Pixel Perfect

Thanks NoOdle. I know that has a very good reputation for model file format conversions although I've never used it myself. I've downloaded a time limited demo version to try it. Maybe they rebuild the normals correctly when exporting.

I don't believe Marcus has done anything here other than vigorously explored the possibility of seamless world loading in LE, as this is obviously important to him, and as such I am certainly not going to criticise him for it. I also believe Josh has clearly stated his reasoning for not wishing to do so and I have to agree that this engine cannot be all things to all people ... as no engine can possibly do so. My personal take is, whilst I would have liked to have seen all three features implemented, I am happy to sacrifice seamless loading of levels (as an inherent function of the engine) if the other two requests are likely to be implemented and consider two out of three a good result! I also believe that whilst seamless loading of levels is a nice feature, not having that would not in any way detract from game sales if the game has compelling game play (Dragon Age: Origins being a perfect example as pointed out by niosop). Josh has, I believe, struck a fine balance in the design of this engine making it a highly desirable game development vehicle and I'm happy to work within the confines that brings as I don't believe (with the other two changes in place) that this prevents the successful implementation of any genre of game.

What program did you use to fix the normals issue NoOdle? Erik kindly looked at some issues I had with normals in the Town and Castle pack and concluded, as I had, that these appeared to be in the underlying models and not his conversions. I have highlighted these problems with Dexsoft but they seem in no hurry to sort any of the issues preferring to just offer me a refund, in fact they have completely ignored my last email asking if they had looked any further into the issue. This does not fill me with confidence for future model packs if they are unprepared to rectify any issues that might arise! It's a real shame, as up until now I had considered them very reliable.

That really does look nice and the glass is really quite effective ... excellent!

I think I would support all three of these suggestions, they are certainly things that have all indivdually been requested in the past. I personally have now given up asking for the increase in texture layers ... you can only ask for something so many times before it just becomes a pointless exercise. I hope it's on the 'to do list' for implementation at some point; as the current 5 layers are way to restictive.

The approach you've taken in the code you've posted is pretty much how I've done it in my player/weapon class, it works well enough for me!

Looking nice afecelis

Excuse me for stating the obvious if you have, but did you create a terrain first as you can drag and drop models without one but you won't get the shadows! I guess if you see them when running the map in your own code then you did

Sounds like possibly something is grabbing the input before the application does. I had a similar problem when I first installed Win 7 and it drove me crazy for a while, Ctrl and Mouse Clicks wouldn't work in Sandbox or in the UDK Terrain Editor. Turned out to be the copy of Comodo firewall I'll installed. Got rid of that and it all came back to life. Have you installed anything similar recently or have anything using 'hotkey' configurations? It's a long shot I know but thought I'd mention it.

Very impressive Tyler ... good luck with this and looking forward to seeing the video!

lol ... join the rest of the 'sad' brigade'

Cheers Josh, I'll take a look at this

I took a look at this seeing that you have had no replies and I cannot reproduce any of the problems you've highlighted above, it all works ok on my Windows 7 installation. The only issue I see is a 'wrong thread' warning as I close the application down, which has been there since I first installed it. I'm wondering if this is somehow a graphics driver related issue?

Haha... thats the funniest expression I've heard in a while. With regard to your game language decision, its possibly too late to offer my advise as you seem to have already decided but, I'd advocate sticking with C++ as although it may be harder to learn initially in the end I believe it pays dividends as it's game industry standard (which if your going to put the time in to learn something you might as well get some recognition for it). It also has better support for OOP than BlitzMax. In addition to this, some of the best game oriented code libraries in the world are coded in C/C++. From my current understanding you will have slightly less linkage with LUA at the moment by going down the C++ route but despite the undoubted advantages of using LUA for some things writing an entire game engine in LUA seems pointless and really isn't playing to its strengths. No one does this in the commercial games industry and it's worth spending a little time to ask yourself why!

Great tools ... thanks for providing these

Sound great, good luck with the port Davaris.

This is really good stuff Rick ... nice one!

I agree, if there are going to be changes lets make them now

The steroids are to allow us to finally make 'Duke Nukem Forever'

Thanks from me too Rick ... much appreciated

Yes, the pick data is returned in a TPick structure as shown below: Struct TPick { TEntity entity; TEntity surface; flt X, Y, Z; flt NX, NY, NZ; int triangle; }; The X,Y,Z co-ordinates give the pick point and the NX,NY,NZ co-ordinates the normals [EDIT] Chris was quicker off the mark

Yes, welcome back Matt

Looking very nice ... its come on a lot since I saw it last ... great work! Yep, dead easy, just click on Insert Media and post your YouTube url. It auto loads a YouTube player for you. Works fine in posts, just doesn't work for some reason in the Gallery.

I agree, I am aware I need to do something about this, at the very least pull the models in towards the player somewhat and review it again but that's a good suggestion regarding using an overlay to allow for some seperate control. Thanks for the input.

Thanks for the positive comments Aggror and Andy It's coming Andy .... it's coming. I won't be releasing anything now till I get combat up and running but that's next on the list