Which template to use for new game (no fps)

#1

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I think it would be great to have some templates for different game types like U4 has...would make it much easier for Newcomers.

Get to work. Torque 3D is free and community-maintained, not a commercial product with a dedicated staff.

So, you don't want to make a FPS - what do you want to make? Most of the tutorials in the documentation start with the Full template. You could try starting with the Empty template and see how it goes....

#2 Airship Dragoon was the "Full Template" with various bits taken out and added. "Full Template" has a lot of useful stuff in it, and it's quite easy to change. Might try starting off with the "Empty Template" next time as I won't be needing player style Ai.

#3 I don't always start new projects, but when I do, I use t3d-bones. It's emptier than Empty, though that includes being empty of editors :P. It's about to get a major upgrade to support proper networking while still being super small and easy to get started with.

#4

#5 I think that should be on the front page. Probably in the readme, too.

#6 I dunno, guys - to me it seems easier to delete stuff I won't be using and modify things that I will than to have to recreate the stuff that I do use for each project....

Full is cluttered, but it's easier to just change the control mode in spawnPlayer() than to recreate everything necessary to get there.

#7 The problem comes when you don't want to use spawnPlayer at all. Also it might be 'easier' if you've been working with the current templates for years and have intimate knowledge of them. Till then it's just confusing and unnecessary...

#8 If I had a choice, I'd say it would be better to make a template that achieves the same functionality of the Full template but cleaner rather than removing it all together. Further, my opinion is that efforts should be focused on fixing issues and updating engine features instead of fiddling with the existing templates - though there's nothing wrong with adding templates, I think it's time that would be better spent on improving the engine itself. Removal of things for the sake of eliminating confusion is a slippery slope.

#9

Quote:I'd say it would be better to make a template that achieves the same functionality of the Full template but cleaner rather than removing it all together.

Good thing I plan on going exactly that, then! Also I feel it's useless improving the engine if we don't have accessible, attractive examples of using all these fancy features.

#10 UE4's templates are stupid simple. They're not even really meant to get you very far into a project, they're just good examples of how to setup character and camera for various different genres. They don't really include any real gameplay functionality. In the First Person one you can move around and shoot a single gun that fires orange balls around. In the Third Person you can run, jump, crouch. That's about it. The rest are simple in similar ways. People love these because they identify which one is closer to their goals and start from there. These should not be hard to make, they don't need much.

They also have a free fully functioning first person shooter game called Shooter Demo. It's open source and can do just about all the same stuff the Full Template can do. Score list, deathmatch, multiple weapons, etc. This is not shipped with UE4 but can be downloaded for free, and is a bit heavy in assets, but it serves as a good example of a fully functioning networked project. I personally think this is what the full template should become. A separate repo, separate project, FPS demo. This would also allow people to improve the FPS demo specifically without worrying about the changes being too FPS-centric (Vignette? Dirty Lens postfx? etc..)

Just my $0.02 :D

#11

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Also I feel it's useless improving the engine if we don't have accessible, attractive examples of using all these fancy features.

If it was me, I'd prioritize bug fixes above all else. Features and demonstration of those features comes next (and go hand-in-hand).

@Andrew - I'm on board with simpler templates, I just don't want to remove anything until there is a replacement. I also agree with "promoting" the Full Template to more of an example project, with Daniel's planned clean-up thrown in for good measure.

I believe the design goal that resulted in the current implementation (core with game-specific overrides) was maximum "out of the box" bang combined with maximum flexibility. Unfortunately, by the time it was done it was rather convoluted.

I suppose simply adding player spawn to the empty template could then classify it as equivalent to UE4's "First Person" project type....

Speaking of UE4, I'm liking it so far but it's still drifting too far between releases - too much breakage. Hopefully it'll settle down shortly.

#12 Nice to hear about UE4's templates. I guess this is positioned somewhere between the barebones templates, and a full demo game. Actually who am I kidding, this is totally in 'demo game' territory.

#13 I think the Steering Committee should, wherever possible, look at the latest engines and see what they're up to. Personally I do this anyway to some extent, though I haven't looked at Cryengine I have fiddled with UE4 and Unity a bit. Things like UE4's game templates are great, and things like Unity's terrain editor are not great (T3D's is better by a wide margin in my opinion). Both have much simpler asset tools (though UE4's are even better than Unity's). UE4 even has the ability to one-click add assets used in ProjectA to ProjectB.

It would streamline conversations on feature and content roadmaps a bit because someone could just say "yeah, like UE4's blingaling feature but with tidbit 2 from Cryengine's blingaling feature added." Otherwise, we start exchanging incomplete design documents (read that as "vague forum post descriptions") and things get muddled so that no one understands anyone....