Very new some questions!
by Scott Wolfe · in Torque Game Engine · 11/29/2004 (11:28 am) · 5 replies
I just got the book 3D game programming all in one yesterday so I have gotten about as far as a hello world program and have a few questions. I have skipped around the book and read a little of this and that and Torque looks to be pretty good, so my questions are
Does it always have to run a program from a dos window?
Can you make EXE files and run your programs from a shortcut from windows desktop?
Is there another editor that is low cost or free? I did not like the one that came with the books cd.
and I'm sure the more involved I get with this the more questions I will have
THANKS
Does it always have to run a program from a dos window?
Can you make EXE files and run your programs from a shortcut from windows desktop?
Is there another editor that is low cost or free? I did not like the one that came with the books cd.
and I'm sure the more involved I get with this the more questions I will have
THANKS
About the author
#2
With torque the whole engine is included with your finished product, is this correct? If so how much does that add to your file size?
11/29/2004 (11:58 am)
Like I said I'm new to torque. I was working with a programming language called Dark Basic, Its a basic language that was created with C++. direct X was made simple. If you need a light you type make light 1, 40,100 40 which makes light 1 at x40, y 100, z40 in 3D space. when you are finished coding you compile and test the program if all is well you go to make exe and it turns it into an exe file. I don't think the whole DB language is put into the exe file.With torque the whole engine is included with your finished product, is this correct? If so how much does that add to your file size?
#3
The whole DB language?? I think you've misunderstood this here. Torque is not a language, Dark Basic is also a bit limited and you can't code everything that you want.
Torque is far more than that. It's written in C++ (and assembler) and you can change whatever you like within it. It's not a language, it's a Software Development Kit.
When you try a feature which you have coded in the engine (the SDK) you go compile it, then link it and make an exe. The exe will have all the instructions, functions, and code to make your game roll.
Our Torque game is somewhere around 1600 kilobytes in size.
And yes, the whole engine is included with your finished product.. in a compiled state.. binary. All games work like this. Even DB :)
11/29/2004 (12:50 pm)
Depends on what you mean..The whole DB language?? I think you've misunderstood this here. Torque is not a language, Dark Basic is also a bit limited and you can't code everything that you want.
Torque is far more than that. It's written in C++ (and assembler) and you can change whatever you like within it. It's not a language, it's a Software Development Kit.
When you try a feature which you have coded in the engine (the SDK) you go compile it, then link it and make an exe. The exe will have all the instructions, functions, and code to make your game roll.
Our Torque game is somewhere around 1600 kilobytes in size.
And yes, the whole engine is included with your finished product.. in a compiled state.. binary. All games work like this. Even DB :)
#4
My demo.exe is 2.2MB. The smallest size I have been able to zip things to in terms of the demo .exe file and all of the required scripts and assets was around 3MB. That's with no installer. That was for a deomstration of a torque scripted feature for someone so there was very little 'content'. That's not to say it can't be even smaller. DSO files are the compiled versions of .CS files. You can ship a product with just the DSO files and not the script and it can reduce the size and help package your script in a way so that it cannot easily be read and compromised.
Another demo I have demonstrating a new kind of vehicle, and a good sized handful of related art is around 30MB. It's all the art that is making this zip file huge. Not the one class I added to the engine, nor any of the 4 or 5 scripts I added.
Text files compress like mad. I would think that the things that will cause the ~real~ distributable to bloat would sound file format and number of sound files, image file format and number of images used, number of and complexity of models, ... well to put it short... all the art and assets. The size of the script and what engine changes you make will have an impact of an order of magnitude less then these other files.
If you do not have Dark Basic Installed on your computer, then how do you run a game written in Dark Basic? There has to be some kind of binary that gets shipped with it, or some kind of runtime thing doesnt there?
11/29/2004 (12:53 pm)
Adding a light can be as simple as adding text to the mission file, or via the mission editor, or it can be as hard as figuring out how to add a named node to a model of some new kind of vehicle which requires a whole new C++ class to be written. It depends on what sort of light you need and what it is associated to if anything. Either way these changes or additions would dwarf the real reason for bloat.My demo.exe is 2.2MB. The smallest size I have been able to zip things to in terms of the demo .exe file and all of the required scripts and assets was around 3MB. That's with no installer. That was for a deomstration of a torque scripted feature for someone so there was very little 'content'. That's not to say it can't be even smaller. DSO files are the compiled versions of .CS files. You can ship a product with just the DSO files and not the script and it can reduce the size and help package your script in a way so that it cannot easily be read and compromised.
Another demo I have demonstrating a new kind of vehicle, and a good sized handful of related art is around 30MB. It's all the art that is making this zip file huge. Not the one class I added to the engine, nor any of the 4 or 5 scripts I added.
Text files compress like mad. I would think that the things that will cause the ~real~ distributable to bloat would sound file format and number of sound files, image file format and number of images used, number of and complexity of models, ... well to put it short... all the art and assets. The size of the script and what engine changes you make will have an impact of an order of magnitude less then these other files.
If you do not have Dark Basic Installed on your computer, then how do you run a game written in Dark Basic? There has to be some kind of binary that gets shipped with it, or some kind of runtime thing doesnt there?
#5
Back to torque. I'm sure I have a lot to learn here so I'm going to go through the book read the docs and forums and try to learn as much as I can. I think this is something I'm going to really get into.
Thanks for the responses I know Torque is not a language I probably did not say what I wanted to right but I really don't know enough about it to really discuss it with out sounding foolish so I'm off to study and learn about it!!!
11/29/2004 (2:22 pm)
I do have DB installed on my system when you make your program into an exe it puts everything into that exe code, textures, objects etc... and I'm sure there is a runtime or binary in there, I'm not up on all the inner workings, but it is just one file with everything in it and you click the file icon and your program starts. there is no other files and folders with your exe files.Back to torque. I'm sure I have a lot to learn here so I'm going to go through the book read the docs and forums and try to learn as much as I can. I think this is something I'm going to really get into.
Thanks for the responses I know Torque is not a language I probably did not say what I wanted to right but I really don't know enough about it to really discuss it with out sounding foolish so I'm off to study and learn about it!!!
Torque Owner Stefan Lundmark
Nah.. but you need the engine to modify that. It's a very easy thing to change, however :)
Huh? The engine is compiled into a .exe binary, from which you run the game. Of course you can shortcut the .exe file just like any other application out there.
I don't have the book, so I can't answer that for you. But there is Q3Radiant, WorldCraft/Hammer and QuaRK.. and I think there is something called GameSpace too but I'm not sure.
The first two have legal issues with using TGE so if you ever plan to go commercial, you'll have to look at Quark or GameSpace.
Welcome.