How good is power render...

shaft · 2001-07-08T10:20:13

I''m looking to buy a 3rd party 3D rendering engine for a demo I will be working on soon. I''m wondering how you all would rate power render. - Installation - Documentation - Initial Learning curve - Ease of use - Speed - Quality - Over-all I''m want to create a 3D RTS type demo (not nealy as complicated as a full game, I just want to play around with the scripting engine I''m building). So I need an engine that can render the terrain and the 3D objects I insert into the world. -Thanks Shaft.

Power Render API Affiliates

Started by shaft June 29, 2001 06:59 PM

20 comments, last by shaft 22 years, 9 months ago

stodge

144

July 03, 2001 03:44 PM

I think my problem is that although PR is cheap compared to most engines, it''s more than I can pay for what I will be doing. I''ll just be playing around with ideas, experimenting and learning.

Unfortunately, none of the free engines I''ve found either work well, or give me what I need. There are some cheaper engines, but there are usually caveats with them - poor performance, missing functionality etc...

So what''s a boy to do!?

*sigh* I always have expensive tastes

---------------------http://www.stodge.net

Sephiras

122

July 03, 2001 05:56 PM

I think there needs to be more documentation before I would touch this engine, but thats just me.

- Sephiras

ChrisE

184

July 03, 2001 06:45 PM

How many pages of documentation do you want?

Author of Power Render (http:/www.powerrender.com)

stodge

144

July 03, 2001 08:01 PM

How many pages are there?

I''m kidding!

---------------------http://www.stodge.net

Norb

122

July 03, 2001 08:55 PM

Power Render is an excellent product for the money. I don''t think that you can beat it anywhere. But for novice graphics programmers the documentation will have to be coupled with the directx8 documentation, because the explanations of how to do things are just not there. Also there are no error return codes from most of the functions that I can see so far. If they don''t work, you just have to figure out why yourself, there''s no return code to give you a hint. But there just minor beefs for what you actually get. I''ve been coding for a while and have just recently gotten into gaming and have no urge whatsoever to learn the guts of directx, so it''s the perfect missing piece.

Sephiras

122

July 03, 2001 09:08 PM

Documentation on the tools would be nice.

V12(The Tribes 2 engine) over at garagegames.com sounds like a pretty good deal($100) too, but there is some stigma about the engine because of the launch of Tribes 2; other then there are some crappy restrictions on releasing a product, but still good for the hobbiest.

- Sephiras

ManFriday

122

July 03, 2001 10:06 PM

Also, the V12 engine is not shipping with documentation either from what I understand.

I believe they say "You get a CD with the source code, a demo program, and our best wishes".

That & the wierd license agreement of the v12 are reasons I decided to go with power render.

MF

ChrisE

184

July 03, 2001 11:17 PM

The main tools (Landscape Studio, PRO Edit and CHR Edit) have completed documentation. Just open the application and choose Contents from the Help menu.

I have the technical reference describing every function in detail about 85% completed. The user''s guide which explains the basic 3D concepts and how to use the main features of the engine is the last thing that needs to be done for docs.

Author of Power Render (http:/www.powerrender.com)

Sephiras

122

July 03, 2001 11:50 PM

You call that documentation?! Oh wait... yeah it is documentation..why didn''t I think of looking there...

lol, maybe I can stop asking dumb questions here now...the dumb statements will still be a coming

- Sephiras

Caemonaustri

122

July 05, 2001 10:07 PM

I''ve read on the PR website that 3D web content is possible. Does this mean I can post a virtual world on the web?

How good is power render...

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