Friday 30 August 2013

Friday Screenshot Finally

Ready To Let The Cat Loose

So you've waited long enough for some visuals, so without any ado here are some shots for you.


Here we have three enemies, one of which I dispatched with my trusty sniper rifle with the other two making there way to my position. I can make a b-line for the door which will give me some concentrated fire, but I would also be trapped.  Not quite sure what assets in Reloaded will be sphere shaped, but the wireframe ball rolling through my battle will find it's place soon enough.


A few seconds later, one of the enemies decided to rush me and start punching and kicking his way to victory  Even though fire can be exchanged both ways now with working health, melee combat does not impose any damage or make physical contact so his efforts are in vain :)

Progress So Far

As you can see, I have integrated the characters and AI into the main terrain & physics demo and started populating it with some assets such as sandbags and buildings (well, one building to be exact).  I've given the characters a patrol route around the building and I start some way off near the shore, so I can sneak up on them and snipe them if I wanted.  The zoom feature is not in yet for the rifle, but that will come when I make a full integration of the latest weapon system from Classic which is pretty good actually.

What's Next

The week is over and the weekend begins (when I next wake up). I have some more assets in the form of finished ladders, stairs and a door plus the need to connect it all together so I can place some enemies in the building and on the roof.  My hope is that the demo will be a sort of 'assault on the building' and make it quite hard for the player to win.  If I can create that, I will have put together the first game play glimpse for Reloaded.

Signing Off

As Rick logs in for the day, I log out for the day, so until Monday (or sooner if you are lucky) I will bid thee goodbye for now.  I hope you like what you see so far!

15 comments:

  1. Hi Lee I saw how are you progressing and I must say I am very happy with your progress :) I did not think fps creator will become more expansive in this new fps creator called "reloaded" and according to what I've read many problems that will be deleted in x9 were very frequent, in fact, is called reloaded for some reason;) we could finally finish what we had left aside in x9, but finally now with much more power, dynamic, an engine made ??for the dynamics of the movements, but the thing I'm really happy is that there will be no more than a calculation of the absurd level memory construction due to the lights which made it very heavy, and do not forget that the grid will be expanded and a great graphics :) I'm not a maniac for graphics XD I think the real taste to create a game as it is passion to be satisfied with their work and do the final play to others, this counts for me :) but it is true that the world of the new generation now look much the graphics :) I wanted to ask you something Lee: I know you've already answered in one of the old posts, but I wanted to be sure even though it is still early to tell. there will be backward compatibility? the legacy mode? because maybe if i tell you, maybe believe me crazy but I have 100 GB of entities and objects created by me in these last years XD and I'd like to be compatible in this new fps creator :(. I hope so. if there s no legacy mode, I have done so much work for nothing :( :( anyway let me know :) anyway, i make you my compliments, good work Lee, keep on this way you great :)

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  2. I am hoping they get a rework the characters anyway. Im sure bond will re animate and do lod and things.

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  3. I do not know if will make new animations for the characters, perhaps it would be better to make the new model pack fps creator on the new but certainly a legacy mode would serve a lot. bonds probably will decide whether to make an upgrade of the old model pack or a new model pack for the new fps creator reloaded. and given the new possibilities it offers, it is better to make a new model pack for me:) and then do an upgrade of the most beautiful model pack seems not wright for me: (I bought all the model pack and know that it will not works in the new fps creator reloaded ... hell I would have spent a lot of money for nothing:(I want the legacy mode. has reason Game Ranger, also for the fact that if one of us had done the model pack and would like to upgrade them to the new one, it can not possibly because we have to start to zero all because to the file format of the different models. then if they make an upgrade is better., or the better solution is both: legacy mode and upgrade :) :) why only one of the two should we choose? Jem Freiesleben I too think like you :) but Lee said that perhaps will no longer be in .x but we'll see ... I'm scared for this. :(

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    1. I thought .X was tied to the directx thing - so taking it out wouldn't make sense, as fpsc is still using direct x 9. As a modeller I can see the advantage for supporting additional formats though.

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  4. I don't like what I see . It looks horrible.
    Yes shaders and high res textures,sprites,high poly models are coming this is about AI and not visual elements.But what about that 58FPS?I thought engine optimization is done FPS drop down and memory leak problem solved.Than what?
    With shaders and higher res textures,high poly models FPS going to drop down to 20 on Lee's machine which means 0 on our machine.

    This is the point where I decided to not support this project instead wait for the "final" product and some reviews from unlucky supporters.

    At this point it looks like we already have to wait at least 5 years from release to a polished , mostly bug free product.

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    1. easy ...
      if u missed it its time to point out
      that Reloaded is a module dependant engine
      now that means its not hardcoded

      in reloaded stuff can be optimized much better
      and FPS wont be a issue
      see - this is all still wip
      and if the rest of us would be that way
      reloaded wouldnt even be in production
      so instead of jumping the gun - how about
      reading between the lines and most important
      support it now, because now is the time
      and not a year after the release
      anyways prejudgment is the reason why we dont get more insight into the developement of reloaded

      there are just too many ppl who tend to overlook the obvious
      that this all still a wip showcasing whats currently going on
      and whats to come

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    2. @sc fp: Let me explain. 60 FPS is a cap imposed by the vertical synchronisation to prevent screen from "tearing". In other words, LCD monitors usually have a refresh rate of 60 hertz which means we can render only 60 frames per second and anything above that will result in screen tearing (horizontal lines). This is why there is no point in rendering more than necessary as the user will not be able to spot the difference (much like our eyes can distinguish roughly 24 frames per second). Before you jump the gun read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_tearing

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  5. sc fp your complaining about 58 FPS? I'm pretty sure staying within 60 FPS is the safe norm.

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  6. No, because if it's running at less than 60fps (which it's capped at) on Lee's monster PC, then it's going to run at 2fps on a normal person's PC.

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  7. With regard to fps.

    True its is to say that if a system and software is uncapped then if in game engine terms one can start building an empty level with an uncapped frame rate of 500fps when you start filling that up then especially in the case where various heavy and continuous calls are made to an engine many times per second then if the engine is not built to efficiently manage those calls. e.g. in the case of dynamic entities, particularly perhaps AI and just about everything else then fps can quickly fall off and dramatically so.

    This has always been the case with all engines no matter what standing. The better the engine in that respect the better the end performance and fps.

    Of course the only way to really find out what that means for the end user in real time game play is to actually have users build games and distribute them so the game makers and game layers can actually prove the results in a variety of game levels containing a wide range of content to see how that pans out in a wide variety of circumstances.

    Thus we wont know hoe Reloaded performs in actual game making until we can do that and use it to that end.

    However I am sure that before that you will be able to get a good indication as soon as any relatively complete initial release of V1 is distributed to you so test it for yourself. That may be a long way off and the product is under development. A little unfair to make a judgement at the moment.

    Still I understand the concerns and fps is always going to be one.

    I have no idea if Lees work shown is capped and if so then that does little to indicate the real situation anyway.

    No doubt Reloaded will have its work cut out in maintaining performance and fps to an acceptable level which is why Lee has constantly changed and adapted so far some of the development to accommodate spikes in loss of performance. As always that may mean Reloaded does not accommodate envisaged features to the level of complexity either ideally wished for or desired and that may impact of the product and the reality of how good it "Can" be.

    The reality is Lee is working with what is possible and not what is perhaps ideal and I am sure it is unlikely to meet everyone's expectations and aspirations in perhaps numerous areas.

    Reloaded is not a complete re -write using a complete new set of technologies from the ground up chosen and designed with unlimited time and resources at hand so choices are limited for Lee and what he can do with what is available from all those points of view.

    Not ideal perhaps but thats the way it is given the initial choices in the way Reloaded was going to be developed and from what when at that stage again the choices were probably quite limited for TGC.

    Have some faith yet and wait and see then well either it will perform adequately or it wont. In the mean time I guess its fine to air any concerns which are perhaps legitimate.

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  8. Some very good points there, Peter.

    However I just want to point out that we assume he's got the FPS capped at 60fps (that's standard and one screenshot shows it running at 60fps). One of the screenshots shows it running at 58 frames per second, which means either Lee has it capped at 58fps for some bizarre reason or it's running slower than 60fps on his monster PC.

    Of course we have to bare in mind that this is all still unfinished work and for all we know Lee's PC might have crapped itself for a second just as Lee took the screenshot.

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  9. Well clearly TGC and Lee want to see the best possible performance and fps for Reloaded otherwise it will not meet users or their own expectation/aspirations for Reloaded which even TGC seem to be looking towards.

    Lee seems to be quite concerned about performance and the quality of the product and if it does not prove to be on target or meet their own aspirations as it were I am sure TGC will themselves will be as dissapointed as the users. Not that will be of help to either. TGC obviously want Reloaded to be a very successful product and clearly classic style performance, fps and or issues wont be what everyone is or was expecting and will impact on its success in relative terms to its quality in those and all other areas.

    I am sure it will be as good as is possible. If that is not good enough to elevate Reloaded to a much more prominent position than past products then it will sit somewhere in between what perhaps is aimed for and what in reality it delivers which will eventually dictate it success in the longer term.

    As said previously elsewhere the bar has been raised and expectations high and setting such aims one would be disappointed if something near to that is not the outcome.

    We have to wait and see.

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  10. I think this all comes back to the idea that Reloaded should be beta tested by the pledgers to get some real feedback on the earlier builds before it goes out for slaughter to the big wide world.

    There is no way Lee can be designing the engine, building the engine and testing the enging thoroughly by himself. I think the longer FPSCR goes without any alpha / beta testing the more of a risk this will become.

    I think Lee said that integration will be happening once the AI module is done so hopefully we can expect this to happen fairly soon.

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