Plan for Melv May
by Melv May · 10/17/2004 (1:05 am) · 31 comments
... continued from previous .plan.
... T2D .plans.
... T2D .Discussions.
IGC seemed a blast ... well, that's what I hear as unfortunately I wasn't there but in some ways I guess I was; T2D was there!
IGC kinda' removed the covers from T2D and hopefully lots of people would like to see more. Now comes the hard work of beating this thing into a better shape to produce a real kick-ass product. I've worked pretty damn hard over the last couple of months getting to where I am today and I think it's ultimately been worth it. It's been especially hard as it was during the birth of my daughter but that was simply a test of stamina I guess. The original idea was to release this to the community about a few weeks ago but in the end, T2D will be an official GG product and will be much better for it.
It's a real privilege to be working with GG on this project and I'm really fired-up about it. The initial design concepts have been expanded upon greatly and some wonderful things'll be happening to T2D over the next few months which will bring some serious 2D power to your fingertips. Hopefully, I can get T2D finished just in time to get started again on Strategem after Christmas 2004.
GG had their own demos for the IGC but I put together my own which includes some things you may have already seen and possibly not if you didn't go to the IGC.
It's a pretty big download (32.5mb) but it's kind've fun to watch. Just a little eye-fodder for fun really, nothing serious.
T2D Movie
I'll try to keep you all informed as we crack through the major milestones.
All the best everyone,
- Melv.
... T2D .plans.
... T2D .Discussions.
IGC seemed a blast ... well, that's what I hear as unfortunately I wasn't there but in some ways I guess I was; T2D was there!
IGC kinda' removed the covers from T2D and hopefully lots of people would like to see more. Now comes the hard work of beating this thing into a better shape to produce a real kick-ass product. I've worked pretty damn hard over the last couple of months getting to where I am today and I think it's ultimately been worth it. It's been especially hard as it was during the birth of my daughter but that was simply a test of stamina I guess. The original idea was to release this to the community about a few weeks ago but in the end, T2D will be an official GG product and will be much better for it.
It's a real privilege to be working with GG on this project and I'm really fired-up about it. The initial design concepts have been expanded upon greatly and some wonderful things'll be happening to T2D over the next few months which will bring some serious 2D power to your fingertips. Hopefully, I can get T2D finished just in time to get started again on Strategem after Christmas 2004.
GG had their own demos for the IGC but I put together my own which includes some things you may have already seen and possibly not if you didn't go to the IGC.
It's a pretty big download (32.5mb) but it's kind've fun to watch. Just a little eye-fodder for fun really, nothing serious.
T2D Movie
I'll try to keep you all informed as we crack through the major milestones.
All the best everyone,
- Melv.
About the author
#2
Its all good, im sure itll be worth it :)
10/17/2004 (1:48 am)
Sigh. I was so looking forward to this to just play around with. Suppose I'll have to open up my wallet yet again. DAMN YOU GG!! Sending me to the poorhouse lol.Its all good, im sure itll be worth it :)
#3
Seems like the main focus is on particles, and damn they do really enhance the scenes.
10/17/2004 (1:59 am)
I usually don't follow the T2D stuff, but this is just amazing. Especially the asteroids clone in the end of the movie up there, just wow!Seems like the main focus is on particles, and damn they do really enhance the scenes.
#4
Can't find any player that supports wmv3 videos.
10/17/2004 (3:32 am)
Any plans on releasing a "non-wmv" format video?Can't find any player that supports wmv3 videos.
#5
I think i may have to drop my 2D/3D engine.....
Now i will have some time for my other lil projects.
This looks like it will be really flexable.
But i have one question, even though this is a 2d game engine, will it still allow you to load 3d objects?
Im only asking this because thats the direction i was going with my 2d/3d game engine. Ex. All charaters would be in 2D but the level itself would be made in 3d.
10/17/2004 (5:30 am)
Wow man!I think i may have to drop my 2D/3D engine.....
Now i will have some time for my other lil projects.
This looks like it will be really flexable.
But i have one question, even though this is a 2d game engine, will it still allow you to load 3d objects?
Im only asking this because thats the direction i was going with my 2d/3d game engine. Ex. All charaters would be in 2D but the level itself would be made in 3d.
#6
10/17/2004 (5:44 am)
Will this engine be sold or will it be a free asset? So making a game like the classic 2 screen X-Men arcade should be fairly easy with this engine only with better effects right?
#7
@Dylan: All I can say is that it'll be worth every penny/cent. :)
@Stefan: I was focusing mainly on the particles because the editor was the last thing I did. It wasn't really meant to be a balanced demo showing a complete feature set as there just isn't enough demo material for that. Just a little eye-fodder. Most of the work has been on the underlying code with little emphasis on demos (as it should be) but you should start to see more and more cool things with the T2D label on them soon.
@Alex: I just use Windows movie-maker because it's simple to use but it does insist on spitting out WMV files. A quick search revealed WMV on Linux and WMV on Mac although I really don't know much about these products, sorry. T2D is completely cross-platform and any official demo will be in a better format. I'll have a look at converting it into a more friendly non-MS format though.
@Chris: It is really flexible. T2D sits squarely on-top of stock TGE/TSE although the packaging of it when it's released is something that's being discussed now. T2D is presented using a standard GUI control window so you can mix it up with standard 3D TGE. You could use T2D as a 2D overlay if you want instead of gaming, even cool looking HUDs are possible. There's no interaction though between the 3D world and the 2D one.
@Kenny: As I mentioned above, I can't say yet whether there'll be a free scriptable version available yet or exactly how the package(s) will turn out. However it turns out, I can guarantee, it'll be worth the wait. Already it's extremely simple to knock together games and for most newbies, all they'll need. What we need to do now is integrate the components and expand them so that veterans alike will find it valuable.
Sorry to be so vague about it all but I just wanted to let everyone know that it's all moving along nicely and you should start seeing more details soon.
- Melv.
10/17/2004 (6:16 am)
@Timothy: It's good to hear things about T2D. I really missed out this year at IGC but I'll be there next year and probably stay for a week or so.@Dylan: All I can say is that it'll be worth every penny/cent. :)
@Stefan: I was focusing mainly on the particles because the editor was the last thing I did. It wasn't really meant to be a balanced demo showing a complete feature set as there just isn't enough demo material for that. Just a little eye-fodder. Most of the work has been on the underlying code with little emphasis on demos (as it should be) but you should start to see more and more cool things with the T2D label on them soon.
@Alex: I just use Windows movie-maker because it's simple to use but it does insist on spitting out WMV files. A quick search revealed WMV on Linux and WMV on Mac although I really don't know much about these products, sorry. T2D is completely cross-platform and any official demo will be in a better format. I'll have a look at converting it into a more friendly non-MS format though.
@Chris: It is really flexible. T2D sits squarely on-top of stock TGE/TSE although the packaging of it when it's released is something that's being discussed now. T2D is presented using a standard GUI control window so you can mix it up with standard 3D TGE. You could use T2D as a 2D overlay if you want instead of gaming, even cool looking HUDs are possible. There's no interaction though between the 3D world and the 2D one.
@Kenny: As I mentioned above, I can't say yet whether there'll be a free scriptable version available yet or exactly how the package(s) will turn out. However it turns out, I can guarantee, it'll be worth the wait. Already it's extremely simple to knock together games and for most newbies, all they'll need. What we need to do now is integrate the components and expand them so that veterans alike will find it valuable.
Sorry to be so vague about it all but I just wanted to let everyone know that it's all moving along nicely and you should start seeing more details soon.
- Melv.
#8
10/17/2004 (6:49 am)
[quote]You could use T2D as a 2D overlay if you want instead of gaming, even cool looking HUDs are possible. There 
#9
One quick question please.
Can the 2D particle effects be applied to the 3D world also.
eg. Orcs shooting flaming/smoking arrows or magic spells that are projected particle effects that affects 3D characters.
Orc cast a teleportation spell and using the beam-up effect is transported away.
Orc cast entrapment and swirling particles of force holds a character in place.
Orc cast Heal and a aura of light baths a character and renews thier health.
Orc cast focus and particles of light surge from underneath as his magic bar fills back up.
Realm Wars would be perfect to test bed a lot of particle tech.
Plainly Melv that particle editor alone is worth buying IMHO.
If I missed the answer already I blame lack of sleep :))) I may have asked this before. :))
John H.
10/17/2004 (6:51 am)
Bro and I just watched your DEMO Melv!! Free!!! nah SELL it Man SELL it. You put in some serious work.One quick question please.
Can the 2D particle effects be applied to the 3D world also.
eg. Orcs shooting flaming/smoking arrows or magic spells that are projected particle effects that affects 3D characters.
Orc cast a teleportation spell and using the beam-up effect is transported away.
Orc cast entrapment and swirling particles of force holds a character in place.
Orc cast Heal and a aura of light baths a character and renews thier health.
Orc cast focus and particles of light surge from underneath as his magic bar fills back up.
Realm Wars would be perfect to test bed a lot of particle tech.
Plainly Melv that particle editor alone is worth buying IMHO.
If I missed the answer already I blame lack of sleep :))) I may have asked this before. :))
John H.
#10
@Johnny: As I mentioned before, there's no interaction between the 3D world and the 2D one. The particles are 2D only. I'm due to kick-start Strategem / Strategem after Christmas and this engine will form the basis of the 3D one for that game so you'll definately see a 3D version of it next year. That's the plan.
- Melv.
10/17/2004 (9:04 am)
@Eric: Definately. I'm pretty pleased with the results of the particle engine. Although the editor doesn't allow editing the graphs graphically, it does allow control of all the fields. The official GG editor will kick booty.@Johnny: As I mentioned before, there's no interaction between the 3D world and the 2D one. The particles are 2D only. I'm due to kick-start Strategem / Strategem after Christmas and this engine will form the basis of the 3D one for that game so you'll definately see a 3D version of it next year. That's the plan.
- Melv.
#11
10/17/2004 (9:04 am)
Thanks Melv, didn't know that windows media player were available for Mac (although I really hate windows media player, but hey... it worked)
#12
Question time!
1) Does it require tge to use? I read that it's sitting ontop of tge. Do you know if it will or not yet? Because I develop mainly 2d games and would certainly pick up and use t2d, but not tge.
2) Will it be about the same as tge in the handling of source code, and other policities?
3) Price/release date range? Probably not possible for you to say so just ignore this one ;) .
Nice work you finally conveived me to ditch creating my own engines and just buy one, and that's not easy.
10/17/2004 (10:15 am)
Wow!Question time!
1) Does it require tge to use? I read that it's sitting ontop of tge. Do you know if it will or not yet? Because I develop mainly 2d games and would certainly pick up and use t2d, but not tge.
2) Will it be about the same as tge in the handling of source code, and other policities?
3) Price/release date range? Probably not possible for you to say so just ignore this one ;) .
Nice work you finally conveived me to ditch creating my own engines and just buy one, and that's not easy.
#13
Melv its simply absolute the best 2d engine what i ever see...im totally shocked on the knowledge of the engine when i see the movie... !! Truly amazing !!
When its will be released ? Do you have a date for ?
T2D totally rules !!
10/17/2004 (11:18 am)
I cant believe my eyes !! 8:ooooooMelv its simply absolute the best 2d engine what i ever see...im totally shocked on the knowledge of the engine when i see the movie... !! Truly amazing !!
When its will be released ? Do you have a date for ?
T2D totally rules !!
#14
From everything I've seen, it's a TGE component layer, so TGE will be required. At least as far as I've seen. I don't know if any move behind the scenes to make it outside of TGE are in place, but the simple fact that it started as an integrated project that adds major control to the GUI interface (to the extent that you can make fast action games with realistic particle systems), it seems that it's a strong part of TGE.
@Melv
I wish I could have been at IGC, too. I would have loved to have seen this in person and talked to the GG guys who've been working with it. It would have been great to see everything and everyone else, as well, but this is one of the TGE projects that I've found most intriguing. It is the first hge thought-shift example that the community can show people when we get the question "isn't Torque only good for FPS's?"
Just friday I was asked by a guy in my office if Torque had a third-person view "like Alice". I pressed tab, and the camera magically moved. He wasn't happy because it still felt like a FPS. He was a bit happier when I installed the Alice demo and showed him that the camera was nearly the same except that the sensitivity was lower, and the distance to the character model was the further. Then I showed him some of the camera resources and he was quite a bit happier. But there's still a mentality that since Torque came from Tribes, it's a FPS engine.
This is a major deviation from that line of thought, and one of the best examples of just how far a talented program can take such a solid engine. Now, if you could figure out a way to clone yourself and hire your clones out on retainer, then you could make some major bank!
10/17/2004 (11:59 am)
@BenFrom everything I've seen, it's a TGE component layer, so TGE will be required. At least as far as I've seen. I don't know if any move behind the scenes to make it outside of TGE are in place, but the simple fact that it started as an integrated project that adds major control to the GUI interface (to the extent that you can make fast action games with realistic particle systems), it seems that it's a strong part of TGE.
@Melv
I wish I could have been at IGC, too. I would have loved to have seen this in person and talked to the GG guys who've been working with it. It would have been great to see everything and everyone else, as well, but this is one of the TGE projects that I've found most intriguing. It is the first hge thought-shift example that the community can show people when we get the question "isn't Torque only good for FPS's?"
Just friday I was asked by a guy in my office if Torque had a third-person view "like Alice". I pressed tab, and the camera magically moved. He wasn't happy because it still felt like a FPS. He was a bit happier when I installed the Alice demo and showed him that the camera was nearly the same except that the sensitivity was lower, and the distance to the character model was the further. Then I showed him some of the camera resources and he was quite a bit happier. But there's still a mentality that since Torque came from Tribes, it's a FPS engine.
This is a major deviation from that line of thought, and one of the best examples of just how far a talented program can take such a solid engine. Now, if you could figure out a way to clone yourself and hire your clones out on retainer, then you could make some major bank!
#15
But anyway, to Melv. Yeah I know itll be worth it, I would actually pay a fair bit for it :). I just love getting free rides :P
10/17/2004 (3:57 pm)
Concerning the 'fps engine' tag that TGE gets. My default reply is that an engine is genre inspecific. It just happens to have some features that make fps games easier to make. I would say 90% (or more) of the code is pretty game independent.But anyway, to Melv. Yeah I know itll be worth it, I would actually pay a fair bit for it :). I just love getting free rides :P
#16
10/17/2004 (6:11 pm)
Hey Melv, T2D looked real nice at the ICG - game ideas were popping into my head and I may be doing my next game using it if I can ever get minigolf out the door. Looking at the some of the game demos I was wondering if everything is happening on the client or if it is using a client/server model similiar to basic Torque.
#18
@David: My thoughts exactly. I hope it's encouraging to see non-FPS applications coming out.
@Dylan: There may still be free versions coming from this in the form of script-only versions but I just don't know how it's going to turn out yet.
@Kevin: At the moment, everything is happening on the client. I kept networking in mind when I was developing T2D but I was initial cautious about making it too complicated as I wanted to make it as simple as possible but networking does make for some very interesting game ideas and it'll be networked as per standard TGE fairly soon. The hardest part at the moment is trying to not get distracted by game ideas which are flooding my mind. The urge to get sidetracked and write classic 2D arcade games is almost overpowering!! Can't wait to see what you guys will come up with.
@Randy: You better believe it. :)
- Melv.
10/17/2004 (11:26 pm)
@Ben: David is correct in that T2D is a component layer. It relies upon TGE/TSE for the fundamentals and has a hierarchical set of objects that can be manipulated within a specialised GUI control which acts as a window on the 2D world. There's physics, mounting, animation, bounds-control, object file-streaming, simple collision-detection and much more, all scriptable. With that said, there's actually very little it does rely upon; apart from the GUI control as a canvas, just things like vectors etc so it wouldn't be beyond reason to have it as a standalone although I haven't implemented things like sound and input as this is already done within the TGE. Unforuntately, I haven't got any other details on packaging yet.@David: My thoughts exactly. I hope it's encouraging to see non-FPS applications coming out.
@Dylan: There may still be free versions coming from this in the form of script-only versions but I just don't know how it's going to turn out yet.
@Kevin: At the moment, everything is happening on the client. I kept networking in mind when I was developing T2D but I was initial cautious about making it too complicated as I wanted to make it as simple as possible but networking does make for some very interesting game ideas and it'll be networked as per standard TGE fairly soon. The hardest part at the moment is trying to not get distracted by game ideas which are flooding my mind. The urge to get sidetracked and write classic 2D arcade games is almost overpowering!! Can't wait to see what you guys will come up with.
@Randy: You better believe it. :)
- Melv.
#19
T2D is great and i followed all the time the progress of T2D and Melv's "promise" to publish it once its (near) done.
Then long time there is nothing to read about T2D around here (which i understand, cuz Melv got his daughter), then all of a sudden i read that its now a GG product and you have to pay for it.
Dont understand me wrong, T2D is great (so far) and i understand that Melv put lot of time and efforts into it, but now i feel i wasted my time waiting for the T2D being published ...
10/18/2004 (9:22 am)
I am a little bit disappointed.T2D is great and i followed all the time the progress of T2D and Melv's "promise" to publish it once its (near) done.
Then long time there is nothing to read about T2D around here (which i understand, cuz Melv got his daughter), then all of a sudden i read that its now a GG product and you have to pay for it.
Dont understand me wrong, T2D is great (so far) and i understand that Melv put lot of time and efforts into it, but now i feel i wasted my time waiting for the T2D being published ...
#20
- Melv.
10/18/2004 (12:14 pm)
@Masoud: And if you had to pay $10 for it; you wouldn't? You shouldn't feel you've wasted your time as there may still be free versions of it, just not with all the months of work that's still to be put into it. If I was to release it as it is; you wouldn't get nearly as much as you will later in the year when it's got fully integrated editors, networking, robust physics and other stuff that I just couldn't do on my own. A small price tag should be of trivial concern when you see what you'll get. Don't dispair, see what's on offer later in the year. You should *never* put on hold your plans for work that's WIP. :)- Melv.
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