T3D Component System Community Purchase: An Update
by Jeff Raab · 09/29/2013 (6:53 am) · 33 comments
Well, as Indie GoGo's Updates sumission system doesn't understand how numbers works, it things my update is too long while the character counter clearly indicates I'm under limit. So whatever I'll Just post the thing here and link back:
What's up people?
I'm just dropping a pre-update breakdown. I've been doing work on updates, including new behaviors. I'll also be putting together a new video that demos what this sort of thing can do and why its helpful.
While I'm working on it, here's an update:
So what's been updated?
Bug fixes and documentation updates! I also improved the level loading, so behaviors saved into the level can load an unlimited number of fields. There were some limitations to the way it loaded levels before, but now you can have any number of fields saved. This is especially helpful for some of the new stuff being added, such as...
The New Stuff:
Mounted Camera Behavior!
The original camera behavior worked perfectly, but it operated much akin to the spectator camera. There wasn't a real easy, editor-friendly way to set up mounted cameras for shooters, or Side Scrollers or the like. This fixes that. It's a camera behavior that integrates in the mounting stuff so all you need to do is set the mount target and any transform offsets and it does the rest.
Animation Behaviors!
There are 2: Ambient Animation and Animation Controller.
Ambient animation is What It Says on the Tin. You define an animation for the entity if it has a shape behavior with animations and it plays it for you.
Animation Controller is more general purpose. It gives you up to 16 animation threads with full control. Start and Stop points, speed, forward or backwards, looping, triggers, script controls, etc. This lets you use it for everything from movement and look animations, to facial animations.
And the last major behavior addition, State Machine Behavior
This is a general-purpose state machine behavior. It allows for any number of states and fields to each state, and I'll be setting up hooks for everything from state timeouts, external events, animation triggers and more to allow tons of flexibility in how states operate.
The animation triggers are especially interesting, as that lets you rig up small states that transition from animation-to-animation, so you have a state play an animation for the character laying down that locks player movement, and then it automatically transitions into the prone state. All in all, very flexible.
So that's the update prefacing the video that should be up here before too long demo'ing it off. If you haven't donated yet and aren't sure, keep your eyes on this, and be sure to tell people you know that think it would be a good addition to the Torque Community!
And if you don't have it, here's a link to the campaign:
igg.me/at/T3DComponentSys/x/4589845
-Jeff out
What's up people?
I'm just dropping a pre-update breakdown. I've been doing work on updates, including new behaviors. I'll also be putting together a new video that demos what this sort of thing can do and why its helpful.
While I'm working on it, here's an update:
So what's been updated?
Bug fixes and documentation updates! I also improved the level loading, so behaviors saved into the level can load an unlimited number of fields. There were some limitations to the way it loaded levels before, but now you can have any number of fields saved. This is especially helpful for some of the new stuff being added, such as...
The New Stuff:
Mounted Camera Behavior!
The original camera behavior worked perfectly, but it operated much akin to the spectator camera. There wasn't a real easy, editor-friendly way to set up mounted cameras for shooters, or Side Scrollers or the like. This fixes that. It's a camera behavior that integrates in the mounting stuff so all you need to do is set the mount target and any transform offsets and it does the rest.
Animation Behaviors!
There are 2: Ambient Animation and Animation Controller.
Ambient animation is What It Says on the Tin. You define an animation for the entity if it has a shape behavior with animations and it plays it for you.
Animation Controller is more general purpose. It gives you up to 16 animation threads with full control. Start and Stop points, speed, forward or backwards, looping, triggers, script controls, etc. This lets you use it for everything from movement and look animations, to facial animations.
And the last major behavior addition, State Machine Behavior
This is a general-purpose state machine behavior. It allows for any number of states and fields to each state, and I'll be setting up hooks for everything from state timeouts, external events, animation triggers and more to allow tons of flexibility in how states operate.
The animation triggers are especially interesting, as that lets you rig up small states that transition from animation-to-animation, so you have a state play an animation for the character laying down that locks player movement, and then it automatically transitions into the prone state. All in all, very flexible.
So that's the update prefacing the video that should be up here before too long demo'ing it off. If you haven't donated yet and aren't sure, keep your eyes on this, and be sure to tell people you know that think it would be a good addition to the Torque Community!
And if you don't have it, here's a link to the campaign:
igg.me/at/T3DComponentSys/x/4589845
-Jeff out
About the author
#22
I always go to http://www.garagegames.com/community/blogs
Instead of anywhere else on GG because it doesn't give me what I want to read about, the current stuff happening.
Maybe when http://torque3d.net has blogs and things it could take over from GG?
09/30/2013 (5:42 pm)
Yeah it would be great if more community efforts blogs and cool/exciting projects like Steve's game was high lighted and more easy to see almost everywhere.I always go to http://www.garagegames.com/community/blogs
Instead of anywhere else on GG because it doesn't give me what I want to read about, the current stuff happening.
Maybe when http://torque3d.net has blogs and things it could take over from GG?
#23
10/01/2013 (12:47 am)
What do you mean by 'has blogs'? The user blogging facility looks pretty much the same as here, it's just lacking actual users. Which is a kind of chicken-and-egg problem :P. 
#24
10/01/2013 (1:41 am)
increased my contribution - these things just need to be backed for the better good of the community! :)
#25
I'll see about getting a post up on Torque3D.net pointed back to this and the campaign page.
Also was contemplating having a chat QA/Discussion about this stuff in the garage games chat if anyone was interested in that idea. So if people had more questions on the implementation, or why this is important for Torque, we can go over that stuff.
Thoughts on that?
10/01/2013 (1:54 am)
Thanks guys!I'll see about getting a post up on Torque3D.net pointed back to this and the campaign page.
Also was contemplating having a chat QA/Discussion about this stuff in the garage games chat if anyone was interested in that idea. So if people had more questions on the implementation, or why this is important for Torque, we can go over that stuff.
Thoughts on that?
#26
@Jeff I think that's a good idea. Maybe another blog with some more cool stuff and a video and a time for the Q&A, timezones makes it difficult though.
10/01/2013 (7:38 pm)
@Daniel, oh yeah your right, didn't notice it, hmm maybe I should try and help out to get it to be more visible.@Jeff I think that's a good idea. Maybe another blog with some more cool stuff and a video and a time for the Q&A, timezones makes it difficult though.
#27
10/02/2013 (12:54 pm)
Just (7) days to get the remaining 40% ... would have expected more than (20) contributors by now.
#28
Not a surprise (20 contributors) to me. GG user base consists of a few dozen 'old school' dudes that have been around T3D awhile and a HUGE number of new people that likely do not understand how something like this is hugely useful in nearly any game dev environment. J0linar summed it up well. Something like this would make T3D more 'competitive' with something like unity and make things MUCH simpler for new users. Problem is, the 'older generation' guys already know how to do much of this and the new guys have not reached a level where they realize they could use it to save dev time. I really hope this succeeds. I would hate to rack up yet another failed crowd funded project because the benefit was not understood. (By the way.... the video.... not a great way to show off what this is about... Just my humble opinion.)
Ron
10/04/2013 (5:50 pm)
Jeff, Not a surprise (20 contributors) to me. GG user base consists of a few dozen 'old school' dudes that have been around T3D awhile and a HUGE number of new people that likely do not understand how something like this is hugely useful in nearly any game dev environment. J0linar summed it up well. Something like this would make T3D more 'competitive' with something like unity and make things MUCH simpler for new users. Problem is, the 'older generation' guys already know how to do much of this and the new guys have not reached a level where they realize they could use it to save dev time. I really hope this succeeds. I would hate to rack up yet another failed crowd funded project because the benefit was not understood. (By the way.... the video.... not a great way to show off what this is about... Just my humble opinion.)
Ron
#29
That's probably a fair assessment, and yeah, while the video technically shows off what it does, it's not that great.
That was my first attempt at putting any kind of video/demonstration together, so predictably it kind of sucked ;)
I've been trying to think of a better way to demonstrate what this sort of thing can do, and given how much happens 'behind the scenes', in regards to stuff in the engine or whatever, a quick bite-let of a video is probably one of the worst formats for that sort of thing.
I wanted something a bit more cohesive than a text walkthrough, but this didn't really nail that unless you had an idea of what the project was about already. Given the time left on the campaign, I probably can't salvage it, lol.
That said, like I mentioned before, this'll continue development either way, and I'll be pushing a campaign on this again down the road either way.
Next time, however, I'll probably do a multi-part tutorial that puts together a simple side scroller, or maybe even a livestream where the people in the channel direct the micro product.
Given that this is(as far as I know) the first community purchase project for the GG community, I'm definitely flying blind on who needs what information-wise.
I also don't think that IGG is a good platform for this, so that's another consideration.
That said, given what you guys know of unity and T2D's systems(since this is more or less a mashup between the two, heh) and what I've explained and shown so far, what sort of information do you need or want demonstrated and explained?
If I know what kind of information you guys require about what this thing does, I can better present it than just rambling down a checklist of 'Stuff This Do'.
10/04/2013 (6:11 pm)
@RonThat's probably a fair assessment, and yeah, while the video technically shows off what it does, it's not that great.
That was my first attempt at putting any kind of video/demonstration together, so predictably it kind of sucked ;)
I've been trying to think of a better way to demonstrate what this sort of thing can do, and given how much happens 'behind the scenes', in regards to stuff in the engine or whatever, a quick bite-let of a video is probably one of the worst formats for that sort of thing.
I wanted something a bit more cohesive than a text walkthrough, but this didn't really nail that unless you had an idea of what the project was about already. Given the time left on the campaign, I probably can't salvage it, lol.
That said, like I mentioned before, this'll continue development either way, and I'll be pushing a campaign on this again down the road either way.
Next time, however, I'll probably do a multi-part tutorial that puts together a simple side scroller, or maybe even a livestream where the people in the channel direct the micro product.
Given that this is(as far as I know) the first community purchase project for the GG community, I'm definitely flying blind on who needs what information-wise.
I also don't think that IGG is a good platform for this, so that's another consideration.
That said, given what you guys know of unity and T2D's systems(since this is more or less a mashup between the two, heh) and what I've explained and shown so far, what sort of information do you need or want demonstrated and explained?
If I know what kind of information you guys require about what this thing does, I can better present it than just rambling down a checklist of 'Stuff This Do'.
#30
Just a random guy throwing his opinion in here, but maybe a good way to demostrate your system's effectivness is to do a side by side demonstration. To elaborate on that concept, track the time it takes to do something simple/complex both with your system and without it. A video showing what you have to do in each circumstance would work well here.
10/04/2013 (7:39 pm)
@JeffJust a random guy throwing his opinion in here, but maybe a good way to demostrate your system's effectivness is to do a side by side demonstration. To elaborate on that concept, track the time it takes to do something simple/complex both with your system and without it. A video showing what you have to do in each circumstance would work well here.
#32
www.indiegogo.com/projects/t3d-component-system-community-purchase
10/09/2013 (4:27 am)
Only 20 hours to go!www.indiegogo.com/projects/t3d-component-system-community-purchase
#33
Maybe the idea got some notoriety a little too late, or maybe that would changed nothing.. Who know!
Let's see...
But I guess T3D need to find a way to get money by itself, like Blender or some others projects to stay in the race for game engines innovations.
Probably the most difficult to do.
10/09/2013 (1:53 pm)
It's something sadly missing in T3D, it would be nice. I guess a good step in the right direction. I gave few love to the project but in only less than 11 hours to fund the last part make me a little pessimistic.Maybe the idea got some notoriety a little too late, or maybe that would changed nothing.. Who know!
Let's see...
But I guess T3D need to find a way to get money by itself, like Blender or some others projects to stay in the race for game engines innovations.
Probably the most difficult to do.
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