A bite from the Apple: TGEA 1.8

That's right. Many of you thought it couldn't be done. But the rumors are true: TGEA now includes full Mac support. WHOOHOO!



GarageGames used TGEA 1.8 tech to create both the Windows and Mac versions of Fallen Empire: Legions on InstantAction

A Peek Underneath the Hood of TGEA 1.8

Now everything you've come to know and love about TGEA is on a Mac, including:

Procedurally Generated Shaders: Procedural generation of shaders support normalmapping, detail maps, specular, cubemapping, glow, refraction, reflection, texture UV animation, and more.

Custom Materials: A powerful custom shader interface allows easy integration of custom shaders and effects. Also included are exclusive fallback hooks that allow full control over how a custom material looks on all hardware platforms.

GFX2 Power: We've revamped TGEA's rendering layer to make it faster than ever before on your Mac. And we still include full screen anti-aliasing and support for non-shadered video cards. You can deploy your games to a much wider audience and trust that it will ''just work.''

MegaTerrains: Our MegaTerrains system allows you to create enormous worlds, built upon our powerful Terrain editing system.

Polysoup Collision: Now Mac users can take advantage of OPCODE Polysoup Collision implementation. Quickly drop in your mesh objects and levels and get up and running with them in no time.

SFX Sound System: Our sound system provides proper abstraction and tools for using sound in games, including a robust FMOD implementation.

Mission Editor: TGEA's Mission Editor provides an entire suite of WYSIWG tools for designing and editing a game or simulated environment. The Mission Editor is fully integrated with the Torque runtime and provides full access to all Torque subsystems allowing for asset importation, object placement, property editing, and terrain manipulation.

Torque Build System: Our Project Generator makes it easy for you to coordinate with team members all over the world, by generating up-to-date project files.



Apparatus' metal textures work great in TGEA 1.8.

Knowing is Half the Battle

None of the above is useful without proper documentation so you can dive into the code. Fortunately, Mich has been leading the docs team and come up with a robust set of documentation to get you started on TGEA 1.8. Check out what's being updated in Doc Land:

GFX2 Docs

• GFX Overview: Provides a high level description of TGEA's GFX Module
• GFX Engine Tour: Walks you through the files and source code that make up GFX
• Render Management: Explains how GFX manages the rendering in TGEA
• Render Delegate: Details the new RenderDelegate class in TGEA 1.8
• State Blocks: Provides an overview of GFXStateblocks
• Shader Constant Buffers: Provides an overview of GFXShaderConstantBuffers
• GFX In TorqueScript: Explains where and how GFX is used in Torque Script
• Sky Comparison: Compares the Sky class in TGEA 1.8 to previous versions
• Flow of Render System: Walks through TGEA's rendering flow.

Resource Manager Docs

• Resource Manager Overview: Provides an introductory description of the Resource Manager for TGEA 1.8
• Engine Tour: Walks you through the files and source code that make up the Resource Manager
• Reference Docs: Contains the technical breakdown of the ResourceManager class

Migration Guides

• Porting Guide: Contains the main migration guide for porting your project to TGEA 1.8
• Gotchas: Lists several "gotchas" introduced by TGEA 1.8 and is part of the TGEA 1.8 porting guide.

The Forge Demo shows off the power of our shaders

It Takes a Village

A momentous release like this couldn't have happened without the help of a lot of people. If you love TGEA on a Mac, then first and foremost you need to name your first child after either Brian Richardson or Alex Scarborough. Brian lead the creation of the GFX2 Plastform Layer, while Alex ported it over to Mac and squashed more bugs during a one-week beta period than Jeff Daniels did in Arachnaphobia. Truly, this is a dynamic duo.

That's not to downplay the roles that other developers played in this project. Rene Damm has been instrumental with Atlas bugs and fixes since the release of TGEA 1.7, and this build was no exception. Josh Engebretson stepped in during the beta period to help get this out before Christmas. Pat Wilson, Tom Spilman, and John Kabus all worked on various lighting issues. And of course, without having the dedication of Ken Holst on leading the QA team and Michael Perry on the doc team, this release would not have met our quality standards.

Onto the next big thing: Torque 3D

Since game tech is evolving so fast, there's always more to do, so it should come to no surprise that we're already thinking ahead to the next release. If you're interested in the future of Torque, Brett's blog on Torque's 2D and 3D future is a must read. But if you're looking for a quick recap, here's what's in store: