Zen and the Art of Indie Game Development
by Tony Richards · 11/12/2008 (8:50 pm) · 2 comments
Well, it's been quite awhile since I made my last GG .plan... so I figured it was about time to give a quick update.
My current projects are making incredible progress.
Mostly I've been working on Zen Open Source Software and currently we have 8 games (and even some military hardware and simulations!) using our technology.
Last time I blogged, I was concentrating mostly on game development tools, expecting the state of the Indie Game Engine scene to significantly improve with the upcoming versions of TGEA, Torque 2 and the new and improved Garage Games with fully transparent development. Somehow I missed the 1 year anniversary, but I guess it was so transparent I simply saw through it, eh? :-P Ok, enough sarcasm... I still love the GG employees and Torque even though sometimes I'm disappointed with the progress or apparent lack thereof.
As a result, I've switched gears... so less concentration on tools and more concentration on game engines.... and the results have been uberlicious, but more on that later.
I am definitely looking forward to some of the new games using Torque... Legions and Ascension and even some commercial guys are starting to use Torque... EA, NCsoft, Ubisoft, etc... Incredible for an "Indie" game engine, eh? Personally I'm rooting for the true Indies.
And then comes the added advantage of a bunch of GG guys "making it big" with their own game studio. Awesome! Truly inspirational!
In other news...
Last month several Indies concentrating on Open Source Game Development had a chance to host a panel at SIEGE... and the turnout was grand. The panel covered how Open Source Game Development didn't have to mean "source distribution required" and how sometimes (often times?) Open Source Software could be significantly better than closed source... and free... how can you beat that!?!
As some of you may know, several of my friends and I have been putting significant time into a new website dedicated to Indie game developers... and more importantly, Open Source Indie Game Developers.
IndieZen.org specializes in Indie Open Source Game Development. Our primary project is a Game Engine Framework that makes life easier for Indies putting together custom game engines tailored specifically for their game. We also provide free hosting for SVN, Trac, phpbb3, and general site hosting for developers creating games using our technology. We are more than just a group of projects sharing some servers. We are a community of developers and users collaborating on game development software with an open, unrestrictive software license. First and foremost is our desire to create high quality extensible software that leads the way in the field of game development. Additionally, we foster an environment of mentors, journeymen and apprentices among several game development disciplines including programming, art, game design and producers.
What is a Game Engine Framework vs a Game Engine?
Before you get your panties in a wad thinking I'm hopping over here advertising a product that competes with Garage Games on their own website, lets take a step back.
Zen Engine does not necessarily compete with Torque... in fact, it augments it. Zen Engine is a full set of open source game development middleware and frameworks that works with any C++ game engine... including Torque.
Although the ZGarage (i.e. Torque based) plugin is still incomplete, when it's finished it will allow you to use the Torque scripting engine, rendering engine, networking, etc with the rest of the Zen Engine framework.
What does that get you?
Complete and professional integration with other components, including fully replaceable plugins for physics, databases, game rules, behaviors, AI, GUI, and even other options for networking, rendering and scripting.
A framework provides a generic facade over components in a system... in this case a game engine... but it doesn't limit you to the lowest common denominator of any component... in fact, if you so choose, you can use all of the advanced features of each component and put together the best game engine to suit your needs with minimal effort.
What's even better is it allows you to utilize the impressive game engine agnostic starter kits we've been creating, including the awesome MMO RPG starter kit based on my award winning game "Fractured Universe" as well as the upcoming genre defining games "Arcanoria" and "AIR".
Zen Engine Framework status
Ok, enough hype... what's the status of Zen Engine?
We're days away from our 0.3.0 release. In two to three months with our quasi monthly release schedule we'll be at 0.5.0 which is the "Final Alpha" version. Not every feature will be implemented, but everything you'd expect from an Indie Game Engine will be complete... whether you choose to use Torque + ZGarage as your primary components, or any of the other myriad of combinations of plugins... the choice is yours.
And as always, ZOSS is licensed via the ZLib license... free, open source, unrestrictive... use it however you like... commercial, open source, in house... it's yours to use, abuse, extend and enjoy.
And now for the obligatory screenshots....
Arcanoria
AIR
And an old but good Fractured Universe collage:
My current projects are making incredible progress.
Mostly I've been working on Zen Open Source Software and currently we have 8 games (and even some military hardware and simulations!) using our technology.
Last time I blogged, I was concentrating mostly on game development tools, expecting the state of the Indie Game Engine scene to significantly improve with the upcoming versions of TGEA, Torque 2 and the new and improved Garage Games with fully transparent development. Somehow I missed the 1 year anniversary, but I guess it was so transparent I simply saw through it, eh? :-P Ok, enough sarcasm... I still love the GG employees and Torque even though sometimes I'm disappointed with the progress or apparent lack thereof.
As a result, I've switched gears... so less concentration on tools and more concentration on game engines.... and the results have been uberlicious, but more on that later.
I am definitely looking forward to some of the new games using Torque... Legions and Ascension and even some commercial guys are starting to use Torque... EA, NCsoft, Ubisoft, etc... Incredible for an "Indie" game engine, eh? Personally I'm rooting for the true Indies.
And then comes the added advantage of a bunch of GG guys "making it big" with their own game studio. Awesome! Truly inspirational!
In other news...
Last month several Indies concentrating on Open Source Game Development had a chance to host a panel at SIEGE... and the turnout was grand. The panel covered how Open Source Game Development didn't have to mean "source distribution required" and how sometimes (often times?) Open Source Software could be significantly better than closed source... and free... how can you beat that!?!
As some of you may know, several of my friends and I have been putting significant time into a new website dedicated to Indie game developers... and more importantly, Open Source Indie Game Developers.
IndieZen.org specializes in Indie Open Source Game Development. Our primary project is a Game Engine Framework that makes life easier for Indies putting together custom game engines tailored specifically for their game. We also provide free hosting for SVN, Trac, phpbb3, and general site hosting for developers creating games using our technology. We are more than just a group of projects sharing some servers. We are a community of developers and users collaborating on game development software with an open, unrestrictive software license. First and foremost is our desire to create high quality extensible software that leads the way in the field of game development. Additionally, we foster an environment of mentors, journeymen and apprentices among several game development disciplines including programming, art, game design and producers.
What is a Game Engine Framework vs a Game Engine?
Before you get your panties in a wad thinking I'm hopping over here advertising a product that competes with Garage Games on their own website, lets take a step back.
Zen Engine does not necessarily compete with Torque... in fact, it augments it. Zen Engine is a full set of open source game development middleware and frameworks that works with any C++ game engine... including Torque.
Although the ZGarage (i.e. Torque based) plugin is still incomplete, when it's finished it will allow you to use the Torque scripting engine, rendering engine, networking, etc with the rest of the Zen Engine framework.
What does that get you?
Complete and professional integration with other components, including fully replaceable plugins for physics, databases, game rules, behaviors, AI, GUI, and even other options for networking, rendering and scripting.
A framework provides a generic facade over components in a system... in this case a game engine... but it doesn't limit you to the lowest common denominator of any component... in fact, if you so choose, you can use all of the advanced features of each component and put together the best game engine to suit your needs with minimal effort.
What's even better is it allows you to utilize the impressive game engine agnostic starter kits we've been creating, including the awesome MMO RPG starter kit based on my award winning game "Fractured Universe" as well as the upcoming genre defining games "Arcanoria" and "AIR".
Zen Engine Framework status
Ok, enough hype... what's the status of Zen Engine?
We're days away from our 0.3.0 release. In two to three months with our quasi monthly release schedule we'll be at 0.5.0 which is the "Final Alpha" version. Not every feature will be implemented, but everything you'd expect from an Indie Game Engine will be complete... whether you choose to use Torque + ZGarage as your primary components, or any of the other myriad of combinations of plugins... the choice is yours.
And as always, ZOSS is licensed via the ZLib license... free, open source, unrestrictive... use it however you like... commercial, open source, in house... it's yours to use, abuse, extend and enjoy.
And now for the obligatory screenshots....
Arcanoria
AIR
And an old but good Fractured Universe collage:
About the author
I am the founder of IndieZen.org, a website dedicated to the Indie 2.0 Revolution where a number of Indie game development studios and individuals collaborate and share a suite of custom built open source game development tools and middleware.
Torque Owner Adib Murad
Been working on a Java2D game framework. Sometimes I keep thinking about a Java bind to Torque, something like split TGEA subsystems into native SO libraries (like DLLs) and then JNI them into a Java API. A "T4J", so to say, to develop in Eclipse. But I suspect Torque code is too coupled to separate into "subsystems".
Now I'll be paying attention and following your progress on this. Sounds very interesting.
EDIT: Tried to fix my bad English...