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Torque's 2D and 3D Future Vol. 2
Torque's 2D and 3D Future Vol. 2
| Name: | Brett Seyler |  |
|---|---|---|
| Date Posted: | Nov 18, 2008 | |
| Rating: |  4.6 out of 5 | |
| Public: | YES | |
| Comments: | YES | |
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| Profile Page: | View profile page for Brett Seyler |
Blog post
Since my last post on this subject in March, our Torque engine developers have been quietly toiling away on some major new stuff. The major focus? TGEA. While we've also spent some serious cycles on Torque X (the impressive results of which you'll be seeing soon) and on TGB (which you'll probably start hearing about toward the end of the year), probably 80% of the energy has gone to TGEA, and it's definitely starting to bear fruit.
There are many of you out there who started with TGE and have yet to make the jump to TGEA. Some of you will be asking "why TGEA and not TGE?" That's going to be the main focus of this post. I'm going to talk about what you'll be seeing from TGEA in the coming weeks and months, and why you're not likely to see an update to TGE soon, or perhaps every again. Don't panic yet. Keep reading...
If you check out Matt Fairfax's recent post, you'll see a LOT more detail than I'm providing here, but the big whammy in 1.8 is that TGEA will now run on OSX and be used to create the best games ever seen on the Mac. This was long overdue and something we always wanted in our front line engine.
While there were good reasons OpenGL support did not make it in TGEA 1.0, it's here now with vastly better performance than ever possible before thanks to the new Brian Richardson and Alex Scarborough powered graphic layer (GFX2). You can see the early fruits of Alex's efforts porting Rokkitball and Legions to the Mac for InstantAction below.
Rokkitball and Fallen Empire: Legions running in Safari on OSX
Did we mention that TGEA 1.8 is a FREE update for all TGEA owners? You can grab the beta release by hitting your My Account page right now.
What About TGE?
We've kicked this idea around a lot here in the office and so have you in the forums and in the comments on my previous blog. Why aren't we working on TGE? There are a number of reasons that matter to us, but I really want to approach this from your perspective. I want to take a hard look at the reasons people have, in the past, chosen TGE over TGEA.
Reason #1: TGE has better documentation. While this was true when TGEA 1.0 originally launched back in February 2007, it's certainly not anymore. TGEA documentation has gotten the Mich Perry treatment. It's now probably the most well-documented engine out there with mountains of resouces and a well organized set of reference and learning materials. See the proof for yourselves.
Mich's docs blogs:
* What do you think about Documentation?
* MAJOR Documentation Announcement 1
* New Documentation System
* Documentation Announcements
* September Documentation Wrap Up
* October Documentation Wrap Up
Reason #2: TGE has better resources. More resources? Yes. Better resources? Not anymore. TGEA is where all the latest, coolest stuff is happening, and some Torque developers are defintiely taking it by the horns and doing some really cool stuff. There are also a bunch of great add-ons for TGEA and many many more in the works. Case in point: Konrad Kiss. His Cliff Construction Kit makes gorgeous, detailed environments much easier to do. There's also Lorne McIntosh's SSAO (screen space ambient occlusion), and Apparatus' Beautiful Doors.
Reason #3: TGE has better stability. This is also no longer true. While TGEA pre-1.7 didn't match TGE's stability, the 1.7 and 1.7.1 release did. It may take a while for TGEA to match TGE's stability on the Mac, but it will get there. On the PC, it's no longer an issue.
Reason #4: TGE can run on OSX with OpenGL. Now so can TGEA, only it runs the same projects faster.
So with TGEA we now have...
The first thing I want to say is this: I'm thrilled we got here. With TGEA 1.8, we're out of reasons to look back and we'll be looking to the future from here with continued improvements to TGEA. It was not without great effort. TGEA is now is a much better product for game developers than TGE. If you're part of the Torque community, TGEA is where all the new development will be happening. TGEA is where the majority of new resources and 3rd party products will be born. And the best part of this for TGE owners is, we've taken great care to make sure that TGE projects are very portable to TGEA.
I'm encouraging those that haven't made the move to consider it. Having all hands on the same codebase benefits our development internally, but it also has huge benefits you guys. It means you'll have more compatible resources, and you'll have better, faster, more accurate answers to your technical questions because everyone's looking the same code.
There are real, tangible advantages for your project as well. In addition to all the hallmark strengths of Torque like world class networking and real-time world editing, with TGEA you have...
To us, it's a clear choice. You'll notice that we've taken this new embrace of Torque's future to heart with some recent changes to the website too. If you're a new user looking for an engine and want to make a 3D game, you'll end up on the TGEA landing page in just one click.
Getting to TGE is a tad tougher, but of course it's still there.
At some point, TGE will likely either go away, or be licensed in a different way. We could do something like the id does with the older Quake engines offering both GPL and closed source. We could simply leave it on the site as a less expensive option. To be honest, we haven't decided and we won't be doing anything about it right away.
This is a decision that I really would like some community feedback on. I know many of you have been working with TGE for years and really love it. We don't want to do anything that discourages it's continued use, but for new and advanced users alike, TGEA is now a better product, so we want to put it out front where we can focus on making it even better.
If TGE is going away soon, doesn't the name "TGEA" seem a little dumb?
Yes =) We are some gigantic dunces at this whole "naming" and "marketing" thing, but I see no reason to live with our mistakes or repeat them in the future. At some point, we'll look to simplify our products down to basics. It could look something like:
TGEA --> Torque 3D
and
TGB --> Torque 2D (duh...didn't we do that once already?)
So, none of that is happening *right* now, but likely happen in the future.
Okay Cool. So What's Next?
First off, to quickly review the stuff I've covered so far...
* TGEA 1.8 is in beta and adds an OpenGL graphics implementation and runs on OSX.
* At some point TGEA will replace TGE entirely and may be renamed to something more...concise.
Alright, alright! What's next? Good question...
The next version of Torque for 3D games
If you're still looking for another reason to make the leap to TGEA, pay attention. Remember all that stuff mentioned in my last blog under R&D? Well, back in March, there were dozens of things I wasn't ready to mention and quite a few that we'll be able to confirm as part of our next Torque release. The GG Studios team and many 3rd party developers we work with are already hands on with some of the coolest new R&D tech around. While the game studio is proving this new tech out with games you'll see on InstantAction and consoles over the next year, we're merging it with TGEA to be included in our next release.
When is this new version coming? I can't say how long the development cycle will be, but I can tell you for sure that we'll be showing some pretty monstrous new stuff at GDC (or potentially even before). If you're working with TGEA, there are some excellent reasons to be excited about the future. If you're on the fence, it's time to make the leap.
Finally, Some "Thank Yous"
Maintaining and improving Torque is an incredible amount of work, so I want to recognize some of the people who've been HUGELY helpful in this last round of development, and generally moving the Torque experience in a positive direction, either by generously providing community resources, contributing directly to development, or providing really nice add-ons that help make Torque shine.
1. The entire Sickhead Games crew (Tom Spilman, Russell Fincher, Ross Pawley, and James Ford). These guys are to thank for a ton of what goes on behind the scenes in Torque development and even more of what you're about to see in the future. Their products, Torsion especially, make Torque much easier and much more fun to work with. They are a truly independent studio and they're bound for success.
2. John Kabus. John's continued support for the entire Torque product lineup has been a huge value add. He's been working on a lot of cool stuff that you guys will be psyched to see in the future too, so John definitely deserves a big thanks.
3. John Kanalakis. Remember when I mentioned that you'd be seeing some really new and impressive Torque X stuff? You have John to thank. John spearheaded our last round of development on Torque X both by updating it to XNA Game Studio 3.0 and he added his own suite of 3D editing tools. Now you can use WYSIWG tools to design your scene, assign components, and even write new ones right inside the editor. It's hot stuff and it's not been easy, so thank you, John. You're a superhero.
4. Melv May and Phillip O'Shea. Melv and Phillip are currently hard at work on some super-top-secret 2D engine stuff. When the next version of Torque's 2D engine tech ships, you'll have them to thank for most of its coolness.
5. Jeff Faust. Jeff never stops improving his fabulous AFX technology. He recently updated it to include TGEA support and more awesome effects. Word has it he's planning a big release in the next few months that will impress us all. I have no doubts about that. Keep it up, Jeff!
6. Rene Damm. Rene's another guy who's been absolutely killer behind the scenes helping with TGEA. He's tackled Atlas Terrain issues that frighten the best of us and his current plans include some really cool ways to leverage that core tech. We're all really looking forward to seeing what will happen when the final stuff emerges.
7. Laurentiu Danila a.k.a. "Apparatus". Does this guy ever sleep? Doors, bridges, props, textures, environments...KABOOM!. Talk about making Torque shine! Great job, Apparatus. Can't wait to see what you do next.
AND THAT'S A WRAP!
If you made it this far in the longest blog ever, congrats! I hope it was worth reading. Thanks!
...................................................................................................
Another Pre-emptive Q&A (with myself)
Q. What? No more TGE?
A. TGE is not gone yet and it's not going to disappear tomorrow, next week, or even next month. Next year? Possibly. There are no longer any technical reasons to choose TGE over TGEA, so we're going to focus our development efforts there. If you're concerned about the price, I wouldn't worry. We're going to find a way to make Torque technology as accessible on a budget as it can be. TGE resources and documentation aren't going to disappear either. They'll always be available, they may just become less relevant.
Q. Which of these releases will GG charge for?
A. TGEA 1.8 will be a free update. The next version of our 3D tech after that will be a paid update. The next version of our 2D tech will probably be a paid update. It's been almost 2 years since we charged for any version of TGEA and almost 4 years since we charge for any version of TGB. That's a pretty generous track record. At some point, we're going to have to feed the developers but as always, if we do charge for an update, you'll get more *way* more than your money's worth.
Q. When will we see OpenGL support in TGEA?
A. In TGEA 1.8! It's in open beta now! Pull it down. Put the hammer to it. Let us know what needs fixing.
There are many of you out there who started with TGE and have yet to make the jump to TGEA. Some of you will be asking "why TGEA and not TGE?" That's going to be the main focus of this post. I'm going to talk about what you'll be seeing from TGEA in the coming weeks and months, and why you're not likely to see an update to TGE soon, or perhaps every again. Don't panic yet. Keep reading...
If you check out Matt Fairfax's recent post, you'll see a LOT more detail than I'm providing here, but the big whammy in 1.8 is that TGEA will now run on OSX and be used to create the best games ever seen on the Mac. This was long overdue and something we always wanted in our front line engine.
While there were good reasons OpenGL support did not make it in TGEA 1.0, it's here now with vastly better performance than ever possible before thanks to the new Brian Richardson and Alex Scarborough powered graphic layer (GFX2). You can see the early fruits of Alex's efforts porting Rokkitball and Legions to the Mac for InstantAction below.
Rokkitball and Fallen Empire: Legions running in Safari on OSX
Did we mention that TGEA 1.8 is a FREE update for all TGEA owners? You can grab the beta release by hitting your My Account page right now.
What About TGE?
We've kicked this idea around a lot here in the office and so have you in the forums and in the comments on my previous blog. Why aren't we working on TGE? There are a number of reasons that matter to us, but I really want to approach this from your perspective. I want to take a hard look at the reasons people have, in the past, chosen TGE over TGEA.
Reason #1: TGE has better documentation. While this was true when TGEA 1.0 originally launched back in February 2007, it's certainly not anymore. TGEA documentation has gotten the Mich Perry treatment. It's now probably the most well-documented engine out there with mountains of resouces and a well organized set of reference and learning materials. See the proof for yourselves.
Mich's docs blogs:
* What do you think about Documentation?
* MAJOR Documentation Announcement 1
* New Documentation System
* Documentation Announcements
* September Documentation Wrap Up
* October Documentation Wrap Up
Reason #2: TGE has better resources. More resources? Yes. Better resources? Not anymore. TGEA is where all the latest, coolest stuff is happening, and some Torque developers are defintiely taking it by the horns and doing some really cool stuff. There are also a bunch of great add-ons for TGEA and many many more in the works. Case in point: Konrad Kiss. His Cliff Construction Kit makes gorgeous, detailed environments much easier to do. There's also Lorne McIntosh's SSAO (screen space ambient occlusion), and Apparatus' Beautiful Doors.
Reason #3: TGE has better stability. This is also no longer true. While TGEA pre-1.7 didn't match TGE's stability, the 1.7 and 1.7.1 release did. It may take a while for TGEA to match TGE's stability on the Mac, but it will get there. On the PC, it's no longer an issue.
Reason #4: TGE can run on OSX with OpenGL. Now so can TGEA, only it runs the same projects faster.
So with TGEA we now have...
The first thing I want to say is this: I'm thrilled we got here. With TGEA 1.8, we're out of reasons to look back and we'll be looking to the future from here with continued improvements to TGEA. It was not without great effort. TGEA is now is a much better product for game developers than TGE. If you're part of the Torque community, TGEA is where all the new development will be happening. TGEA is where the majority of new resources and 3rd party products will be born. And the best part of this for TGE owners is, we've taken great care to make sure that TGE projects are very portable to TGEA.
I'm encouraging those that haven't made the move to consider it. Having all hands on the same codebase benefits our development internally, but it also has huge benefits you guys. It means you'll have more compatible resources, and you'll have better, faster, more accurate answers to your technical questions because everyone's looking the same code.
There are real, tangible advantages for your project as well. In addition to all the hallmark strengths of Torque like world class networking and real-time world editing, with TGEA you have...
To us, it's a clear choice. You'll notice that we've taken this new embrace of Torque's future to heart with some recent changes to the website too. If you're a new user looking for an engine and want to make a 3D game, you'll end up on the TGEA landing page in just one click.
Getting to TGE is a tad tougher, but of course it's still there.
At some point, TGE will likely either go away, or be licensed in a different way. We could do something like the id does with the older Quake engines offering both GPL and closed source. We could simply leave it on the site as a less expensive option. To be honest, we haven't decided and we won't be doing anything about it right away.
This is a decision that I really would like some community feedback on. I know many of you have been working with TGE for years and really love it. We don't want to do anything that discourages it's continued use, but for new and advanced users alike, TGEA is now a better product, so we want to put it out front where we can focus on making it even better.
If TGE is going away soon, doesn't the name "TGEA" seem a little dumb?
Yes =) We are some gigantic dunces at this whole "naming" and "marketing" thing, but I see no reason to live with our mistakes or repeat them in the future. At some point, we'll look to simplify our products down to basics. It could look something like:
TGEA --> Torque 3D
and
TGB --> Torque 2D (duh...didn't we do that once already?)
So, none of that is happening *right* now, but likely happen in the future.
Okay Cool. So What's Next?
First off, to quickly review the stuff I've covered so far...
* TGEA 1.8 is in beta and adds an OpenGL graphics implementation and runs on OSX.
* At some point TGEA will replace TGE entirely and may be renamed to something more...concise.
Alright, alright! What's next? Good question...
The next version of Torque for 3D games
If you're still looking for another reason to make the leap to TGEA, pay attention. Remember all that stuff mentioned in my last blog under R&D? Well, back in March, there were dozens of things I wasn't ready to mention and quite a few that we'll be able to confirm as part of our next Torque release. The GG Studios team and many 3rd party developers we work with are already hands on with some of the coolest new R&D tech around. While the game studio is proving this new tech out with games you'll see on InstantAction and consoles over the next year, we're merging it with TGEA to be included in our next release.
When is this new version coming? I can't say how long the development cycle will be, but I can tell you for sure that we'll be showing some pretty monstrous new stuff at GDC (or potentially even before). If you're working with TGEA, there are some excellent reasons to be excited about the future. If you're on the fence, it's time to make the leap.
Finally, Some "Thank Yous"
Maintaining and improving Torque is an incredible amount of work, so I want to recognize some of the people who've been HUGELY helpful in this last round of development, and generally moving the Torque experience in a positive direction, either by generously providing community resources, contributing directly to development, or providing really nice add-ons that help make Torque shine.
1. The entire Sickhead Games crew (Tom Spilman, Russell Fincher, Ross Pawley, and James Ford). These guys are to thank for a ton of what goes on behind the scenes in Torque development and even more of what you're about to see in the future. Their products, Torsion especially, make Torque much easier and much more fun to work with. They are a truly independent studio and they're bound for success.
2. John Kabus. John's continued support for the entire Torque product lineup has been a huge value add. He's been working on a lot of cool stuff that you guys will be psyched to see in the future too, so John definitely deserves a big thanks.
3. John Kanalakis. Remember when I mentioned that you'd be seeing some really new and impressive Torque X stuff? You have John to thank. John spearheaded our last round of development on Torque X both by updating it to XNA Game Studio 3.0 and he added his own suite of 3D editing tools. Now you can use WYSIWG tools to design your scene, assign components, and even write new ones right inside the editor. It's hot stuff and it's not been easy, so thank you, John. You're a superhero.
4. Melv May and Phillip O'Shea. Melv and Phillip are currently hard at work on some super-top-secret 2D engine stuff. When the next version of Torque's 2D engine tech ships, you'll have them to thank for most of its coolness.
5. Jeff Faust. Jeff never stops improving his fabulous AFX technology. He recently updated it to include TGEA support and more awesome effects. Word has it he's planning a big release in the next few months that will impress us all. I have no doubts about that. Keep it up, Jeff!
6. Rene Damm. Rene's another guy who's been absolutely killer behind the scenes helping with TGEA. He's tackled Atlas Terrain issues that frighten the best of us and his current plans include some really cool ways to leverage that core tech. We're all really looking forward to seeing what will happen when the final stuff emerges.
7. Laurentiu Danila a.k.a. "Apparatus". Does this guy ever sleep? Doors, bridges, props, textures, environments...KABOOM!. Talk about making Torque shine! Great job, Apparatus. Can't wait to see what you do next.
AND THAT'S A WRAP!
If you made it this far in the longest blog ever, congrats! I hope it was worth reading. Thanks!
...................................................................................................
Another Pre-emptive Q&A (with myself)
Q. What? No more TGE?
A. TGE is not gone yet and it's not going to disappear tomorrow, next week, or even next month. Next year? Possibly. There are no longer any technical reasons to choose TGE over TGEA, so we're going to focus our development efforts there. If you're concerned about the price, I wouldn't worry. We're going to find a way to make Torque technology as accessible on a budget as it can be. TGE resources and documentation aren't going to disappear either. They'll always be available, they may just become less relevant.
Q. Which of these releases will GG charge for?
A. TGEA 1.8 will be a free update. The next version of our 3D tech after that will be a paid update. The next version of our 2D tech will probably be a paid update. It's been almost 2 years since we charged for any version of TGEA and almost 4 years since we charge for any version of TGB. That's a pretty generous track record. At some point, we're going to have to feed the developers but as always, if we do charge for an update, you'll get more *way* more than your money's worth.
Q. When will we see OpenGL support in TGEA?
A. In TGEA 1.8! It's in open beta now! Pull it down. Put the hammer to it. Let us know what needs fixing.
Recent Blog Posts
| List: | 12/31/08 - Torque 3D Development - Luma's racing kit 12/22/08 - Torque 3D Development - Apparatus and Warrior Camp 12/22/08 - iTGB 1.1 released, more to come! 12/17/08 - Torque 3D Development - Kickoff 11/18/08 - Torque's 2D and 3D Future Vol. 2 10/14/08 - iTGB 1.0.1 released! 10/03/08 - The Fortress 10/01/08 - iTGB 1.0 in the Wild |
|---|
Submit your own resources!| Brett Seyler (Nov 18, 2008 at 14:05 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
| Steve YorkshireRifles Acaster (Nov 18, 2008 at 14:45 GMT) |
| Scott Burns (Nov 18, 2008 at 14:53 GMT) |
Based solely off the 1.8 Beta stuff I've seen I'm rather excited about TGEA's future, especially these new editors and tools.
Also, rabble rabble.
| JPaxson (Nov 18, 2008 at 15:40 GMT) |
| Daniel Buckmaster (Nov 18, 2008 at 16:07 GMT) |
Well, in all seriousness, TGEA is looking great - I'm finally considering seriously the move across. Way to get me excited! :)
| Rob Sandbach (Nov 18, 2008 at 16:15 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
*shakes his fist angrily*
Great news, great product! Keep up the good work guys.
| Michael Perry (Nov 18, 2008 at 16:50 GMT) |
BTW
This will be one of the topics discussed further at this week's IRC Hour. If you want to chat real time with Brett and the other GG employees, stop by this Thursday at 5:00pm (PST) in the GarageGames IRC channel.
| Jermaine Morgan (Nov 18, 2008 at 16:51 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
I may just take that leap off the fence.
You are a great salesman.
| Kory James (Nov 18, 2008 at 16:57 GMT) |
thank you
| Todd Pickens (Nov 18, 2008 at 17:11 GMT) |
On more than one occasion while I was at Garage Games I detailed out why as a professional developer or inexperienced hobbyist, I would have recommended or picked TGE hands down every time over TGEA.
That has changed.
And from recent conversations with Matt Fairfax it looks to be on the path to great things.
| Gary Preston (Nov 18, 2008 at 17:14 GMT) |
Dropping TGE isn't as bad as it may initially sound either. Existing licensee's can still work with TGE and due to having source access, feature can always be implemented ourselves. Also with OpenGL and Legacy terrain support + terrain editors now in place with TGEA, it's finally a viable alternative to TGE.
Keep up the good work :)
| Rene Damm (Nov 18, 2008 at 17:43 GMT) |
As for Atlas, in case anyone had taken a look at the 1.8 beta, found that Atlas was basically 1.7.1-Atlas-ported-to-GFX2 (that's what it is), and was disappointed: I didn't make the deadline for 1.8 with the end-to-end Atlas overhaul, but trust me, delayed or not it *will* end up in your hands. And nonetheless there's no shortage of great new stuff in 1.8, anyway :)
| Brett Seyler (Nov 18, 2008 at 18:39 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
@Rene: Your work on Atlas, and what that might become is definitely one of those things I'm excited about for future versions of Torque. There's a ton of potential there and I'm definitely looking forward to it.
@Everyone: There are probably a dozen people who've done a lot of work on TGEA here in recent months that I didn't yet mention. There's Matt Fairfax and Josh Engebretson of course, but I wanted to also recognize a guy you all probably don't know that well. Brian Richardson. Brian actually wrote GFX2 and is responsible for majority of performance gains you see on the PC side of TGEA 1.8. He's a superstar that doesn't have that much visibility to the community right now because he's usually heads down doing manly shit like that. Together, he and Pat Wilson (who needs no introduction) are building out some really neat stuff I'll be introducing in the coming weeks. It's *seriously* cutting edge rendering stuff. Stuff that almost no other engine technology is doing. More on that to come =)
| Manoel Neto (Nov 18, 2008 at 19:20 GMT) |
| Konrad Kiss (Nov 18, 2008 at 19:31 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
This is really exciting! I'm very curious about the future of TorqueScript, especially because I already thought it was good and fast, and I keep getting surprised about what cool features I find in it day by day. If only %object and %datablock would work without having to define them in the function header (without all the %this confusion). That is the only nominee for the upcoming change in my eyes.
And your last line in your last comment.. that's just plain cruel. :) Can you please say just a bit more? Just so we can get some sleep.
Thanks for mentioning me and the Kit. I'm still working on the port to 1.8, hopefully to be out soon.
| Brian Wilson (Nov 18, 2008 at 19:35 GMT) |
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 18, 2008 at 19:40 GMT) |
If someone sends us a Linux port that doesn't interfere with the Windows and Mac stability and features, then we would be happy to roll it in.
We've done the hard part: porting GFX to OpenGL. The rest is up to you!
Edited on Nov 18, 2008 19:42 GMT
| Marcus (Nov 18, 2008 at 20:00 GMT) |
1) Is TGEA Torque 2?
2) Will TGEA be modularized like what was supposed to happen to Torque 2?
My concern is, I am close to starting a project for AI and I don't want to port my code at some point. I am currently considering TGEA (Torque 2), C4, and Leadwerks.
| Pat Wilson (Nov 18, 2008 at 20:10 GMT) |
We have been keeping our lips tight about things because over-promising and under-delivering isn't the way we want to roll. I will say, though, that if one were to scour Flickr, the GG forums, and some graphics dev forums than one could piece together what is in the works.
Any screenshots you'd find wouldn't be jaw-dropping because I prefer to use bad art for under-the-radar tech so it is easily mistaken for "nothing new".
| Konrad Kiss (Nov 18, 2008 at 20:22 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
I couldn't agree more with you. I understand what you mean, and I wasn't really expecting an answer - knowing that you guys are at least as much excited to tell as we are to hear what's cooking.
Now, I'm off to search for those clues! :)
| Andrew Hull (Nov 18, 2008 at 21:43 GMT) |
How will a full switch to TGEA affect those trying to target older platforms?
Edited on Nov 18, 2008 21:43 GMT
| Scott Wilson (Nov 18, 2008 at 22:30 GMT) |
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 18, 2008 at 23:04 GMT) |
Quote:
1) Is TGEA Torque 2?
2) Will TGEA be modularized like what was supposed to happen to Torque 2?
Marcus,
The answer to that is slightly complicated. Torque 3D (the next version of TGEA after 1.8) will include a lot of the R&D tech that we talked about back when we initially presented "Torque 2". In fact, TGEA 1.8 already includes some of that tech (GFX2, new ResourceManager, and String class). However, it won't include the "components" system that we talked about back then. That is still heavily in R&D. The base architecture for it is largely in place but we still need to develop a few games on it (keep an eye on InstantAction.com) and flesh out our component library. We also are hard at work on building the proper editor experience for it (and editors takes a long time to develop).
In a lot of ways TGEA 1.7 and TGEA 1.8 already have a lot of "modularization". With the Project Generator you can enable and disable different parts of the engine depending on what your goals are. We are slowly pushing this more and more with each iteration. I would expect it to start to "feel" a lot more modularized over the course of the next year or so.
In most practical ways, yes, the next version of TGEA (Torque 3D) is going to fill the role we envisioned for "Torque 2" (internally we've been calling it TGEA 2.0 for a while). There is still some cool tech in R&D waiting in the wings for you guys =)
| Guimo (Nov 18, 2008 at 23:36 GMT) |
Funny... about two months ago I suggested that this was going to happen and got flamed...
http://www.garagegames.com/index.php?sec=mg&mod=resource&page=view&qid=15447
I got future sight! :)
Can you throw some numbers about the performance of TGEA on small or limited PCs using old processors (or Atom processors) and integrated cards? If it can beat TGE then I guess you have a winner.
Luck!
Guimo
| Ross Pawley (Nov 18, 2008 at 23:46 GMT) |
Someone correct me if I'm wrong (I get the versions and what features they do or don't have mixed up easily nowadays...).
Edited on Nov 19, 2008 00:05 GMT
| Pierre (DragoFire) Hay (Nov 18, 2008 at 23:58 GMT) |
I ask only due the the current world financial problems, which inturn has major effects on exchange rates. Having almost saved money up to do the upgrade from TGE to TGEA, just before the big crash, I know how many others maybe feeling ATM. My personal example is that before the crash I was looking at @ $180 NZ dollars, but with the exchange rates it's now @ $300 NZ dollars, I'm sure others thinking ot doing the same thing are hurting ATM due to the same reason.
| Ross Pawley (Nov 19, 2008 at 00:06 GMT) |
| Derek Bronson (Nov 19, 2008 at 00:28 GMT) |
| Chip Lambert (Nov 19, 2008 at 00:34 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
I think a id approach would be nice. The problems I see with abandoning TGE, is TGEA is not a beginner's engine (I think thats even in the marketing material on the page) I guess beginners could always be pushed to Torque 2D. But if TGE existed in some way like the old Quake engines, beginners could still get their feet wet with it before coming to TGEA. And maybe have a note up front that the engines are "as is" with no updates, true support, etc.
Another, the upgrade price, or even the total price for TGEA. I know its still a hell of a deal at its current price, but some people just starting out might be a bit scared or some TGE users might not be able to afford the upgrade. But as Brett said, they are working on the price options.
All around though I'm excited about the future of TGEA and some of that cool R&D stuff.
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 19, 2008 at 00:52 GMT) |
We honestly haven't had the time to do much profiling of TGE vs TGEA on older hardware. However, I do have some numbers from a test I did earlier this year that might be interesting. Before I get into that, though, here are a few things to think about:
How do we define "older" hardware?
Vista has been shipping on most OEM computers for close to 2 years now and it pretty much requires a shader model 2.0 video card. Even if you go back a little further than that, it was pretty common for OEM computers (like Dell, HP, Gateway, etc) to ship with an ATI or nVidia video card (possibly integrated). Anything the average user has bought in the last 5 or so years has been able at least as powerful as a GeForce 4 MX or a Radeon 1300. These aren't powerful cards by todays standards but they aren't slouches either. Anyone who is even remotely conscious of wanting to do 3D gaming is likely to have something at least as powerful as a Radeon 9600 (which was a *great* card btw).
If you look back at the GeForce 3 and Radeon 8500 (even some in the higher end GeForce 2's), there was a shift away from optimizing rendering performance by sending less data to the card (reducing the number of polys using software/cpu culling techniques) to being more intelligent about what order we send the data to the video card (worrying less about the number of polys and more about optimizing state and texture changes...in other words....batching).
TGE is heavily designed and built for pre-batching optimization. It's focus is on sending less triangles to the video card at the cost of using more cpu power. This was great for GeForce 2 and Voodoo 4's (the top-of-the-line video cards when the bulk of TGE's rendering code was written). However, with any "modern" video card (even weak ones), 300 single triangle drawcalls is way slower than one 3000 triangle drawcall (a batch). TGE uses a lot of OpenGL immediate mode draw calls and make very little use of deferred/buffered rendering (which can allow the video drivers to do a ton of optimization and to maximize use of you video bus). TGE just inherently draws slower on anything but the oldest or slowest of video cards.
TGEA will draw the same geometry faster on average on pretty much anything except those oldest and slowest cards and it may even win out there. But, you do have to be careful with TGEA...it opens you up to doing a lot more effects when you draw (specular, refraction, reflection, normal maps, etc) and it is very tempting to use them since they are so easy to use. If you overuse a lot of those effects it can really cost you in performance and TGEA does little to protect you from that.
How fast is a "small", "limited", or "old" processor on average these days? 1 GHz with a 512 Kb cache? Even the weakest of these is hugely faster than the processors that Torque was targeted against (Pentium 3 800 MHz). In addition to that, TGEA actually uses a lot less cpu power on average than TGE since we've offloaded a lot of the graphical effects (like the TerrainBlock blending and the dynamic shadows) from the cpu onto the gpu.
Now, before I paint us into a corner and have someone coming back with, "I tested it on my mom's machine and TGEA didn't run right but TGE did!", I do want to point out that most of the development on TGEA has been focused on newer and higher end video cards so there are bound to be some graphical glitches and issues when you run on older video cards. We've done a little patching here and there that helps (TGEA 1.7.1 plays a lot nicer with Intel integrated chips) but we know that there are still some gaps. It would be great to have it all work out of the box but for now we have higher priorities and, ultimately, it is a problem that will fix itself in time (what Clark Fagot calls the "elegant solution" =). It is our hope that the indies and the professional developers who actually ship games with Torque will be able to help us identify and fix these kinds of issues (we've already seen wins from some games on InstantAction.com). The more developers who join us on this codebase, the faster that will happen!
So back to those numbers I mentioned at the very beginning. Back in May I was doing some comparisons of the terrain rendering performance in the TGE Demo in TGE, TGEA 1.0.3, and TGEA 1.7. This is a comparison of the exact same scene in all three engines using the same artwork and effects. It was done on my 3 year old Dell laptop with an nVidia 8600 M (128 Mb video RAM):
Camera stationary:
TGE 200 fps
TGEA 1.0.3 180 fps
TGEA 1.7.0 320 fps
Camera in motion (repeating path):
TGE 180 - 250 fps
TGEA 1.0.3 180 - 240 fps
TGEA 1.7.0 300 - 360 fps
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 19, 2008 at 01:01 GMT) |
I would say at this point that TGEA is more of a beginner engine than TGE. It has all of the same features and code that TGE plus better docs (which are also available offline as part of the SDK installer) plus an easier to understand directory structure plus better modularization plus bigger terrains plus an easier to use art pipeline (polysoup collision).
Honest question: where would you say that TGE is a better choice for a beginner at this point (aside from price)?
| Chip Lambert (Nov 19, 2008 at 01:43 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
Honestly, I don't know why. I've seen a few people that just bought TGEA and not TGE complain about having some trouble with everything. Also I was basing it on this quote from the TGEA page:
Quote:
TGEA is not a beginner's engine. You need to have a solid foundation for scripting, editing, physics, networking, animation, and debugging if you want to finish the game idea that's been stirring at the back of your mind for the last two years.
There wasn't much of a learning curve for me, because I do believe the docs and everything is much better, but just by what I've seen, beginners seem to stumble through it, get frustrated and sometimes even ask for refunds.
Edit: I meant no offense or disrespect, and hope I didn't come like I did. :) I do think TGEA is much better and easier, hence why I upgraded and I think everyone should ;)
Edited on Nov 19, 2008 01:48 GMT
| Guimo (Nov 19, 2008 at 01:49 GMT) |
Thank you very much for the number which prove the architecture has indeed improved. Its undeniable that for a new project or maybe a beginner the superior codebase and documentation is the best choice they can make. It may have a higher price but its completely worth it. Even better if they go for the TGE-TGEA udpate path as it provides 2 engines for the price of one.
My question is there not because I want to run my game in my Gandmas PC. Unless you come from under a rock, netbooks are just selling like hot pancakes... their low price combined with decent hardware makes it an incredible choice for the average user. Come on... just look around you at the train or bus and you will see somebody with one of this tiny 10inch-800x600 books. And in this times of recession it is possible users in need of a portable PC will see them as a viable option.
Even major manufacturers and those who initially denied they wanted to enter this business have been driven into it forced by just the number of sales. Intel is still struggling to keep the demand for Atom and AMD in its worst move has delayed the launch of their new platform for 1 year at least.
So, you cannot deny that this new small form PCs are not the ones you find in your Grandpas library. These are brand new computers but with limited HW or dedicated video cards. Unfortunately you wont get an ATI 9600 (i really loved that card), or a nVidia FX5200 or a Geforce3Ti or any dedicated card in the foreseable future. We are talking about throwing up power for portability and the owners of these PCs will want games.
So, doesnt it makes sense for GG to keep development on TGE?
Dont take me wrong, Im completely in favor of a unified engine. All my game has been designed to be able to run in a unified network and it wont matter if the clients run in TGE-TGEA-TX-TWii-iTorque or whatever. Once finished I will start porting to TGEA in order to get an advanced client. But I just cannot justify a blind move to TGEA and just drop development on TGE if it will make me lose all this potential market. Indies live on their ability to reach any possible target and TGE gives us that.
So, please reconsider your idea of dropping TGE as it still has a lot of way to go.
Luck!
Guimo
| Benjamin L. Grauer (Nov 19, 2008 at 02:01 GMT) |
If I wait for the next big TGEA (Torque 3d) paid update, will it be still possible for me to upgrade from TGE?
Edited on Nov 19, 2008 02:02 GMT
| jydog (Nov 19, 2008 at 02:27 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
| Guimo (Nov 19, 2008 at 03:12 GMT) |
| Pierre (DragoFire) Hay (Nov 19, 2008 at 05:00 GMT) |
You'll also find a large number of Vista shipped PC's are being downgraded to XP Pro. And also a Intel research project found no bonus from upgrading PC's to or with Vista on them. If anything there was more issues with security lock-downs and programmes crashing.
| Pisal Setthawong (Nov 19, 2008 at 07:42 GMT) |
| Pierre (DragoFire) Hay (Nov 19, 2008 at 08:05 GMT) |
Brett I'm not wanting to side track your topic, but thought it would a good point to add.
So those who are able to help, please read and if possible put your hand up to offer any services you can offer.
The topic is covering updating some of the other GG development tools and content packs for use with the latest versions of TGE/A.
www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=80934
Edited on Nov 19, 2008 08:06 GMT
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 19, 2008 at 08:09 GMT) |
Personal tastes and preferences aside, every game developer should be cheering Vista on!
Microsoft is one of the few movers in the computer industry that can establish shader capable cards as the baseline for all of our end users and that is incredibly exciting. Windows XP is a huge step backwards for game developers.
| Matt Fairfax (Nov 19, 2008 at 08:17 GMT) |
In a perfect world we could throw dozens of developers at every one of our products at all the same time and have them be everything to everyone.
Unfortunately, our resources are limited and we have to smartly focus our efforts. We believe that there are far better wins for us and for our community in the long run if we focus on Torque 3D.
| Pierre (DragoFire) Hay (Nov 19, 2008 at 08:30 GMT) |
There are a lot of corp's that haven't moved over to it yet and Microsoft is trying to force them to by ending licencing for XP seats over the next year.
I'm not saying I have a problem with Vista, but trying to point out that there is still a very large amount of XP systems out there (a large percentage then there is of Vista). XP will be around for a while to come and is still supported by Microsoft (well for the time being that is).
Yes Vista will be a major OS for PC's, but atm it's not as Microsoft may wish it was.
We as developers and game designers have to look at all the possible markets for our games/products, be it for PC, Mac, IPod, PS3, Xbox/360 or any other OS that is out there or to come. Remember you need to look at every possibility.
Edited on Nov 19, 2008 08:36 GMT
| Guimo (Nov 19, 2008 at 10:34 GMT) |
I completely understand you have to optimize your resources and the development of TGEA has been awesome. TGEA is way ahead from what it was since version 1.0 and I know GG has put a great effort into it.
Unfortunately there are things which prevent TGEA from becoming the main GG solution like adequate low end PC support. Im not saying this things just to piss you off. Its just that I feel that if GG can provide solutions for those cases then TGEA will become a suitable platform.
Meanwhile, IMHO you just cant go and tell everybody that TGEA is a complete solution and everybody should leave TGE behind because it is an obsolete platform because right now that is not completely true. TGEA still cant replace TGE in all aspects.
Im just trying to make a point that this new small factor platforms look like an awesome target for casual games and they are a wonderful target for TGE. If you dont want to take on that business thats ok, its your decision. Im sure there will be other developers that will gladly take on that market.
Im really waiting for TGEA to become the main engine and rest assured that I will upgrade to Torque3D when it comes out. I just would love if you could provide a single solution covering a wide range of platforms. That would be healthy for you and for any user. Meanwhile TGE is still a viable choice and you just cant tell everybody to abandon it.
Luck!
Guimo
| Thomas Huehn (Nov 19, 2008 at 10:37 GMT) |
* No dedicated Server on Unix out of the box.
I did read it's possible with some changes but out of the box would be much better ;)
| Joseph Greenawalt (Nov 19, 2008 at 13:26 GMT) |
{offtopic}
Quote:
Personal tastes and preferences aside, every game developer should be cheering Vista on!
Pretty hard to cheer for an OS that copies files approx 20x slower than its predecessor on the same hardware :-( Microsoft has seriously lost its way. Luckily I was able to get a refund on it after squacking loud enough and was able to upgrade back to XP. I have nothing good to say about the XP->Vista downgrade, and will probably never be buying another copy of windows.
(yeah, I know the file copy bug didn't hit everyone, but it did affect lots of folks, including me, and there is still no solution. I've even heard that the problem still exists in the early versions of Windows 7)
{/offtopic}
My next PC will likely be a Mac dual booting Linux, so thanks a ton for the OpenGL support on your flagship product, and for free to boot :-)
| Thomas Bang (Nov 19, 2008 at 13:36 GMT) |
Quote:
The new Torque(coming soon):
Vastly Improved Art Pipeline
...
...
...
Good to know. So you will implement...
- ShowToolPro and Constructor with Shader Preview?
- Cast & Receive Shadows on all object types?
- a mechanism to protect models, textures and sound?
Then and only then... it would be really a "Vastly Improved Art Pipeline" !!!
| JoZ (Nov 19, 2008 at 13:47 GMT) |
Oh, and the announcement of some loving going to ediotrs & tools make me very happy! :D
Something I would like to see taking some care is... more GG shaders! Especially now that a lot of shaders created by the community will suffer for not having a OpenGL counterpart... Easy way to put in shaders directly coming from RenderMonkey or FXComposer will be nice also ! :)
I've yet started to collect a budget for TORQUE 3D and related things will come out of it :D
| Michael Perry (Nov 19, 2008 at 15:35 GMT) |
I'd like to join in the conversation to address some of the suggestions, such as Thomas's art pipeline reply, TGEA becoming the flagship product, and so on.
Unfortunately, I'm locked down writing docs without TDN. My best free time will actually be tomorrow during IRC Hour, where we will have Matt, Brett, our new exporter dev, Alex Scarborough...and so on =)
| Manoel Neto (Nov 19, 2008 at 16:28 GMT) |
I worked on 7 TGE games, and all of them were borderline unplayable on non-ATI and non-NVIDIA integrated chipsets. They were not lookers by any means either.
Our first game that was truly playable on integrated cards was based on TGEA 1.3. It runs fine on PCs that have issues playing The Sims 2, and that was a huge plus for us. Simply put, integrated cards like Intel's, VIA's and others have terrible OpenGL performance.
The same game (same models, same textures, without normal maps or fancy effects), running on both engines will be faster on TGEA most of the time.
| Andy S. (Nov 19, 2008 at 16:48 GMT) |
| Michael Perry (Nov 19, 2008 at 16:52 GMT) |
TX is a topic I've tried bringing up in IRC Hour before, but there just never seems to be anyone available to talk. If we can get a group of TX users together, I might be able to get a real time chat going with those involved with its development. We'll have to discuss it further though.
| Jarrod Roberson (Nov 19, 2008 at 17:46 GMT) |
| Pierre (DragoFire) Hay (Nov 19, 2008 at 18:09 GMT) |
Upgrade price for TGE 1.5 -> TGEA 1.7 is $149 USD
| Deborah Marshall (Nov 19, 2008 at 18:37 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
What is written on the product page is an obsolete description written for TGEA 1.0.3 when it had less features, less stability, less examples, and less documentation than TGE. It should be changed shortly. Thanks for catching it!
| Szzg007 (Nov 19, 2008 at 18:43 GMT) |
| Chris "DiGi" Timberlake (Nov 19, 2008 at 18:50 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
P.S. I put my vote in for a Quake like licensing for TGE. I think that is the one way to make TGE Live for nearly ever.
| JoZ (Nov 19, 2008 at 20:52 GMT) |
Would be nice at least 1 time on 3 having it like at 1 or 2 pm
;-)
| Jeremiah Fulbright (Nov 19, 2008 at 22:18 GMT) |
| Kenneth Holst (Nov 19, 2008 at 22:29 GMT) |
Second, things worth having are things worth paying for. This goes for just about everything in life, wouldn't you say?
| JoZ (Nov 19, 2008 at 23:04 GMT) |
Now with the 1.8 release all seems to be done... also the OpenGL support, so I think all of us could be happy with what we've got...
I think GG now has delivered us a good and usefull product with wich we can work well.
Certainly I think a bit of care about some lighting issues that TGEA still suffers (especially on interiors) would be nice for those who will decide to stick with 1.8...
The new big enhanchements TGEA seems (as per Brett words) promising surely will worth some money, so I don't mind if the next releases will be not free, I like to pay some money to get those great enhanchements TGEA seems promising...
In the end I think like us noone at GG could "live of solely air" ... No cash at all, no updates at all, it's pretty obvious! ;-D
| Will Zettler (Nov 20, 2008 at 01:19 GMT) |
I have enjoyed TGE for several years now, it is a great beginner engine to use and build from. I've used it and still use it, for testing before anything goes into TGEA 1.7.1 or soon, 1.8. I've always enjoyed the ease of use with it, no shaders to worry about, nothing special to run... just drop your content in and go. Yeah I know, TGEA is getting like that, and I've been a big fan of both engines, learning to work more with TGEA now that the effort is swinging in that direction. But TGE is and always will be a great engine.
I think the engine should go as you guys listed, something like the old ID tech stuff. GPL or whatnot seems to work wonders. The TGE is a dying tech, but it is still a cool engine, even if TGE is going the way of the dodo. I think it was always a strong engine for a beginner to learn from and work with. Maybe now, since everything is going TGEA, we might see it released with source for free or a small fee and see what those talents who haven't got in on the TGE can do with it. Would be amazing I'm sure.
Will
| Benjamin L. Grauer (Nov 20, 2008 at 07:26 GMT) |
| Joseph Greenawalt (Nov 21, 2008 at 10:35 GMT) |
Is there a transcript available of the IRC Meeting yesterday?
| Dale Cannon (Nov 21, 2008 at 16:27 GMT) |
| Michael Perry (Nov 21, 2008 at 18:53 GMT) |
| Amr Bekhit (Nov 22, 2008 at 12:25 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
--Amr
| jydog (Dec 03, 2008 at 03:30 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
| Allyn "Mr_Bloodworth" Mcelrath (Dec 04, 2008 at 22:40 GMT) |
| Russell Fincher (Dec 04, 2008 at 22:51 GMT) |
Edited on Dec 04, 2008 22:55 GMT
| Francisco Canedo (Dec 05, 2008 at 02:18 GMT) |
I like to play with tge, is a hobby for me, I would like to upgrade to TGEA 1.7, but I have no money ($145.00 USD). There is some possibility to upgrade to a "hobby license"(allowing only publish my game for free). I don't need Indie License.
I bought some products and I have a lot of fun with them :-).
my list of products:
-GG Studios: Enviroment Pack
-GG Studios: Environment Pack 2
-BraveTree: Car Pack Pro
-BraveTree: Girl Pack
-BraveTree: Jet Bike Pack Pro
-BraveTree: Tank Pack
-BraveTree: War Sparrow Pack Pro
-Chris Calef: Ragdoll Animation Pack
-Synapse Gaming: Lighting Pack for TGE
-Torque Constructor
-Torque Game Engine 1.4.2 - INDIE License
-Torque Game Engine 1.5 - upgrade from TLK - INDIE
-Torque ShowTool Pro (TGE 1.5 Indie Bundle)
-Torque X 3D Open Beta
-Tridinaut: Soldier Pack
-Zap!
Thx GG
Francisco
| Thomas Bang (Dec 05, 2008 at 08:44 GMT) |
You know Gnometech?
www.gnometech.com/lwdtsmain.shtml
@Garagegames:
If you play with the idea to import fbx and/or dae (collada) directly in the mission editor... don't do that !!!!!
I think each engine has different internal requirements. So it would be better to let the DTS-Format the only mesh-format in Torque. Instead of... modify ShowToolPro and implement the import of fbx, collada,x...
The developer can now modify and export the file to DTS.
Also the possibility to append normal- and specmaps and the automatic creation of materials.cs would be a real improvement.
Keyword Collision: Implement the possibility to respond to animated collision meshes.
I dont have TGEA. Only TGE.
It is hard to say... sorry... but at the moment i don't see a reason FOR ME to switch to TGEA.
Edited on Dec 05, 2008 08:52 GMT
| Russell Fincher (Dec 05, 2008 at 14:11 GMT) |
Internal testing of Collada has been fairly successful, and frankly, not dealing with an exporter is great. Yes, there's the issue of a preview application like ShowTool, and yes, there's still more to do on the implementation and testing. But simply put, DTS has limitations that modern game art needs to transcend. Don't worry, one goal is to make sure your old models can be easily brought into the engine as Collada files without much (or any) modification. And my understanding is that DTS shapes will still be supported in Torque.
I kinda disagree with you about the possibility of automatic materials creation. Though it's not artist-friendly, the materials.cs file is simple and direct. Creating materials settings in a modeling program is never going to be an accurate preview for those same settings and textures in-engine, and no one would be happy with a guessing game like that. I hated working with the materials file at first, but it's a simple layout of all the basic materials functionality you have to work with, and nothing more. Now, I would love to see a simple app that previews using Torque that would allow you to load texture maps, create materials settings, and export a materials file, but I don't think fitting that functionality into a modeling app would be the best way to handle that. Just my opinion. :)
Edited on Dec 05, 2008 15:23 GMT
| Thomas Bang (Dec 05, 2008 at 16:54 GMT) |
Quote:
But simply put, DTS has limitations that modern game art needs to transcend.
GG can develop a new version of the DTS-Format. And the mission editor can look at the header of the file to get the version number. So that should not be the problem. If a engine has its own mesh format is advantageous... it is optimized. So import dae, fbx... whatever you want..., modify the mesh and export it to dts.
You know Morphmaps/Endomorphs in Lightwave? The new dts format could provide this and we, the developer, are happy because we can do Facial Animation without to use Bones.
Quote:
I kinda disagree with you about the possibility of automatic materials creation
A mesh viewer has to show everything is needed. And if a material.cs is automatically created the developer has a basic material construct. He can use this basic material as starting point.
| JoZ (Dec 05, 2008 at 21:03 GMT) |
Sincerely I think that this more or less is a direction that GG has yet took into consideration (this is just a personal speculation!).
Also the ability to view .DIF in this new Showtool would be great but maybe GG has yet took into consideration the idea to integrate in a similar way constructor into the engine and this would be also better! Again, this is just personal speculation but I think this would be not so strange, when Constructor was in development Matt Fairfax spent some words about the possibility to integrate it into the engine...
What is not really clear to me is if GG thinks to drop the BSP geometry usage in favour of polysoup or not (I hope NOT!)...
From some comments seams to me thay want, from some other comments seams to me they don't want... Some people still retain that BSP can be a nice advantage in terms of impact on FPS because of the simple collision but I'm really really not in the position to express a valid point of view on that...
It's embarassing to say that but my prefer for BSP it's mainly because of the easying in creating them!
Eheheh ^_*'
Sorry if I made too many speculations, GG can punish me deleting all purchased products from the Download Section in my account... LOL! (NO! I was just jocking !!! Sigh !!! ...)
P.S. Sorry I didn't put a lot of attention in grammar and spelling in this post, I'm really too tired... I've spent all the day doing my baggage (...leaving tomorrow for Bruxelles to visit European Community institutions for a travel of studying with my university... and very happy about that! :D )
Edited on Dec 05, 2008 21:09 GMT
| Tyler Slabinski (Dec 21, 2008 at 21:24 GMT) |
I know what your going to say "Torque is a very cheap game engine for delivering high-performance features", but it is one of the many questions that I am thinking of.
| Brett Seyler (Dec 21, 2008 at 23:20 GMT) Resource Rating: 5 |
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