Torque3D Engine Goes Open-Source

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Torque3D Engine Goes Open-Source

Posted by Soulskill on Friday September 21, 2012 @09:30AM from the go-forth-and-build dept.

New submitter DangerOnTheRanger writes "Torque3D, the game engine behind games such as Blockland and Tribes 2, has gone open-source. The engine itself — in addition to four game templates — are all included in a Git repository hosted on GitHub. Documentation is available in a separate repository. Quite the exciting time in the world of game development!"

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Again? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 09:35 · Score: 0

Open Source, twice in the same week...
1. Re:Again? by Anne+Thwacks · 2012-09-21 19:58 · Score: 1
  
  And it doesn't even burn diesel. How relevant is that?
  
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  Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
Could have sworn... by taktoa · 2012-09-21 09:36 · Score: 2

I think I saw this article a few days ago
1. Re:Could have sworn... by RenHoek · 2012-09-21 09:42 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Yes, our conclusion then was: Torque3D is already irrelevant due to the success of the Unity engine.
2. Re:Could have sworn... by orodos · 2012-09-21 09:44 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, you did. http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/09/11/1337216/torque-3d-to-be-released-on-github-under-the-mit-license
3. Re:Could have sworn... by GoodnaGuy · 2012-09-21 09:50 · Score: 1
  
  The previous article said they were going to release it to the open source community. This one announced the opening of the actual git repository. Subtle difference.
4. Re:Could have sworn... by tlhIngan · 2012-09-21 09:52 · Score: 1
  
  That was the announcement that it was going open-source. This is the actual release you can download right now and play with.
  Close, though.
5. Re:Could have sworn... by zill · 2012-09-21 10:33 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Comparing a FOSS game engine and a close-source one, isn't that comparing apples and oranges?
6. Re:Could have sworn... by Tough+Love · 2012-09-21 10:38 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  our conclusion then was: Torque3D is already irrelevant due to the success of the Unity engine
  Which orifice did you pull that conclusion out of? Unity offers a free-to-use version that is very definitely not open source. There is value in that to be sure, for people who want to work with a state of the art engine, but for many devs the open source aspect just matters a whole hell of a lot more. Look at the vast majory of mobile games, the form factor rapidly dominating the game market. Those 3D engines are, to put it succinctly, pure crap. But a lot of those games are fun and successful, and better yet, production values are within the reach of small teams. I say: open source Torque is worth more to the community than the free Unity engine, without in any way belittling the value of the latter.
  
  --
  When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
7. Re:Could have sworn... by Arashi256 · 2012-09-21 10:50 · Score: 1
  
  You know that Unity supports both iOS and Android, right?
8. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 11:22 · Score: 1
  
  You know that Unity free version sucks monkeyballs right? Need a list on how awfully restricted that version is?
  You know that Unity doesn't have a AAA title yet but Torque does, right?
  You know that having a complete open source AAA engine (albeit outdated) opens up possibilities Unity can't hope to match right?
  You know that people who download Torque 3D doesn't care what you think right?
  You know that 1500$ + IOS, Flash, Android = $6000 vs 0$ is a no brainer right?
  etc... right?
  You sir, are an idiot.
9. Re:Could have sworn... by Grayhand · 2012-09-21 11:55 · Score: 2
  
  I've been a fan of Unity for a lot of years. The easy to use interface and browser player were early favorites for me. I remember doing a large island you could explore in a week's worth of evenings five years ago. That was trees and plants with custom textures and some structure models. I had a version of skull mountain including a cave in the mouth and a log bridge you had to cross. In that first week I had a huge canyon through the middle and several bays. I also had a Stonehenge and lava field with smoke and a volcano. You could hear lava bubble as you crossed the field and there was even a great wall and functional gate. All in the space of one working day. The speed you could work was amazing. I loved the texture system because you could layer so I would stack textures at two different scales so I could fade between them to kill that cloth pattern look you normally get with landscapes. I could bring in content and textures and set basics like gravity without a line of code. It's gotten much friendlier but even back 5 years ago it was amazing. The rendering looked better in Torque but it was a headache. I also like the particle system better in Torque but it's a real hassle and less stable than Unity.
10. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 12:19 · Score: 0
  
  You can do that in T3D as well. If you think dragging a model onto the screen is difficult, and a hassle. Then perhaps you should consider changing your profession.
11. Re:Could have sworn... by hairyfeet · 2012-09-21 12:42 · Score: 1
  
  Besides what will it be used for? 300 half assed Quake 3 CTF and DM ripoffs...yay.
  Its not the engine that's the problem anymore, its the artwork, level design, AI design, all of that is HARD as hell, so what we get is dozens of Q3 Arena ripoffs since no AI, all you need is some half ass character skins, and the same dozen levels everyone else has...yay.
  Personally I would love a SP FOSS game on the level of Bioshock but it looks like we won't even get Redneck Rampage, just an endless parade of Q3 clones...yay.
  
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  ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
12. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 13:00 · Score: 0
  
  The same can be said about Unity or any other engine as well (and it does happen) but what you are really saying here is essentially:
  "Take the engine away... you may not use it because I can't stand the noise!"
  At the same time completely ignoring those who actually *can* use it professionally and *are* good at making games.
13. Re:Could have sworn... by Tough+Love · 2012-09-21 13:00 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  You know that Unity supports both iOS and Android, right?
  Good point. Because the source code is available, Torque3D can be ported to both iOS and Android. And to any other platform anybody cares about. Thankyou for illustrating the power of open source.
  
  --
  When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
14. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 13:21 · Score: 0
  
  No, it's irrelevant due to id Tech 4, Blender, Irrlicht, Crystal Space, Ogre and other superior, open source engines.
15. Re:Could have sworn... by Daniel+Phillips · 2012-09-21 14:18 · Score: 1
  
  The previous article said they were going to release it to the open source community. This one announced the opening of the actual git repository. Subtle difference.
  Unfortunately, a difference subtle enough to be lost on the submitter.
  
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16. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 14:35 · Score: 0
  
  This just in: free (and Free) operating sytems childish
17. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 15:50 · Score: 0
  
  Are they superior? In what ways? Or, perhaps more appropriately, in what was is Torque3D inferior?
18. Re:Could have sworn... by hairyfeet · 2012-09-21 16:15 · Score: 1
  
  What games AC? Show me ONE, just one mind you, that isn't yet another MP only half assed Q3 ripoff because that is ALL we ever see from these releases. No cool single player games, no really innovative ideas, just the same maps and CTF/DM/TF2 ripoffs over and over AND OVER again.
  Again handing someone with zero talent an engine what do you get? Crap. Ripoffs, Same Old Same Old. There may be plenty of FOSS programmers but just from the looks of the output game designers? They be lacking.
  Now if you'll excuse me I'm gonna back to my Torchlight II marathon, a game that is actually fun. Like the world needs another MP only CTF/DM game..sheesh.
  
  --
  ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
19. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 18:08 · Score: 0
  
  You quite obviously care what everybody thinks don't you ;)
20. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 20:39 · Score: 0
  
  Not really. Only Unity 3D spin doctors who tries to downplay a great open source move (could be anything, now it just happened to be T3D) just to promote their own interest. That sir, pisses me off.
21. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 20:46 · Score: 0
  
  Take the stick out of your ass, dippy. The only people interested in Torque 3D will be the indies looking for full source access without the stupid copyleft shit. Here's a tip: Those people aren't interested in cloning Quake.
22. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 20:47 · Score: 0
  
  Care to explain how a full game engine is made irrelevant because of a rendering system which is useless on it's own (Ogre)?
23. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 20:48 · Score: 0
  
  An Ogre (open source) engine game.... oh the irony.
  Also.. what exactly are you asking for? AAA titles? If you don't know where Torque3D comes from we have nothing more to discuss.
  In fact we have nothing more to discuss anyway, because it is quite obvious you don't approve of T3D being open source.
24. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 01:11 · Score: 0
  
  *sigh*
  
  Is OGRE a Game Engine?
  No. OGRE can be (and indeed has been) used to make games, but OGRE is deliberately designed to provide just a world-class graphics solution; for other features like sound, networking, AI, collision, physics etc, you will need to integrate it with other libraries, something several frameworks have done, and we have a collision / physics reference integration library as an example in our distribution.
25. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 02:10 · Score: 0
  
  Unlike many other engine releases which have been GPL, this one is MIT which very easily allows for closed source development as well. I think adoption of this will end up being higher than that of the id releases for this reason (though, it may be easier to go unnoticed.) How anyone has taken this announcement as anything but good news (while not really too surprising) is a bit sad how dumb people on ./ have become.
26. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 06:03 · Score: 0
  
  Who said it was a game engine? You need to learn reading and comprehension.
27. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 07:08 · Score: 0
  
  Torque was released under MIT, so it can totally be used on those platforms that don't allow GPL.
28. Re:Could have sworn... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 14:20 · Score: 0
  
  Add to this the fact that Unity's art pipeline is crap.
  The reason, no big, complex project has been done with it is the fact that it has some inherent design flaws that keep it from scaling.
To be or not to be... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 09:42 · Score: 0

Last post they said that the engine was
"to be released"
now you can access a link to the repository, documentation and examples, as said above.
Posix? by leandrod · 2012-09-21 09:43 · Score: 1

Or, when will it run on GNU/Linux?

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1. Re:Posix? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 10:11 · Score: 0
  
  Loki made a Linux port to Tribes 2.... I bought it at half-priced books like a decade ago....
2. Re:Posix? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 10:13 · Score: 0
  
  It already does, and has for 10 years. I remember building Mac/Linux/Win binaries for all my projects in my game development class a decade ago. It's been a cross-platform, $100/person and free for educational use game engine for a long, long time. Now it's free for everyone.
3. Re:Posix? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 07:17 · Score: 0
  
  TGE supported Linux up until 1.5, which was around 2005. At that time GarageGames dropped Linux support company wide as the cost to maintain it had outgrown Linux sales. Since then all Linux support was entirely community driven. Now that it's MIT a lot of Linux programmers have been showing interest in resurrecting Linux support.
YESH! more things to obsess over...:D by michael_rendier · 2012-09-21 09:52 · Score: 1

Well how nice...i'm gonna need a 3D engine soon...right after i get the cluster put together...:D

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Why is this relevant? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 09:56 · Score: 0

While I can see some novelty in poking through old versions of top-tier 3d engines like id's Tech 4 but this seems to be a minor player. Can a 3d programmer explain why this is still relevant?
1. Re:Why is this relevant? by flimflammer · 2012-09-21 10:29 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Because not everyone needs or even wants a top tier 3D engine to make a game? Torque was designed to be extremely easy to use and newbie friendly, while still powerful. id Tech 3/4 is most assuredly not.
  Also, I know people hate on commercial software but the GPL version of id Tech 3 is just that. GPL. You can't make commercial closed-source games (spare the "why would you want to do that" comments please) with it unless you buy a commercial license.
2. Re:Why is this relevant? by angelbar · 2012-09-21 10:56 · Score: 1
  
  I am not a 3d programmer, so I ask... Of course you cannot make a closed 3d engine based on Troque3D, but a game that uses that engine will be too GPL'd? Seriusly asked.
  
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3. Re:Why is this relevant? by iamnothing · 2012-09-21 11:08 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  I think there's some confusion. The id tech engines are under the GPL, so all games/tools/etc created from it must have their source released.
  Torque 3D is under the MIT license, so no one has to release their source regardless of the type of project.
4. Re:Why is this relevant? by Daniel+Phillips · 2012-09-21 14:21 · Score: 1
  
  I think there's some confusion. The id tech engines are under the GPL, so all games/tools/etc created from it must have their source released.
  Torque 3D is under the MIT license, so no one has to release their source regardless of the type of project.
  And as a bonus, the good bits could be imported into a GPL project.
  
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5. Re:Why is this relevant? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 14:41 · Score: 0
  
  The id tech engines are under the GPL, so all games/tools/etc created from it must have their source released.
  Only to people you distribute binaries to. There is nothing stopping anyone from using any of the id Tech engines, up to version 4, making a commercial game and only providing their customers with source.
6. Re:Why is this relevant? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 18:38 · Score: 0
  
  I think there's some confusion. The id tech engines are under the GPL, so all games/tools/etc created from it must have their source released.
  Or pay id for a license...
7. Re:Why is this relevant? by Xest · 2012-09-22 09:58 · Score: 1
  
  The problem I always found with Torque is that they'd promise features in x number of months, and they'd simply never arrive. Some engines such as Torque X they gave up on completely without the slightest hint of a refund to customers whom they'd promised all sorts of things to.
  I never really thought Torque was particularly friendly too, it seemed like a poorly designed mess and TorqueScript was horrible. In terms of ease of understanding of the engine I always found the likes of the C4 engine better, it was worlds apart from Torque in terms of ease of use, quality of design, code, and tools.
  I dunno, I just always found with GarageGames that you lost a lot of time waiting on promises that were eventually broken or trying to fix the engine to do something you'd been promised by the devs yourself such that ultimately it was better to just go with one of the competitors, or if you were targetting something like XNA, then to just start from scratch.
  GarageGame's goals were noble, but their implementation was morally bankrupt, they fucked a lot of customers over with a lot of products, all the way back to the RTS kit, through to TGA getting effectively ditched and promises broken, to u-turns on promised features for T3D after people had already paid, to TorqueX just outright getting abandoned before it became usable - again, with no refund.
  It's good to see they've done this, but if they're hoping to use it as a gateway to selling more of their still commercial products like content packs etc. I'd urge people to heed a buyer beware warning - what they say you'll get, and what you actually get may be very different things, and don't expect any kind of refund if you find you actually got screwed.
8. Re:Why is this relevant? by iamnothing · 2012-09-24 04:27 · Score: 1
  
  There is little indication that they are still licensing their older engines to new clients since they have removed their technology licensing page after the announcement that id tech 5 will not be licensed outside of ZeniMax.
V12 by AstrumPreliator · 2012-09-21 09:58 · Score: 4, Informative

Actually Tribes 2 used the V12 engine. This later became the Torque Game Engine, then Torque Game Engine Advanced, then Torque3D if memory serves me. The V12 engine was also an improvement over the Darkstar engine used for the original Tribes. Before that I have no idea, but this engine has been getting updates for at least 15 years.

It's not exactly the best engine in the world, but open sourcing code is never bad. So thanks GarageGames!
1. Re:V12 by Life2Death · 2012-09-21 17:26 · Score: 1
  
  Its the best to me because:
  I messed with it a lot in Tribes 2. So I can only assume it has gotten better but:
  Its net code was not tied to frame rendering and was object oriented from the get-go.
  Had a built in world editor that worked while live games were running. You could prop a server up and edit the world real-time.
  Supported scripting and compiled it on the fly for faster run-times
  had the best vehicle code I've seen outside of a racing game...
  Hopefully one can learn this, perhaps consider publishing, and then license it for $100 still. That'd be great!
2. Re:V12 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 00:25 · Score: 0
  
  Where does Torque Game Builder fit into all of this? It's yet another variant, isn't it? Off the top of my head I think it was used to build S.P.A.Z.
3. Re:V12 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 02:14 · Score: 0
  
  I think it's similar (precursor I think) to Torque2D (which used Torque3D as base.)
4. Re:V12 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 02:45 · Score: 0
  
  It's true it's not the best, but it does have quite a few good things going for it.
5. Re:V12 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 07:33 · Score: 0
  
  The Torque family tree goes like this:
  V12 fathered TGE, TGE fathered TGEA, TGEA fathered T3D.
  Around 1.3 or 1.4, TGE fathered T2D (this was the no tools all code driven version), T2D got a facelift and changed its name to TGB, and a couple years ago it changed its name back to T2D.
Tribes 2 by n30na · 2012-09-21 10:40 · Score: 1

The real question is if this could be simply used to make an updated version of the tribes 2 linux client.. assuming that was even built on the same engine.
1. Re:Tribes 2 by iamnothing · 2012-09-21 11:10 · Score: 1
  
  Most likely not without a lot of repurposed work. V12 had a lot of proprietary Sierra code that was removed so that we could release V12/TGE. You would have to identify the missing pieces and then find an alternative solution to ensure that Tribes 2 and its mods ran well.
2. Re:Tribes 2 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 17:49 · Score: 0
  
  Screw Tribes 2 I want my damn original Tribes. God how I miss Renegade and Shifter mods :'(.
3. Re:Tribes 2 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 04:32 · Score: 0
  
  The guys at garage games rewrote all the missing pieces from scratch so yes you can now make a clone of Tribes 2 now. In fact one of their first example games for the new engine was a one-off of Tribes with all new artwork and gameplay. These guys are gods to me for releasing this engine under the MIT. This is a huge benefit to the world far beyond gaming. The things that they pulled off in this engine technologically haven't been matched by many in the industry. Probably the closest at least in terms of the network code would be Mount & Blade Warband which can handle a couple of hundred knights attacking each other in high paced horseback sword/bow&arrow/jousting fights, and that's a closed engine. This engine could be re-purposed for so many things now, I'm thinking of medical simulations even. At the chance of sounding a bit over-dramatic, I'd say that by releasing this they just set the human race forward a number of years technologically. Not to mention just the gaming industry itself, this was definitely the kick in the pants it needed. Heck I'm even fantasizing using this engine as the basis for an OS or window manager. There's so many things that could be done now with it that were not possible before. What a nice early christmas gift for the world. These guys rock.
Unlike Unity, Torque3D doesn't sound like Unity by tepples · 2012-09-21 10:55 · Score: 1

Torque3D has one advantage: its name won't be easily confused with that of the "Fisher-Price" style desktop environment that recent Ubuntu releases have adopted.
Loved Tribes 2! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 12:08 · Score: 0

Does anyone still play? This was the first FPS that I ever played. The big maps, team play, and physics (skiing!) were excellent.
1. Re:Loved Tribes 2! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 15:31 · Score: 0
  
  Look up tribes next. There is still a hardcore t2 base.
  Awesome, because for some developers like me, who played tribes and tribes2 for years, I bet that I could pick up this engine and run with it, already having looked at tons of mission files, dts files and assets that supported it.
Not the same by TiggertheMad · 2012-09-21 20:58 · Score: 1

Good point. Because the source code is available, Torque3D can be ported to both iOS and Android. And to any other platform anybody cares about. Thankyou for illustrating the power of open source.
Ported to isn't the same as supports. I believe that you can compile code using unity for multiple platforms. Who cares if torque gets ported to all sorts of esoteric *nix flavors? I want write games on one platform and compile for multiple platforms. That could be done, but I am not holding my breath.

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1. Re:Not the same by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 21:41 · Score: 0
  
  And Unity costs $6000 for all those platforms... and it's still closed to you. Get the point?
2. Re:Not the same by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 06:28 · Score: 0
  
  So you want to be able to provide a game for multiple platforms...and yet you don't actually _care_ about the multiple platforms you supposedly want to support. Interesting position on things. I'm guessing that's why I've never heard of you, you're a complete and utter twat.
3. Re:Not the same by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-22 07:04 · Score: 0
  
  Torque has an abstracted platform layer. When someone talks of porting to another platform they really mean adding support for that platform to the platform layer. Yes you will still have to compile on the target platform, assuming you make changes to the engine to build the binaries.
4. Re:Not the same by Daniel+Phillips · 2012-09-22 10:28 · Score: 1
  
  Good point. Because the source code is available, Torque3D can be ported to both iOS and Android. And to any other platform anybody cares about. Thankyou for illustrating the power of open source.
  Ported to isn't the same as supports.
  Yes it is. You better get a refund on that dictionary you're using.
  
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5. Re:Not the same by TiggertheMad · 2012-09-22 14:49 · Score: 1
  
  Unity can publish to: Web Player, Flash, iOS, Android, Desktop, Wii, PS3, Xbox 360. Torque3d is an engine that publishes for one platform. I could give a fuck what exotic flavor of *.nix that Torque gets ported to, it still doesn't publish to more than one platform without radical re-writes being done by the OS community which I don't see happening any time soon.
  
  So, 'ported to Ubuntu' is not the same as supports publishing to Web Player, Flash, iOS, Android, Desktop, Wii, PS3, Xbox 360, sorry.
  
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6. Re:Not the same by Daniel+Phillips · 2012-09-22 15:05 · Score: 1
  
  You are truly an idiot. Please post again and confirm.
  
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Should be intereresting by lennier1 · 2012-09-21 21:20 · Score: 1

At least, once people like the ones that upgraded the Freespace engine to more modern standards get ahold of ths one.