Modding a game for the first time.
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Hey guys,
I'm looking to work on modifying an existing engine, mainly focusing on adding new gameplay features, creating new games of various genres, learning about using shaders (just the basics), and adding some new AI to fit with any new games I create.
What engine would you guys recommend I start with? I've had a look at the Source engine, and also Torque (my university has a license), but with a fair few options out there, all with varying strengths and weaknesses, I'm struggling to find a good starting option.
I've got experience making my own games with OpenGL, XNA and SDL, but I'm still only an amateur developer with a lot to learn, if that helps.
Quote:Original post by Exomoto
What engine would you guys recommend I start with? I've had a look at the Source engine, and also Torque (my university has a license), but with a fair few options out there, all with varying strengths and weaknesses, I'm struggling to find a good starting option.
I took a machinima course a year back that made use of the Source engine. We worked primarily with the Hammer and FacePoser editors, modifying the engine only very little. Overall, I was impressed with the in-depth functionality and documentation that Valve has put into their tools. The Source engine can be buggy at times, and it has the occasional unexplained phenomena, but that's life.
Torque I've never dealt with. Someone else wanna jump in for that?
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Quote:Original post by Omega147Quote:Original post by Exomoto
What engine would you guys recommend I start with? I've had a look at the Source engine, and also Torque (my university has a license), but with a fair few options out there, all with varying strengths and weaknesses, I'm struggling to find a good starting option.
I took a machinima course a year back that made use of the Source engine. We worked primarily with the Hammer and FacePoser editors, modifying the engine only very little. Overall, I was impressed with the in-depth functionality and documentation that Valve has put into their tools. The Source engine can be buggy at times, and it has the occasional unexplained phenomena, but that's life.
Torque I've never dealt with. Someone else wanna jump in for that?
From the little I've looked at Torque, a lot of the focus appears to be on scripting rather than hard coding, which is what has put me off it.
Source has some nice documentation for its tools, but there isn't a lot of information related to programming. It's possible that no game engines have a massive amount of documentation related to programming, but I'd obviously like to check all possible options before selecting an engine to work with.
Does anyone have experience working with Unity?
I took a look at unity once and it seemed like a very strong possibility. But I haven't got the money to buy it. :D
The source engine is a good way to start, despite its bugs and unpredictability sometimes. I can only talk about this engine mostly. I still need to look into other engines. Theres other factors at stake. I, for example, am figuring out a way to create some horror stories and the Source engine just isn't adequaet for this, because it doesn't manage lighting and shadows as well as I need. Physics is an issue in my case aswell. Source physics aren't the most appealing.
But it's an ok engine to make many good things. I'd go from there if I didn't have such requirements in my ideas. Documentation is a bit superficial sometimes, but it's very well structured and there's a huge community around it. But you're right about programming documentation, it fails at that point.
I also took a look at Penumbra HPL engine. Can't realy talk about the code, just seen that there's no map editor or anything. Everything is made through 3D modeling and scripting. Although I think that maybe you can hard code it (Even though I'm not so sure about what exactly that is).
EDIT: you may want to take a look at this free engine too:
http://irrlicht.sourceforge.net/
I just don't use it cuz I can't realy figure out how to compile the source... I'm not too good with that...
[Edited by - Master thief on September 18, 2009 5:07:52 AM]
The source engine is a good way to start, despite its bugs and unpredictability sometimes. I can only talk about this engine mostly. I still need to look into other engines. Theres other factors at stake. I, for example, am figuring out a way to create some horror stories and the Source engine just isn't adequaet for this, because it doesn't manage lighting and shadows as well as I need. Physics is an issue in my case aswell. Source physics aren't the most appealing.
But it's an ok engine to make many good things. I'd go from there if I didn't have such requirements in my ideas. Documentation is a bit superficial sometimes, but it's very well structured and there's a huge community around it. But you're right about programming documentation, it fails at that point.
I also took a look at Penumbra HPL engine. Can't realy talk about the code, just seen that there's no map editor or anything. Everything is made through 3D modeling and scripting. Although I think that maybe you can hard code it (Even though I'm not so sure about what exactly that is).
EDIT: you may want to take a look at this free engine too:
http://irrlicht.sourceforge.net/
I just don't use it cuz I can't realy figure out how to compile the source... I'm not too good with that...
[Edited by - Master thief on September 18, 2009 5:07:52 AM]
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