Blog for ando at GarageGames.com

Anybody want to make a game :)

ando — 2008-08-15T18:03:37+00:00

I seem to have created a load of random stuff while toying with TGE / TGEA. Little wacky robot dudes, city streets, alien desert worlds etc... I really should put this time into something more useful like a game :)

Some of that random stuff...

I got loads of these things, seems to calm me and it beats watching TV :) I really would like to hook up with somebody who can code and just maybe between us knock out a game, if that sounds good to you, drop me a mail.

1.7 Good Stuffage

ando — 2008-05-14T22:58:51+00:00

Only me, been tinkering around with TGEA 1.7 and seeing what it can do. I love all the tweaks, features and terrain stuffage There is plenty to like with good terrain texture detail now achievable, polysoup, etc... all good stuff but it seems the terrain now blurs out over a distance, hmmmmmmmmmmm.

I have been thinking of starting a project or just join one that's already in development and shows promise. Maybe just work along with a single coder and see what we can do code/art. If you got something cooking let me know.

djmix.net/ando/mixes

Stuffage

ando — 2008-02-04T22:20:05+00:00

Hello people, first post this year me thinks, thought I share some images from a small contract I just did, thanks to Mikey for permission to pimp. Shots show a few semi damaged buildings, couple of these you can access and go onto the roof. The big tower blocks are just candy so you cant enter them.

I was thinking of creating a complete set similar to these buildings, kinda like a complete battlefield pack but I don't think the packs really sell enough numbers to be worth the hassle, if your interested in this I would like to know. As always if you have any stuff need doing give me try :P

Gnostaria WIP4

ando — 2007-12-15T02:08:22+00:00

This is one crazy level build, it has caves, ruins, woods, two villages, docks, bridges, inns, a complete town etc.. You can enter all the structures, some have multiple floors, you can even access and patrol the town wall, its a very busy level. Getting all the interiors of the town to play nicely was a challenge but it is pretty good performance considering.

I avoided structural brushes and portals basically because it murder/death/kills the frame rate when your standing out in the street of the town, I could not afford to let map2diff slice and dice the geometry so it is pure detail brushwork and not a single portal. Proper optimizing of the brushwork when building was the order of the day hiding, chalking, mitring and the major saver was sneaky LOD's and some cool code from Matt that took the performance hit out of the water shader.

Santa would be happy to know some buildings in this level have good old chimneys so he can unload his big fat sack all over the place, well he does only come once a year, haha

Thanks to Matt again for letting me post this work and be sure to check out Gnostaria, it is shaping up nicely... www.gnostaria.com/

If you need any level work doing or general game art stuffage, drop me a mail (paying gigs only)

Gnostaria WIP3

ando — 2007-10-12T13:05:15+00:00

Last blog pretty much covered the nature side of things in Gnostaria, terrain, trees, rocks, caves, blah blah, now I am onto the fun stuff, structures. You probably guessed by the screenshots it is a medieval town that is being built, the cool thing is these buildings will all have interiors, so you go to the Inn for a drink, go to Church and be forgiven for getting drunk and if they don't work you can sober up in the dungeons :)

Only the church here is opened at the moment, the other buildings are currently just exterior, I really want to plot out the town with these basic builds to get the idea of how things will look so I can easily make changes. I am loving TGEA and its fancy pants normal maps, cobbles and brick just look awesome when you in-game, the screens don't do em justice.

Something that bugged me was that the DTS bake into constructor seems to ignore transparency which is a nightmare because I will need to float in all the windows with the editor, I dunno if I am missing a trick here, any ideas? It be cool if somebody knows a good method of getting windows into TGEA diffs so it is one piece. I did float in the main church window with the editor just as a quick test but things will get ugly if I do a complete town like this. This seems a pretty basic feature that TGEA should be able to do.

There is still a long way to go with this and I hope to keep you guys updated as it go's. Thanks to Matt for being very open with this and letting me show you the level as I progress.

Check it out... www.gnostaria.com/

Gnostaria WIP2

ando — 2007-10-06T18:26:21+00:00

Dunno if you got my last blog, I showed a few pics from Gnostaria (work in progress) if you compare the shots from that blog to this you will see the difference, still work in progress but a big jump.

I wanted to push the visuals more especially the trees as some wooded areas are featured and it is no doubt the most common and in your face art asset in the game. Having sorted the tree it was onto the caves, pain in the ass this was. Making blocky DIF look natural ain't fun but toss in some models and it improves.

I use 3DWS for my DIF builds but it seems the newer MAP2DIF stuff seems to not like 3DWS (pink and green crap appearing on edges and in water reflections) What I done was load the 3DWS made .map into constructor and compile out of it, problem solved but a little goofy.

I am learning Constructor slowly but I can make 3DWS stuff far faster and more efficient at this moment. The next milestone in this contract is a small town dock, church, inns, etc... that will be fun, hopefully I keep you posted on that.

Check it out... www.gnostaria.com/

Gnostaria - Work in progress

ando — 2007-09-19T22:03:42+00:00

Been a while since I blogged, I have been busy with various contracts more and more TGEA related work than anything. I don't know if you chaps have heard of Gnostaria but it should look the muts nuts when done :) Matt the Gnostaria Master Cheif kindly let me show some work in progress, nothing much really but damn TGEA certainly wakes up an environment when you put the candy on. Still a long way to go with the environment but the basic layout / terrain is pretty much done and I have the raw assets in place, block buildings, trees, rocks. The hard part is in the detailing and the harder part is in the is in the performance.

Go check out Gnostaria... http://www.gnostaria.com/

This is awsome with sound... http://www.empiresofgnostaria.com/

Note to the PA team, I will be back on it next month :)

TGEA bling

ando — 2007-06-11T23:43:05+00:00

BLING BLING, maybe 4 pics is a but much but hey you need broadband in your life.

Been busy doing various contracts and finally got the chance to work with TGEA. I have been wanting to have a crack at TGEA for a while now and building this sewer system was a good introduction, water, lights, shader tricks etc... I think it is important to be subtle with shaders and bling bling FX, I see some newer games that go too far with shiny shaders and everything can look plastic.

I really enjoyed playing with the eye candy extras TGEA offers and hope a few more TGEA contracts come my way so I can tinker with it some more, any work really, TGE, TGEA, whatever drop me a mail.

Jungle Boogie 2

ando — 2007-04-04T20:20:59+00:00

After some feedback from my previous blog I fixed the offending eye candy (grass and detail map) and pushed the scene some more. I could keep adding to this but it would kill framerate as the alpha textures really suck up the frames.

I don't have any broken food to give as prizes for guessing the framrate this time, sorry :) so I will just tell you... 62FPS @ 1280x1024 not bad

It could be interesting to port this scene into TGEA just to compare visuals and performance.

Jungle Boogie

ando — 2007-03-30T18:36:14+00:00

A client wanted some jungle bits doing, I always test my stuff before I hand it over so decided to build a scene. What you see is ONE tree model and ONE billboard texture and the magic that is replicator along with my usual environment fiddling. The framerate is very healty too :)

TGE rox :)

Guess the framerate and win a broken sandwich