Torque 3D Development - 1.1 Alpha!
by Brett Seyler · 11/19/2009 (5:06 pm) · 143 comments
Greetings Torque 3D users! In the last Torque 3D dev blog, we showed that the Torque 3D team has no plans of slowing down after the 1.0 release. In this blog, we're thrilled to unveil some more of the new tech we have been working on.
Download Torque 3D 1.1 Alpha from your account now!
Got your downloads started? Good, now read on...Torque 3D 1.1 Alpha New Features
Forest Editor
Since GDC '09, you've all been patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Sickhead Games' foliage rendering and painting technology. We showed you videos of Tom demoing the 'Forest Kit' and Pacific Demo. For those of you who have not heard about it, the Forest Editor is a tool that allows you to quickly create massive amounts of vegetation for your level. This includes patches of trees, forests, and fields of smaller elements such as shrubs and plants. You can paint an entire forest using multiple brushes, which will lay down 3D models for you. In addition to these great tools, Sickhead has done a tremendous amount of work to make sure Torque 3D can render vast forests with ease.We never officially announced pricing for 'Forest Kit' (now officially 'Forest Editor'), and of course, in the end it was Sickhead's creation and their choice to put an appropriate price on it. For what it provides, we were looking at prices anywhere from $100 to $500 / seat as an add-on. Sometimes, where it's appropriate for Torque, we try to work out a deal to offer 3rd pary add-ons like this as a fully integrated feature of the core engine. I'm happy to say that we were able to work out this kind of deal with Sickhead. As great as these guys are to work with on development, they are also very flexible on the business side, with the best interests of Torque and Torque users in mind.
Let me make this crystal clear for all you anticipating use of the new Forest Editor then, but perhaps fretting the cost...it's now included in Torque 3D Professional, free of charge. All current Torque 3D license holders can download the 1.1 Alpha and begin using this amazing tool. The Official Documentation will be updated later today to show you how to use it. I'd suggest jumping on IRC hour today to say thanks to Sickhead for helping us make this happen and to ask questions about how to get the most from this new feature.
Sketch Tool
We have another surprise feature for the 1.1 Alpha, yet another fantastic Sickhead creation. The Sketch Tool allows you to quickly generate convex meshes without going to 3rd party modeling applications, such as Maya or 3DS Max. The interface allows you to quickly sketch out convex shapes via simple mouse actions. You can edit the faces of your mesh to roughly resemble what your final assets might look like. As with the Forest Editor, the Official Documentation will be updated later today with a guide to using the Sketch Tool. Again, big thanks to Sickhead for making rapid iteration in Torque 3D ever more powerful.In the hands of a non-artist, such as myself, I was able to create a few simple houses which I then duplicated to create an entire village:
For experienced artists, such as Sickhead's Russell Fincher, the levels you can create in less than 2 hours is amazing:
Prefabs
Another major win for rapid iteration in Torque 3D is the addition of prefabs. Rather than copying and pasting multiple selections (rinse & repeat), the prefab system allows you to group multiple objects together and combine them into a single file. Imagine you are making a city with hundreds of working lamp posts? Simply combine the lamp model and point light into a single prefab. You can now load the prefab file into your level as much as you want without having to create each lamp and point light by hand.
We also put together a quick and dirty version of this new feature in action. Please forgive the lack of editing, narration and music...we'll build something nicer to show this later on.
Major GUI Editor Improvements
Rene Damm performed a full usability pass on Torque 3D's GUI Editor to clean up the interface and add new adjustment options, making the GUI Editor much easier to use. Of course, he couldn't stop with just general improvements...Gone are the days of manually editing every single GUI profile by hand via TorqueScript. Rene Damm integrated a Profile Editor into Torque 3D's GUI Editor! If you didn't already know, GUI Profiles are what determine the overall appearance of your interface elements. Want your buttons to be opaque? Need to use 20 different fonts depending on the text control type? Making these changes are as simple as loading the Profile Editor.
Major SFX Upgrades
Speaking of Rene, his SFX work also deserves major spotlight time in this blog. The overall goal was to move from the very rudimentary and primarily code-driven SFX system in 1.0 to a primarily data-driven system that can be set up and controlled entirely from within the editors.- Ambient Audio: Audio behavior can be directly assigned to objects within a level as well as to levels themselves. As the listeners roams around, an ambient audio mix is automatically created and maintained by the system.
- Interactive Audio: Audio can be set up to react to game state changes using SFXParameters and SFXStates. The system automatically responds to changes to these objects.
- FMOD Designer Support: Complex game audio effects and interactive music can be designed in the FMOD Designer tool and dropped right into Torque. Events can be used just like any other track type.
Ground Cover
Torque 3D's Ground Cover system is very powerful and can make level building go much faster, especially when used in conjunction with the Forest Editor. There has always been confusion about how to properly use a GroundCover object, such as getting it to paint the terrain based on the material. Previously, you had to hard code the material for the foliage and figure out which terrain layer to cover (based on a numerical index) from memory. Rejoice, for we have given the system a major usability pass to make it much easier to use. You can now select the cover material (such as grass) and the terrain texture right from the object using our Material Selector:
Shape Editor and COLLADA
Nothing seems to slow Chris Robertson down. Improving Torque 3D's asset pipeline is a constant effort and for the 1.1 Alpha he has delivered again. Chris has improved the COLLADA Importer (both backend and interface) and added new functionality to the Shape Editor. The two biggest improvements to the Shape Editor include viewing and controlling LODs, and linking the Material Editor to the Shape Editor. While viewing a shape, you can switch to the materials tab then edit a selected material without having to switch to an entirely separate editor.
This is an exciting time to be involved with Torque 3D, whether you a part of the development team or a licensed owner. This month, most of the team are picking up their lives and making the move to our new Las Vegas headquarters. With such a great internal team and so much support from our external dev partners, I doubt you'll see us miss a beat. Torque 3D and 2D are both making rapid progress toward the vision you've helped us create. Thank you for your consistent, constructive feedback. You all help us make Torque better.
Torque 3D development blogs:
- Post #1 - Kickoff
- Post #2 - Apparatus and Warrior Camp
- Post #3 - Luma's racing kit
- Post #4 - Josh Engebretson and Web Publishing
- Post #5 - Pricing and Licensing
- Post #6 - Pricing and Licensing CONTINUED
- Post #7 - Wetness & Precipitation
- Post #8 - Screeen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO)
- Post #9 - Matt Langley and the Torque Launcher
- Post #10 - Chris Robertson and Collada
- Post #11 - Depth of Field
- Post #12 - Advanced Lighting
- Post #13 - Soft Particles
- Post #14 - World Editor
- Post #15 - Pricing and Licensing ANNOUNCED!
- Post #16 - GDC Live Edition
- Post #17 - River & Road Editors
- Post #18 - Beta is UP!
- Post #19 - Light Rays, Undercity, and the Material Editor
- Post #20 - Mass Market Hardware
- Post #21 - Beta: Part Deux
- Post #22 - Marching Towards Beta 3
- Post #23 - pureLIGHT
- Post #24 - Lighting, Terrain, and Cloth
- Post #25 - Beta 3!
- Post #26 - Documentation
- Post #27 - Beta 4!
- Post #28 - Shape Editor
- Post #29 - Beta 5!
- Post #30 - Collada Import GUI Dialog
- Post #31 - 1.0 Release!!!
- Post #32 - The only good bug...
- Post #33 - 1.1 Alpha!
- Post #34 - Coming Soon!
About the author
Since 2007, I've done my best to steer Torque's development and brand toward the best opportunities in games middleware.
#102
11/22/2009 (4:43 pm)
Nice work guys! Many new features that I was wishing for!...opps, download is done...gotta get to work!
#103
My credit card seems to be jumping out of my wallet... I think it's trying to tell me something...
Seriously, I've done some light toying with the demo of 1.0 so far and I like it, it's leagues above TGEA and with all these new features it really is hard to continue not getting it.
11/22/2009 (9:07 pm)
So... when are these features coming to TorqueX? (Yeah ok it's a dream not a real question).My credit card seems to be jumping out of my wallet... I think it's trying to tell me something...
Seriously, I've done some light toying with the demo of 1.0 so far and I like it, it's leagues above TGEA and with all these new features it really is hard to continue not getting it.
#104
We're planning on some improvements to it for the 1.1 beta already.
11/22/2009 (10:27 pm)
@Ronny - Yes they are... it took us like 3 days to get working in Torque. It's crazy that no one took the time to implement them over the last decade since TGE was released.We're planning on some improvements to it for the 1.1 beta already.
#105
T3D(core) + Xbox adapter
T3D(core) + PC,Mac adapter
T3D(core) + PS3 adapter (a sweet dream)
By the way nice features on alpha release :)
11/23/2009 (9:46 am)
I hear some guys talk about TorqueX... I really think GG should make T3D work on all platforms possibles...... one solution (one core engine) and something let consumer to choose which platform they want to work on it.. Example:T3D(core) + Xbox adapter
T3D(core) + PC,Mac adapter
T3D(core) + PS3 adapter (a sweet dream)
By the way nice features on alpha release :)
#106
That's not too far off-base, though there will always be porting work needed on some level for consoles; but much of the backend work is done so the team will have to ensure that they are targeting the console spec for their games.
Of course, the caveat is that you have to be a licensed console developer to be able to use the C++ SDK's for the consoles. XNA, while a very nice setup, pretty much removes compatibility with other non-Microsoft/XNA platforms. Which is perfectly understandable.
11/23/2009 (10:29 am)
@EdinsonThat's not too far off-base, though there will always be porting work needed on some level for consoles; but much of the backend work is done so the team will have to ensure that they are targeting the console spec for their games.
Of course, the caveat is that you have to be a licensed console developer to be able to use the C++ SDK's for the consoles. XNA, while a very nice setup, pretty much removes compatibility with other non-Microsoft/XNA platforms. Which is perfectly understandable.
#107
Is it possible to use multiple billboards in a groundCover? You can place different billboards in each type, but only the "main" billboard is used.
Is there any way to allow a dts/dae to be effected by the wind in a groundCover? ex: name a node(s) wind01(02, 03) and whatever is assigned to that node is effected by the wind.
Expand that to any dts, even not related to groundCover. Or have like a "behavior" that you can apply to the dts(even to a group of prefabs), that effects every node, so it will have wind effect.
Same theory with physics. Name a node physix01 and the engine will apply gravity type drag on the node. Or use this like a behavior that applies to all nodes in a dts. You can apply it to a dts on the fly. Your player dies, you kick in the physics and he falls like a ragdoll, then after a period of time, disable it and leave the player in a heap. Realalistic.
11/24/2009 (10:24 am)
Quick Questions/thoughts:Is it possible to use multiple billboards in a groundCover? You can place different billboards in each type, but only the "main" billboard is used.
Is there any way to allow a dts/dae to be effected by the wind in a groundCover? ex: name a node(s) wind01(02, 03) and whatever is assigned to that node is effected by the wind.
Expand that to any dts, even not related to groundCover. Or have like a "behavior" that you can apply to the dts(even to a group of prefabs), that effects every node, so it will have wind effect.
Same theory with physics. Name a node physix01 and the engine will apply gravity type drag on the node. Or use this like a behavior that applies to all nodes in a dts. You can apply it to a dts on the fly. Your player dies, you kick in the physics and he falls like a ragdoll, then after a period of time, disable it and leave the player in a heap. Realalistic.
#108
I've been playing with the tool in my free time and I like it, especially the export options, but there are some peculiarities I haven't figured out yet and was hoping the docs would shed some light on it.
11/24/2009 (1:53 pm)
Call me blind but I can't seem to find anything on the Sketch Tool in the online documentation. IF I'm missing it could some one point me in the right direction. If it's not there, is there any word on when we might see more info. I've been playing with the tool in my free time and I like it, especially the export options, but there are some peculiarities I haven't figured out yet and was hoping the docs would shed some light on it.
#109
11/24/2009 (1:59 pm)
Wow, I take a vacation and I missed all this news. I can hardly wait to use 1.1 when it is fully released. (Non-Alpha)
#110
I should (hopefully) be able to get everything I have online tomorrow.
11/24/2009 (2:05 pm)
@Allen - See this comment.I should (hopefully) be able to get everything I have online tomorrow.
#111
11/24/2009 (2:36 pm)
@Allen: the Sketch Tool is intentionally simple, but here are the basics, as I recall them:- Create a volume: hold down [alt] and drag on a surface (horizontal or vertical, it works anywhere), then it automatically begins extruding the shape.
- Extrude a face of a volume: select face, hold [shift] and extrude using the translate tool
- About rotating faces: the pivot point can be moved along a face by selecting it and moving it with the rotate tool. It can actually be moved off of a face and still works.
- To split a face: hold down [ctrl] and use the rotate tool to split at the pivot point. Do not attempt this with the [alt] key... I've been getting crashes accidentally doing that.
- You do need to be attentive to whether or not you are in the Sketch Tool or Object Editor, as you may need to jump back and forth.
- Get comfortable choosing the translate, rotate, and scale tools using the number keys (2, 3, 4, respectively). Makes working a lot quicker.
- Save and save often. There may still be a few unattended crash bugs using Sketch Tool in the alpha.
- Some of the items in the list above are available in the horizontal bar across the top of the UI
- Be aware that the Sketch Tool is building out of convexes, so a volume you see may actually be a group of volumes. You won't always be able to split or extrude things the way you see it in your head. Keep it simple and block out your level, and leave the detailed 3D modeling to a modeling app. :)
#112
The extrude thing is one of the weird bits, and I thought I was doing it wrong. As it seems to create an actual new object as part of the extrusion.
I also notice that sometimes I accidentally get in a weird camera mode where the camera moves every time I select a face so that it's facing said face. I'm not sure how I'm doing (there is a keyboard shortcut there somewhere) but it can be a bit frustrating.
In any case awesome tool. This is just the kind of thing I was getting at in Brett's blog. Thanksgivings weekend is upon me starting tomorrow. Once I get done with all that family stuff, it'll just be me, my basement, and T3D. . . er. . . until my wife says otherwise. ;)
11/24/2009 (5:46 pm)
Thanks Russel!The extrude thing is one of the weird bits, and I thought I was doing it wrong. As it seems to create an actual new object as part of the extrusion.
I also notice that sometimes I accidentally get in a weird camera mode where the camera moves every time I select a face so that it's facing said face. I'm not sure how I'm doing (there is a keyboard shortcut there somewhere) but it can be a bit frustrating.
In any case awesome tool. This is just the kind of thing I was getting at in Brett's blog. Thanksgivings weekend is upon me starting tomorrow. Once I get done with all that family stuff, it'll just be me, my basement, and T3D. . . er. . . until my wife says otherwise. ;)
#113
11/24/2009 (5:47 pm)
@ Michael: No Worries. I was just making sure I wasn't being dense. It's been a long milestone month and my brain is a bit tired.
#114
11/24/2009 (9:48 pm)
@Edinson: I talk of TorqueX because I like C#, not because I want T3D to work on the 360. 
#115
11/24/2009 (11:46 pm)
The Alpha version is not show-up under my account? Does it show-up for everyone else when following the link? 
#116
11/24/2009 (11:58 pm)
You should see it when you click the Download link for Torque 3D. 
#117
11/25/2009 (1:28 pm)
@Keith: Only a Windows alpha, so in case you're on a Mac you won't find anything on the page presented. 
#118
I cannot say it´s fantastic, the term would be not enough :-D
Tnx to all GG and Sickhead for the ForestKit :-)
11/26/2009 (6:18 pm)
Finally today I had the time to test out the 1.1 alpha...I cannot say it´s fantastic, the term would be not enough :-D
Tnx to all GG and Sickhead for the ForestKit :-)
#119
however, I have to be honest and say that the prefab video shows that Torque still is having problems with performance when lots of objects are in a scene. This is especially inexcusable considering that the objects aren't using any complex lighting or large textures. Are all unique prefabs loaded and processed like separate difs? Considering what that scene is comprised of, performance should be alot better.
just my opinion.
11/26/2009 (7:43 pm)
Forest kit, sketch tool, and prefabs. wow you guys are on a roll! =) Nice additions to T3D, keep up the good work. Why is there no video of the forest kit in action?however, I have to be honest and say that the prefab video shows that Torque still is having problems with performance when lots of objects are in a scene. This is especially inexcusable considering that the objects aren't using any complex lighting or large textures. Are all unique prefabs loaded and processed like separate difs? Considering what that scene is comprised of, performance should be alot better.
just my opinion.
#120
11/26/2009 (8:48 pm)
@Sean H - What you are describing from the prefab video is due to the screen recording software. Using something like Fraps will drastically reduce the real time performance of an app. Torque 3D's performance in regard to numerous scene objects is actually quite good. Per object, Torque 3D has better performance than TGE or TGEA. The only performance drop occurs when you are pushing heavier rendering techniques, not additional objects. 
Torque 3D Owner Ronny Bangsund
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