Back in Blac... er... Green?
by Jacob Williams · 10/14/2008 (10:24 pm) · 7 comments
I guess it has been about 2 years (2 years tomorrow, actually) since my last blog post, and so much has changed it is sometimes difficult to grasp. Since the last time I wonder the halls of this community looking for ridiculous ways to make fast cash, I have grown quite a bit. I am now married, have a little boy (whose birthday is today!), co-own a web development business, and have a, well, a life I guess. The next logical step, I guess, is to post a blog about what I have learned (that seems to be the trend these days) in the hopes that someone might, in turn, learn something from me. Also to stay in sync with the latest trend, I will give a brief overview of what I am currently working on.
To start, I want to say that if you buy Torque (TGB, TGE, TGEA), even without that slightest hint of game development, programming talent, modeling talent, sound... well you get the picture, it will become apart of your life in a way that is similar to a rash. You get it, scratch at it a while, and decide to leave it alone for a bit. Sometimes, at that point, it goes away, but it will always be back, and worse than ever. Torque is an amazing product with amazing abilities, and there is always something to be learned from it. That being said, I would like to stress the point that the first few projects you start probably won't ever be finished. I believe that this is, in part, due to the cosmic order of things. If Joe Average could buy a product like Torque, work at it for a few months, and create Fallout, gaming would be lost as an art. So to keep things in balance, whichever God you choose to believe in, had to lay down some indie game development ground rules at the creation of time. The rules went something along these lines.
1. You cannot complete your first 10 projects.
2. Projects 11, 12, and 13 are required to suck.
3. Your development team cannot remain the same. The lead designer, artist, programmer is required to leave you, take all of the code, and start back at Rule 1.
4. Project 14, although great, can only effective sell at 1/10 of its actual value.
5. You cannot, at any point in your career, make enough money to support a family.
6. Your wife/girlfriend/significant other is required to hate your development time.
7. Everyone indie developer, at some time in his/her career, must be apart of a sub-par MMO project.
Now, I could elaborate more on the rules that were laid down that day, but i think by now you get the picture. The jest of the story is this: Indie development it tough, someone will screw you over, people will think that your game sucks, and you will learn to get over it. Now, I don't want to discourage anyone from becoming an indie developer. Hell, if it wasn't for my numerous failed project, I would not have learned many of the things I know now, and I would have never become a PHP developer. In the game industry, people can be more harsh that you might think. You will get your feeling hurt along the way, but the constructive thing to do is to use one's harshness as motivation to be better. So, go for it! Create something horrible and use the experience gained to create something great. What sets this place apart is the community, you have a host of people that are or have been where you are at now, and their encouragement is going to be needed at some time or another to carry though the rough spots.
Now, if you are still reading at this point, I commend you, and as a reward, you get to see what I am currently working on. I have decided long ago to for go any dreams I have of singlehandedly creating the next best game, but instead, do my best to help others accomplish that through useful resources.
MySQL
There are a few resources floating around to make TGE compatible with mySQL. While some of these work, the possibility for it's usefulness hasn't even been tapped. I am working on creating a better and more functional mySQL infrastructure.
Community Driven MMO Framework
While I have my reservations about indie MMO projects as a whole, I do believe there is a great need for a better infrastructure. I have read many posts about creating such a thing, and though I would take the initiative. I am going to spend the next couple of weeks putting together a team that can effectively create such an infrastructure. I want to create a system of "modules" that can be plugging into stock TGE that address certain issues of MMO development. Each module can be "plugged in" individually or used in conjunction with one another to provide to basis for a MMO Client/Server architecture. This will not be a "MMOKit" in the sense of added assets or point and click MMO creation, but rather the framework to allow TGE to make it happen. I want to be able to provide a product that can pass GarageGames QA, and ultimately release it to the community free of charge. If you are serious about making something like this happen, drop me a like at cheapdevotion (at) gmail (dot) com with how you can contribute and we will talk.
Well, that about sums it up. Until next time...
-Jacob
To start, I want to say that if you buy Torque (TGB, TGE, TGEA), even without that slightest hint of game development, programming talent, modeling talent, sound... well you get the picture, it will become apart of your life in a way that is similar to a rash. You get it, scratch at it a while, and decide to leave it alone for a bit. Sometimes, at that point, it goes away, but it will always be back, and worse than ever. Torque is an amazing product with amazing abilities, and there is always something to be learned from it. That being said, I would like to stress the point that the first few projects you start probably won't ever be finished. I believe that this is, in part, due to the cosmic order of things. If Joe Average could buy a product like Torque, work at it for a few months, and create Fallout, gaming would be lost as an art. So to keep things in balance, whichever God you choose to believe in, had to lay down some indie game development ground rules at the creation of time. The rules went something along these lines.
1. You cannot complete your first 10 projects.
2. Projects 11, 12, and 13 are required to suck.
3. Your development team cannot remain the same. The lead designer, artist, programmer is required to leave you, take all of the code, and start back at Rule 1.
4. Project 14, although great, can only effective sell at 1/10 of its actual value.
5. You cannot, at any point in your career, make enough money to support a family.
6. Your wife/girlfriend/significant other is required to hate your development time.
7. Everyone indie developer, at some time in his/her career, must be apart of a sub-par MMO project.
Now, I could elaborate more on the rules that were laid down that day, but i think by now you get the picture. The jest of the story is this: Indie development it tough, someone will screw you over, people will think that your game sucks, and you will learn to get over it. Now, I don't want to discourage anyone from becoming an indie developer. Hell, if it wasn't for my numerous failed project, I would not have learned many of the things I know now, and I would have never become a PHP developer. In the game industry, people can be more harsh that you might think. You will get your feeling hurt along the way, but the constructive thing to do is to use one's harshness as motivation to be better. So, go for it! Create something horrible and use the experience gained to create something great. What sets this place apart is the community, you have a host of people that are or have been where you are at now, and their encouragement is going to be needed at some time or another to carry though the rough spots.
Now, if you are still reading at this point, I commend you, and as a reward, you get to see what I am currently working on. I have decided long ago to for go any dreams I have of singlehandedly creating the next best game, but instead, do my best to help others accomplish that through useful resources.
MySQL
There are a few resources floating around to make TGE compatible with mySQL. While some of these work, the possibility for it's usefulness hasn't even been tapped. I am working on creating a better and more functional mySQL infrastructure.
Community Driven MMO Framework
While I have my reservations about indie MMO projects as a whole, I do believe there is a great need for a better infrastructure. I have read many posts about creating such a thing, and though I would take the initiative. I am going to spend the next couple of weeks putting together a team that can effectively create such an infrastructure. I want to create a system of "modules" that can be plugging into stock TGE that address certain issues of MMO development. Each module can be "plugged in" individually or used in conjunction with one another to provide to basis for a MMO Client/Server architecture. This will not be a "MMOKit" in the sense of added assets or point and click MMO creation, but rather the framework to allow TGE to make it happen. I want to be able to provide a product that can pass GarageGames QA, and ultimately release it to the community free of charge. If you are serious about making something like this happen, drop me a like at cheapdevotion (at) gmail (dot) com with how you can contribute and we will talk.
Well, that about sums it up. Until next time...
-Jacob
About the author
#2
About the MySQL layer, I'm using a third party connection layer to work with mySQL called SQLAPI (www.sqlapi.com). It was really easy to wrap the APU around a class and expose my methods to the console. All the inserts, updates and deletes are done on the engine level and the functions to access that information are exposed to the console like:
%equipment = DBConn.getPlayerEquipment(%playerid)
%name = DBConn.getArmyName(%playerid, %armyid);
Of course SQLAPI costs a little $ but it provides everything I need. On the other hand you can do the same by using MySQL++ which is free.
I think trying to expose a DB API to the console is just overkill as games usually only require some specific commands at some specific times which you can wrap in your class.
Luck!
Guimo
10/14/2008 (11:18 pm)
Hi Jacob,About the MySQL layer, I'm using a third party connection layer to work with mySQL called SQLAPI (www.sqlapi.com). It was really easy to wrap the APU around a class and expose my methods to the console. All the inserts, updates and deletes are done on the engine level and the functions to access that information are exposed to the console like:
%equipment = DBConn.getPlayerEquipment(%playerid)
%name = DBConn.getArmyName(%playerid, %armyid);
Of course SQLAPI costs a little $ but it provides everything I need. On the other hand you can do the same by using MySQL++ which is free.
I think trying to expose a DB API to the console is just overkill as games usually only require some specific commands at some specific times which you can wrap in your class.
Luck!
Guimo
#3
10/15/2008 (10:43 am)
Interesting read, but from many years using torque and working professionally with "3d environments", although your encouragement is good, a few of your rules are WAY off. If you share experiences with others you'll see it varies a great deal from person to person. The over zealous, MMO fanatic type developer usually experiences your rules, but for those aiming at other genre's things can be much different.
#4
@Chris - My rules were placed there just from my own experiences. The fact that they don't apply to everyone is definitely a positive statement. I hope for the sake of the indie game development community that these rules apply to a select (unlucky) few only.
10/15/2008 (11:40 am)
@Guimo - Thanks for the links, although SQLAPI looks very promising, I will probably look into mySQL++ to keep everything free. @Chris - My rules were placed there just from my own experiences. The fact that they don't apply to everyone is definitely a positive statement. I hope for the sake of the indie game development community that these rules apply to a select (unlucky) few only.
#5
10/15/2008 (9:12 pm)
Torque works great with mySQL using PHP no?
#6
I will note here that from a licensing stand point, the httpObject is the right direction, but I have a feeling (pure speculation) mySQL is about to make a significant licensing adjustment to stay competitive.
10/15/2008 (9:35 pm)
@Jeremy - It does work great using the Torque httpObject, however, one of the things that I am trying not to do is require someone to use another language with which they may not be familiar. PHP is a very easy and useful language to learn, hell, I have been a PHP developer for 2 years now and I have only found one thing that PHP couldn't accomplish, but for someone trying to tackle TorqueScript and C++, it is a bit much.I will note here that from a licensing stand point, the httpObject is the right direction, but I have a feeling (pure speculation) mySQL is about to make a significant licensing adjustment to stay competitive.
#7
Possibly check out this website because we've been doing what you're talking about for the past two years and we're within two or three months of completing it.
10/17/2008 (7:29 pm)
I posted a nice long comment, but it looks like it got eaten.Possibly check out this website because we've been doing what you're talking about for the past two years and we're within two or three months of completing it.
Associate James Ford
Sickhead Games