3850+ posts on the Forums, yet I've only Blogged twice before... I'm considering remedying that situation.


Recently I received yet another email asking for help in porting Kaboom! for use in Torque 3D. It's a simple port only requiring a few changes in a handful of particle effects, and correcting all filepaths in the example datablocks to conform to the Torque 3D directory structure. I've actually been sitting on the update for a while...

I'd like to say I had a better excuse than laziness for why it was never uploaded, but no... I had some Kraken Black Spiced Rum instead. :)
...however I never officially endorsed Kaboom! for Torque 3D mainly due to artwork considerations: no normal/spec/etc maps, and for the fact that some of the included shapes use a crude collision mesh that can cause visual artifacts/defects when applying large (explosion) decals to them. But as an effort to make things more convenient for anyone who wants to use the pack, and since TGE & TGEa are no longer available or supported, I'll soon be sending the updated package to GarageGames. This is not going to include any new artwork of a substantial nature, although there may be a few new particles, decals, and other cosmetic changes, so it will be available as a free update.

All that's left to do is decide on how to package the port: either as an example dropped into a stock Full Template, or as assets and instructional documentation only. I'm probably going to opt for the latter since there should be little to no conflict with any project, as well to reduce file size.


I haven't seen this video in years!

In other news:

My series of Resources titled Damage and Destruction will soon be coming to an end as well:

• Damage and Destruction: Part1 - Simple Destroyables
• Damage and Destruction: Part2 - Simple Destroyables Addendum
• Damage and Destruction: Part3 - OnHit Damage Effects
• Damage and Destruction: Part4 - Damage Effects (Sound)
• Damage and Destruction: Part5 - Destroyable Class Methods
• Damage and Destruction: Part6 - Player Bits and Pieces
• TBD: Part 7 - Wreckage example
• TBD: Part 8 - Calling animated damage sequences
• TBD: ShapeBase damageSequence & hulkSequence allowing scriptless damage representation
• TBD: Explanation of DTS explosion shapes

Only two more definite examples exist to be done: one for wreckage (after destruction) and the animated shape example using animation sequences to represent stages of damage and eventual wreckage, instead of deleting and replacing shapes. All of the damage and/or destruction examples that the Resources series has demonstrated use scripting (and one small source edit for player gibs) to interact with the stock ShapeBase damage features. This type of interaction can be as complex or as simple as you want it to be.

There was another Damage and Destruction Resource I was intending as well, the Tribes 2 method. Did you know that a totally scriptless solution for destroyable exists? Well, it used to. Using the damageSequence (called "Damage") and the hulkSequence (called "Visibility) ShapeBase features in combination with properly setup models, animated damage as well as destruction can be done that "just works". The example shapes that I was intending to use for a final Damage and Destruction Resource work fine in TGE, however I've recently found that the damageSequence is not working as it should in TGEa or Torque 3D. As of yet I do not know if this is a code failure in the engine or something wrong with the artwork when used in the newer engines. Some, but not all, of the shapes made use of the deprecated IFL feature so I understand why those don't work.

If I can't resolve the problem with the damageSequence I may post an example that just makes use of the hulkSequence since it still works. I also may demonstrate how to setup and use a DTS explosion. Yes, you read that right. Torque has always had the capability of utilizing a mesh in the Explosion object to be used in conjunction with particles -- this can help ease the possible strain of utilizing large complex particle systems for explosions. Of course all of my existing examples and custom artwork (abandoned content pack) made use of IFLs... but the Material Animation feature is almost sufficient to work in their place.


Maybe someday soon I'll start demonstrating creative and unusual ways to kill a player. Drowning, catching them on fire (yes, with fire effects), acid, lava, lightning, etc, come to mind...