3DGPAi1 VS official Torque Engine

#1 You don't get a $100 source license with a $35 book. You get a step-by-step tutorial on modding the TGE from the ground up so that you have a strong base to work from when you purchase an engine license.

#2 The thing is though.. I DO have the 100 source licence...


So if I were to apply patches and modifications on the official torque engine, would they show up in my example game that I have built using this book?

Thanks

#3 I know, but you would have to contact Ken Finney about the source modifications that he has made for his examples.

#4 The example game Emaga6 uses the executable that came with the book. Making changes to the header files and source files in your official Torque distribution will not allow you to make changes to the executable that Emaga6 is actually using.

#5 AFAIK, what changes in 3DPGAI are just the scripts. The TGE executable is the same. But the changes include show tool, and the editors.

#6 So would I be correct in saying that I will not be able to apply patches in Emaga6 since that involves making changes in header files and source files?

Or could I rebuild a new tge .exe (modified), place it in the Emaga6 directory to see the changes?

Thanks!

#7 You could replace it with your own version of the engine, but you'd lose the changes made to the book version of the engine, since you don't have the source code for those.

#8 I would suggest here that the base idea is to use the book "as is", and not worry about patching in any changes to the executable--it's designed to be specific to the book exercises, and external patching/modifications would not only not include the code Ken wrote for the book's version, but may very well break the rest of the book's instruction plan.

Instead, keep your patches and updates in your own personal "space", and do your experiments and programming there. It sounds like you want to use your 3DGPAI1 environment as the base for experimentation and continued programming after you are done with the book, but since you do have the source code from your TGE license, this will probably cause more frustration than it's worth--just use the TGE 1.3 code instead!

#9 I'm not sure how many changes there would be, but I am able to run Emaga6 with TGE 1.3 under Linux. It's all I have to use for learning it. It certainly couldn't hurt to do what you want to do - rebuild it & place the modifed tge.exe into the folder & see what happens. The author made available a .zip version of the Emaga6Install.exe from Chapter 6, so Linux & Mac users could have the base install to use with their own TGE/TGE Demo.

#10 Guys.

The question is simple : Is the 3DGPAI1 game engine any different from the one downloaded from GG ?

Only Ken Finney can answer that, but I beleive the answer is NO.

What would be the point in writing a book about Torque and providing something that's different from what you would get ???

#11 @Bruno
You say that it wouldn't make sense for Ken Finney to use a non-stock version of Torque. A certain reviewer on Amazon.com agrees with you, and that was his main complaint about this book. Here is an excerpt of his review:

I quickly learned, however, that the TGE has many faces and that this book examines only a few of them. For example, the TGE is a C++ based engine that must be compiled before it can be used to build a game. The book includes a pre-compiled version of the TGE, however it is not a stock version and no source code is included in the book, so the book's engine cannot be re-compiled or debugged. The TGE included in the book also has been modified by the book's author at the C++ code level. Therefore, it doesn't behave like the stock TGE in all respects. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, to run any other TGE samples from other sources using the book's TGE engine. I ended up running one version of the TGE when using the book, and the other (stock) version of the TGE for all of my other learning experiences. This makes for some confusing learning cycles.

#12 Hmmm,

I wonder how that critic got that info. It could also be just a bad TGE release version...

I've got some problems running some scripts, but I'm running them on a Mac.

#13 He does not indicate how he got that information. The same reviewer also says that each of the examples could have been done on stock Torque, but that they were instead done in ways that relied on changes to the code. To me this sounds like a rather big mistake for Ken to make. It is also quite possible, though, that the reviewer just doesn't know what he's talking about.

#14 Torque is not a static codebase... there were changes to the code after the version that was used for the book was built. No great conspiracy...

#15 The version Ken used in the book is probably the version of Torque that was hip and/or cool at the time. Writing a book takes a long time they say...

#16 Quite the discussion we got going on here!

I emailed Ken - and he has confirmed that all that needs to be done is recompile a new .exe with the modifications!

Cheers :)

#17 The book version is older, I am not sure of the version off hand, 1.1 or something.

#18 Back up the truck a little here. 3DPAI1 is a great book and works very well for the money. However, it is a self contained unit. While it can help people learn a lot about Torque, any body that thinks they are getting the entire Torque Game Engine is sadly mistaken. I would appreciate it if people would kind of stand up for us in these instances. One of the best things about Torque is that for $100 you get access to a living codebase that is constantly getting better. It so happens that anybody at any time can spin of an executlable that allows itself to be "modded", i.e. changed by adding new models and scripting changes via TorqueScript. That alone is an extremely powerful concept, and one that we should not be reamed for. That guy posting in Amazon is completely off base, but we don't have time to go around defending ourselves on Amazon forums.

If you want to add resources posted here on GarageGames, then buy the TGE. We make absolutley off of the book that the $7B per year Thompson published, yet we are doing the customer support. Don't get me wrong, I am happy to have this book, but we just need to make sure expectations are set.

-Jeff Tunnell GG

#19 I am confused about what your complaint is Jeff.

The only topic of this post has been to help Kayley, a Torque SDK owner, to modify one of the examples in Ken Finney's book.

The person on Amazon that I refered to was complaining about a specific aspect of the book that was in no way insulting to Torque. His issue was simply that the Torque in the book did not exactly match the stock Torque, so that some of the things learned from the book would need to be unlearned upon buying the real thing (Torque SDK). Kayley's most recent post indicates that the reviewer was wrong, but, whether or not it was correct, the complaint was against the book rather than Torque.

#20 The version used is 1.2. It say this ont he back of the book cover. I would like to see a list of mods that were done to it on the C++ side?