Just finished a new game (non-torque) similar to Homeworld.
by Mark Hu · in General Discussion · 05/10/2003 (8:05 pm) · 4 replies
Hi guys,
I've always been a homeworld fanatic, and I just finished up a game that attempts to provide Star Trek with the same feeling. You can find the game at http://www.carlhu.com/markhu .
I *did* buy the torque engine, but as a programmer, it didn't feel right learning how to work with a high-end engine when I don't even know the basics (does anyone else feel this way?). So I bummed around developing my own engine (it took a while) to provide an adequate trekkish space environment.
There's a tech demo as well as a short playable campaign - please let me know your thoughts.
Note: The game uses your desktop settings to initialize the D3D graphics device. If you get an error message saying 'can't initialize so and so D3D graphics device' and you've got your desktop settings at some insane 1600*1200*32 bit color on a geforce 2 or MX400 or older card, don't come crying to me!!! Try it at 1024 * 768 * whatever color bit depth.
In other words, I didn't put up a nice windows framework for you to select graphic modes... TOUGH! haha :).
Mark.
I've always been a homeworld fanatic, and I just finished up a game that attempts to provide Star Trek with the same feeling. You can find the game at http://www.carlhu.com/markhu .
I *did* buy the torque engine, but as a programmer, it didn't feel right learning how to work with a high-end engine when I don't even know the basics (does anyone else feel this way?). So I bummed around developing my own engine (it took a while) to provide an adequate trekkish space environment.
There's a tech demo as well as a short playable campaign - please let me know your thoughts.
Note: The game uses your desktop settings to initialize the D3D graphics device. If you get an error message saying 'can't initialize so and so D3D graphics device' and you've got your desktop settings at some insane 1600*1200*32 bit color on a geforce 2 or MX400 or older card, don't come crying to me!!! Try it at 1024 * 768 * whatever color bit depth.
In other words, I didn't put up a nice windows framework for you to select graphic modes... TOUGH! haha :).
Mark.
#3
I'm always impressed by people who write their own engines. I know from personal experience what a pain in the a#$% they can be and I was only working in isometric 2d mode, I can't even imagine how impossible a 3D engine would be. Anyway congrats on the engine and your game.
05/11/2003 (5:55 am)
Mark,I'm always impressed by people who write their own engines. I know from personal experience what a pain in the a#$% they can be and I was only working in isometric 2d mode, I can't even imagine how impossible a 3D engine would be. Anyway congrats on the engine and your game.
#4
Thank you so much for your kind words! Heh, I was dreading the criticism =).
There's always a ton of self-doubt when you try something new, and I certainly had my share of it when I first started this project. I work in a job that's not really related to software development, but I say that if you believe you can, you will.
I'm a fan of lots of games, FPS, RTS, adventure, etc... But Homeworld was the first game that really brought that special thrill home to me! Let me clarify - we all have this mental image of the action/story, and as a science fiction buff, Homeworld brought this to life gloriously! At the same time, it made possible for a whole ton of other worlds to come true too. Think about it... Star Wars... Star Trek... your favorite universe... < pause for ecstasy >.
So I decided that a Homeworld-like game would be the right thing to do. It took a long time, over 6-7 months to get it to this stage. And that's working till you drop type of thing. It doesn't include the extra 2 months trying to figure out how to get started :). I'm sure there are people who assimilate this stuff faster than me!!!!
The game also wouldn't have been possible if I didn't have access to the ship meshes as per staryards.com and fleetyards.com. The quality of those meshes range from really awesome (check out the soveriegn by red dragon) to the sorta nasty (no pointing fingers, hehe). As well, having someone like Rake, who's completely dedicated to trying to create AUTHENTIC weapon textures (search on google for rake's weapon textures), made it easy for me to decide to make the attempt.
Mark.
05/11/2003 (3:20 pm)
Thank you so much for your kind words! Heh, I was dreading the criticism =).
There's always a ton of self-doubt when you try something new, and I certainly had my share of it when I first started this project. I work in a job that's not really related to software development, but I say that if you believe you can, you will.
I'm a fan of lots of games, FPS, RTS, adventure, etc... But Homeworld was the first game that really brought that special thrill home to me! Let me clarify - we all have this mental image of the action/story, and as a science fiction buff, Homeworld brought this to life gloriously! At the same time, it made possible for a whole ton of other worlds to come true too. Think about it... Star Wars... Star Trek... your favorite universe... < pause for ecstasy >.
So I decided that a Homeworld-like game would be the right thing to do. It took a long time, over 6-7 months to get it to this stage. And that's working till you drop type of thing. It doesn't include the extra 2 months trying to figure out how to get started :). I'm sure there are people who assimilate this stuff faster than me!!!!
The game also wouldn't have been possible if I didn't have access to the ship meshes as per staryards.com and fleetyards.com. The quality of those meshes range from really awesome (check out the soveriegn by red dragon) to the sorta nasty (no pointing fingers, hehe). As well, having someone like Rake, who's completely dedicated to trying to create AUTHENTIC weapon textures (search on google for rake's weapon textures), made it easy for me to decide to make the attempt.
Mark.
Torque Owner John O