ECK, Released for free !
by Andy Wright · 07/30/2013 (6:58 am) · 50 comments
Environment Creation Kit
Its goin' Free !
After much deliberation, I have decided to release the Environment Creation Kit for free, in modular packages letting you download what you want to use from it. I have made a small site to do this and hosted it on a friends webspace for now, with plans to make a dedicated site in the future and add more to the contents.
All of the pack is free to use for any project free or commercial in any engine, the only request I have is acknowledgement, and it would be nice to see how it is used too, so any feedback is greatly appreciated.
The initial releases can be found here in the textures section
The pack started out as a personal project, creating a library of terrain textures for my own use, this turned into a bit of a beast and its now at around 900mb of terrain materials alone split into 10 sub groups. When I started making terrains and posting screens of my progress, there seemed to be a demand in the community for good textures and terrains, this made me look at the idea of creating a content pack in the same way brokeass games did with building packs BP1 and BP2. However, over time, my patience for the pack waned and real life took over alot of my time to complete the pack, and it has dragged on now for over 2 years and it is still not where i wanted it to be as a finished pack. This has lead me to think about releasing what I have, in pieces, allowing anyone to use them, and I have decided it is the right time to do this as Torque is now open source too.
Alot of time was put into this, with the package racking up to nearly 3 gig in size and I greatly appreaciate any contributions anyone wishes to make for the time and effort put into this, all contributions will go towards a dedicated site and more content going up.
Initially I will upload the textures in their sub packages by material type, including materials.cs entries so that they are literally drag and drop installation into your torque /game folder. At a later date I will also upload each individual material for selection, but for now to simplify things and get the site together I will keep them grouped up and come back to breaking them down into individuals later.
For the site launch, I have all the terrain materials packaged up, at a later date I will be adding the terrains, but each one will be packaged individually to include the source, required materials, any decals and precipitation etc used within the mission. The missions that use decals and precipitation will require merging with your projects existing datablocks to ensure that your data is not broken, installation steps will be posted on the relevant page at the time i release them, but do not just extract the packages and overwrite your existing file unless they are just the standard stock ones from a clean installation.
Made this site in a hour thismorning, if theres any broken links that you find, please drop me a mail at fenyx83@gmail.com to let me know, still a work in progress, so there are some placeholder pages for now.
Enjoy Environment Creation Kit
Cliff Material Pack
Cracked Earth Material Pack
Dirt & Mud Material Pack
Grass Material Pack
Gravel Material Pack
Rubble Material Pack
Sands Material Pack
Snow Material Pack
Stone Material Pack
Woodland Material Pack
Its goin' Free !
After much deliberation, I have decided to release the Environment Creation Kit for free, in modular packages letting you download what you want to use from it. I have made a small site to do this and hosted it on a friends webspace for now, with plans to make a dedicated site in the future and add more to the contents.
All of the pack is free to use for any project free or commercial in any engine, the only request I have is acknowledgement, and it would be nice to see how it is used too, so any feedback is greatly appreciated.
The initial releases can be found here in the textures section
The pack started out as a personal project, creating a library of terrain textures for my own use, this turned into a bit of a beast and its now at around 900mb of terrain materials alone split into 10 sub groups. When I started making terrains and posting screens of my progress, there seemed to be a demand in the community for good textures and terrains, this made me look at the idea of creating a content pack in the same way brokeass games did with building packs BP1 and BP2. However, over time, my patience for the pack waned and real life took over alot of my time to complete the pack, and it has dragged on now for over 2 years and it is still not where i wanted it to be as a finished pack. This has lead me to think about releasing what I have, in pieces, allowing anyone to use them, and I have decided it is the right time to do this as Torque is now open source too.
Alot of time was put into this, with the package racking up to nearly 3 gig in size and I greatly appreaciate any contributions anyone wishes to make for the time and effort put into this, all contributions will go towards a dedicated site and more content going up.
Initially I will upload the textures in their sub packages by material type, including materials.cs entries so that they are literally drag and drop installation into your torque /game folder. At a later date I will also upload each individual material for selection, but for now to simplify things and get the site together I will keep them grouped up and come back to breaking them down into individuals later.
For the site launch, I have all the terrain materials packaged up, at a later date I will be adding the terrains, but each one will be packaged individually to include the source, required materials, any decals and precipitation etc used within the mission. The missions that use decals and precipitation will require merging with your projects existing datablocks to ensure that your data is not broken, installation steps will be posted on the relevant page at the time i release them, but do not just extract the packages and overwrite your existing file unless they are just the standard stock ones from a clean installation.
Made this site in a hour thismorning, if theres any broken links that you find, please drop me a mail at fenyx83@gmail.com to let me know, still a work in progress, so there are some placeholder pages for now.
Enjoy Environment Creation Kit
Cliff Material Pack
Cracked Earth Material Pack
Dirt & Mud Material Pack
Grass Material Pack
Gravel Material Pack
Rubble Material Pack
Sands Material Pack
Snow Material Pack
Stone Material Pack
Woodland Material Pack
#2
[Edit] hah, it might help if I uploaded them wouldn't it ?
07/30/2013 (7:42 am)
oh snap, fixing them now, thanks.[Edit] hah, it might help if I uploaded them wouldn't it ?
#3
I think you are right :o)
All packs have now been downloaded and donation given :o)
Best,
Dwarf King
07/30/2013 (7:49 am)
Quote: hah, it might help if I uploaded them wouldn't it ?
I think you are right :o)
All packs have now been downloaded and donation given :o)
Best,
Dwarf King
#4
Currently packing up the decals and working out the best way to package missions, might just pack them as plain terrains as not to bloat them out with stuff that will be available through the shapes section anyway.
[Edit] Extracting to your /game directory all works fine yeah? you should get a terrain material listed in your editor for each texture then as the materials.cs is stored in the subfolder relevant to that pack.
07/30/2013 (7:54 am)
oh wow, thank you :D I'm humbled, all contributions are massively appreciated.Currently packing up the decals and working out the best way to package missions, might just pack them as plain terrains as not to bloat them out with stuff that will be available through the shapes section anyway.
[Edit] Extracting to your /game directory all works fine yeah? you should get a terrain material listed in your editor for each texture then as the materials.cs is stored in the subfolder relevant to that pack.
#5
This deserves a donation!
07/30/2013 (8:08 am)
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTThis deserves a donation!
#6
Best,
Dwarf King
07/30/2013 (8:30 am)
Looking good I must say. Any game developer will love this stuff :o)Best,
Dwarf King
#7
Dwarf, install this mod http://www.garagegames.com/community/blogs/view/22371
That lets you break up the large areas like the grass with the automated painter, mix different grass textures together, also is that a default material setting I had in there, the tilings very repetetive or is it set really low on the detail and macro size ?
07/30/2013 (8:36 am)
Thanks Lukas!Dwarf, install this mod http://www.garagegames.com/community/blogs/view/22371
That lets you break up the large areas like the grass with the automated painter, mix different grass textures together, also is that a default material setting I had in there, the tilings very repetetive or is it set really low on the detail and macro size ?
#8
It was a test in a big mega terrain. Also the details were set to 250 in distance so it might have look odd :o)
I shall sure try the mod you linked to :o)
Best,
Dwarf King
07/30/2013 (8:38 am)
Oh Andy if you check the link above it looks better now. It is just garage games pic wrapper doing some nasty stuff to the pic. I will drop a link instead to the real pic on my website.It was a test in a big mega terrain. Also the details were set to 250 in distance so it might have look odd :o)
I shall sure try the mod you linked to :o)
Best,
Dwarf King
#9
07/30/2013 (8:41 am)
Get some cliff textures on there with side project and a mid range distance in the macro channel with the detail map ;)
#11
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Would be great if you could confirm that the use under this license is ok with you, so that there is some legal security for people if they want to use your work in a Free Software game for example. Thanks!
07/30/2013 (8:48 am)
Your license discription sounds just like the creative commons attribution license:http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Would be great if you could confirm that the use under this license is ok with you, so that there is some legal security for people if they want to use your work in a Free Software game for example. Thanks!
#12
Free use goes as far using it in a game or 3d project of some sort.
I guess ill sort out a definitive license file to include or put something up on the site about it later tonight.
07/30/2013 (9:00 am)
Yes, that seems fitting, i just ask not to resell, or to repackage and sell as a texture or map pack etc, as that would be quite shitty of someone to do that... Free use goes as far using it in a game or 3d project of some sort.
I guess ill sort out a definitive license file to include or put something up on the site about it later tonight.
#13
07/30/2013 (9:26 am)
What a big collection, coincidentally I started something similar about two month ago, but got bored relatively fast making the same work over and over.
#14
07/30/2013 (9:30 am)
Thanks Duion, thats not even half the filesize of stuff i have in my eck install tho, my eck Game folder is 3.55 gig :| and thats just eck bits on there, default installations about 250mb i think, so yeah, somehow, ive got around 3.3 gig of stuff to put up tho majority of it is textures, heightmaps etc from the terrains... 
#15
07/30/2013 (9:42 am)
WOW, Andy! Just WOW! Your insane ;) Have to send you a donation there, would feel very dirty otherwise. 
#16
Looking forward to tamper with the resources
-donut clicked as well m8 ;)
07/30/2013 (10:37 am)
Wowzers Andy. Much appriciated ;)Looking forward to tamper with the resources
-donut clicked as well m8 ;)
#17
Ive got the road decals uploaded, page is up and pics on fb at the moment.
You can find them here for download
I will sort out the menu's in the site later...
07/30/2013 (10:57 am)
Massive Thanks Christian and Smally!Ive got the road decals uploaded, page is up and pics on fb at the moment.
You can find them here for download
I will sort out the menu's in the site later...
#18
"released for free" sounds like ... awwww, flup it I'm sick of this - get rid! ;)
I'll have to wait until Thursday to get my new quota of bandwidth ...
07/30/2013 (11:52 am)
Awesome stuff!"released for free" sounds like ... awwww, flup it I'm sick of this - get rid! ;)
I'll have to wait until Thursday to get my new quota of bandwidth ...
#19
I'm not sick of it, not doing terrains and stuff like that anyway, what i got sick of was the expectation, feeling like i had to finish it fully and comprehensively to make everyone happy, and im an absolute nightmare when it comes to saying something is finished... ive thought about this for a long time, and well, lastnight i just decided what the hell go for it, do somethin nice for the community and see how it goes, if its sustainable ill continue uploading any stuff i make, would be awesome to see someone make proper use of some of it.
07/30/2013 (11:54 am)
eww, bandwidth, thats why i ended hosting it on a friends webspace, plan to move it to another host and dedicated url once i have funds and the site sorted out.I'm not sick of it, not doing terrains and stuff like that anyway, what i got sick of was the expectation, feeling like i had to finish it fully and comprehensively to make everyone happy, and im an absolute nightmare when it comes to saying something is finished... ive thought about this for a long time, and well, lastnight i just decided what the hell go for it, do somethin nice for the community and see how it goes, if its sustainable ill continue uploading any stuff i make, would be awesome to see someone make proper use of some of it.
#20
I added your link in the link directory under art/terrain. Let me know if the description is okay.
07/30/2013 (12:07 pm)
@Andy,I added your link in the link directory under art/terrain. Let me know if the description is okay.
Torque Owner Dwarf King
Noble Games Production
Best,
Dwarf King
PS:
rubble, sand, snow and woodland links are not working :o)