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That is why efforts like garagegames.com are worthwhile.

While I am not an avid watcher of the show, I have seen a few episodes and the movie. The writing, acting and directing are excellent.

I have started watching more of the show, though, due to the fact that I recently joined a team working on a Stargate: SG1 first person shooter. So far the its looking awesome! We are always looking for input, though.

If any other Stargate: SG1 fans out there are interested, you can find information about the game at our website.

It started out as a Mod for Tribes 2, but the Lead programmer purchased the Torque Game engine and the mod turned in to a stand-alone game. Oh, and it will be freeware ;)

The future of gaming is what every NES/atari/old school gamer has dreamed of. They always complain that games today are just copies of what is popular (how many quake/fps copycats can you name?).

Well, modding is changing all of that. When a game comes out, modders push the limits of the engines to do anything they want... the clincher is... they do it for free.

Now, for game designers to still make money, they have to come out with new and unique ideas. Doing your standard FPS ain't gonna do it anymore. Even single-player FPS with great plots are being done with mods. The games of tomorrow will have to be bigger and better than mod writers (or have a bigger and better engine), which means the days of the FPS copy-cat will soon be over.

Also, to note, some publishers are encouraging the modding community to step forward into the gaming industry. Just look at Garage Games. They are selling their Torque Engine (the engine behind tribes 2) for $100 for a non-commercial license (and if you make a commercial product with it, no problem, as long as garage games is your publisher).

Let the mod revolution continue!

Also, note that SDK's like Garage Games Torque engine (what made tribes2) is something you can get for a cheap $100 for a 1 seat license (vs another modern engine which will cost you around $250,000-$500,000).
Why? One of the main reasons is what you are saying. The person gets experience with the engine, gets a job in the gaming industry, and which engine will he talk his employer on using (btw - the commerical version of the Torque engine is a ton)??
Second reason (if you wanted to know, and is slightly OT) is if independent developer(s) actually make a game on their own, the license state that you have to publish it through Garage Games.

I had an askSlashdot about licensing issues like this about a week or two ago...

I can neither confirm nor deny that I'm smoking anything. ;-)

I'm working on a Torque project, on Linux, as we speak. The engine has had Linux support pretty much from the start.

Er, I read this, which clearly says "Linux server, Linux client under development". Sorry if I got it wrong, I was just going by the website. Its good to hear that the Linux client is further along than that! :-)

Do the various tools work under Linux as well?

With respect to independent game developers, there is no comparison between the GarageGames deal and what ID offers. Indies are the future of innovative gaming and arming them with AAA technology, a publishing deal, and a thriving community for only pennies will result in gaming experiences you wouldn't have imagined were possible. The big traditional publishers are looking for "hits", not innovation - from game studios with a track record. That's a hard burden to overcome for an independent game studio with little or no budget.

Therefore, when comparing the two engine models discussed in this thread so far - alternatively consider more than just the financial differences. ID gives you a lot of expensive technology and leaves the rest to you. GarageGames gives you awesome technology, a publishing deal, and great community - all for $100. For an "indie", there really isn't a better deal on the planet.

To help put some perspective on my perspective, I feel I should point out that I am the President of 21-6 Productions, an independent game studio currently using the Torque Game Engine from GarageGames to build our cooperative multiplayer, action-RPG called Myrmidon.

Licensor shall pay to Licensee fifty percent (50%) of the Net Proceeds from the use and distribution of the Games through the Website or other electronic delivery mechanism. For purposes of this Agreement, "Net Proceeds" shall mean all monies received by Licensor for the sale, license or use of the Games If Licensor sells or licenses Licensee's Game as part of a compilation or collection of games, Licensee shall receive its pro rata share of the payments for such compilation or collection. For sales and licenses of Games through "box" or "hard" media channels, the parties shall negotiate in good faith to determine a fair royalty payment and related terms, with the minimum amount being paid to the Licensee being eighty percent (80%) of the Net Proceeds.

The article/press release states that they have 10,000 people in their community but it doesn't say whether these people all bought licenses. Anyone can visit the site and sign up for free, giving them forum access (except to the SDK forums). I have no doubt they've sold thousands of licenses to the Torque engine, but not everyone who's a member of GarageGames has licensed it.

When you get the source you can use the preconfigured projects to build an "example" - a fully working program and some demo levels. It compiles on Linux, Windows, and Mac and for Windows at least you can use Visual C++ 6 (I think Visual C++ .NET/7 also works if you tweak it a bit), CodeWarrior and now MiniGW (which is free). GarageGames for some time now has been saying thet would release a "demo" of the engine, basically the binaries of the example. They've since stated that they want to hold off until Version 1.2, but that hasn't arrived yet (current version is 1.1.2). They do have a demo of Realm Wars, a community project, which pretty much "serves" as the demo.

The reason the demo is significant is because the Torque engine, like Tribes 2, is heavily scripted. A scripting language powers all the "important" stuff, like game code, to a higher degree than say Quake 3. Having access to the scripting language (the compiler is built into the engine) means you can make more or less a completely different game touching no engine code. The downside being that unless you place in controls or distribute compiled scripts only, everyone gets access to your code.

If you buy the engine then you're paying $100 for engine code you may never touch. The demo has all the scripts neccessary to make a new game. Of course the downside is that you can't then legally charge for your game or modification, which depending on your idea may be important. Also, if the engine limits anything then you're stuck unless you bought the engine.

Still, Torque is 1000x better than free engines, cheaper than a non-GPL license for Quake 1 ($10,000 and it's an old engine) and it has lots of neat community features built in (I'd wager a bet that you'd have much more fun with it than trying to talk to Epic about Unreal - GarageGames is more used to newbies - like me).

Still, I do wonder how it is they're calling it a "success" so far. Don't get me wrong - I love the engine and I love the ethic GarageGames has, but they were thinking it was going to be six months before a game was published - here we are one year later and no games have been finished - and only 2-3 I can name off hand I know of are nearly done. I know $100 x however many they sold is a bit but as I understand it a lot of that went to the lawyers that got the funsies with the Tribes 2 licensing done. GarageGames is the place now doing the final fixes to Tribes 2, so they have that revenue coming in (which, since GG consists of former Dynamix employees, makes sense) but other than that I hope people start finishing some games soon, or else they're going to have problems staying afloat.

Still, when Tribes 2 came out, many people's hardware couldn't take it. Now the hardware has surpassed it and so now the engine looks and plays really good - the Torque technology is sound and hopefully people get to experience that soon.

There is also a 3d game construction set available from a small company, saw it in a gaming magazine- I ordered it and it seemed okay, but was more than I wanted to commit to at the time :)

As for the mod issue, the one thing that mods of course don't afford you is the ability to send your mod as a standalone application to someone else - they have to own Morrowind or Quake or whatever. This GCS gets around that - the catch being all the bad stuff (lack of graphics, etc.) it brings with it, which wouldn't be bad were it not for the $70 price tag. An alternative is the Torque engine by GarageGames. I've got it - it's damn good. Not only does it have what most systems lack (online play, top of the line graphics, multiplatform) but the price is right - for $100 you can make what you want with it and give it to whomever you want. If you want to sell what you make its a different affair (games have to be sold through the GG.com site) but for free games you can do what you want with it. GCS lets you sell it however you like - provided you can get someone to pay for it.

The only problem is that games are not just programming. They are programming, music, art, and level design. Musicians, artists, and level designers (even hobbyist ones) are used to making money for what they do. But since the core engine of the game is GPL, no money can be made on the game.

This is completely and totally wrong. (Or it's an artfully constructed troll; can't tell which.)

You are only required by the GPL to release any changes you make to the engine itself. If you take the Q2 engine and make a game with your own models, textures, levels and game logic, you are not required to give away the models, textures, levels and game code.

Remember, the engine and game logic are seperate codebases: Id Software releases the game logic seperately from the engine code, and usually years before, so that mod authors can play with it. And of course, the GPL does not "infect" anything but code: your textures, skins, models and levels remain your own no matter what.

If you really need to make changes to the rendering engine itself (highly unlikely for a hobbyist game programmer) without giving away your code, consider looking at the Torque Engine, which you can license for $100 and a revenue-sharing agreement with GarageGames.

Somebody else was having this problem. Read the thread found here. Also please post any other bugs you have in the forum, as described here.

Somebody else was having this problem. Read the thread found here. Also please post any other bugs you have in the forum, as described here.

Somebody else was having this problem. Try following the instructions found here

Additionally, any Torque engine games that a developer wishes to distribute must be published through Garage Games. One must accept their publishing contract. See the Torque SDK FAQ for details.

Should I be worried about this?

It is $100 per person that will be seeing the source code. The Torque engine also has a very powerful scripting language, so not everyone on a team would need the source code access.

Torque also runs on Windows, Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X. Garage games has a great community, and the improvements are coming fast and furious.

GG also just released a demo of their community produced game, Realm Wars. You can check it out here

Twostep

released for Linux

Take a look at Torque - it's basically the V12 engine from Tribes 2 with all the Tribes 2 Intellectual Property pulled out. What's left is a nice, fairly good engine. Here's the cool part:

If you want to just do modding, you don't have to BUY Torque, instead, just download the demo. The also have all sorts of community boards for ya to look at and interact with each other for questions. Pretty nice.

If you suddenly decide you want to write a commercial game with it, or, you need the source code - no problem. License the engine. For $100, and a distribution agreement for commercial sales. Not TOO bad.

There is a built-in terrain editor, world editor, etc - however, no actually map-building tools for interior locations. But, you can use Quark or WorldCraft (er... guess that's Valve's Hammersomethingorother now) to do that work.

I licensed the Torque engine to do Trajectory, and so far it's been wonderful. C++'ish scripting language built in, plus having the source for some further modifications that I can't do in scriptin is great.

Go check 'em out at Garage Games and download the demo or the RealmWars demo to check it out. Or, heck, play Tribes 2 a bit, and you know what to potentially expect ;-)

I'm very suprised that Garage Games was not mentioned in the article.

They allow you to buy the source code to the engine that powered Tribes 2 for $100.

Not only that, but they have released a project called Realm Wars. This is a game that the community contributes to. If you bought the source code, then you can contribute source code. If not, you can still download the demo, and contribute SCRIPTS, artwork, models and more.

It will be extremely interesting to see how this pans out.
(as long as I don't get any UE errors)

I'm very suprised that Garage Games was not mentioned in the article.

They allow you to buy the source code to the engine that powered Tribes 2 for $100.

Not only that, but they have released a project called Realm Wars. This is a game that the community contributes to. If you bought the source code, then you can contribute source code. If not, you can still download the demo, and contribute SCRIPTS, artwork, models and more.

It will be extremely interesting to see how this pans out.
(as long as I don't get any UE errors)

Creating games has become a true massmarket medium - unfortunately it is also almost entirely about money now and for most in the industry has nothing to do with vision or fun.


Check out Garage Games for a good assortment of games being produced mostly for fun and maybe a little profit in the end (its possible!), but mostly for fun. Some of the games being made would be classified as "different" and would cater to a niche market... check out the listed projects and maybe get involved in something. Most projects are looking for poeple to help out.

Here is a very in-depth look at the networking model for StarSeige: Tribes and Tribes2. It is written by Mark Frohnmayer and Tim Gift, who kinda wrote the thing. It goes into great detail about all the things you're going to have to think about, including construction of the stream layer, the perception of real-time play, preemptive client prediction, etc. A must-read if you're thinking about programming this kind of thing.

You might also want to check out GarageGames for some other game development resources.

Here is a very in-depth look at the networking model for StarSeige: Tribes and Tribes2. It is written by Mark Frohnmayer and Tim Gift, who kinda wrote the thing. It goes into great detail about all the things you're going to have to think about, including construction of the stream layer, the perception of real-time play, preemptive client prediction, etc. A must-read if you're thinking about programming this kind of thing.

You might also want to check out GarageGames for some other game development resources.

This isn't necessarily a bitter end for linux or cross-platform gaming. The Torque Gaming Engine from Garage Games, the engine behind Tribes 2, is being ported to non-windows platforms. The mac port is pretty much complete and the linux port is functional and getting better. The SDK costs a measly $100 and includes full source code to the engine and a demo application.

Fortunately, the GameCube seems to be cracking this stigma a little. Too bad I can't get it on the net yet.

It's not so much the Gamecube that's "cracking the stigma", as Sega. Chu Chu Rocket, Jet Set Radio, Super Monkey Ball, etc. All Sega games. I'm assuming that you're referring to Super Monkey Ball, and possibly Pikmin, when referring to the GameCube breaking the trend, but look at Rogue Leader (hey, it's a sequel to Rogue Squadron!), Wave Race: whatever it's called (look! sequel to Wave Race on the N64), and Super Smash Bros. Melee (look! sequel to Super Smash Bros.!). The Gamecube is just as "me-too" as any other platform. It's the game developers that have to make the difference. Thankfully, Sega is playing all the consoles (Super Monkey Ball on the GameCube, Chu Chu Rocket and Sonic on the GameBoy Advanced, Shemue II and Jet Set Radio: Grind on the XBox, and I don't remember what they're bringing to the PS2, besides things like the Crazy Taxi series (was that Sega?)).

I miss the days of 'Garage Developers' creating shareware games on BBS's.

Check out Garage Games. If the next John Carmack (mmm ... Commander Keen) is going to be found anywhere, it's highly likely it'll be there. Sure, you can license the Tribes 2 engine (or V12, now the "Torque Game Engine", as it's not completely the T2 engine) for cheap, but there are plenty of other engines, or you can write your own. Also, check out places like FlipCode, GameDev, and GamaSutra (probably need a free registration to read most of the interesting things) to see what's going on in the world of amatuer graphics and games development (the first two more than the third, as gamasutra seems aimed more towards the game development professional). There's some crazy stuff going on, and lots of great little games that you'll never see elsewhere (the games, that is, not always the concepts. You'll see a lot of tetris clones, defender clones, whatever. but every now and then a completely off-the-wall concept shows up).

This sounds similar to what Garage Games has put out. Their Torque Game Engine is the same one that powered Tribes 2 and now you can buy the source for $100. You get Mac, Linux and Windows code for that one price. Sweat Deal if you ask me. Sure there are a few things to consider, you cant release the source code and if you create anything that you wish to sell you have to do it through them (although its still a good deal). There is also a good community currently working with the code. Plus they are improving the code as time goes on and release it to those who purchased it. No I dont work with for them or anything, I just purchased the package and I'm currently working on a game in my spare time. I hope to release it cross platform when its done (mac,win,linux).

No, it's not OpenSource, but it's cheap and good things can be done with it.

I noticed the absolute lack of ANYTHING other than DirectX games.

I'm not sure what you are classifying as a "DirectX game". If you mean the game "requires DirectX #" to run, that doesn't mean it's not an OpenGL game. Many games, including recent kickass Tribes 2, run both under Direct3D and OpenGL. Almost all modern games require DX because it supplies a common interface for sound, input controllers, etc. D3D is merely the graphics module of DX, and "OpenGL games" usually use both DX and OpenGL simultaneously.

AFAIK, OpenGL is also the favored API of both nVidia and ATI, which together make up almost all current and next-gen 3D cards. Most modern driver sets are fully compatible with both OpenGL and D3D.

The V12 graphics engine, featured in Tribes 2, is best seen under OpenGL. Furthermore, the V12 engine has been recently acquired by Garage Games and V12 liscenses can soon be purchased by developers for the unheard-of price of $100. It's not open-source, but it is cross-platform (Linux and Mac too!). I expect an absolute FLOOD of cross-platform OpenGL-supporting games to be released soon after the V12 is available. ATI has recently been working with GG to implement their next-gen rendering doohickies on the V12.

OpenGL is NOT dying.

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The revolution will be slashdotted.

I am utterly surprised that the V12 engine, a derivative of the Tribes 2 engine by GarageGames at www.garagegames.com hasn't been mentioned. With minor exceptions where Sierra's intellectual property was removed from the engine and replaced with other code, it essentially the source code to the Tribes 2 game engine, already near the state where it could be used to create high-quality games for Linux. The EULA requires a $100 per-seat license fee for the source code and distribution must be through GarageGames, but the model seems quite pragmatically attractive, seeing as how open source hasn't quite caught on in the 3D games arena like it has for operating systems etc. If you ask me, this is a big chance to improve the gaming scene for alternative platforms.

Plus the Tribes 2 designer would go along with the game. I personally think Garage Games should take it under it's wing, but that's just a personal feeling.

Did I already said all i needed was a freakin spinfuser and a jetpack?

Forget the link?

Of course, it's $100 to get ahold of, but that's rather reasonable compared to licensing costs of any of the other major game engines.

Support for game development on Linux is increasing. This book is a good first step.

Although the following is not Open Source it might be very interesting to all those who want to develop games for Linux: http://www.garagegames.com. They will be releasing the V12 engine (Tribes 2 engine) for $100 USD. Full Source AND it is multi platform (Linux, MAC, Windows).
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I've had a sore point with games for years, because there were only so many ideas being rehashed over and over. Same junk just looks better, but the game doesn't hold my attention. Strange as it may seem, I download one of the Apple ][ or C64 emulators and find all sorts of creative, interesting games which never made millions of dollars, but are fun to play, even trying to figure them out.

Updates of some of my favorite old games, I felt have been spoiled by the too-many-cooks "solution." (If a mountain bike is fun, then it should be fun with a blown-hemi, positraction differential, chrome wheels and sound like a Hog!) Uhm, no. It's the idea, if it isn't a fun idea, all the skin, glam, glitz and 5.1 audio isn't going to make it any more fun. Best games are still designed by people with an idea, who put it together. Crummy games are rehashes pushed by companies with shareholders as hungry and interested as a nest of baby birds looking for momma to show up. Seems there was a fun place to look for new developments. www.garagegames.com/

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All your .sig are belong to us!

Check out www.garagegames.com, here you can license the tribes2 engine for 100$... play with it the rest of the year and you just might be ready

I managed to get in by making mods for games like Quake 2 and Half-Life - nothing shows your skills at making a game more than actually making a small game!

As for education, I don't have a Uni degree, and quite a few of the other designers I know don't have degrees either, so it definitely isn't a prerequisite.

Most of the stuff that you're thinking of learning about though seems very programmer-oriented (D3D, AI coding). There is a difference between Design and Programming (and Art), although in most cases a designer also has skills in another area.

Your best bet is to make a small game or a mod, and submit it to a game company asking for a job at doing what you like doing best. If you enjoyed making the levels and game rules, then be a designer. If you enjoyed coding the engine, then be a programmer. If you enjoyed making the models, be an Artist. If you just enjoyed playing it, be a QA guy!

Oh yeah, also check out GameJobs and The GarageGames marketplace for positions

... The Linux-compatible Tribes 2 engine is being sold, source and all, for $100 by GarageGames. They're all ex-Sierra/Dynamix employees with a license.

You do, however, have to publish your game through GG...

You can get a developer's license of the engine for cheap ($100 and some publishing restrictions)

If this game is successful, and many people playtest the engine and submit bug reports and the folks at Tribes2 keep on top of it, you might see a whole slew of mods that may rival Half-Life's in terms of quality, only this time on the Linux desktop. It'll be a real shot in the arm for linux game development to have this stuff available at large, if it catches on.

There are some publishing restrictions on the license that you'll probably want to check out if you think this is the way you want to go, but if it'll bring over any programmers from the Windows ballpark, or at least prepare Windows game programmers to work with a game engine that has success on the Linux platform, that increases the chance that we'll get more and better games.

If you haven't seen it already (or if it hasn't been posted here) check out GarageGames.com They are a group, founded by many Dynamix game designers, who are looking to cultivate the untapped masses of Independant Game Studios. Being an "indy" myself, I'm very pleased to see this.

I don't think gaming is dead because the people aren't buying, I think gaming is dead because the publishers are killing it. Game publishers are notorious for "sticking" with safe concepts and ultimately flogging them to death. As a result they don't give many game shops a chance with genre-creating games, thus stagnating the market and making people tired of playing "just another Doom Clone on graphics crack."

Think about it. Would "The Sims" have been published if Will Wright hadn't already had a name for himself? (and the money and contacts to make it happen?) No. His ideas would have been discarded because they don't contain the words "Frag" or "300 giga-polygons a nanosecond".

This is a real threat to the gaming industry, and a hotly debated topic in the development circles. Hopefully with GarageGames and their ilk, we'll start seeing a lot more new concepts, some good, some bad, from the teeming masses of under appreciated indy studios.

My other .sig is a Porsche.
Vulgrin the MAD