Mac-Centric Torque user group
by Gibby · in General Discussion · 01/17/2009 (10:22 am) · 6 replies
Greets all:
Are there any other Mac-Centric developers here interested in a Torque user group?
By ‘Mac-Centric’ I mean that you:
Use OSX as your primary development environment using Xcode, Maya, etc
as opposed to
Developing on Wintel and porting over to OSX.
…in other words if you’re using Torsion, 3DS, Milkshape, etc. for development, you’re NOT Mac-Centric.
The reason I’m interested in talking to others is that there are a number of Mac-Centric issues I need to address and have had considerable difficulty finding answers. Before I hear yet another ‘game programming is tough, kid, be patient’, let me say this:
I’ve been a Torque’r since ’02, having bought the code with the specific intention of developing for OS9, using Code Warrior. Most recently, I’ve spent about a year coding a very solid build of TGE 1.52 + AFX, with all the features I need. I’ve even ported over to PC and Linux from OSX with good results. I was about to get around to finally implementing my game ideas and artwork when TGEA 1.8 was released.
My quandary is this: After seven years experience working with Torque, it’s quite evident that getting TGEA 1.8 to work as well as my TGE version could easily take 6 months to a year. This. without taking into account the Windows-oriented and IMHO very difficult art pipeline. With that in mind, I am seriously considering using a different engine, one that would enable me to spend more time on my game idea and less time in Xcode. This would of course mean forfeiting a considerable investment in time but may in the long run prove the wiser choice.
Before posting an emotional blog about how I’m leaving, etc., and becoming yet another loyal GG customer to be pegged a ‘dreamer’, ‘hobbyist’, ‘whiner’, etc., I’d like to interact with other Mac-Centric Torque users to see if there is a way to continue. I have witnessed the considerable effort guys like Alex Scarborough and Matt Fairfax have put into porting TGEA to OSX and will stick around if I can find other brave souls willing to do the same.
To this end, I’m interested in hearing from any of you out there that may be interested in participating in a MacTorque user group. I’m willing to take time to help organize such a group if there is enough interest. I’ll stick around if I can find other Mac-Heads willing to brave TGEA 1.8 with me. If I don’t, well…
Peaceout
gibby
Are there any other Mac-Centric developers here interested in a Torque user group?
By ‘Mac-Centric’ I mean that you:
Use OSX as your primary development environment using Xcode, Maya, etc
as opposed to
Developing on Wintel and porting over to OSX.
…in other words if you’re using Torsion, 3DS, Milkshape, etc. for development, you’re NOT Mac-Centric.
The reason I’m interested in talking to others is that there are a number of Mac-Centric issues I need to address and have had considerable difficulty finding answers. Before I hear yet another ‘game programming is tough, kid, be patient’, let me say this:
I’ve been a Torque’r since ’02, having bought the code with the specific intention of developing for OS9, using Code Warrior. Most recently, I’ve spent about a year coding a very solid build of TGE 1.52 + AFX, with all the features I need. I’ve even ported over to PC and Linux from OSX with good results. I was about to get around to finally implementing my game ideas and artwork when TGEA 1.8 was released.
My quandary is this: After seven years experience working with Torque, it’s quite evident that getting TGEA 1.8 to work as well as my TGE version could easily take 6 months to a year. This. without taking into account the Windows-oriented and IMHO very difficult art pipeline. With that in mind, I am seriously considering using a different engine, one that would enable me to spend more time on my game idea and less time in Xcode. This would of course mean forfeiting a considerable investment in time but may in the long run prove the wiser choice.
Before posting an emotional blog about how I’m leaving, etc., and becoming yet another loyal GG customer to be pegged a ‘dreamer’, ‘hobbyist’, ‘whiner’, etc., I’d like to interact with other Mac-Centric Torque users to see if there is a way to continue. I have witnessed the considerable effort guys like Alex Scarborough and Matt Fairfax have put into porting TGEA to OSX and will stick around if I can find other brave souls willing to do the same.
To this end, I’m interested in hearing from any of you out there that may be interested in participating in a MacTorque user group. I’m willing to take time to help organize such a group if there is enough interest. I’ll stick around if I can find other Mac-Heads willing to brave TGEA 1.8 with me. If I don’t, well…
Peaceout
gibby
#2
Thanks for your reply. Like Jeff Tunnell, I'm a big believer in the power of small, organized groups, and if even a handful of us were to present these OSX issues in a well detailed manner, the folks at GG might address them, as I have seen happen with the previous management. Even if not, if there were a group of us who could help other Mac-Centric developers, as well as PCers porting over (I do have Windows and Linux, I just don't develop on them) it could benefit the whole GG community. I have a web server and space I could donate to such a cause and would be willing to take time off of my project to help get it going if there were enough interest.
With regards to TGEA, I just purchased 1.8 and there are a number of issues that need to be addressed before I can begin porting my project over but it's no different than earlier Mac versions of TGE. I've been careful with my most recent TGE project to use resources that work on both versions and with the exception of anything that used dgl most of them work in TGEA. I'm likely to use Unity for some smaller web-based projects I have coming up, but lack of source and Win/Linux support is a huge issue for me too.
So whaddya think, should we start MacTorque?
-gibby
01/18/2009 (7:46 am)
Sherman:Thanks for your reply. Like Jeff Tunnell, I'm a big believer in the power of small, organized groups, and if even a handful of us were to present these OSX issues in a well detailed manner, the folks at GG might address them, as I have seen happen with the previous management. Even if not, if there were a group of us who could help other Mac-Centric developers, as well as PCers porting over (I do have Windows and Linux, I just don't develop on them) it could benefit the whole GG community. I have a web server and space I could donate to such a cause and would be willing to take time off of my project to help get it going if there were enough interest.
With regards to TGEA, I just purchased 1.8 and there are a number of issues that need to be addressed before I can begin porting my project over but it's no different than earlier Mac versions of TGE. I've been careful with my most recent TGE project to use resources that work on both versions and with the exception of anything that used dgl most of them work in TGEA. I'm likely to use Unity for some smaller web-based projects I have coming up, but lack of source and Win/Linux support is a huge issue for me too.
So whaddya think, should we start MacTorque?
-gibby
#3
I enjoy working on a mac; the only thing that slows me down is the minor differences TGB has between platforms.
01/21/2009 (3:35 pm)
I've been developing in TGB for about 5 months. I prefer a mac for developing, and personally can work much faster on it than a pc (which I have for debugging). The problem is the time I save working on my mac I end up spending twofold on backwards compatibility with pcs. I've learned some functions either work differently or not at all on either platform, and I've had to cut the quality of my projects in half just to have it run on even quality winpcs. It ain't fun.I enjoy working on a mac; the only thing that slows me down is the minor differences TGB has between platforms.
#4
Once this project is done I'll have to take a serious look at where Unity is and how it would compare to Torque for future products, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Torque 3D. We'll see.
01/21/2009 (6:34 pm)
I would certainly participate, as I am Mac-first. I've been developing with TGE 1.5.2 for some time now, and I'm hesitant to port over to TGEA like others have mentioned. One issue is that I will need AFX, which I don't think is ready yet for Mac TGEA. But I'm also a bit leery of the product since it's still new to the Mac platform, and I don't want to spend a ton of time porting over only to find a series of issues that need to be addressed. Go with the devil you know, as they say.Once this project is done I'll have to take a serious look at where Unity is and how it would compare to Torque for future products, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Torque 3D. We'll see.
#5
I make cross-platform kiosk products with TGE 1.52 with fixes and enhancements.
I always port to Win because the most platforms are targeted, the less bugs are left.
I'm working with TGEA 1.8.0 now to evaluate it.
So count on me.
Nicolas Buquet
www.buquet-net.com/cv/
01/22/2009 (12:50 am)
I'm a Mac-centric developer too.I make cross-platform kiosk products with TGE 1.52 with fixes and enhancements.
I always port to Win because the most platforms are targeted, the less bugs are left.
I'm working with TGEA 1.8.0 now to evaluate it.
So count on me.
Nicolas Buquet
www.buquet-net.com/cv/
#6
01/26/2009 (2:26 pm)
Greets all, sorry to take so long to reply. Give me a few more days to deliver a project and I'll begin organizing... 
Torque 3D Owner Sherman Pendley
With all due credit to Alex and Matt, I'm sitting on the fence when it comes to TGEA. I'm concerned that I'll spend the $$ only to find that the laundry list of long-standing shortcomings in the Mac version of TGE have still not been fixed. The lack of proper HID support, for instance, and writing preference and log files along side (or worse, inside) the .app bundle.
Yes, these are easy issues to address, and many Mac users can and do fix things up ourselves. But since they're such easy things to fix, one has to wonder, why didn't GarageGames do it? They've put in a lot of effort to maintain a working Mac port of TGE for all these years, and I really do appreciate that. That effort is why I'm still here! But it's always felt like it was just a tiny bit short of finished - missing that last 1% that would make it a GREAT Mac-native product.
Still, the problems are fixable and the alternatives that I'm aware of are worse. Unity is great, and Mac native, but it doesn't ship with source code, and the Windows version requires an expensive "Pro" license. The free engines are not even in the same league in terms of functionality, and other commercial engines with close to the same capabilities are orders of magnitude more expensive.
So, I'm taking a wait-and-see attitude towards TGEA, but I'm not quite ready to jump ship just yet. Quite a lot will depend on what the price on T3D is, and whether it's a truly well-executed Mac-native version. If the price is as high as some are speculating it might be, my expectations of it will be correspondingly high as well.