TGEA 1.8.1 in Development

Hey everyone! It's been a while since I posted a blog...hopefully some of you remember me. Busy as I've been on the R&D side of the Torque equation, I've paid close attention to the new OS X compatible TGEA 1.8 as you all have begun to use it. Adding something this big is never perfect the first time, but you *really* need to know what you're doing with OS X / OpenGL to start making improvements.

I've notice some concern that TGEA 1.8 might not get any attention now that all the internal focus here is on Torque 3D. This is unwarranted though. There are actually a number of improvements on Torque 3D that can be applied immediately to TGEA.

So, I'm in the midst of doing a polish and performance pass on TGEA 1.8 This will be more than just window treatments of course. I'm looking directly at your feedback from the beta that didn't make it into 1.8, and the post-launch feedback we've prioritized high in the overall stack.

I'll be looking first and foremost at:

• Fullscreen support on OS X
• Fix terrain heightfield loading
• Fix lockup with OS X and X1600
• Legacy terrain performance improvements
• Fix glow buffer blurring
• Fix for incorrect terrain texture paths
• Fix bad sun color on legacy terrain in OS X
• Fix audio bug in Projectile
• Fix lighting preferences
• Fix for ShapeBase::getCameraTransform
• Fix so changing datablock in mission editor actually changes the object datablock
• Update OpenAL dll
• Remove need for DDS mipmaps
• Render bitmap gui controls with linear texture filtering
• Fix FontRenderBatcher::render assert
• Fix scrolling with touchpad on OS X
• Fix for WMIVideoInfo init
• Fix LightManager initialization
• Fix fullscreen in Vista
• Disable fences by default
• Implement/Fix waterFind function in ShapeBase
• Fix mismatched method signatures in GameBase
• Fix for Splash emitters and explosions
• Color Picker support on OS X

More from Jan, 26

• Mac: Fix sound volume issues post mission start
• Fix issue where cursor is offset after drag operations
• Fix billboard meshes
• Reimplement/fix BillboardZ meshes
• Dedicated server should not open window
• Mac: Key events processed by action map while GuiTextEditCtrl is active
• Mac: Modifier keys incorrect

More from Jan, 27

• Fix getScheduleDuration, getTimeSinceStart
• DSQ import crashes/has incorrect orientation
• Mac: Bumpmaps rendering incorrectly
• World editor defaults overwriting world editor prefs
• Win32: Cursor offset after resizing window
• Fix IFLs
• Pink lines in gui
• MegaTerrain match up problem

This is an incomplete list though. What's missing are your bug reports. Have you found a bug in TGEA 1.8? Post a thread in the TGEA forums. We'll be keeping an eye out for bug reports and will post a reply if we think we'll try to address it in TGEA 1.8.1. Already posted a thread that isn't listed here? Post a link in the comments, and we'll take a look at it. I'll keep the list here up to date, and I'll be back later this week with an update on how work is progressing. In the meantime, go find bugs and stay tuned for updates!