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Torque Network Gaming Library Released Open Source

Posted by simoniker on from the ping-marvellous dept.

An anonymous user writes "GarageGames launched the Torque Networking Library under the GPL today - this is the PC game networking technology behind Tribes and Tribes 2. It's also available under indie and commercial licenses for closed source projects, but OpenTNL.org is the home for the open source release, which also has an official FAQ online. Along with the library itself is a master server implementation for game tracking, a graphical test app, Zap and a retro-styled space shooter."

4 of 183 comments (clear)

  1. I've been working with Torque by oskillator · · Score: 5, Informative
    I've been working with the Torque engine for a while, and my assessment is that it's very solid where it counts (assuming you want to make a tribes-like game), but surprisingly flimsy in areas like extensibility and documentation.

    I imagine it's par for the course in the game industry, where code is written to be abandoned within a few years.

  2. Re:Other good network layers by ezavada · · Score: 5, Informative

    Hmm... I guess I really should have hit preview.

    I meant to say:

    Other network layers to look at are OpenPlay and SDL net, both of which are also also free and OpenSource.

  3. Re:Awesome news! by silentrob · · Score: 4, Informative

    Tribes and Tribes 2 will be available for free download on May 4th. Or will also be available bundled in Computer Gaming World on the same date.

    IGN Article here.

  4. Re:Awesome news! by Mark+Frohnmayer · · Score: 5, Informative

    Yes, TNL can easily handle 60 players who all have line of sight to each other. TNL takes a different approach - for most simulations the TNL server allots a fixed amount of bandwidth per client (Tribes 2 was 3K per second), regardless of how many objects are visible to that client. For each packet the server sends, it proritizes objects based on relevance to the client and then writes updates based on that priority. TNL performs a bunch of other tricks to reduce bandwidth usage as well. Take a look at the design fundamentals for more in depth info.