Worth the money?
by Ian Chiofolo · in General Discussion · 09/08/2005 (3:48 pm) · 5 replies
Ok I need your guys opinion on something.Over the summer I spent $150 on the torque indie, I spent $400 on game space 1.6 then true space 6 for good modeling.Then I figured out to reach my goal in my game I need to buy the Torque shader Engine for the terrian distance, and I noticed a requirement for the shader is that you need a good graphix card. Something like 9 or something. Then I thought why not buy a new Lap Top with one in it because I wanted one.Do you think I'm wasting money?
About the author
I have an associates degree in fine arts. I am currently working on my bachelor's in theater and minor in art history. Once done with those degrees I aim to get a degree in game art at an online university.
#2
The rest of his points are absolutely true though: only you (Ian) can decide if the money you are spending on your hobby(?) is worth it to you--I know people that spends thousands and thousands of dollars a year on collecting coins, or stamps, or action figurines...and they feel it's absolutely worth it. But, that's them...the question is, do you think it's worth it for you?
09/08/2005 (4:59 pm)
Just to make sure there isn't any misunderstanding: Changing the default heightmap size of 256x256 internally is not in any way an easy or trivial project. You can of course play with the blockSize to stretch those 256x256 height points, and of course TGE has infinitely repeating terrain, but I wanted to make sure Ian understood that while yes, the changes Mark mentions are possible, it's not something even a small team is going to do in their spare time in a few weeks or even months.The rest of his points are absolutely true though: only you (Ian) can decide if the money you are spending on your hobby(?) is worth it to you--I know people that spends thousands and thousands of dollars a year on collecting coins, or stamps, or action figurines...and they feel it's absolutely worth it. But, that's them...the question is, do you think it's worth it for you?
#3
09/08/2005 (5:27 pm)
TSE makes extending the terrain easier doesn"t it? 
#5
@Ian :
If you have a project with a big terrain, and good viewable terrain distance, YES! TSE is a must.
09/10/2005 (1:05 pm)
@Andy and stefan : www.garagegames.com/blogs/51584/8672@Ian :
Quote:I noticed a requirement for the shader is that you need a good graphix cardYou need a graphic card supporting shaders. I don't know what your configuration is. But my 2 year old computer works perfectly with TSE.
If you have a project with a big terrain, and good viewable terrain distance, YES! TSE is a must.
Torque Owner Mark Storer
Are you having fun? Learning stuff? Building A Game?
Missing bills? Starving?
PS: You CAN get bigger terrains in TGE. The default terrain is a 256x256 height map (IIRC). You've got the SDK, you could change that to whatever number you like (though I think it needs to stay a power of 2). You can also change the resolution of that height-map, at the cost of rougher terrain. I suppose you could modifiy things so you've got half the resolution the engine supports now, with a 1024x1024 height map, giving you a HUGELY VAST play area. That'd be... x8 bigger on a side, or 64 times more area. If that doesn't satisfy you... How about 4096x4096 (yow) ?