Torque 3D Development - GDC Live Edition

#161 Such a shame when clarification is free...yet none of us can get any of it.
Please see my previous post: www.garagegames.com/community/blogs/view/16853/6#comment-118703

#162 --sorry, that posted twice.---

#163 @eb: Please repeat any clear questions you have here. I read your post (#115) and I couldn't see anything that hadn't been answered previously.

#164 @Brett

I'm not sure it has anything to do with being patient; we are willing to be patient, but their seems to be a discrepancy between what you view as "feature spec has been provided already" and what some of us view as a feature spec being provided. I think this is the main issue, and none of it is intended to beat you guys up about things.

It appear you guys have done some great work; I think that goes without question. But many of us, while we are in aww of the vid's we have seen, require further clarification on what we are seeing, and what actually will be in the package known as T3D.

You'll notice that in the present and past, people usually only start getting negative and "mouthy" when information isn't forthcoming, or as forth coming as clients need. It has little to do with anything else imo.

LK

#165 I am a literal person, things are not 'clear' enough for me yet...and I have to admit that I do not want to read 8 pages of what seems like rants, to find this info.
..So I guess I will do what I said I was going to do..sit and wait for rock-solid-itemized-lists or a demo where I can gather the information on my own.

Not a big deal really...although curiosity does get the better of me at moments. ;)

#166 @Andrew: It seems to me like we've been as clear as we can be about what changed from TGEA 1.8.1 and in terms of content, what's included with Torque 3D Pro. Single player physics? Check. Multiplayer physics? Yes, but how much of the advanced stuff will work is unknown. As Tom says in the video, it's a hard problem. New rendering / lighting / shadowing system? Check. New World Editor with new sub-editors (Road / River / Material)? Check. New Terrain with high detail and ridiculously large size w/ arbitrary dimensions? Check. New PostFX system w/ SSAO, DoF, etc? Check. AI? I expect some basic stuff to land, but it's not done, and until it's done, I won't say it's in the SDK.

I'm sure I'm forgetting LOTS of stuff, but I'm watching these comments for questions I can answer. When I see questions like "what's in Torque 3D? just some shaders and a new skin?" it makes me want to ignore my GG Notify email and play some CoD =)

@eb: You could just read employee comments and skip the rants =)

#167 By the way, info will keep coming in the form of blogs, demo videos, and tutorials for months to come.

#168 does the terrain allow overhangs by any chance ?

#169 I'm not a victim of hype.
Or a member of the GG mafia (though I did parley with them for a second).
GG and it's community have been good to me, so fanboy, mafia, whatever.
I have actually seen the insides of the new engine, so that is where my view stems from.
I also know what it's like to slave on code without a "thank you".
This was a sneak peak held at one the largest conferences in the industry.
Some pretty sexy info was made public at this EARLY stage.
I guess what I'm seeing is two things:
People are excited/anxious and desperately want to know/see more. (good sign)
There's some shiny new bling around somebody's neck, and we all know how that can go.
Regardless of all the flames, keep it up GG.
It may even get worse the better the engine gets.
God only knows what would happen if you made an in-house MMO kit, lol.
It's all part of the game. ;)
I'm still broke and I got nothing but love for you.
I'll be waiting patiently for Torque3D Post #17!

To all the people spending long nights behind the compilers and svn repositories of Torque3D, this song goes out to you, stay strong:

Much love from NorCal!

#170 @Andy:

Quote:does the terrain allow overhangs by any chance ?

No. Overhangs and tunnels must be done using additional geometry. The "why" (collision control, detail, LOD, etc.) has been discussed in some detail already.

#171 Hi, I'm Jondo, you may recognize me from the internet. That's me asking the noobish questions of Tom at the end of video 4 above... You're welcome!

two questions for the community:

"Did you really think you guys could have a flame war without me co-signing on it?"

and

"Are you not entertained?"

Quote: Can I just say that I think "King-Tyrannosaur-Flaming-Sword-Engine" is a much better name for T3D?

Although this an oxymoron, I like it.

#172 @Brett

Much better.. it's nice to have features listed in one place then scattered throughout several pages and posts and background discussions in vids. ;) I think that might be the main point. In any case, thanks for the response.

#173 Dear Torque, sorry this post is so long and I hope this doesn’t sound too critical of your work.

I’ve been reading through all these comments about Torque 3D, but it still doesn’t seem to address my criteria on if I were to buy T3D. Perhaps I can get some specifics from those who are developing T3D.

I first bought Torque a long time ago because I didn’t feel to code up a 3D graphics engine and collision detection system. Most of my concerns have been around gameplay creation, physics, ease of coding, and so forth. Not too much on the polishing an already finished game. – A reason I never went the TGEA route. Oooo shaders… pretty, but not too much help.
@Brett: sorry, you can go play CoD after this.

MAKING THINGS PRETTY
I employ an artist neither full time nor part time. I intend to make games that are fun first, and if I have time left over, then I will work on making them pretty. Collecting colored blocks should be just as much fun as collecting glowing coins and mushrooms spewing green mist and shooting purple lightning, or I didn’t design the game right.

Terrain is nice, but I’m not even using terrain in my next two games.

Running a web browser inside of T3D is a nice trick. But will it improve game development? Or just the ability to add in-game advertisements?

Soft particles look nice too, but is it just polish? Can these actually be a significant part of gameplay? (After spending the time writing this, I have thought of one way they might be used as a major tactic in an air combat game. Hmm… perhaps… would be nice if T3D could help speed up prototyping a game idea beyond TGE’s ability. Can it? )

WILL IT IMPROVE GAMEPLAY?
So how about collisions? TGE had an ok one, as in I could break it if I tried hard. Can I get a ball to bounce off a wall correctly? Can I get a vehicle to bounce off a wall correctly? How about a player? TGE had some lackings on player physics, collisions, and degrees-of-freedom. Which was why my players were derived from vehicle classes. Can we run up walls and do back flips with T3D yet?
If I have to modify player classes again, with T3D, will it:
1. be very similar to TGE so it won’t take too long;
2. or will it be more obvious and documented so the learning curve will be easier;
3. or is all of this already built into T3D so I won’t have to change much code at all?

And what does this mean? “Torque is built with an abstracted C++ Physics API with the ability to be integrated with major 3rd party physics libraries, including PhysX, Bullet, and ODE.” Ability to be integrated? As in drop it in and hit compile? Or many hours of configuring to get it right? I think this needs clarifying on your main page.

WILL IT REDUCE DEVELOPMENT TIME?
Yea! More documentation. Thank you. But coding wise, still the same? Easier? Harder due to more features? Changed the class hierarchy? I’ve worked with some massive programs before. They can greatly vary in their learning curve depending on how they are written.

How about Torque Script? Easier than before? Completely different language than before? More robust or improved debugging capabilities? Almost the same for backwards compatibility? Can you give an example of the changes expected?

And finally, is Torque 3D useable for the one man show or should I just finally TGEA and work with that? (I expect many replies saying nothing more than ‘get both’, so please support your answer.)

I think these are the features you should be telling people about. Don’t just focus on the artists, but the programmers too.

One final note: I tried to limit my questions to things that have not already been answered other than from vague speculation, but how about making a FAQ out of the Torque 3D comments and answers? This would help a lot.

Thank you and good luck,

Colin

#174 @Colin: I went to everything with a question mark at the end...

Quote:Running a web browser inside of T3D is a nice trick. But will it improve game development? Or just the ability to add in-game advertisements?

Even though "nice trick" is kind of pejorative, but I'll try to answer anyway. It won't improve game development unless you want to use Flash for GUIs, or display adds and web content in game. Quite a few people seem to want to solve those problems, and are willing to pay a lot of money to do that. (see Microsoft's pruchase of Massive, or in-game web / comm widgets like PlayXpert.)

Quote:Soft particles look nice too, but is it just polish? Can these actually be a significant part of gameplay?

It's more realism. I actually that makes games more fun to play. If the evolution of games is any indication, so do most gamers.

Quote:So how about collisions? TGE had an ok one, as in I could break it if I tried hard. Can I get a ball to bounce off a wall correctly? Can I get a vehicle to bounce off a wall correctly? How about a player? TGE had some lackings on player physics, collisions, and degrees-of-freedom. Which was why my players were derived from vehicle classes. Can we run up walls and do back flips with T3D yet?

Polysoup collision was added in TGEA 1.7. You'll have to code your own wall-flips.

Quote:Yea! More documentation. Thank you. But coding wise, still the same? Easier? Harder due to more features? Changed the class hierarchy?

Some coding will be easier. For example, integrating 3rd party code should be much easier. Coding in custom source without breaking anything else should be easier as a result of the directory refactor.

Quote:How about Torque Script? Easier than before? Completely different language than before? More robust or improved debugging capabilities? Almost the same for backwards compatibility? Can you give an example of the changes expected?

Torquescript is the same, except for faster, more efficient execution.

Quote:And finally, is Torque 3D useable for the one man show or should I just finally TGEA and work with that?

Torque 3D can do everything TGEA can do.

Just for the record, I do appreciate the sentiment, but I would not call these clear or focused questions. Okay, back to CoD.

#175 1: I must say that the OP demos surely seems to have upped the engine and the toolset to todays standard -and for the greens wanted, it's a awesome job (gratz GG)

2: All this fuzz could have been avoided if GG would present the white paper stating what T3D is (standalone thank you)
(if you need to make development plans current implementations in bold, might be in normal and hopes in italics)

-not having this still is not the GG of today (or is it :/)

3: The foilage I asked about week(s) ago is seemingly part of T3D from the posts since my question.

4: Water is not real water zones, but a very interesting spline based hybrid ones (covers my previous question as well)

5: I have been following Bryce's development of his AI. You guys keep mentioning Gerhard's AI -what is the difference ?

6: Can we have that whitepaper please. It kinda sucks to have bought a engine without knowing it's features (would you buy a car without knowing it's data?)

(I simply do not believe T3D was developed on the fly, with friday morning brainstorms as base -you guys must have had a plan (featureset) so C'mon ;) -give it!

PS: besides that, the devs @ GG rocks!

#176 Couple of quick questions.

The road tool... is it mainly for dirt type roads, or can you do normal roads with it as well?

Whats the server requirements for running you're game on a browser?
(i.e. do you need a game server or just a web server?)


Joe

#177 Joseph, it looks as if the Road Editor is decal (texture) based, though I am not 100% certain.

#178

Quote:
I employ an artist neither full time nor part time. I intend to make games that are fun first, and if I have time left over, then I will work on making them pretty. Collecting colored blocks should be just as much fun as collecting glowing coins and mushrooms spewing green mist and shooting purple lightning, or I didn’t design the game right.

I see this argument a lot, along with belittlement of "shiny things". Mostly the people that say them have a bad understanding of game design.

The decision to use colored blocks or glowing coins and mushrooms spewing green mist and purple lightning is absolutely a game design issue. If you leave the decision until the end "if I have time left over", then you didn't design your game right. You should be developing your game around features and content, and adjust your schedule accordingly, not making your features and content a slave to your schedule.

Humans are sensual creatures. Visual and audible content draws upon our emotions, and helps us immerse ourselves in the game experience. You can come up with the most revolutionary game design concept since the MMORPG, but if you don't have the right visual and audio content to make a connection with your audience, it's not going to be fun.

Granted you can make a fun game with colored blocks, or a fun game with glowing coins, but they're not interchangeable. For instance, people intuitively understand that glowing gold coins are desirable, for 3 reasons. 1) Gold coins are desirable in real life, because they are valuable. 2) Glowing gold coins are pretty, and pretty things are almost universally desirable. 3) Glowing gold coins are common place in games already, and so there is a familiarity factor.

Outside of the 4-year-old demographic, colored blocks are not so intuitively desirable. You have to do different things to make them seem desirable. You'd probably actually have to make your colored blocks prettier than glowing gold coins, with more dramatic types of glowing effects, or with more detail, to make that connection. More likely you'd also have to make the surrounding content help you make that connection.

So the way you design your game certainly should take into account the type of content, and how that content is going to draw upon the user's emotions. "shiny things" are a big part of that.

#179 Well I already seem to have an understanding of what will and won't be in the engine so far. Correct me if I'm wrong.

1)Single player physics w/ PhsyX
2)New rendering
3)Lighting
4)Dynamic Shadows
5)New World Editor
6)Road Editor
7)River Editor
8)Material Editor with built in ground cover billboard FX and higher terrain texture counts
9)Higher Depth Terrain push and pull
10)Smoother sky transitions
11)Better ambient lighting to accommodate the sun light and the sky color lamination
12)Addition of fractal noise painting
13)Better Brush controls
14)PostFX system
15)SSAO
16)DoF
17)Cloth Simulation
18)Wetness simulation w better rain FX
19)Flash enabled Gui?
20)More accurate water/surface collisions
21)Browzer Enabled Publishing
22)Collada importing for static objects
23)Self-Creating Install Wizard
24)Softer Partials



First of all listing that made me want to drive to GG and ask to just sit at a pc for a few hours and have fun. But I digress.

My questions are as follows: (note: non of these I'm saying "I'm too damn lazy to make this so you need to have this in your engine or it will suck, cause I'm too lazy to build it myself.)

#'s refer to the numbered feature above. Yes or No would be ok answers don't have to answer all.

1)So if I make a bolder with given mass, friction rate, and elasticity it would behave just like a real bolder when I toss it down a slope?
Also is there a way to give the floor a friction rate like 0 to make it like ice?

3)Did you change this lighting system? Like do they have photometric light effect. Or presets for 40 watt, 75 watt, street lights, stadium lights?

4)So if its all dynamic now, if I made a DIF Shed without portals and walk in it. Will I still see a shadow of my character on the ground even though the shed blocks the sun rays from my character?

5)Will there be a thumb preview of the objects for the create tab? Because I seem to forget what asset I'm about to place down. (wall corner_a, wallcorner_c)

Are the organizing of objects better like the creation of object groups. I know if I did something slightly wrong with the drag and drop that my item might go into the wrong group folder.

6)Are these multi-textural?

7)Are these multi-textural? Can i make the density of the water so thick that it's like walking on moving jello? (weird ass question I know lol)

8)Dose the ground-cover only work for billboards or can it include trees, bushes or skull meshes.

10) Is it still a sky box? because from the videos it looks like a single panoramic image where some how it auto blended to the next sky image. Is it an image at all?

12)Are these preset fractal like in Vue where you have options for spikes, bumpy, crater
13)I heard he said in a video that he tried to make it like photoshop user ability, dose this include custom brush patterns?

14)What is PostFX.

17)Are these cloth simulations for static objects only or can it be integrated into a character models cloths?

18)I would love you if I could see this effect in the south pacific demo, during the day.

19)Flash enabled how? As in buttons or just a flash player for movie playback?

20)When swimming in the current engine I notice i can swim to the end of the water even though i know my character can stand in 4 feet of water. Is the code for the swimming more accurate? If I jump into the water will i get a splash and nipples off the water?

21)Would this require the user to still have the needed user specs to play the game even though its streamed via internet?

22)Can collada be used for characters? Should it be used for characters? Would it be a good alternative to using DTS or DIFs?

23)The install wizard. Can it be configured for CD/DVD/Blue-Ray deployment? IE breaks the burnable files up into sections. Also dose it make them into .ISOs?

24) Can i make a waterfall effect with partials that reflect? Can i place a emitter on the wall and have it project a O O O O pattern in 3D space or is the partial emitters still in a billboard pattern where the partial still looks at me as i move around it.

LOL Brett hates me now, "TOO MANY DAMN QUESTIONS!"

:D

GG Mafia member 227 outty.

PS: I can make my own characters back flip off walls and do a matrix walk :P MUAHHAHAHA. ... COUGH ... >.>

please answer...

#180

Quote:1)So if I make a bolder with given mass, friction rate, and elasticity it would behave just like a real bolder when I toss it down a slope?
Also is there a way to give the floor a friction rate like 0 to make it like ice?

If you use PhysX to do so, then you have individual control over the mass, static friction, dynamic friction, buoyancy settings, etc. of an object, and some control over the settings on the terrain. So making an object slide around as if it's on ice shouldn't be a problem.

I love your list of questions that goes to 24, yet has 19 questions in it. In a related note, my amp goes up to 11! ;)