AFX 2.0 Question
by Michael S · in Torque 3D Beginner · 04/17/2013 (1:20 pm) · 11 replies
This is not a big question, I am just curious if this tool comes not only with Spell fx but a start kit type deal that actually lets a character cast spells..
So basically, does this tool come with a character and scripts that work and cast spells?
So basically, does this tool come with a character and scripts that work and cast spells?
About the author
#3
You can read about it or watch some of our media
I have also written quite a few blogs about it :) Check it out.
04/18/2013 (6:49 am)
If AFX is not for you then I'm working on a Bundle with a spellsystem and a particlesystem you might be interested in.You can read about it or watch some of our media
I have also written quite a few blogs about it :) Check it out.
#4
Buy it. Jeff delivers, not seen much of any use from WL, apart from talk.
04/18/2013 (2:12 pm)
I have AFX fully integrated into T3D MIT development branch. Plenty of PCs and NPCs casting good looking spells. Very easy to merge and most important for me is that, so far, all MIT updates have not conflicted with my AFX MIT codebase.Buy it. Jeff delivers, not seen much of any use from WL, apart from talk.
#5
So far we have delivered on DNT 1.0 and the AutoPatcher. OneWorld 1.0 release was put off until MIT 3.0 comes out. DNT 1.1 is already approaching testing stages. Lukas's IPS system is in testing and we are going over its documentation.
If you dont have a use for our products Andy, thats one thing. But making it sound like that we arent delivering products? thats where id have to argue w you.
04/18/2013 (7:49 pm)
Quote:not seen much of any use from WL, apart from talk.
So far we have delivered on DNT 1.0 and the AutoPatcher. OneWorld 1.0 release was put off until MIT 3.0 comes out. DNT 1.1 is already approaching testing stages. Lukas's IPS system is in testing and we are going over its documentation.
If you dont have a use for our products Andy, thats one thing. But making it sound like that we arent delivering products? thats where id have to argue w you.
#6
Honestly, the product is complete. We are just running it through test after test after test to eliminate as many bugs as possible before release. And then we are writing the documentation which needs to get QA'd and spellproofed. AFX got a lot of years and a lot of experience on it's back so it's definetly a polished product that you shouldn't encounter any issues with. So by all means if it suits your needs buy it.
But like Paul I don't like that you smother our reputation.
IPS Pro was originally announced back in Q3 2012, and I was about to release it back then and told you so in the blogs, that might be your source of annoyance. But truth is, I got into WLE and when I work for a company like WLE I have to meet some higher standards which resulted in a rewrite of the particle system and extensive debugging which is why it was delayed for such a long time.
The documentation had to be kicked up a notch aswell, we spend a lot of time writing tutorials and easing the installation process etc, in fact thats what we have spent the last month or so on.
@Michael I'd be happy to list the core differences between IPS and AFX if you'd like it.
04/19/2013 (12:33 am)
@AndyHonestly, the product is complete. We are just running it through test after test after test to eliminate as many bugs as possible before release. And then we are writing the documentation which needs to get QA'd and spellproofed. AFX got a lot of years and a lot of experience on it's back so it's definetly a polished product that you shouldn't encounter any issues with. So by all means if it suits your needs buy it.
But like Paul I don't like that you smother our reputation.
IPS Pro was originally announced back in Q3 2012, and I was about to release it back then and told you so in the blogs, that might be your source of annoyance. But truth is, I got into WLE and when I work for a company like WLE I have to meet some higher standards which resulted in a rewrite of the particle system and extensive debugging which is why it was delayed for such a long time.
The documentation had to be kicked up a notch aswell, we spend a lot of time writing tutorials and easing the installation process etc, in fact thats what we have spent the last month or so on.
@Michael I'd be happy to list the core differences between IPS and AFX if you'd like it.
#8
To begin with, the IPS Bundle started as a ParticleSystem (the IPS Pro) and therefore the primary focus is ofc on the ParticleSystem.
The spellcasting product IPS/S is a very lightweight spell casting system that can be used to create a whole range of different spells very simply.
AFX on the other hand is a complex modular composition engine where you create a lot of different effects etc and add them to a timeline as a manner of speech. The key difference in how the two handles "timelines" is that in AFX you add your different effects to an afxMagicSpellData datablock that takes care of spawning them at the right time.
While the IPS/S lets you have the responsibility of spawning the different effects by triggering callbacks at the appropriate times.
You can find a (pretty old albeit) sample of how the flame broil spell is written online at: AFX Codex as well as an old user guide that might help give you an idea of how it works.
I believe that you don't need such a complex system to create your spell and I think that you get cleaner code by using a simple callback system.
It's two very different approaches but I honestly believe you can create whatever spell you want in either of them. IMO the IPS/S comes with a smaller learning curve than AFX.
Also to return to the point that IPS started as an Improved Particle System. The IPS is really focused on particles atm while AFX have a lot of features covering a lot of the engine and a lot of different stuff.
As a side note, if you got a money tree or something, since a huge part of IPS is just a particle system you could actually merge IPS and AFX if you'd like to get the particle systems from IPS Pro and the composition system from AFX.
Less objective part:
I found AFX confusing and a bit cluttered (tons of datablocks for a single spell) and didn't really like how it worked. I loved the features and I love the thought of a modular system, but it just seemed to complex for me. Which is why I wrote IPS Pro which makes it really easy to create something fancy with the enhanced emitters (try the IPS Lite here which is an old codebase (really ugly one too) which shows a few of the features you can get in IPS Pro)
The IPS/S is a more Torque-like way of doing things imo, since TorqueScript is an event-driven language it seems more familiar to be using callbacks to structure your spells.
I haven't actually used AFX this is all notes from my research ofc, but what I've heard from people that have used it is that AFX have a pretty large overhead (500 megs or so) from just being present in the engine (I can't confirm this ofc) and I've heard that the other folks at WLE have had some issues with it aswell (maybe Paul could chime in on this one).
But either way AFX is a really robust and stable solution, and I hope in time the IPS Bundle will get a foothold as robust as the one AFX have had.
Hope I answered most of your questions! And whatever you buy I wish you the best of luck!
This was all thrown out in one go so I can't ensure that it is all syntactical or semantically correct!
04/19/2013 (7:18 am)
Great.To begin with, the IPS Bundle started as a ParticleSystem (the IPS Pro) and therefore the primary focus is ofc on the ParticleSystem.
The spellcasting product IPS/S is a very lightweight spell casting system that can be used to create a whole range of different spells very simply.
AFX on the other hand is a complex modular composition engine where you create a lot of different effects etc and add them to a timeline as a manner of speech. The key difference in how the two handles "timelines" is that in AFX you add your different effects to an afxMagicSpellData datablock that takes care of spawning them at the right time.
While the IPS/S lets you have the responsibility of spawning the different effects by triggering callbacks at the appropriate times.
You can find a (pretty old albeit) sample of how the flame broil spell is written online at: AFX Codex as well as an old user guide that might help give you an idea of how it works.
I believe that you don't need such a complex system to create your spell and I think that you get cleaner code by using a simple callback system.
It's two very different approaches but I honestly believe you can create whatever spell you want in either of them. IMO the IPS/S comes with a smaller learning curve than AFX.
Also to return to the point that IPS started as an Improved Particle System. The IPS is really focused on particles atm while AFX have a lot of features covering a lot of the engine and a lot of different stuff.
As a side note, if you got a money tree or something, since a huge part of IPS is just a particle system you could actually merge IPS and AFX if you'd like to get the particle systems from IPS Pro and the composition system from AFX.
Less objective part:
I found AFX confusing and a bit cluttered (tons of datablocks for a single spell) and didn't really like how it worked. I loved the features and I love the thought of a modular system, but it just seemed to complex for me. Which is why I wrote IPS Pro which makes it really easy to create something fancy with the enhanced emitters (try the IPS Lite here which is an old codebase (really ugly one too) which shows a few of the features you can get in IPS Pro)
The IPS/S is a more Torque-like way of doing things imo, since TorqueScript is an event-driven language it seems more familiar to be using callbacks to structure your spells.
I haven't actually used AFX this is all notes from my research ofc, but what I've heard from people that have used it is that AFX have a pretty large overhead (500 megs or so) from just being present in the engine (I can't confirm this ofc) and I've heard that the other folks at WLE have had some issues with it aswell (maybe Paul could chime in on this one).
But either way AFX is a really robust and stable solution, and I hope in time the IPS Bundle will get a foothold as robust as the one AFX have had.
Hope I answered most of your questions! And whatever you buy I wish you the best of luck!
This was all thrown out in one go so I can't ensure that it is all syntactical or semantically correct!
#9
AFX is a modular composition system
IPS/S uses a simple callback system
AFX covers a bunch of changes and features that impact the whole engine
IPS is more focused towards particle systems
You can create almost any spell in both, some spells might be simpler in either one or the other.
The Particle System improvements from IPS Pro could be merged into AFX to get the composition system from AFX and the particle system from IPS.
I found AFX confusing and a little cluttered so I decided to write a more lightweight spellsystem thats easy to learn and use and capable of handling any spell I will ever need.
04/19/2013 (7:25 am)
Tl;drAFX is a modular composition system
IPS/S uses a simple callback system
AFX covers a bunch of changes and features that impact the whole engine
IPS is more focused towards particle systems
You can create almost any spell in both, some spells might be simpler in either one or the other.
The Particle System improvements from IPS Pro could be merged into AFX to get the composition system from AFX and the particle system from IPS.
I found AFX confusing and a little cluttered so I decided to write a more lightweight spellsystem thats easy to learn and use and capable of handling any spell I will ever need.
#10
I was planning on doing this actually, I figure why not have the power of both? I already bought AFX and next up is IPS!
04/19/2013 (7:26 am)
"As a side note, if you got a money tree or something, since a huge part of IPS is just a particle system you could actually merge IPS and AFX if you'd like to get the particle systems from IPS Pro and the composition system from AFX."I was planning on doing this actually, I figure why not have the power of both? I already bought AFX and next up is IPS!
#11
Should be easy enough to just add the changes from the particle.cpp particle.h particleEmitter.cpp and particleEmitter.h that AFX gives to the ParticleSystem from IPS Pro
04/19/2013 (7:35 am)
Haha everyone is happy that way then!Should be easy enough to just add the changes from the particle.cpp particle.h particleEmitter.cpp and particleEmitter.h that AFX gives to the ParticleSystem from IPS Pro
Torque Owner Lukas Joergensen
WinterLeaf Entertainment