Pack Update
by Robert Fritzen · 01/30/2014 (9:02 am) · 10 comments
So, first and foremost, I want to thank my wonderful Google Chrome for dying after I had typed up this wonderful blog post explaining how awesome my next pack was going to be yada-yada-yada, and then it decided to die, killing my beautiful text with it. :|
Ok, Chrome Rant Done! Let's talk about how my pack development has been going, and what kind of cool stuff I'm bringing to the tables. So, my third pack installment is called the Advanced FPS Kit, and it contains quite a selection of code-work that I have been developing for a little FPS project of mine, as well as a selection of other goodies I have recently put together.
So, basically, this blog is going to be more about what my next pack is going to entail, some of the specifics on it, and when you'll start getting some of this stuff to play around with, and yes, before you ask me, I will have images and videos next time, some of this stuff is still in the WIP stage, others are in the bug-hunting mode while others, well, I just need some more time.
First and foremost, as I brought forth in my last blog, I'm adding a new GUI to the game called the Advanced Radar Control. This is going to be a radar/minimap control that allows you to create a wide variety of different radars and minimaps, whether you're going for that CoD/BF look, a Halo look, or something completely new, I've got you covered there. I've set up this control to manage objects and render them in multiple different modes such as Normal (standard single position reveal), Tracker (Continual tracking), and support for objects that can scan in more objects or act as a local radar jammer. There is also built in UAV functionality to do radar reveal sweeps of all enemy objects on the field. I'll try to cover all of the bases of this in a video next time around. As it stands now, I've got this progress. Some more debugging and messing around is in the works, but I've nailed the coffin in the remaining crashing and access violations with it.
The next "big" feature I'm adding with this pack is an AdvancedAIPlayer object. This is built around the current AIPlayer object, but with the ability to handle most of the heavy lifting in terms of targeting, goal planning, ect, inside the C++ code to allow it to run much more smoothly. Since the pack incorporates a new in-engine team system, it allows goals to be planned for all different forms of game modes, such as free-for-all, team deathmatch, ect. I have to hand out a big thanks to Dan Buckmaster for bringing Recast into the MIT engine, because this new AI relies quite heavily on the NavMesh for pathing.
I've also got some more C++ goodies in the engine being added by the pack, including a brand new MissileProjectile, which has the ability to "target" and seek targets out. I'm currently working on a pair of new GUIs to handle target locking, and for something else in which I will mention below.
Similar to what I did with MAP, I'm also adding a plethora of tutorials to the pack to help out the FPS oriented developer. I tested the waters a while back with a mini-FPS series that stopped after T3D 1.2 was released, but I saw some vast room for improvements. And I've also got some big time requested tutorials covered with this pack. I posted a little spoiler yesterday regarding one of the tutorials:
The "big" tutorials in the pack include a full fledged four part intro to blender modelling tutorial that will walk the absolute modelling beginner through a A->B style tutorial on how to model a third person weapon, texture it, and get it into torque, I'm pretty sure I've spent well over 100 images and a load of pages of typing to get this done :).
I've also got a few FPS Design tutorials including weapon design, and a How-To-Make weapons tutorial that will incorporate the elements of the prior modelling tutorial to basically get the gun to properly show in the game. This will also cover the concepts of weapon balance, and how to do a few "cool" things with weapons that I did back in my Tribes 2 days.
On the Team-Based combat side of things, I'll show you how to use the elements of the new team-code added to the engine to build and run a fully fledged Capture The Flag game mode. I'll also cover game design, and walk you through some tutorials on how to build server setup gui's to load in different game modes when you want to.
There's also a little "fun" thing lying around regarding some very high powered weaponry earned after getting 'x' kills. Which is where you might need to grab that new missile launcher to shoot it down before it decimates you. :)
All in all, I'm really excited about this pack. I've covered a ton of bases in terms of what I've been asked to do in the past and I have taken what I have learned and failed to accomplish with my prior two packs to build this awesome piece of learning and fun. AFPSK in it's standard form will be $45 and will probably launch sometime in March. I'll have a full demo out probably 1-2 weeks before the official pack launch.
Last thing is a announcement of sorts regarding the pack. Since this idea kind of boomed with MAP 2.0, I've decided to take it for a little spin. Starting next week, I'm going to release elements of the pack one by one that people can simply pick and choose what they would like to buy out of the pack. So let's say you just want the modelling and weapon design tutorials, well, you can just get that alone if you want it.
I'm hoping this one hits the bank in terms of popularity, I've put quite a bit of time into this one, and I'd hate to see another DWP happen to this pack as well, that would pretty much seal my end as a Torque developer. I'm going to be spending a lot of time trying to ensure pack elements are easy to install, and then I'm going to go all out on the media of the pack in terms of screenshots and videos for next time. I've opened up the AFPSK Forum on my forums for open discussion regarding the pack and for ideas between now and the release of the pack.
If you've got any questions or comments regarding it, I'd love to hear it now, until next time!
Ok, Chrome Rant Done! Let's talk about how my pack development has been going, and what kind of cool stuff I'm bringing to the tables. So, my third pack installment is called the Advanced FPS Kit, and it contains quite a selection of code-work that I have been developing for a little FPS project of mine, as well as a selection of other goodies I have recently put together.
So, basically, this blog is going to be more about what my next pack is going to entail, some of the specifics on it, and when you'll start getting some of this stuff to play around with, and yes, before you ask me, I will have images and videos next time, some of this stuff is still in the WIP stage, others are in the bug-hunting mode while others, well, I just need some more time.
First and foremost, as I brought forth in my last blog, I'm adding a new GUI to the game called the Advanced Radar Control. This is going to be a radar/minimap control that allows you to create a wide variety of different radars and minimaps, whether you're going for that CoD/BF look, a Halo look, or something completely new, I've got you covered there. I've set up this control to manage objects and render them in multiple different modes such as Normal (standard single position reveal), Tracker (Continual tracking), and support for objects that can scan in more objects or act as a local radar jammer. There is also built in UAV functionality to do radar reveal sweeps of all enemy objects on the field. I'll try to cover all of the bases of this in a video next time around. As it stands now, I've got this progress. Some more debugging and messing around is in the works, but I've nailed the coffin in the remaining crashing and access violations with it.
The next "big" feature I'm adding with this pack is an AdvancedAIPlayer object. This is built around the current AIPlayer object, but with the ability to handle most of the heavy lifting in terms of targeting, goal planning, ect, inside the C++ code to allow it to run much more smoothly. Since the pack incorporates a new in-engine team system, it allows goals to be planned for all different forms of game modes, such as free-for-all, team deathmatch, ect. I have to hand out a big thanks to Dan Buckmaster for bringing Recast into the MIT engine, because this new AI relies quite heavily on the NavMesh for pathing.
I've also got some more C++ goodies in the engine being added by the pack, including a brand new MissileProjectile, which has the ability to "target" and seek targets out. I'm currently working on a pair of new GUIs to handle target locking, and for something else in which I will mention below.
Similar to what I did with MAP, I'm also adding a plethora of tutorials to the pack to help out the FPS oriented developer. I tested the waters a while back with a mini-FPS series that stopped after T3D 1.2 was released, but I saw some vast room for improvements. And I've also got some big time requested tutorials covered with this pack. I posted a little spoiler yesterday regarding one of the tutorials:
The "big" tutorials in the pack include a full fledged four part intro to blender modelling tutorial that will walk the absolute modelling beginner through a A->B style tutorial on how to model a third person weapon, texture it, and get it into torque, I'm pretty sure I've spent well over 100 images and a load of pages of typing to get this done :).
I've also got a few FPS Design tutorials including weapon design, and a How-To-Make weapons tutorial that will incorporate the elements of the prior modelling tutorial to basically get the gun to properly show in the game. This will also cover the concepts of weapon balance, and how to do a few "cool" things with weapons that I did back in my Tribes 2 days.
On the Team-Based combat side of things, I'll show you how to use the elements of the new team-code added to the engine to build and run a fully fledged Capture The Flag game mode. I'll also cover game design, and walk you through some tutorials on how to build server setup gui's to load in different game modes when you want to.
There's also a little "fun" thing lying around regarding some very high powered weaponry earned after getting 'x' kills. Which is where you might need to grab that new missile launcher to shoot it down before it decimates you. :)
All in all, I'm really excited about this pack. I've covered a ton of bases in terms of what I've been asked to do in the past and I have taken what I have learned and failed to accomplish with my prior two packs to build this awesome piece of learning and fun. AFPSK in it's standard form will be $45 and will probably launch sometime in March. I'll have a full demo out probably 1-2 weeks before the official pack launch.
Last thing is a announcement of sorts regarding the pack. Since this idea kind of boomed with MAP 2.0, I've decided to take it for a little spin. Starting next week, I'm going to release elements of the pack one by one that people can simply pick and choose what they would like to buy out of the pack. So let's say you just want the modelling and weapon design tutorials, well, you can just get that alone if you want it.
I'm hoping this one hits the bank in terms of popularity, I've put quite a bit of time into this one, and I'd hate to see another DWP happen to this pack as well, that would pretty much seal my end as a Torque developer. I'm going to be spending a lot of time trying to ensure pack elements are easy to install, and then I'm going to go all out on the media of the pack in terms of screenshots and videos for next time. I've opened up the AFPSK Forum on my forums for open discussion regarding the pack and for ideas between now and the release of the pack.
If you've got any questions or comments regarding it, I'd love to hear it now, until next time!
About the author
Illinois Grad. Retired T3D Developer / Pack Dev.
#2
01/30/2014 (10:26 am)
That radar bit sounds interesting.I might pick it up if it looks like it would work for what I want.
#3
01/30/2014 (12:13 pm)
@alpha: As mentioned, I'll try to grab some video footage of it in action next time around. But yeah, it can do a wide variety of things. The code I wrote is very well documented so it can be easily modified and adjusted to suit the needs of the application.
#4
After hours of sitting here getting worried about the prospect of needing to introduce a hefty load of ghosting calculations I was able to save the day by adding a quick code adjustment to ShapeBase. Now Player arrows and dots are properly rendering.
Tomorrow, I'm going to tackle the positioning and rotation errors and then maybe if time permits, get a video. :)
01/30/2014 (7:50 pm)
And a quick hotshot update:After hours of sitting here getting worried about the prospect of needing to introduce a hefty load of ghosting calculations I was able to save the day by adding a quick code adjustment to ShapeBase. Now Player arrows and dots are properly rendering.
Tomorrow, I'm going to tackle the positioning and rotation errors and then maybe if time permits, get a video. :)
#5
01/31/2014 (12:29 am)
Sounds cool. I would like to know more about the advanced AI.
#6
I mainly did this since the current AI I had in my little demo, while fun for DM applications, was causing quite a bit of lag, removing the fun factor from the game. I'd also need to do a ton of TS just to get certain things to properly work, where a few lines of engine code could eliminate most of that problem. All in all, this should be a very useful system to make AI that can be fun and very challenging to play with or against.
01/31/2014 (11:01 am)
@Jose: The AI I'm adding with this pack is a separate Object from the AIPlayer, namely, it's called the AdvancedAIPlayer. It relies on the Recast addon that Dan Buckmaster gave us with MIT 3.5. What differs this from the standard AI Player is that first and foremost, It's got the pathing built in to it, compared to the AIPlayer where you'd have to do all of that in script, which can be very costly in a computational sense. Next off, all of the heavier calculations related to AI such as player detection, reactions to events, ect. are built into the C++ and simply triggered via callback when necessary, such as if the AI is doing a task and is suddenly shot, you could then send a single line of TS to the AI telling it to drop it's current task and return fire.I mainly did this since the current AI I had in my little demo, while fun for DM applications, was causing quite a bit of lag, removing the fun factor from the game. I'd also need to do a ton of TS just to get certain things to properly work, where a few lines of engine code could eliminate most of that problem. All in all, this should be a very useful system to make AI that can be fun and very challenging to play with or against.
#7
Knocked out the rotation problem with some really appreciated help from Andrew Mac. I've also got my icon modulation working now so arrows and dots now render as their proper colors (green and red for my radar).
I've still got a little bit of a position calculation bug going on, but that's pretty much one of the last major holds on a good radar demo video, so let's hope I can fix that soon. :)
01/31/2014 (1:24 pm)
Adding another picture today:Knocked out the rotation problem with some really appreciated help from Andrew Mac. I've also got my icon modulation working now so arrows and dots now render as their proper colors (green and red for my radar).
I've still got a little bit of a position calculation bug going on, but that's pretty much one of the last major holds on a good radar demo video, so let's hope I can fix that soon. :)
#9
02/03/2014 (2:35 am)
Congrats @Robert! Nice to see a working minimap :)
#10
Tomorrow, I'm releasing the AFPSK Modeling Tutorial Series Pack which contains the four part modeling tutorial series which will walk someone with practically no modelling experience through the Modelling and Texturing process using Blender (You'll model yourself an RPK Machine Gun in no time at all!). This also contains a weapon design tutorial which will help you accomplish some pretty neat weapon effects and properties of weapons that date back to my experience in the Tribes 2 days. There's a few little goodies in the pack as well containing some quick references and some sample files to start with when you need them.
That shotgun you're seeing in my pictures is yours in this pack as well along with the .blend source as an additional learning tool. :)
As for the remainder of the pack, I've got a release estimate calendar planned out and available on my forums if you're interested here.
I'll have some more blogs and information coming in the next few days as this begins to move closer and closer to completion.
02/03/2014 (10:31 am)
As I stated in the OP of this blog, elements will begin to appear. The first of which will be released tomorrow. Tomorrow, I'm releasing the AFPSK Modeling Tutorial Series Pack which contains the four part modeling tutorial series which will walk someone with practically no modelling experience through the Modelling and Texturing process using Blender (You'll model yourself an RPK Machine Gun in no time at all!). This also contains a weapon design tutorial which will help you accomplish some pretty neat weapon effects and properties of weapons that date back to my experience in the Tribes 2 days. There's a few little goodies in the pack as well containing some quick references and some sample files to start with when you need them.
That shotgun you're seeing in my pictures is yours in this pack as well along with the .blend source as an additional learning tool. :)
As for the remainder of the pack, I've got a release estimate calendar planned out and available on my forums if you're interested here.
I'll have some more blogs and information coming in the next few days as this begins to move closer and closer to completion.
Torque Owner Kory Imaginism
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