Releasing Code

#1 I see no problem with people charging for engine enhancements... as long as they aren't price gouging.

That's a lose/lose situation because no one will buy it and the developer won't make anymoney.

But if someone made an enhancement that made torque on par with todays latest games, I'd easily pay another 100 bucks for it.

But I wouldn't pay, say, a thousand for it.

Also, the license would have to be extremely open with no strings attached. No royalties or other future fanagling.

#2 No one will buy what?
There game or application?

little confused on that statement.

If you are saying there game or application I think people will buy it as long as its a quality game.

#3 This is the way I see it: If someone writes a piece of useful code, and then gives it away for free, to give something back to the community or whatever, that's great, and I'll say thank you very much and use the code if I have need for it. But if someone doesn't want to give away their code, it is their choice! It doesn't matter if the community enabled them to write the code, or even if they've used other peoples source code as the basis for their work (as long as they are not in breach of any license or user agreements that is). If you write code, you should be allowed to sell it at any price you want, and with any usage restrictions you want.

#4 I kinda had a feeling this might turn up again (it's not the first and won't be the last time). Personally if they sell it for a reasonable price and license then power to them. If you don't like it wait until someone does it for free, I really don't think it's as hard as anyone thinks.

My C++ / Torque is a bit rough. But it look me ~8 hours to add all the feature's they've got to my own engine. The enabler was really getting a strong vertex / pixel shader pipeline in.

What I think would be a good idea is if people posted generic 'feature' requests and posted a pledge to get them implemented. That way if 2000 people want Maya exporter support and are willing to pay $10 for it, we'd probably have it by the end of the week.

Software is a strange case because of no cost of duplication they think it doesn't cost people to make it. Obviously this isn't the case. No other industry "expects" innovation to be given away free. We're just spoilt since we have an aweful lot of good people that do.

#5 I like the idea of selling engine upgrades. Its a great way for people to earn some more funding for their project.

However, I think that if someone uses a free code resource on the site in their game, they really should release some free resource before they sell their engine upgrades. It just seems right to me... if you're going to use something a community member is giving away, you should give something back.

#6 If they don't sell it they are likely to keep it closed. At least you can get the code if they sell it. Giving away code is good and all but programmers should not be expected to give everything away. If your an artist.. you paid your 100 bucks, why dont you shell out a bunch of free models to pay back? Or if your a musician, why not shell out a bunch of free music tracks and sound effects. or if your a designer why not submit some 10-20 page design documents for games? We are trying to make commercial games here.. not support the free(dom) software movement. When your young (not saying you are.. just this argument keeps coming up) you think everything should be free, when you get older and have to support yourself you start wishing you had a code enhancement to sell. That's my opinion on it. Don't let it start a flame war or anything.. these forums are badly torched and shaken as it is.

#7 I see were your coming from but I believe if they do use any thing from the community the should release an equall or greater amount back to the community to repay for what they have taken.

Theres no reason to flame you Tim you have a good argument and I also see that point of it.

#8 Would you supply the community with models in exchange for free code they released that you used? Something along the lines of the content packs that are available now except free? They would need scripts with them so they are pluginable to torque as you would not want the free code without it being pluginable, otherwise I can go to nvidia's website and get you the code to add per pixel bumpmapping to torque.. your just not gonna know where to put it in torque. Because if you say not then honestly you can't say that programmers should. Personally Im all for selling code or art content or whatever. I think the content packs are a good idea. We don't have the budget of pro developers so we have to do what we can to generate some money to fund our work. Games aren't free to make.

#9 very true tim... I've only been around for a little over a year and I'm already very sick of people brining this up in the forums, its a shame the newbies dont check for this before they start a whole new thread on it.

Yes Sean, if everyone who did anything for torque was willing to give all their stuff away for free then torque could possibly look just as good as DOOM III, theres a lot of talent here and I'm sure we could keep torque alive just about forever... So what? who are you to say "hey, torque is really great and almost free, so you should give away all the work you do for it, or else your a jerk", true if someone gave away resources it might make them more popular (I know I think very kindly of people who contribute), but its not our place to scold people if they dont. A prime example of this is Paulb and his game, project shadow (I believe). I think they've been working on it for about a year now and all they have done so far is make graphical improvements to torque (or at least thats all they are showing to the public). That means they have 0% actual game made, just a powered up version of torque. Now every now and then paul will release a screenshot and all everybody does is bug him to give it away for free (a whole dev shot on water effects was taken down because people were getting really nasty because he didnt want to give away his code). This is a very bad thing, theres no reason why people like him should be bullied because he is investing his time in the engine instead of his actual game. While they have been working on torque I believe orbz, marble blast and thinktanks have all gone from start to to finish to market. That means that while they were bussy improving the engine, other people spent their time making games and selling them for money... why shouldnt paul (who is planning on selling his improvements to the community) be expected to be compensated for the year of effort his team put in on the engine? he could have easily made a game in that time and have gotten money for it. I'm a kid, all my expenses are paid for by scholarships and my parents, I'm happy to make free improvements to the engine... but what I dont think you understand is (and it took me awhile before I really got it to) is that GG isnt made up entirely of kids and amatuers, there are some adults here who have actualy worked in the real game industy and need to make money doing this to support themselves and their family. Put yourself in their shoes for a moment, if you have the choice, make money, pay for your kids vacinations and make sure your wife doesnt leave you for another guy who can actualy support her, or be a cool guy and do free work out of an obligation to compensate for torques low price, what would you chose?

seriously Saun, what is the point of starting a thread like this except to put down people who dont want to give away their code? stop using selfishness to mobilize community bullying

#10

Quote: what is the point of starting a thread like this except to put down people who dont want to give away their code?

I don't see a need to censor him. He has an opinion on the subject and was looking for other opinions.

???

#11 anthony, unless that was a joke relating to the sadamn thread, then just shut up... god, I am so sick of all this censorship bullcrap. If someone says something stupid and you expain to them why its stupid and all the harmfull effects its causing then that is not F'ing censorship, censorship would be if I moderated this forum and just deleted this thread right after seeing it, that would be censorship. I swear, its like people in this community throw that term around all the freakin time just for kicks.

Anthony, you said he was looking for other opinions and thats exactly what I gave him, except my opinion is a little more than an opinion because its based on what actualy happens with this topic. Look, I'm not trying to be insulting to Saun here, I think he's a bright eyed newbie who honestly thinks it would be great if everyone shared stuff, I thought that way as well when I was new, then I read about 30 threads like this (and saw how nasty everyone treated pual because he wouldnt give up his hard work) and I realised just how dumb and pointless this whole topic is. this never ectualy motivates programers to share resources, in fact it probably just pisses them off having someone pretty much say they should. On the other side it rallies the support of artists and newbies who will agree with you for idealistic reasons, but those reasons are really very shallow, when it comes down to it (whether you realise it or not) your main motivation for supporting this is because you want shaders and bump mapping, or whatever in the engine and cant do it yourself.

so ya, this topic is spam and its getting very old, this has already been discussed in detail and all it ever ends up doing is making one group feel pissed off and cheated because somone wouldnt give away their code, and the other group feel resentfull towards the whole community for demanding them to give up their work... I dont see why we have to go through all of this crap again and again and again.

#12 Here Here. If there was a better forum search then we could avoid topics like this ;)