Due to the fact that all the Steelhead ships we made rely heavily on gatling guns in one way or another, we will need to rework them so that they fit properly with the other ships in ICS 3.1. They will still work with ICS 3.1 ships at the moment, but the gatling guns will not work on ships above 250HP. After we finish our current submarine commission we will go back to the drawing board and give these ships a nice facelift.

And that about does it for the big changes. I apologize if I missed something, you can imagine how hard it can be to manage the 40+ items in our catalogue. If you notice any bugs in the new update please send Justinian Huszar or MrBunwah Murakami a notecard or IM.

SCSE Orca and MSS Kaitos submarines

2010-04-27T11:25:00.007-04:00

We have just released a special type of exploration sub that does not need a HUD to control. It started off with a commission from the Steeltopian Empire for an exploration submarine for their Steeltopian Consortium of Scientific Endeavors or SCSE. When we took on this project we wanted to create an improved version of the Auriga with a very spacious interior, unlike most 32 prim subs that have you crammed in a small compartment. We also wanted to try a hudless control method with the ship, and seeing as the ship has no weapons controls this would be very doable. So, remembering that we could use llDetectedTouchUV we created a simple control panel for the new sub...

This sub has an engine on and an engine off button, as well as two buttons to control the hatches for letting people in and out of the sub. Also knot speed is displayed as hovertext, so you get all the information you need to control the sub while in mouselook. Using this technology, we may be able to make some of our ships hudless, most notably the submarines. In fact... with a combination of hovertext and audio clues, pilots would be able to receive all the information they need in terms of speed, depth, turning, fuel & ammo amount, hull damage etc etc etc. The only issue is that certain types of weapons systems such as turreted cannons will be very hard to operate as the pilot must essentially be in mouselook the whole time, but I have a feeling if the pilot house and control panel were designed correctly and were adapted to the ship properly then this control system could work quite well.

The advantages of such a system are pretty obvious. Without the need for the ship and HUD to talk to each other you reduce the amount of communication overhead, meaning the ship will be much more responsive (the new sub has already proved this). Another advantage is that you do not have a HUD cluttering up your screen space, which can be annoying to some people. And then of course there is an added sense of realism of actually sitting in front of a control panel as opposed to a floating one in the corner of your screen.

Coal Torpedoes: Fun with Sabotage

2010-04-05T21:10:00.003-04:00

This post will be one of several that introduce non-conventional weapons used during the Civil War that many of you may not have known about (and there was a lot of them!). This one will deal with Coal Torpedoes, which were an old-fashioned IED used by the Confederates.

From Wikipedia...

"The coal torpedo was a hollow iron casting filled with explosives and covered in coal dust, deployed by the Confederate Secret Service during the American Civil War, and intended for doing harm to Union steam transportation. When shoveled into the firebox amongst the coal, the resulting explosion would at the very least damage the boiler and render the engines inoperable, and at most cause a catastrophic boiler explosion that would kill crewmen and be likely to start a fire that would sink the vessel."

"The torpedoes were manufactured at the 7th Avenue Artillery shop (across the street from Tredegar Iron Works) in Richmond, Virginia, in January 1864. The manufacturing process was similar to that used for artillery shells, except that actual pieces of coal were used as patterns for iron castings. The walls of the coal shell were about 3/8 inch thick, creating a hollow space inside sufficient to hold 3–4 ounces of gunpowder. After filling, the shell was closed with a threaded plug, then dipped in melted beeswax and rolled in coal dust, creating the appearance of a lump of coal. Finished coal torpedoes were about 4 inches (10 cm) on a side and weighed 3–4 lb (1.5–2 kg). "

"The size and powder charge of the coal torpedo was similar to a 6 pound Shrapnel shell (a hollow, four-inch cannonball containing gunpowder and 24 musket balls as shrapnel) or the equivalent of three Civil War-era hand grenades. Even so, the explosion of a coal torpedo under a ship's boiler would not by itself be sufficient to sink the vessel. The purpose of the coal torpedo was to burst the pressurized steam boiler, which had the potential to cause a tremendous secondary explosion. Boiler explosions were not uncommon in the early years of steam transportation, and often resulted in the complete destruction of the vessel by fire. In action, the coal torpedo would leave little evidence that a boiler explosion was due to sabotage."

Due to the nature of such a weapon, it's hard to tell just how effective these really were. During the beginning of steam powered transportation, boiler explosions were common as the technology was just in it's infancy. Also, when a boiler exploded it usually resulted in a fire that completely destroyed the ship so evidence was hard to come by.

Moving

2010-03-06T11:33:00.002-05:00

Murakami Steamworks is moving its offices to Steeltopia, setting up shop in the new sim that will be coming soon. I believe the name of it is Pythagoras Airbase but it may change before it is officially set. The reason for this change is that Cape Wrath is starting to get crowded, with new islands popping up in front of our office. It takes a while to render everything due to the many houses surrounding ours, and while we like to have a location in a nice high traffic area we really need more room to breath and a good amount of water to play in.

The sim we will be moving into will be very open, with half of it being water. The other half will be a giant airbase for the Steeltopian Airforce, so that will be interesting. The nice part about this location is it serves as a home base as well as a sandbox as before we could not really test out our ships at our home location, having to teleport somewhere with enough water first. It also allows us to build our dream home that we have been craving for so long...a floating house in the middle of the sea. Once we finish construction of the shop we will post pictures (and yes, there will be plenty of breakable glass in our new office).

As for our updates, expect to have them finished during the end of spring break. That should give us enough time to update the 40+ items we have in our catalogue.

ICS 3.1 updating

2010-02-25T01:17:00.003-05:00

While going through the ship updates, we saw the opportunity to add a lot of really nice features and improvements to the ships. Below is a list of what is being added...

1. All ships and coastal artillery will have splash effects on the cannonballs when they hit the water. Most of the ships already have this feature but it needs to be added to the coastal artillery. Also we made improvements to the splash effect and it now occurs in most kinds of water sims, such as 40m or 60m water levels.

2. Explosion effects have been given a new makeover, rezzing a large blast prim that shows you exactly what the blast radius is of the explosion. 10 meter range explosives will rez a 10x10x10 sphere and so on. The effect looks great and can be seen from very long distances. There will also be underwater explosion effects for depth charges and torpedos.

3. Spar torpedo ships will now rez a nice big splash prim when their torpedos strike so it's easier to see what you hit as well as not leaving the enemy wondering what just hit them.

4. CSS Atlanta will have the new effect mentioned above, as well as a change in it's spar torpdeo functionality. The spar torpedo on it is now a one use weapon and can not be reloaded or rearmed. Once used it is completely disabled and the prim work for it is moved inside the ship. Also a second arm/disarm button was added allowing you to arm/disarm the spar torpedo only. These changes were made to restore balance as well as make it easier to use the ram without worrying about the spar getting in the way.

5. All ships will have their speeds adjusted to more closely resemble their true knot speeds. Some ships are labeled to go at 7 knots but may really only be able to go at 5 knots. Using a speedometer I have been able to measure the speed in m/s and convert it directly to knots, so all the ships will be more realistic in their speeds. This means that some of the larger ships will most likely be able to go faster. Theoretically if 2 different ships both go at 7 knots on their HUDS, they should not be able to outpace each other now.

6. All the ships will now take advantage of the ICS 3.1 sleep/wake system. If you turn the ship engines off, this will put the core into sleep mode and make it immune to damage. Turning the engines on wakes the core back up. (this feature seems like it could be abused rather easily, so we might add a engine cooldown period that takes several seconds but still leaves you vulnerable... we might have second thoughts about this feature, will need to think about this one)

7. Coastal artillery cannons will be given finer angle adjustments as well as a slightly lower velocity, allowing them a wider range of points they can hit.

We don't have much planned for UCS right now as we are mainly concerned about getting all our vehicle updates done. The UCS protection system for ICS works fine, but we are hesitant to use it fully at the moment and will most likely just give infantry 100% protection inside the ironclads. We would need to figure out a way to have the ship be disabled somehow when the UCS pilot is killed, but at the moment you can still operate the ship even if you are killed.

Eventually we will be working on UCS grapeshot rounds for use against infantry which should be fun to test. Speaking of testing, we found out that ramming DOES work against UCS infantry, but the system thinks they are a ship and not a person, resulting in the rammer taking a crap load of damage. Below is what happened when I crashed my Goblin equipped with a heavy ram into MrB wearing UCS...

New Explosives Testing

2010-02-21T23:35:00.005-05:00

Explosives in ICS battles have always been a bit of mixed bag. While they generally are pretty effective at destroying whatever they hit, it's very hard to tell if they hit anything at all unless you see something get damaged. The blast radius was always invisible, with no real way to tell what was caught in it. Well not anymore....

That is a 15x15x15 blast prim effect that will be rezzed along with the explosive prim that goes off. The result is a clear indicator of the blast radius! Another nice part is it has glow and lighting enabled, making it easy to see from a distance. This is similar to the water splash effect that was added to the cannonballs when they hit the water, the point being to add better indicators to rounds so fighters can get more tactical information on the battlefield. Expect to see all explosives in our next update look like this. Also all of the cannonball rounds that did not have splash effects will have them as well.(I think the only ones that don't have splash effects are the coastal artillery)

Note: This explosion effect is not part of ICS 3.1. This is something we are adding to our explosive rounds at Murakami Steamworks. However we will be packaging these special exploding effects as well as our splash effect rounds into one freebie package and making them available at all our vendors so ICS developers can grab them and use them for their own builds.

Observable from over 180meters away...

Anti-Aircraft gun and ICS 3.1

2010-02-18T18:37:00.004-05:00

Well we have finally completed work on the Anti-Aircraft gun. This artillery piece is bit of a departure from our other ones. This gun does not use any buttons, instead forcing you to actually sit on it and use your movement keys to control angle and rotation. Based on the tests we have done with it, it should be able to hold back most airships and give fighters something to worry about.

Also ICS 3.1 was just released, and also brings with it a beta version of the new UCS (Urban Combat System) for infantry fighting. The nice part is UCS is fully compatible with ICS, meaning vehicle versus infantry combat. Some nice additions to ICS include...

- Added support for 'covering' avatars using the UCS system. This allows the ship to specify what degree of protected avatars in them are against explosions outside the ship.

- Added ability to put ICS core to sleep and wake it up again with link messages, so that docked ships can be made immune from vandalism.

- Shaped explosives now take ship height into account, instead of calculating whether the ship was in the shape based on a plane.

- Explosive scripts and cannon shells have been converted back to LSL2 instead of mono, amid growing concerns regarding the lag that mono scripts cause the sim on initial rez.

We will be performing some initial tests with ICS/UCS to make sure everything is working properly. Once we have tested the new system we will begin updating all of our products. Take note that due to the scope of the update, everything will need to be updated in our catalogue. That includes ships, artillery, tanks. This could take some time... but the payoff will be well worth it. Once we release our next update we will post here again to remind everyone to update to the latest versions.

Information on Regularly Scheduled Ironclad Combat Events in Second Life

2010-02-17T14:01:00.001-05:00

VIRTUAL CORDITE AND STEEL

Regular battles using the ICS Combat system are held in many locations in Second Life. The original, and I dare say best known, might be THE IRON MELEE, which started in Roatan on the edge of the Blakes Sea about a year ago.

THE IRON MELEE continues to thrive, but has transitioned from one location (Roatan) to several, in order to spread the gospel of 19th century naval combat around Second Life. Hotspur O'Toolecan be contacted for the current location at any given week, just IM "hotspur otoole" in world.

At the moment, we are holding events on Thursday evenings as per usual at the usual time of 730 PM SLT, but the hosting is split up between myself, Justinian Huszar, AngusGraham Ceawlin and Sharrah Bredel. Our current battle launch locations are:

Sanctuary Rock at Blake's Shore (for naval battles) Sanctuary Rock takes advantage of the Blake Sea Contested Waters (BSCW) battle circle which includes events which will take place in the four Linden Lab owned Contested Water sims (Blake Sea: Kendra, Thunderer, Cannonade, and Beaufort)and the privately owned sims: Blake Coast, Blake Shore, and Blake Cove, Roatan, ZATZAi and Artificial Ilse. See a map, HERE. For more information, view the Blake Sea Contested Waters blog, run by Nber Medici

Port Merrimac at Roatan (for land and naval battles). This is part of the Blake Sea Contested Waters Battle Circle

Sanctuary Shoals Pier (for naval battles, SLURL Forthcoming)

in addition, Steeltopia hosts BATTLESTORM SATURDAYS at Obsidian Pier, Port Tiburon in Steeltopia. Battles are roughly the same format as Iron Melee Thursdays, on Saturday Nights. Contact Steelcobra Calamari in world for details. (Slurl forthcoming)

If you have a relatively lag free location with a lot of water in it and a desire to play naval combat games in world, please contact either myself (Hotspur Otoole) or AngusGraham Ceawlin in world, and we'll try out your location in the rotation.

Keep your powder dry!

Hotspur

Some Holiday Treats: A tank and a freebie

2009-12-25T23:34:00.004-05:00

Our first ICS compliant tank is now available. I have dubbed it the Goblin, a name I find appropriate due to it's small size and green color. It is a light tank, fast and maneuverable. It also makes a great starting point for more advanced tanks that I have planned out. You can find it for sale at our Caledon Cape Wrath office here. Below are some pictures...

(So cute!)

(The Goblin has extra armor in the front as well as the sides thanks to the new hard/soft point system introduced in ICS 3.0.)

(I plan on adding weak points to the exposed engines and boilers on all our vehicles from here on out. It adds a nice strategic element I think. Shown here is the Goblins weak spot, doing double damage to the tank if it gets hit in the boiler. Make sure you protect that weak spot!)

We also have available our first freebie ironclad ship the MSS Ugly Duckling. We have gotten a lot of requests for something like this and what better time then the holidays to release it? This will help when we have new recruits just jumping in who want to participate in the big ironclad battles. Even though the Ugly Duckling can't go toe-to-toe with any of the other ships, it can still play a very good support role and give the new recruit something to test drive in. The Ugly Duckling vendor crates will be sent out to most places that have our vendors set up. We also have it available at our shop if you can't find it anywhere else. Below are some pictures...

(Ugly but still kinda cute.)

(Ok so she has some damage...hey it's free quit whining!)

(This is an inside view. I didn't have time to patch some of those bullet holes up. Hey no biggie it's above the water line.)

The Trouble With Mono

2009-12-12T19:56:00.003-05:00

We are recompiling all of the ships back to LSL and will soon release a V14 update. The reason for this is because mono has severe issues in regards to initiation overhead and anything mono that is rezzed or enters a sim severely cripples it. More details can be found here...http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-3895

You have no idea how frustrating it is to have put all that work in these ships only to find out they don't run very well in a group battle. At least I know what the biggest problem is now so I can properly fix it. We also have been working on reducing the HUD to ship talk so the combination of these two methods will make battles much smoother.

We tested 3 LSL compiled ships using these methods in Obsidian Sea and found that border crossings to be much less painful, as well as the ships generally being more responsive as a whole. This will also do wonders for the machine gun equipped ships, as every single bullet they fire is mono, meaning massive overhead issues for the sim. This is often why in large melees the gatlings will get stuck firing in a loop and cripple the sim.

I would advise anyone who makes ICS compliant vehicles or weapons to try recompiling them back to LSL and see how much they improve. If you type crtl+shift+1 inworld you can measure the statistics and see it for yourselves. Note that this issue only concerns rezzing or sim border crossing. If you have something that is static and stays in one place, it should be just fine in mono.

Also note that if anything you wear has mono scripts in them, such as hair-resizers or AOs then they will cause considerable damage when you cross a sim border. Most hair-resizers have the option of killing all the scripts inside once you have it set the way you like it, however for AO issues I might recommend the Emerald viewer here...http://modularsystems.sl/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3&Itemid=8

The reason why I recommend Emerald viewer is because it has a built in AO system, meaning you do not need to wear any scripts because it is all handled in the client. Not sure how much that actually helps but it is certainly worth a shot, if not for that then for the many other useful features that come with Emerald.

One last thing. It seems there are several alternatives for XStreet available.

http://www.osgrid.org/elgg/pg/generalstore/ -collection of freebie items

http://www.apez.biz -offers many more features such as banking, vendor systems, etc

http://www.texturesrus.net -offers over 80,000 individual textures

http://www.slapt.me/ -another nice alternative with over 18,000 items

Hmmm Apez.biz looks very promising, we will keep an eye on that one.

Farewell to XStreet

2009-11-23T13:05:00.005-05:00

As should be no surprise to anyone, we at Murakami Steamworks will be removing all of our items from XStreet. For those interested about what brought us to do something like this, take a look at Hotspur O'Toole's recent blog post and also take a look at this Linden Labs Official FAQ on the matter to get the details.

Not sure what exactly brought about this push to drive small niche markets out of XStreet but I think greed would be the best guess. In most monetary systems power is regulated to a very small elite group while the majority are left to suffer. The little people are not really given a choice, the elite choose for them and say “we know what's best for you, just let us handle everything”. Sadly this happens both in SL and in real life, and the result is that creativity suffers.

I also find the excuses they use to be rather odd. One of the main problems they have is the fact that these freebies and cheepies clutter up the product listings. So when someone does a product listing by lowest price, the freebies show up first... This is something that could easily be solved by simply moving all 0L items into their own category and not have them listed at all in the normal product listings. There are many solutions that could have been implemented to the site in order to make searching easier. One has to wonder if they were really truly considered...

Another excuse they have is the fact that these freebies force merchants to lower prices on certain items. I guess they never heard of competition? I don't particularly see why any of us should care if someone has to lower their prices or not. Why should a shopper buy a stupid 2000L item when they can find a nice product that's cheaper and works better? I have actually seen this on many occasions. [NB from MrB: hell, sometimes the 2000l$ item just plain sucks from the get go]

Then there is the whole idea of charging a fee just for listing items on XStreet. Considering the amount of items we have up, it would be around 300-400L every month just to have them listed. Granted this is not a huge deal for us, but one has to wonder if this is just a way to make extra money for nothing. How long was SLX up for? 3-4 years? They never had to charge that much. I think they only took like 5% commission on everything you sold, that's it. [NB from MrB: it should have been removed when LL bought them] They managed just fine, but apparently it costs a lot to list all that stuff on XStreet! Sorry but I can't help but roll my eyes on this one. I wish they would tell us the exact costs of listing those items... I think we would find them to be rather negligible.

So in the end we can probably still list our items on XStreet and profit from it, but out of principle we have chosen to withdraw everything. I have a feeling if enough merchants pull out it may scare LL back to their senses and force them to reconsider. I also found the timing kind of funny as I am currently working on a nice freebie ironclad that I would have liked to place on XStreet, however it will still be available at our shop when it is done. In the meantime, I suggest all of you go on XStreet and gobble up as much freebies as you can as they most likely won't be up for much longer.

Oh and if you know of any alternatives to XStreet let us know!

Anti-Aircraft Gun

2009-11-18T21:26:00.003-05:00

Finished modeling a nice AA gun for dealing with pesky airships. The design is modular meaning I can remove the long barreled cannon and replace it with a gatling gun which I will most likely do as another variant. The whole thing is only 42 prims which is pretty nice considering our other artillery pieces are around 35 prims.

The control mechanism for this gun will be a bit different in that there will be no HUD or buttons to press. You use the keyboard controls to move and fire the gun. This will make it a bit easier to get a bead on aircraft and it will also force the user to remain stationary, unlike the other guns where the user can run around and operate the gun from 20 meters away. Hopefully if this works out we can use the same method for the other artillery pieces.

Fleet Week at New Babbage

2009-11-16T17:02:00.004-05:00

Murakami Steamworks will be participating in the events during Fleet Week in New Babbage (Nov 15th-21). For the ship exhibition we have two of our ships displayed, the CSS Virginia and USS Monitor. Both can be seen docked here.

We decided on these two ships because they were some of our first and we are very proud at how they both turned out.

Also during the Fleet Week event there will be a large melee featuring many of the steamlands as well as a Fleet Review of the official navies. Both me and MrBunwah will be attending but will not be flying the Wrath Exiles colors at the request of the Commodore.

Murakami Steamworks Anniversary Party

2009-11-13T01:00:00.006-05:00

We are having our 2 year anniversary party up at Eva's Isle of Skye skyplatorm. Come join us on Saturday, November 14th at 7-9PM SLT. Also if you remember our little experiment at Burning Life 2008 ( mini RC ironclad minigame) it is making a return at our party, but this time it is much more polished.

Update complete

2009-11-08T02:03:00.003-05:00

The last update is finally done. We made quite a number of tweaks to all of the ships, especially the turreted types. We reverted back to the sundial control method, making those ships much easier to operate. Also all the guns now have a marker on the HUD that points in the direction they are aiming, including the turreted ships.

We also cleared up some bugs, such as the USS Roanoke going phantom and none of the ships being able to rearm after depleting their ammo. There was also an issue with some turreted ships not rotating correctly but with the new control method this was cleared up.

This will be the last update we make to these ships as they are pretty much as good as they are going to get now. We COULD have added some extra effects, but we did not feel it necessary to add anything else to these ships as they are very complex as is...the homesteads can barely handle them. The only other update that may come is the addition of grape-shot rounds added to the ships, but this will have to wait until UCS (Urban Combat System) is released to see if it is really viable.

We have three more ships left to complete before we move on to other ventures. The Wrath Exiles will be getting a custom ironclad that will be armed with unconventional weaponry, A more advanced exploration sub will be made in MSS and SCSE variants, and a supply ship is in the works that will provide ammo and fuel services to other ships at sea. After these ships are complete we will move on to other projects such as tanks, airships and field artillery.

The sundial controls make a return

2009-10-16T18:17:00.002-04:00

Due to the recent changes to the HUD in the form of the turret direction markers, we will be experimenting with the old sundial method of turret control. This method used preset rotations instead of the math based format they use now. By doing this, we can reduce the amount of overhead as well as make it more user friendly for people who had complaints with the monitor type ironclads.

The whole reason why the old method caused so much lag was the fact that each blue direction button had to talk to each other in order to light up the current direction button as green. That was the only to identify what direction the turret was facing, other than moving your camera around the ship. However we now have a small marker that rotates to point what direction the turret is facing so now all those blue sundial buttons don't have to communicate with each other.

We will do some field tests to be sure that this method is more responsive and then integrate it into the current update.

Update on the Update

2009-10-07T20:20:00.002-04:00

Well RL is becoming quite the obstacle but we are making good progress. Most of the sound and particle effects are already in place, although some aspects were cut out because they were not very relevant or too over the top. Some other nice changes are being made such as making the damage indicators on the HUD easier to see. All the HUDs now show exactly where the guns are pointing, both for casemated ships and monitor type ships so that will be nice for some of the folks who had complaints about that. We are also thinking about making the HUD full perms so they can tweak it however they like.

We changed all the double guns turrets to use one sculpt prim instead of two regular prims so that will free up some prims, especially for ships like the USS Roanoke. There was also a bug in some of the ships which prevented them from reloading if they expended all their ammo which is now fixed.

Won't be long now, maybe another week or two. Then we can work on those Wrath Exile ships.

The Sight and Sound update

2009-09-16T18:15:00.003-04:00

While working on the sight and sound update, we received a little surprise in the form of a custom explosives kit sent by Kandace. This kit will allow us to alter the explosives damage, range and taper. This will be very useful for balancing out all the explosives we use, such as the new rocket launcher systems we are working on now, and it will make mortars less of a dominator on the battlefield. I still want to experiment with shrapnel based explosives later but for now this will work very nicely.

As for our update...I am almost done with the sound part and it looks like there will be a total of 47 different sound effects. Below is a picture of them all organized for easy playback.

Red = firing sounds
Yellow = exploding sounds
Blue = engine/ambient sounds
Green = random ship noises
Orange = weapon operation

For now we plan to finish this update and include the changes to the explosives in it. Sometime during or after we will release the Wrath Exile ships.

INS Right to Rule: Capital ship of the Imperial Navy of Steeltopia

2009-08-28T02:07:00.006-04:00

We have finished construction of the INS Right to Rule, and it is without a doubt our most impressive ship to date...

NAME: INS Right to Rule
BUILDER: Murakami Steamworks
TONNAGE: 8993 tons
DIMENSIONS: Length 50m. Beam 12m. Draft 14m
ARMOR: 2000HP combat core
ARMAMENT: 4x E.Heavy gun. 4x V.Heavy gun
COMPLEMENT: 3
MAXIMUM SPEED: 8 knots

She is also equipped with a fireworks launch system shown below...

And in the national colors too!

To understand just how big this ship is, here are some shots of her in formation with her sister ships Miranda, Defiant and Redemption...all vessels unique to the Steeltopian Navy

With this juggernaut complete the stalwart nation of Steeltopia can truly call itself a naval power!

Last batch of ships planned out

2009-08-17T23:11:00.004-04:00

Summer is almost over and we plan to get the last batch of ships out so we can work on all the other neat stuff we have planned. The Steeltopian commission that we are currently working on is almost complete (more details on that when it's released). After that we have the troop transport which after some thought I have decided to change a bit. It will be fairly small, about twice the size of a torpedo boat and will carry between 5-6 people. I was originally planning to make a giant sidewheeler that could deploy rowboats, but I like this idea better. It will be agile and have good speed, and because it has an open top you can simply beach the ship and jump out. Great for quickly getting marines deployed.

Next is the Wrath Exile's line of ships, which will be quite different from the other types of ships available. Below are some pictures that Commodore O'Toole sent me in regards to the styling he would like for these ships... (note the number of cannons)

So basically, these ships will have an ungodly amount of firepower at their disposal. The central theme of these ships would be "glass cannon", meaning they would have a very high damage output but would also be rather vulnerable themselves. The ships would be rusty and have exposed machinery near the stern, so a direct hit on those parts would mean double or triple damage to the ship (don't let ships sneak up behind you!). We may also include the ability to temporarily boost engine and have it go 20 knots for a short amount of time. The trade off would be that this damages the engines and eats much more fuel.

The last ship will be an exploration sub, one that uses the Fiskdale hull we had to scrap due to the weapons system not working right. It will be made much bigger, and the internals of the ship will be much more detailed like the Auriga. In fact this ship is really a successor to the Auriga, with the ability to seat several passengers. I plan on adding some more features to this ship however, such as....

working searchlights that can be toggled on/off as well as move up/down and left/right
working hatch on top so people can jump in and out of the ship
have the ability to apply your own logo on the sides of the hull
ability to deploy and pick up divers by way of a second hatch on the bottom of the hull

Not entirely sure if I will be able to get to the Fiskdale in time, but I will definitely try.

Union ships go live

2009-07-31T01:45:00.002-04:00

All the Union ships are now updated and released, and the new USS Queen of the West is up for sale. If you have an older version of these or the Confederate ships please please please make sure you can update them to our new ICS3 versions. If you are having any problems getting the updates working IM MrBunwah Murakami as he handles all that.

We have noticed that during battles we still see some people using older versions of our ships even with the updates out. We have tested all the updates and we are able to get them to work, so make sure you are able to get yours to work. You just need to drop the ship on the ground and wait several seconds. If you are not sure if you have the latest version of a ship, check to see what version of ICS it uses. If you see ICS2.0 or below, you are not up to date. It needs to be ICS3.0 or above. MrBunwah can check the records to see if you purchased a ship so he can send you an update if you request one. Again, talk to MrBunwah Murakami if you are having problems with these updates!

Now that that's out of the way, We have one commission from the Imperial Navy of Steeltopia and a troop transport ship we want to finish. After that is the big sfx/pfx update, in which we update all the sound effects and particle effects as well as some other nice little upgrades. Here is a list of what we have planned for this update...

Upgrade engine sound effects with different sound effects based on ship sizes and ship speeds

Get water wakes to trail behind every ship, and have them differ based on speed and size of the ship

Change the CTF effects so that the color of your smoke would actually change to the color of your team instead of the default sparkle effect

Upgrade cannon sound effects and add more variety between guns

Include sound effects for when you are out of ammo and try to fire a cannon

Include progressive damage sound effects, such as straining machinery, burning, flooding, the sounds of your crew as they scream bloody murder

Upgrade death effects so that chunks of the ship and shrapnel go flying, either by prim or particles or both. Also change the smoke and fire to water bubbles when the ship is fully underwater

Have the ships sink more realistically, instead of going straight down

Add additional sound effects like wave sounds, bells, random machinery

Add an additional camera point that focuses on the direction a turret is facing on a monitor type ship

May make some visual changes to the HUD again, to make it simpler to use

Add the ability for individual components of a ship to be damaged, such as if a cannon is directly hit it may disable it. Also may have the ship take damage if you go at maximum speed for too long, or have it so some boilers explode reducing your overall speed. Of course these changes would come with their own particle and sound effects

Iron out any last bugs we encounter

Now that may look like a huge undertaking, but it's really not that bad. It will no way take as long as our last update, due to the fact that much of the groundwork is already done. Most of it is just a matter of dropping in some new sounds and particles effects.

First Iron Melee at Steeltopia

2009-07-25T21:27:00.009-04:00

Our last Iron Melee was conducted in Steeltopia, which inspired quite a number of ideas as to what ICS may be capable of in the future. It was the pirate team attacking, trying to land infantry on the beach while the navy went on the defense with coastal guns and ironclads. Once the pirates landed, the navy forces abandoned the gun emplacements and repelled the invaders with small arms fire in the streets.

For those of you who don't know, Iron Melees are battles consisting of ICS vehicles and sometimes MMCS infantry. The first Iron Melees started on Port Merrimac in Roatan, off the coast of the Isle of Lilliput in the United Sailing Sims. So far they have mainly been naval affairs, however with infantry added into the mix we are starting to see more land based scenarios.

I would like to go through a scenario I envisioned while exploring Steeltopia, one which would encompass all or many of the aspects of ICS that I would like to see in the future

Land (tank, cavalry, buggy and other forms of land transportation)
Air (reconnaissance, fighters, bombers, airship carriers)
Sea (ironclads, wooden vessels, transports, and aircraft carriers)
Undersea (submarines, underwater mines)
Artillery (flak guns, coastal batteries, field guns, gatling gun placements)
Infantry (riflemen, sappers, medics, commanders)
Buildings (used for capturing or destroying in order to meet an objective)

This scenario could have two teams vying for control of the region, with capture points they would need to secure in order to move to the next area. The fighting could start in the streets, with one team trying to dig in deeper into the city (we will call this team the imperials) while another team tries to push them back and also look for an escape (they may be trying to transport a secret document, or an important hostage like the mayor. This team will be called the terrorists)

If the imperials keeps pushing them back far enough, the terrorists may need to retreat further into the city. If however the terrorists manage to slip past or breakthrough they can load a transport with their hostage or important document and try to make their way across the bay

From here the scenario would switch to a naval role as coastal guns, ironclads and submarines could be deployed in order to sink the transport or to defend it. If the terrorists manage to reach the dam, the fighting would again switch to the infantry. The terrorists would need to fight their way to the elevator to reach the upper level.

If the terrorists manage to make it to the top of the dam, the imperials could deploy tanks and other armored units, as they no longer have to deal with the confined areas in the city.

The final objective would then be in sight. The terrorists would need to make it to the train station and secure it. Once secured, they would use it to make off with the hostage or important document, thus ending the match!

So in a nutshell, the terrorists need to transport their cargo from point A to B to C etc etc until they make it to the final point in which they win the match. The imperials job would be to prevent them from making it all the way to the last point. If they can kill all the terrorists or retrieve/destroy the cargo they then win the match.

(Note: All these shots were taken while I was at Steeltopia , so naturally this would be an excellent place to stage such an operation)

Other elements of warfare I did not mention but could be added into this scenario...

Capturing certain points in the city could spawn ammo and health crates for the occupying units

Imperial airship could drop paratroopers into the city. Terrorists may deploy fighters to destroy it, thus adding aerial combat into the mix

Imperials could mine the bay with explosives, thus impeding the transport making it's way to the damn

The dam entrance could be blocked, requiring terrorist sappers to remove the obstructions

Imperials could airlift tanks on the upper area above the dam to help defend the train station

Gatling guns could be placed around the perimeter of the train station, requiring terrorist sharpshooters to take them out

This is what I would eventually like to see. A combat system that incorporates everything and can be used to create epic battles like this one. If we can get more developers and coordinators involved in this, we can have all the Steampunk and Victorian sims participate and have full scale nation vs nation battles. This of course will require more people, as we at Murakami Steamworks can only do so much on our own...

Confederate ships go live

2009-07-24T02:57:00.003-04:00

All the Confederate ships (minus the Hunley...needs a bit more tweaking) are now updated to ICS3.0 and available on Xstreet and any of our vendors in world. I also want to point out again, that the CSS Richmond and CSS Columbia are discontinued and have been replaced with the CSS Arkansas and CSS Atlanta. We have also changed the way the pricing works so a smaller 750Hp ship will be cheaper than a 1500Hp ship. Let it be known however that a skilled captain can pummel a larger ship with a ship half the size as I have done so on many occasions with the MSS Cuthbert, a personal favorite of mine.

So with that, we are near the end. Only six ( or is it seven? hard to keep track...) ships left until we have updated all the major ships in our catalogue. After that we don't have many new ships coming. We definitely want to work on some kind of troop transport, holding like 5 or 6 infantry and be able to deploy row boats for landing operations. Then there is a refueling ship, equipped with rearm and refuel scripts for long distance operations away from ports. We also may make several cheaper ships for beginners, running around 100-200L. These may be in the form of tinclads or Ellet rams.

Problems with the Fiskdale

2009-07-22T20:45:00.002-04:00

The demolition submarine MSS Fiskdale is proving to be quite a challenge. Motion controls and torpedo launchers work fine, however there are still many issues with its explosives deploying properly. MrBunwah was able to get all the explosives working perfectly in sims like Roatan, however once we took it to deeper waters like the Vernian Sea it failed every time. He did manage to get them working in deeper waters eventually, however when trying them out in normal sims they broke again... So we have not yet been able to get it working in both conditions, something we think is necessary.

After much hair-pulling and cussing it was decided that we would scrap the project...well not entirely. If we remove all the weapon systems from it, we effectively cut its prim count in half. So what we can do is turn it into a very detailed exploration vessel instead. The inside would get a total makeover and would be functional like the way the Auriga is setup. This will need to wait until the USS/CSS makeover.

The Submarines are coming

2009-07-02T00:39:00.006-04:00

Due to heightened interest in the submarines we have decided to update them next. Extensive testing has been done on the Holland, which will be the base model for the rest of the subs updates. So far everything pretty much works. Torpedos and machine guns work, motion works, arming/disarming works. Sometime this week we should be able to package it and get it ready for sale.

The Holland will be one of three subs that will eventually be released. All three of these subs are equipped with torpedo launchers that can be used against surface or underwater vessels. However these subs will differ from one another in their secondary weapons and other specifications. Each type of sub will be made for a particular role.

Holland- Attack sub, meant to prey upon other ships. Secondary weapon is dual machine guns. Will be faster and more maneuverable than the other subs.

Fiskdale- Demolition sub, meant to take out heavier targets. Secondary weapon is a set of six explosives that can be utilized as either floating mines to damage surface ships or depth charges to be used against other subs. Will be a bit slower than the Holland due to the added weight of the munitions.

Sturbridge- Support sub, meant to harass from long distance. Secondary weapon is a very heavy dorsal cannon with adjustable power level. Will be very sluggish due to it's size making it an easy target, but will sport a 250HP core unlike the other two subs 100Hp cores. Will also carry more torpedos and a good number of cannon shells.

And of course we could not release these without some kind of counter-submarine weapon. Which brings us to the MSS Fishkill.

This ship will be the answer to the submarines. Equipped with a strong engine and good armor, this ship can tangle with just about anything under the sea. Weaponry includes a rotating turret with two gatling guns, allowing you to quickly strike when one of those infernal machines lifts it's head above the water.

Behind the smokestack is the depth charge launcher. You can adjust the power level, angle and explosion depth using the HUD. This will be what you use to destroy vessels hiding underwater.

The Fishkill is 99% done. All that remains is adjusting the depth charges explosion. While conducting battle tests in Port Merrimac, it was incredibly easy to hit the Holland with the depth charge. In some cases I was able to destroy the sub on my first try. The problem seems to be that the blast radius is far too large. Not sure how we will fix this but I'm certain we will find a solution.

A New Look

2009-06-23T00:45:00.004-04:00

With the advent of ICS3, we have made a considerable amount of changes to both the ships and to their all important huds. The ships now keep track of fuel and ammunition, however the huds have changed as well.

Both the pilot and copilot are now able to control their own camera, as well as start and stop the ship. Also, using the blue button, the hovertext for a ship can be enabled and disabled.
finally, weapon arming has been reduced to a single button, and guns have to cycle through positions rather than going straight to a specific point like our older monitor type ironclads.

Changes have also been made to speed and turning. Speed is now measured in knots (as close as we could get to them in SL) and every ship has a maximum speed they can reach. This means that ships can now stay in formation a bit better because the speeds are now standardized. Turning is now a bit more responsive, and a third degree of turning was added as well. This means your ships can make tighter turns now.

Overall the hud and ships should be more responsive, due to optimization in the scripting that is used. The huds new standardized and modular design means it will be much easier for us to make them and much easier for pilots to operate them.

SNS and INS updated

2009-06-22T00:54:00.002-04:00

The SNS and INS ships have now been fully updated to ICS3.0. Now that we have everything worked out the rest of the ships will come quickly. We are going to update the MSS ships next, followed by the historical USS/CSS models. We will not however be releasing any submarines during these updates. Those still need to be rescripted but these will come shortly after the rest as most of the scripting is done for these already. Below is our current roadmap...

1. Update MSS series ships

2. Update USS/CSS series ships.

3. Update and implement submarines

4. I want to balance out the mortars. Currently they are a bit overpowered and tend to dominate any match. I plan to reduce their range and accuracy. This will require some testing.

5. If the MMCS combat system proves to be worthy of our infantry battles, we may implement the scripts into ICS rounds so that way ships can fire on infantry.

6. After all that, we will most likely stop making ships for awhile and work on other ICS projects, such as flak guns for anti-aircraft roles, destructible buildings, floating repair/refuel stations, underwater mines etc etc. We also may start on land and air vehicles.

ICS3 Artillery now for sale

2009-05-19T16:24:00.004-04:00

Well the artillery is now up for sale. You can grab the packages at Port Merrimac, Xstreet, or our office at Cape Wrath. I only included the light mortar due to the fact that the medium and heavy versions were so overkill it was ridiculous...I may release stronger versions later if the need arises for more firepower. If you would like a demonstration of any of these feel free to IM Justinian Huszar or MrBunwah Murakami.

Working land artillery

2009-05-15T01:30:00.005-04:00

Well we finally have the cannons and mortars working properly. They are controlled by touching the little buttons on the platform shown here.

They also have 50HP ICS3 cores in them, and when destroyed the gun comes flying off the base, rendering it useless...

After 60 seconds the smoking hulk will die, and you can touch the base to rez another gun.
Just watch your head when that thing reaches 100% damage, as it can fly pretty far...

USS Queen of the West and some Artillery

2009-05-04T23:24:00.005-04:00

Well I finally finished tweaking every single ship model (USS, CSS, MSS, INS, SNS) and am now working on extra stuff while I wait for MrBunwah to work his script magic and get everything updated for ICS3. I got a request for an Ellet ram a while back and decided to take a shot at it. It turned out to be quite an easy job, and I picked the USS Queen of the West as the Ellet ram of choice. It was a logical choice considering the relationship it has with some of our other ships. Below is a picture of it completed.

It will be a lighter ship, roughly 500HP and have a max speed of 10 knots. This will even out the USS/CSS ships a bit as the confederate side always had more ships.

And with that done, I needed something else to do. So I made 6 different artillery pieces, 3 cannons and 3 mortars. The cannons come in Medium, Heavy and Very Heavy variety. The Mortars come in Light, Medium and Heavy flavors. Below is a picture of some of them.

The mortars will be able to rotate 360 degrees and angle their shots. The cannons can change angle too, but they do not have as wide a range for rotation. Not sure how these will be controlled, though I'm aiming for a hudless method if at all possible.

CSS Atlanta & CSS Arkansas

2009-04-13T23:24:00.004-04:00

While assessing what ships to keep and what to remove for the confederate side, I have decided to keep all of them except the Richmond and Columbia. These ships were not big sellers, and they also were too much alike which bothered me a bit. However I will be adding two brand new ships to take there place so that way those that bought the Richmond and/or Columbia will not feel left out when the updates role in. The CSS Arkansas will replace the CSS Richmond, and the CSS Atlanta will replace the CSS Columbia. Above is a model of the CSS Atlanta, complete with spar torpedo.

Skunkworks Extreme

2009-04-07T23:10:00.003-04:00

In between blasting others out of the water, and flying through the streets on a floating ironclad, we at Murakami Steamworks have been hard at work bringing you the latest in MSS brand ironclad technology. Among the new excellencies, all of the ships are being updated to ICS V3, making our ships more realistic, with ammo and fuel usage. Not to worry, as were supplying with goodly stocks of both. Adding to the list of awesome, all of the USS and CSS series are getting their long overdue rebuilds. Both the texturing and primwork are being made nicer and better. Among the less obvious, many of the back-end scripts are being redone to provide a better, faster experience, hopefully allowing shots to occur even in those crazy all-out eight-ship fragfests.

Iron Melees at Port Merrimac

2009-03-17T19:49:00.001-04:00

Starting this Thursday we'll begin a new weekly series called Thursday's Iron Melees. Every Thursday (Except the last week of the month) we'll have a free for all ironclad battle, ctf, defense or whatever is arraged for the night off Port Merrimac. It's free to attend and RP is not required, this is just carnage, fun and the glory of battle.

Thursday’s Iron Melee @ 7:30pm PDT at Port Merrimac

Combat system: Ironclad Combat System (ICS)
Rules: leave the drama at home, it's time for hammering iron and the reek of cordite in your nostrils.

The MSS Lavanco as a Parade Float!

2009-02-16T07:00:00.004-05:00

The multi-faceted Lavanco hull shows its worth once again as a parade float in Caledon's annual Mardi Gras Parade.

Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez!! (click me)

Three new ships and some nice HUD changes

2009-01-19T03:16:00.003-05:00

Well we finally released our three newest warships today. They had been completed a while ago but many changes were being made to ICS2 in the process which complicated things quite a bit. You can find the new MSS Menkar, MSS Cuthbert and MSS Cerberus for sale at our shop in Caledon Cape Wrath as well as Xstreet. We also patched up the other MSS ships and some of them look a bit nicer as a result.

We changed the HUD and added three very nice features. The best being the new camera system. This time actually allowing you to rotate the camera in 4 different directions! No more fiddling with the camera to see that ship behind you, just press the back camera button. Need to set your ship up to fire a broadside? Just press the left or right camera buttons. We also added a second function to the red off button. If instead of just clicking it you hold it down for 3 seconds, it will properly eject you from your seat! No more clipping inside your ship when you stand up. The third feature is the ability to scuttle the ship. Well not really, it's more like a suicide button right now. Just hold down that orange button for 3 seconds and your ship is destroyed. Good for when someone wants to exit the battle dramatically, or if you want to reset your ships core. In the future I will see about having it eject you first and then setting a timer so you have a chance to get away from the blast. Oh and we also have everything on Mono now so the controls should be a bit more responsive.

The subs however still need to wait. The way ICS2 calculates explosives is off and because of that the torpedoes are very unreliable, especially against oddly shaped ships. This is due to the fact that ICS2 uses a very complicated formula that uses a bounding box around the ship in order to pinpoint explosive damage, and this still needs tweaking so it can work 100% of the time instead of the 10% we are getting now. However while we wait for those issues to be resolved I will be working on the MSS Cazadora, a sub hunter type warship that will be equipped with a twin machine gun tower and depth charges. This should compliment the subs quite well when they are to be released and prevent those sneaky little bastards from taking over the seas.

Oh and speaking of submarines, It seems fitting for O'Toole to post something about the Hunley.
While me and MrBunwah were looking at the records we discovered the Hunley is our best seller so far!

*******************
72 hunleys
36 essexes
29 monitors
28 nashville
23 roanokes
21 virginias
18 manassas
16 davids
13 kotetsus
11 onandagas
10 columbias
7 passaic
6 lavancos
5 richmonds
3 tyranns

298 total sold as of 1/19/2009

*******************

I had been debating about whether I should phase out the older ships but with these figures I have decided to do a makeover on all the older models as well. I had been thinking about this for quite some time but it seems clear to me that people really love the historical models. Some of the ships will be harder than others to remake due to the odd shapes I need to deal with. The CSS Virginia will be a tough one, as it has a very odd looking stern and pilot house. The USS Essex will also be a bit of a challenge, what with all those cannons it has mounted on it. The ships that will likely benefit the most are the monitor type ships as we have much better turret technology at our disposal, as you can see on our newer models.

Whew ok so a quick summary as to what lays ahead:

1.MSS Cazadora sub hunter followed by the submarines MSS Sturbridge, MSS Fiskdale, and MSS Holland.

2. Remake as many historical models as possible, including the Hunley and Davids.

3.Work on some land based artillery, such as mortars and rifled cannons. These will most likely not need a HUD and can be operated by pressing buttons on a control panel attached to the cannon's base.

4.Work on some specialized Wrath Fleet warships. These ships would only be available to members of the Wrathful Exiles. They would follow a distinct theme, like the ships I designed for the Steeltopia Imperial Navy. Still brainstorming on this.

5.Get started on some prototype airships...

The Sinking and Raising of the CSS HUNLEY

2009-01-17T03:21:00.001-05:00

change can happen suddenly

2008-12-31T02:00:00.002-05:00

whats that new orange button?

2008-12-31T01:38:00.005-05:00

Breakthrough in turret development!

2008-12-08T22:38:00.004-05:00

In the bowels of the shop, a special ship is being developed -- the MSS Cerberus, of British and Australian fame. Thanks to Mr.Scaggs for the inspiration to make such a vessel.

This ship has two turrets and each turret has two cannons which do a neat retract and rotate animation while also allowing individual fire control (one barrel? both barrels? you decide!). This is a major improvement and was a giant hurdle for us for quite some time...You only need to look at our older monitor class ships to see that it was quite difficult at the time to get something that complex set up. It is also the reason why we have not developed any REAL double cannon turrets until now, so expect us to make use of this technology in future builds.

On further note, with the 2.1 release of the Ironclad Combat System, expect updates to all ships sooner or later. For future reference, the seas are not always exploding on the surface...

Bring out the cake!

2008-10-21T22:43:00.003-04:00

Woot Woot! Murakami Steamworks is one year old now!
(technically older still, but I'm referencing around our Caledon residency from now on.)

And so we blew it all up...

2008-10-06T07:58:00.001-04:00

Burning Life 2008

Until Next Year!

Script Permission Problems

2008-09-29T10:55:00.002-04:00

We have discovered a, erm, uh, "feature" of the Burning Life parcel permissions system that gravely effects the Radio Controlled Ironclads at our parcel in Data, Burning Life. Gleefully, we reported success last week, and posted a few HOW TO videos, anticipating people showing up and playing with ironclads and having a good time... and that's the way it worked out, initially. That's when I started to notice that boats weren't working for people who are not members of the SL Group BURNING LIFE. Since everyone who tested it was in BL already, we didn't make this connection until BL opened for business. Then we discovered that the little boats just don't go for people without Burning Life tags over their heads. A couple of inquiries later, we discovered that the Public may not use parcel scripts in Burning Life parcels. Thus, even though the option appears to be checked in the land menu, I can't change it or mod it in any way. Apparently this policy is to prevent griefing. I have gone back and forth with a couple of the CORE people, as has MrBunwah, and the results were always the same... so if you want to play, and have a group open to play with, joing BURNING LIFE group. Otherwise, I apologize, but our intentions for this build could not be realized.

Appendix HOW TO: More Detail on the HUD used at the Wrath Oasis Burning Life Build

2008-09-27T15:42:00.001-04:00

MrBunwah was not enthused at my magnum opus movie, "Radio Controlled Ironclads at the Wrath Oasis, a HOW TO Video". He felt that I had not adequately explained the workings of the HUD that moves, shoots, and blows up the little toy ironclads. Perhaps he's right. In any event, here's a little further explanation.

Watch more Second Life Videos

So there, MrBunwah!!!!

Hotspur

Radio Controlled Ironclads at the Wrath Oasis: A HOW TO video..

2008-09-24T08:54:00.001-04:00

My last attempt was rushed together and somewhat botched, so I reshot how to use R/C Ironclad Boats at the Wrath Oasis, with the help of some friends.

Enjoy!

A small review

2008-09-22T21:54:00.002-04:00

I suppose that now we are designing more ships, it would be appropriate to review a bit of what we have done, what we are working on right now, and what we have planned for the future. This will help keep track of what types of ships we have already covered and which types we seem to be lacking. Our main goal is to get a good selection of ships out so that there is something for everyone, and to make battles more exciting and random. After all, variety is the spice of life! and if 20 people show up for a battle using the same 3 types of ships it can be a bit boring.

Ironclad Set 1(rotating cannon ships)-DONE
The first set of ironclads consisted of 3 ships that had the ability to rotate their cannons, allowing for accurate powerful shots. Two of them being monitor-type ships and a third being a mortar-type. All are available now at SLX and our shop at Caledon Cape Wrath.

Ironclad Set 2(Submarines)-DONE, BUT NEEDS TESTING AND ICS 2.1
This second set has not been released yet. These ships will be equipped with 100/250 HP cores and all three will have the ability to fire torpedo's as well as a unique secondary weapon. One of these subs will be able to place explosives that can be either proximity or depth charge types. Another will have 2 machine guns that can be angled upwards quite a bit, allowing for anti-aircraft fire. The third sub will have a giant dorsal cannon that can fire a heavy cannon round and can have it's power level adjusted for different ranges. We also released a non-combatant submarine, the MSS Auriga already, as it does not need to wait for any combat system updates.

Ironclad Set 3(Casemates)-30% DONE
This third set of ships will be all casemates, meaning their cannons will be fixed and have the ability to ram to some degree. There will be a small, medium and large ship. These will be balanced accordingly, such as giving the smaller ship better speed and turning while giving the heavy ship stronger cannons and ramming. The small casemate MSS Cuthbert is pretty much done, and with all the scriptwork and effects complete all I have to worry about is the primwork for the other two ships.

Ironclad Set 4(Spec-ops)-0% DONE
This fourth set of ships will be very specialized. They will be unlike any of the other ships so far. The first one planned is a Sub-hunter, equipped with machine guns and depth charges. The other 2 we are not 100% certain on, but some ideas of ours included a mother ship that can send out a smaller drone to attack other ships, a slow casemate that can drop mines behind it, a submersible type ship that can grab on to other ships and use a giant drill to inflict damage over time to simulate taking in water, and a ship equipped with a giant flamethrower that would also make use of damage over time.

After those are all done we might work on our flagships, which will be our own personal super ships that will not be for sale. These will mainly be for looks and will not take part in most official battles. We might also add some more to the monitor-type and casemate-type sets if we feel there is not enough variety.

I did not include our earlier works with the historical ironclads because I eventually would like to phase them out. They are old models and not worth the trouble updating every time there is a new system. I may bunch them up into special editions at really cheap prices before the phase out, not too sure. I also may go back and redo them all, but not likely anytime soon. Anyway that is where we are now.

Ironclad Game for Burning Life

2008-09-22T21:19:00.004-04:00

So several days ago me and MrBunwah got a request by Mr.Otoole to help him with a little project he has planned for Burning Life this year. It involves a roughly 20x20 meter pool of water in which four people can battle with toy ironclads that would be radio controlled. It is pretty much done, so if anyone would like to try it out, it is located here. Look for the vendors on the sides to get your special HUD and instructions. If you have ever been in an ironclad fight with ICS, it is basically the same thing except with a fixed camera.

Anyway...now that this is done, I can continue working on the casemates. I already have a small one complete and with all the groundwork laid out the other two casemates will be a breeze, I just need to do the primwork for the medium and large types. Also, they will come with the ability to angle the cannons a few degrees up and down just like the last set, so they should be able to hold their own against subs and monitor type ships.

Also still waiting for ICS 2.1, but from what I am hearing it will be well worth the wait. After that is released we can balance out the submarine weapons and release those.

The MSS Auriga is complete

2008-08-26T01:21:00.004-04:00

We currently have to wait for the latest build of ICS2 in order to get out our three attack subs as they require a specialized type of explosive script not yet released, but in the meantime we worked on our exploratory model. The MSS Auriga does not have any weapons systems equipped, however you can stuff three of your friends in and take a tour of the deep blue. It is sold at our shop in Cape Wrath as well as SL Exchange

After all that we will either work on our Vengador battle cannon or the next three ironclads(casemates).

(repost) Three New Steampunk(ish) Submarines

2008-08-21T10:16:00.001-04:00

The Reek of Cordite, the Crash of Steel.. again

As the historic record in this journal would indicate, I have been playing around with ironclads and in world nautical combat for well over a year now. During that time, I've come to know the good gentlemen at Murkami Steamworks quite well, and always am happy to do a little beta testing for their new releases. I often bug them about the latest and greatest-- and shamelessly pester them to get cracking on more proper historical hulls. Recently they astounded me by taking ironclad combat firmly into a new dimension, under water. The HUNLEY had always been part of the lineup, that is certain-- but as a historical design she had to sail up close to her target to release the deadly spar torpedo attack. Often, this results in the Hunley going down with the target ship.

Fiskdale, Holland, Sturbridge

The recent release of THREE new hulls takes Murakami Steamworks in a direction both old and new... old, in that the three new hulls are the second generation STURBRRIDGE, HOLLAND and FISKDALE (the original three ships of Murakami Steamworks). New, in that these submarines will each feature a "stand-off" style weapon-- either a ship's gun, a mine dropper, or a torpedo attack. All of these hull designs could conceivable change the face of ICS combat. Imagine steaming into a minefield that wasn't there three minutes ago. Or being struck by a torpedo from a submarine firing from half a sim away. Or having a submarine rise up from the depths behind you, on your blind side, and fire into a vulnerable spot on your hull. Yes, these new hulls operate in a manner quite akin to a WWI level submarine rather than the ACW technology of David or Hunley.

Old Hull namesakes and New submarines

These steampunk subs should be on the market as you read this.. how they will effect battles remains to be seen.

The new ships are rolling out

2008-08-05T02:02:00.004-04:00

The third generation of ships have arrived. We now have three new ironclads for sale and they improve greatly on previous designs. The MSS Tyrann, MSS Kotetsu and MSS Lavanco can all be purchased at our shop as well as SL Exchange. These ships and the ones that follow will not be of historical design. We found that can be a bit limiting in terms of creativity, although in the future after we get a good number of 3rd gen ships released we may go back and remake some of our historical models.

So now with all the groundwork out of the way, ships will take far less time to complete. In fact we have already started on the next batch of ships. The MSS Holland, MSS Fiskdale, and MSS Sturbridge (we seem to always release our ships in sets of 3...not sure why that is). These will be submarines that will be armed with torpedo launchers as well as a unique secondary weapon. The MSS Holland will have a pair of machine guns that can be utilized against ships and aircraft. The MSS Fiskdale will have a set of depth charges that it can deploy, great for ambushing both surface vessels and submersibles. The MSS Sturbridge will have a large dorsal cannon it can use when it surfaces.

Here are some pre-textured designs of the MSS Holland and MSS Sturbridge.

ICS2 and You

2008-04-24T23:38:00.005-04:00

Courtesy of the amazing work of Ms. Kandace Commons, we have managed to rework the old ICS1 into ICS2. This is good news for you, as explosives are now actually implemented, it works faster, and it's easier to deal with. Also included in this is a flag system that allows you to change your flag on the fly with a push of a button.

Here are some of the other exciting new features:

-Fewer listeners

-Better damage calculation methods

-Locational damage. There are now four areas of the ship that can be damaged(starboard, portside, bow, aft) if any of these receive 100% damage your ship will be destroyed

-Regeneration. Ships now regen hitpoints slowly, and there are also repair dock scripts which increase this

-Ramming damage based on speed and mass of ship as well as ram type

Take note that this latest version of ICS was entirely the work of Ms. Kandace Commans, thus if you have any questions or comments about ICS2 refer to her. Murakami Steamworks will not be directly involved with development of the system anymore but will still beta test new versions and share our insight. This also means that we will be concentrating our resources mostly on our ships, old and new.

Due to RL concerns we have not been as active as we would have liked, however now that summer break is here we will be updating all the old ships for ICS2, as well as touching up some bugs. We will be working on mostly non-historical ironclads from here on out, but we may rework some of the older models as we experiment with sculpties.

Here are some non-historical ships we started on. MSS Lavanco and MSS Tirano left to right.

Havok 4 and Flags, tweaks and awesomeness abound!

2008-04-03T20:15:00.002-04:00

So, Linden Lab, makers of Second Life recently busted out a really special update, changing the physics backend to Havok 4. What does this mean to you, revenue (I meant customers!)? Firstly, it means we will need to tweak all the ships to move correctly under the new setup. As noticed, they go really fast now. Secondly, flexi-prims can be attached to physical objects. So what does that mean, mr. mechanic? It means we will be adding totally awesome flexible flags to all our ships! All the ships will be updated to have two flags, a larger top-flag, and beneath it, a pennant flag. Each flag will have four choices of texture, choosable by hud, and editable by you, the user. The top-flag is meant to indicate such things as what country you hail from, and whether you are at a state of combat. The pennant will indicate things such as what system (ICS of course!) and other things, such as being AFk and the like. Adding to the total awesomeness of this, we are adding in a number of other assorted tweaks and awesome fixes. So keep those cannons thundering and ready yourself for the big 6.0 update!

Thrilling Ironclad Action at Antiquity Lagoon!

2008-03-31T01:57:00.002-04:00

Murakami Steamworks Ironclads get a workout at the Intersim Naval battle between the Middlesea Fleet and the Antiquity Fleet.

See the ships in Action! Simply push on the "Go" button.

A Consolidation of Location

2008-03-24T22:03:00.002-04:00

As known, we have our main store and showroom in Caledon Cape Wrath. Lesser known, however, is that we have a parcel in Caledon SteamSkyCity (http://slurl.com/secondlife/Caledon%20SteamSkyCity/153/132/76). Due to the marginalization from Cape Wrath, we have decided to sell the parcel. To inquire, please notify me (MrBunwah Murakami) or have Justinian Huszar harass me if I'm not immediately available.

Welcome to the shop!

2008-03-17T22:24:00.005-04:00

Thanks to the excellent work of Mr. Fleef Fimicoloud, The shop at Caledon Cape Wrath has been reborn! Thanks to the new design, we have an excellent large dock capable of servicing even the more grandiose designs of ship, naval and air. Also, Hello everybody, from Employee Number Three, MrBunwah Murakami!
Come visit the Shop! - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Caledon%20Cape%20Wrath/170/163/22

Roadmap

2008-03-08T00:10:00.000-05:00

So now that we have gotten the latest ICS and Ships out, we can start planning for the future. But first we should look at what we have now.

Currently ICS is at version 1.3 and it has been implemented into all the vessels. This version is quite an improvement from the earlier ones.

It features different types of ramming strengths as well as differing cannon rounds, and even includes a machine gun round. Also now included is a script that displays your Hp count in hovertext, great when you want to know exactly how much damage you have taken. You can throw it in your HUD so only you can view it, or place in someplace on your ship so anyone can see.

The ships themselves have had some drastic changes as well, currently at version 5.0 they now have a new control mechanism that makes operating them much smoother. Sadly the torpedo boats still use the old control scheme right now.

Now for ICS, we are working on some interesting improvements. Most of these ideas are already coded into ICS technically, they just need to be activated.

First off is the ability to repair. We are not sure how exactly we will implement this, but one idea is to have a docking station that consists of a repair script that constantly searches for a ship with ICS. When a ship comes within a certain distance, the script would do reverse damage and slowly heal the ship. The repair station could also be set to only heal a certain amount over a period of time, to protect against abuse. The only thing I'm uncertain of is if we can get it to recognize only certain ships, so that one ship can't use an enemy's docking station. Something i will look forward to...

Next off is bombs. Everyone loves them, but how do we implement them into ICS? A simple way is to simply take a cannon round and just drop it... But that is quite boring. We currently have some prototypes in the works, but are not sure how to use them. What we will probably do is have 2 different types, one would be a cluster of small bombs that do a respectable amount of damage each, as well as give off some nice explosions. The other would be one single bomb that does an enormous amount of damage. Another factor is whether to have them explode on impact or maybe have some kind of timer? This will obviously require some extensive testing...

Finally we have mines. We currently have a nice prototype of a submersible mine that can be detonated upon collision. We can also fine tune this to be proximity or even timed. The main problem we have right now is getting a good splashing effect when the mine explodes...

Now as for the ships themselves, scriptwise they are almost perfect. I may do some slight balancing but right now they are splendid to operate. The next major update to the ships will be visually.

Whenever havok4 is officially out of testing and integrated into the main grid, I will start working on adjusting the sizes of some of these ships, such as the CSS Virginia which should be much larger than it is now. I will also try to implement flexiprim flags into every ship, so that people may customize their ships further.

There is also one idea that has crossed my mind on several occasions, which is to forgo the 31 prim vehicle format completely and make high detailed ships and use some kind of non-phys movement like so many other vehicle builders are doing these days. I have some problems with this method though. First off it takes away the realistic movement of the ships currently and would require an entire rewrite to the scripts to complement the non vehicle type movement. Second, it kills ramming do to the fact that the ships are not physical. I have seen some people making attachment based vehicles that you wear that supposedly don't incur the disadvantages but I alas have little experiences in that field. I only wish that along with havok4 they could increase the prim limit of vehicles. That would make my day.

Along with updating the regular line of ships we have, we will also start on a new line of ironclad ships that are fictional, as in not historical but of our own design. This will allow us to create some unique ships and not worry about properly replicating real ships. Expect some of them to be over the top and flamboyant.

And also not long after that we will be constructing some airships. We already have some basic prototypes ready so all we need is to get cracking on some more models. Here below is our first prototype airship. Very cute I must say.

In any case you will see a considerable difference in the next batch of ships, complete with new snazzy textures, flags and particle effects. Wow quite a lot of work ahead of me, I had better get started!

Life on board a Monitor Ship

2008-03-07T12:34:00.000-05:00

We all know what these ships looked like, and how fun they are to play with in Second Life, but what about the experiences of the RL crewmen of these historic ships?

Life on board an Ironclad could be distinctly unpleasant. Imagine being inside a thick heated metal pot that could reach 155 degrees in some areas, eating rather heavy food, and having to perform very hard physical work even in non-stressful situations. An excellent overview of daily life for an Ironclad Sailor is presented at the Mariner's Museum in Newport News, Virginia. THE MONITOR CENTER (more on her in a future article) has elements of the actual ship MONITOR (risen from the depths off North Carolina) as well as an extensive museum on ironclad ship construction, combat and daily life. A very nice of artifacts taken from the Monitor wreck allow the visitor to garner a glimpse into everyday life for a 19th century sailor.

The web presentation for LIFE ABOARD A MONITOR SHIP is worth a view.

Here is a nice web presentation on the Construction of the Monitor.

Middlesea Fleet Appreciation Sale!

2008-03-07T06:57:00.000-05:00

In appreciation for all the brave men and women of the Caledon Middlesea Fleet, Murakami Steamworks is offering a 10% discount to fleet members.

This applies to inworld purchases only, at the store in Cape Wrath, located HERE.

Wear you group tag ON when making a purchase. The vendor will sense you are a member of the fleet and automatically make the required discount.

Ship Profile: USS Essex

2008-03-06T14:05:00.001-05:00

This is the first in a series on this journal. We will be outlining the historic ships that we are offering up as product lines, their build history, combat records, and ultimate fate.

USS ESSEX
Union Casemate Ironclad

Image

USS Essex, a 1000-ton ironclad river gunboat, was converted in stages from the steam ferry New Era. Originally constructed at New Albany, Indiana, in 1856, the ship was purchased in September 1861 by the U.S. Army for its Western Gunboat Flotilla. Modified into a 355-ton "timberclad" gunboat, and retaining the name New Era, she took part in an expedition up the Cumberland River in November 1861. Renamed Essex soon thereafter, she received iron armor and other changes and was then actively employed in operations during early 1862, engaging Confederate gunboats near Lucas Bend, Missouri, on 11 January. On 6 February, she was badly damaged by enemy gunfire during an attack on Fort Henry, Tennessee.

During subsequent repairs, Essex' Commanding Officer, William D. Porter, spared little expense (albeit without official authorization) in upgrading his ship into one of the most powerful ironclads on the Western Rivers. Lengthened, widened, reengined, rearmored and completely altered in appearance, Essex was back in service in time for operations against Vicksburg, Mississippi, in July. On the 22th of that month she ran past the enemy fortress city, engaging and damaging the Confederate ironclad Arkansas along the way. After joining Rear Admiral Farragut's squadron as the only Federal ironclad on the lower Mississippi, she helped repel an attack on Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on 5 August and was instrumental in the destruction of the Arkansas the next day.

Essex was formally transferred to the Navy in October 1862 and remained active on the rivers through the rest of the Civil War. She bombarded Port Hudson, Louisiana, and helped with the occupation of Baton Rouge in December 1862. In May-July 1863 she participated in the capture of Port Hudson. She took part in the Red River expedition in March-May 1864. Essex was decommissioned in July 1865. After her sale to private interests in November of that year, she reverted to the name New Era. She was scrapped in 1870.

Murakami Steamworks' USS Essex fighting an Aphid Aether Frigate in Second Life

Welcome, Travellers!

2008-03-06T13:58:00.001-05:00

Welcome to the aetheric journal of Murakami Steamworks!

Who are we?

Murakami Steamworks is a small company located in Second Life's Caledon micro nation, at SteamSkyCity and Cape Wrath Waterfront. We specialize in building and selling quality historic ironclad ships at an affordable price, as well as distributing the (Open Source) Ironclad Combat System (ICS) to prospective ship builders.

Company Principles:

MrBunwah Murakami Coder and Builder
Justinian Huszar Coder and Builder
Nowher Meili Ship Breaker

Occasional PR Flack and Beta Tester:

Hotspur O'Toole

Informal, Demented Beta Testers:

Amplebeak Tinlegs
Virrginia Tombola

This aetheric journal is our way of keeping the general public informed of progress on projects, new products, and signficant events for Murakami Steamworks.