General

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

XTatic — Fri, 30 May 2008 12:49:16 GMT

Blade3D takes a slightly different approach. That is avoiding game studio. Essentially the end result is your game hosted in a runtime shell along with any components you have written. This means you don't really have to compile your entire game, just your own components. Once you have written your own components, you simply drop them into the Blade3D directory and it will automatically consume them. The result is a modular system with all the major building blocks, yet still extensible enough to easily integrate your own functionality.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

JohnT — Fri, 30 May 2008 12:33:54 GMT

Here is a link that talks about the current state of the TorqueX 3D editor
http://www.garagegames.com/blogs/44338/14793

And here is an older video that was demonstrated at GDC 2008 of the editor
http://www.vimeo.com/778087?pg=embed&sec=778087

Essentially what the builder does is to look at your project and show all your content. It then lets you create a level that you can add terrain, skybox, objects, particle effects, ... by creating objects that are bolted together with various components supplied by GarageGames and your own custom code. Once complete you save out the level and then load it in your game.

Unfortunately, creating 3D games will always be difficult but this looks like it will take some of the burden off.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

Gib2007 — Fri, 30 May 2008 01:19:43 GMT

The only reason I was trying to roll my own is because there is not an editor for making 3d works, special effects, and drag and dropping in 3d models and placeing them in the world. Actually, thats all the more engine I require. The biggest failure of Microsoft with XNA so far is that they should have had that in version 1 of xna(as a template) like the racing game or space war or whatever. That way, TRUE rapid indie development could go on.

So is Torque X 3d going to do that? Will it allow me to build worlds and scenes and then export it as a project so I can open and run in game studio and hand edit the code it generates and the files it creates - I am picturing a save menu where when i save it, it generates or updates the project, just like GSE does and puts out a file for the terrain maps and such.

That's all we really need IMO since then we could open up the project code it generated(the engine source along with created elements from the gui engine) and we can go alter classes and objects from there. Just having that would be a HUGE time savings of about a year or two for rolling your own because then if you didn't *quite* like what it generated, say for physics, no problem, you go in and edit it and resave to your project.

Is that anything on the market yet? Torque, Blade3d, Visual3d.net? Last time I checked they were all in various stages of development and none of them usable(or didnt look easy to use).

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

Abel Garcia Plaza — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:09:26 GMT

My case is similar to a previous one: what I needed to do was very simple. I tried to make it by using Torke X editor but I got frustrated because of the lack of time (I started to make my DBP entry a week before the deadline...). For me, was simplier and quicker to make the things by my own than using Torke X editor. But, as I said, that was because of the simplicity of my game. I think that the good way of doing things is by reusing others. If I need to make a big game, I'm sure that I'll use Torke X or other game engine which save me from doing all from scratch.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

JohnT — Wed, 28 May 2008 21:01:09 GMT

As someone that has transitioned away from the roll-your-own methodology to TorqueX, I can say that TorqueX is the way to go in the long run. The primary reason that I abandoned my own engine is that creating a more complex game in 3D with animations, scene graph, physics, particle and sound effects turned out to be a bit more then I could handle alone and needed to focus more on my game instead of the plumbing.

With that said TorqueX is a complete departure from traditional game engines with its aggregation methodology for creating objects and is a little difficult to wrap your head around in the beginning. Once learned, the aggregation method is the only way to go and with the soon to be released TorqueX 3D Builder life will be a lot easier. Without the 3D editor it has been extremely difficult to work with TorqueX and documentation on 3D development is non-existent but I must say that this engine has a lot of potential.

Another thing I'm really looking forward to is the release of John Kanalakis's book (The Complete Guide to Torque X) and is scheduled to be on the shelves within the next couple months. Definitely going to be a must have for TorqueX development!

John

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

Streklin — Mon, 26 May 2008 02:05:10 GMT

Stephen Zepp:

Obviously I'm biased, but I've noticed a massive majority of posters here commenting, or implying, that they are rolling their own engine(s) for their games.

With Torque X not directly supporting 3D quite yet I can of course see the reasons why people might not be exploring it, but with that reason aside, is there a specific issue with the engine itself that is having people roll their own, or is it lack of knowledge regarding what it's about?

The main reason I ask is that if it's lack of knowledge of the engine (Torque X) itself, I'd be more than happy to answer and explain whatever I can--I just need to know what needs to be known, so to speak!

I'm not sure how many people share the same view I have, but one of the reasons I make games as a hobby is because it offers a chance to learn new things and face new challenges. Since my primary goal when writing a hobby game is to see what *I* can do with the XNA api, or the DirectX api, or the super awesome text adventure engine system that will take the world by storm and make 3D games a thing of the past..., and as such I prefer to make all the little parts. (Even if X does a better job).

Mind you however, if it came down to making a game on a deadline, I'd probably look into something like Torque X a bit more closely. Of course in that case, I'm not hobbiest, but some kind of profesional, so I'm not sure a person in that scenerio is the intended target of your question.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

The ZMan — Mon, 26 May 2008 00:25:22 GMT

Devman see http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/12124.aspx for more information on what Shaw is talking about.... your 'game' is not working well...

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

ShawMishrak — Sun, 25 May 2008 13:49:53 GMT

DevMan, I would be careful how you market your game submission. Saying it's a TorqueX demo and then having it not work on anyone's Xbox could be construed as bad publicity.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

Jim Perry — Sun, 25 May 2008 03:04:02 GMT

DevMan:
Anyway, if there is any real doubt as to the power of TorqueX, especially the 3D, check out the community game I have submitted, FPS Demo Using TorqueX. It has been accepted onto Live, so more than one person thinks it's viable :)

Just an FYI - acceptance of the game doesn't mean the reviewer personally likes it or TorqueX, just that it meets the criteria you selected for it. You could submit a game that just randomly changes the color of the screen and, as long as it didn't crash and was labeled correctly, it would have to be accepted.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

EvanWeeks — Sat, 24 May 2008 17:08:43 GMT

Nick Gravelyn:
My problem with using TorqueX at this point, having used it a bit more, is that I don't want 90% of the stuff it has. That extra bulk is just getting in the way for me. I can write up a slim little game framework that matches everything I used in Torque in less time (and with less frustration) than trying to deal with TorqueX's extra bloat and strange (in my opinion) architecture and API. Once that become apparent to me, I gave up on TorqueX and started making my own framework which, in my opinion, has just about surpassed TorqueX in the areas I care about. Just another take on it. Some don't like it because it feels like "cheating", some just want the challenge. I'm a picky API guy so I choose to make my own library that works how I want it to and without all the extra junk.

Absolutely agree. I can roll (and have been) my own 2D API using XNA in far less time than it takes to decipher the ins and outs of how TorqueX works under the hood and make it work for what I want. Not only that, but my purpose-built API will serve my needs far better by simple virtue of the fact that it IS purpose-built for my needs. Most of it is bits and pieces from game concepts I've put together since discovering XNA. A growing physics library from a number of games, a particle engine from another, UI framework snatched and streamlined (read: rewritten) from a contract I worked, etc.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

DevMan — Sat, 24 May 2008 01:05:03 GMT

The cool thing about Torque is the way GarageGames set up their pricing. It is a full 3D game engine which runs on the Xbox 360 almost for free! The source code for the whole engine is too cheap to pass up. Therefore, if you want to make something your own, go ahead. Everything else already supported is the kind of stuff which belongs in a real engine. There is an active community out there constantly making it better, too. When I first started playing with the Torque Game Engine for Windows, it wasn't much further along than TorqueX. Water and vehicles are about all I'm missing right now.

Honestly, with TorqueX and some direction, a talented team of 5-10 could whip out a real Live-enabled FPS in a month. Maybe not Call of Duty, but definitely a Duke Nukem 3D clone. Note, I used the words "direction" and "talented". Learning anything which is complex requires effort. It usually doesn't require as much effort to understand how to use a feature of an engine as it does to code that feature for your own engine, though.

For example, I don't really understand how clipmaps work, definitely not well enough to write the code. TorqueX has them built-in, but a change between XNA 1.0 and 2.0 broke the Xbox implementation. Because I had access to the source code, I fixed the bug in less than 2 hours. I don't want to guess how that compares to the time it would have taken me to research and implement clipmaps. (Researching clipmaps was actually what clued me into the latest TorqueX 2.0 and its enhanced support for 3D)

Anyway, if there is any real doubt as to the power of TorqueX, especially the 3D, check out the community game I have submitted, FPS Demo Using TorqueX. It has been accepted onto Live, so more than one person thinks it's viable :) See this post about the submission itself: http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/12124.aspx

DevMan

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

JohnWestMinor — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:39:26 GMT

My main problem with Torque X is that it seems very limited. I understand that using pre-existing engines saves on development time, but I hate losing the hands on feeling it gives to program everything yourself.

It's the same problem I have with flash: I'm too inexperienced with it to be able to know how to take control of it. It controls me, not the other way around. As a result I'm never going to learn flash unless I have to.

Programming everything myself gives me the same sense of control over my project that creating every single pixel of my graphics in paint gives me. It's mine and I had control over every aspect of it.

If I were to use someone else's engine, the implementation of it would have to be similar to XNA: The engine gives me preset functions and classes for the type of game I'm making that I can manipulate at any time, with extremely well done documentation and every line of code is commented in extreme detail. None of the "This sets our variable" type useless commenting I see so often, but rather "This sets our variable to a predefined value that will tell the blankety blank component to do such and such so that the thing will do such and such, producing XX result."

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

moneras s — Fri, 23 May 2008 00:39:22 GMT

Stephen Zepp:

Obviously I'm biased, but I've noticed a massive majority of posters here commenting, or implying, that they are rolling their own engine(s) for their games.

With Torque X not directly supporting 3D quite yet I can of course see the reasons why people might not be exploring it, but with that reason aside, is there a specific issue with the engine itself that is having people roll their own, or is it lack of knowledge regarding what it's about?

The main reason I ask is that if it's lack of knowledge of the engine (Torque X) itself, I'd be more than happy to answer and explain whatever I can--I just need to know what needs to be known, so to speak!

The thing I really like about XNA is the flexibility of the framework. The great thing is that it can be first used to program simple 2D games, and much of the same code will overlap to more complex 3D games. It also has great documentation and the intellisense in Visual Studio makes it very easy to code and debug. Plus I have previous experience with C#, so learning XNA has been a breeze.

Learning a 2D only engine seems like a bit of a dead end. The only 2D games I play are either older titles (Diablo II, Fallout II, Baulder's Gate), or 2D games with a lot of great hand drawn artwork (Aquaria). I want the flexibility to build whatever game I want and it feels less risky building for a framework/platform that is backed by a multi-billion-dollar company. For being essentially free (for Windows users at least), XNA offers a lot of power.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

emachine74 — Thu, 22 May 2008 20:58:03 GMT

When your hobby is one of programmatic curiosity & exploration, there's a perverse nerdy enjoyment in rolling your own. Using someone else's engine can be a little self-defeating in that regard.

It depends on what you're in it for; if you just want to get a game out there ASAP, your decisions will probably be different from someone motivated by the simple enjoyment of a hobby. I'm sure Torque X is better than anything I'll make anytime soon, but for me that's beside the point.

Re: "Roll your own" vs "Torque X"

Nick Gravelyn — Thu, 22 May 2008 19:41:47 GMT

My problem with using TorqueX at this point, having used it a bit more, is that I don't want 90% of the stuff it has. That extra bulk is just getting in the way for me. I can write up a slim little game framework that matches everything I used in Torque in less time (and with less frustration) than trying to deal with TorqueX's extra bloat and strange (in my opinion) architecture and API. Once that become apparent to me, I gave up on TorqueX and started making my own framework which, in my opinion, has just about surpassed TorqueX in the areas I care about. Just another take on it. Some don't like it because it feels like "cheating", some just want the challenge. I'm a picky API guy so I choose to make my own library that works how I want it to and without all the extra junk.