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chris330

Torque vs. OGRE

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Hi quick one chaps anyone any knowledge on this? I want a reasonable graphics engine to make a game on but I want it to be fast. I've done a bit of research on OGRE and Torque. I hear OGRE is becoming dated which concernes me in the sense does this mean it is too slow? The visual quality of effects does not have to be extraordinary certainly not compared to todays standards. I was thinking of something on par with Novalogic's Delta Force 2 games. That's more than good enough for what I need.

Can anyone throw some general advice my way regarding this issue thanks ;)

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The new Torque engine has not been released yet and the old one is too clumsy if you want to have a good workflow. OGRE is widespread but also a bit dated by now. Object import from different software platforms can be a real pita.

I´ve worked with Quest 3D for a while but it simply misses some very basic features and the tree structure makes you vomit at times the bigger your project gets. Apart from that it´s not really cheap and documentation and support is lacking in many, many aspects.

I´ve switched to Unity lately as it was finally released for PC. It comes with a load of tutorials, the mechanics are great, the workflow is very fast, it has a drag/drop option for almost anything and it can be scripted in Boo, JavaScript or C. The community is great, the developers are supportive and there is a different spirit as with Quest 3d as people share for example unity-packages that you can just drag/drop into your project and use. I love it so far. It has all current shading options embedded, performs well and is continously under development while the developers listen closely to customer wishes.

Late this summer there will be a new version for the PC and I´m already biting my nails for the new functions like a live radiosity renderer.

Oh, and the price is neat aswell :pet7:

Unity 3D

Quest 3D

Edited by Balschoiw
Stupidity

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That's a great reply! Some questions I hope you can answer:

Does the Unity engine license allow you to go in and change stuff in it like remove things you don't need and all that? I don't want to rely too heavily on using things made by other people as I really want it ultra optimised.

What's a workflow? Is it an abstract concept I'm not familiar with the term.

I'm also unfamiliar with how important shading is. I know almost squat about the technical methods of rendering textures and even less about how those aspects relate to performance. Is it linked also to lighting in some way?

Sounds like this unity thing is the way to go from what you've said so far!

If the questions seem a bit basic you'll have to forgive me I'm a bit of a n00b when it comes to rendering lingo and details. Cheers ;)

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Does the Unity engine license allow you to go in and change stuff in it like remove things you don't need and all that? I don't want to rely too heavily on using things made by other people as I really want it ultra optimised.

The engine only exports things to a standalone that are actually used in your project, so yes, it´s up to you to decide what you want to have in it or not.

What's a workflow? Is it an abstract concept I'm not familiar with the term.

Concept - creation of objects in external application - texturing/animation - import into Unity by Drag/Drop with latest FBX importer - embedding into your scene by drag/drop.

Unity also checks your project folder automatically for updated models, textures, scripts, whatever and automatically imports the latest version directly into your scenery which is helpful as you don´t have to import and embedd the updated things over and over again with going through all the material, scripting, behaviour or shader settings.

I'm also unfamiliar with how important shading is. I know almost squat about the technical methods of rendering textures and even less about how those aspects relate to performance. Is it linked also to lighting in some way?

Shading is the biggest visual part of a game. It either makes your objects look tasty, with structure, per pixel shadowing, shiny, reflective, etc, etc or when using very basic shaders it makes your objects just look plain coloured with no depth. In unity you can apply several materials consisting of different shaders to one object in a row. For example you have a base texture a shiny layer above the base texture and a reflecting shader on top of it all to reflect the environmet or a cubemap that is generated to represent environmetal reflection.

There are programs to create shaders, or plugins for the common modelling programs like 3dsmax or Maya. In Unity you can program your own shaders for best results but it takes time to get into CG shader programming as it directly addresses the funtions of gfx-cards and therefore there are limits to it.

It´s not directly linked to lighting as the light emitters only emit lights and draw soft or hard shadows, the calculations on what happens with an object that is lighted is a shader thing as the material of an object defines how it looks when light is applied to it.

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Wow more great info! You're a bit of a guru at this mate thanks! ;)

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You might take a look at Leadwerks game engine, has great lighting and shader capabilties. It's quite cheap, but you got to know how to use the SDK in a development environment, it's not all drag & drop. It has the most promise & features for it's price that's for sure :)

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I just spent the last hour or so reading up on Unity3D. Lots of cool capabilities in there.

Unity3D even does independent head tracking! Seems like you should be able to have the players head freelook from the body which is huge for me. (Indeed, that's one huge thing that sets the Arma/OFP series apart from any other FPS I'm aware of.)

The only thing I was expecting from Unity3D but not seeing is any sort of AI component... am I just missing it?

If not, curious what AI middleware you guys are using???

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Seems like you should be able to have the players head freelook from the body which is huge for me.

Yes, there´s a script you can just drag/drop onto your character to make this work. It´s really that simple.

The only thing I was expecting from Unity3D but not seeing is any sort of AI component... am I just missing it?

There is some AI code embedded with the downloadable tutorials but there are also user-created modules that are more sophisticated in terms of defining areas where AI can move upon and pathfinding in general. I used a pathfinding system with waypoints for a realtime architectural visualizations where I have live traffic going on. It is basic though but it does the job for me. Advanced AI like taking cover, leaning and things like that are possible with scripting I guess but up to now I haven´t seen examples.

Right now the AI just works like this:

- enemy freely moves in it´s predefined sector or scans for targets within given range

- If player-tagged object moves into sensor range of enemy he will switch to his combat routines wich means that he either calculates a path towards the player to reach his maximum shooting distance or for stationary weapons waits until the players gets in range moves the gun into the player´s direction and fires. Projectiles can be fired by particle emitters that actually emit physics objects that interact with the surrounding. Each projectile can have weight, mass, speed and affects the environment. Shooting boxes moves them if the projectiles are strong enough, barrels can explode if there damage points are exceeded. It´s just a matter of what you embedd.

I´m curious what the new Unity version will offer in the AI compartement but we´ll see soon. :pet7:

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