Re: Poll ideas?

[Steve Baker <sjbaker1@airmail.net>]

Christian Reiniger wrote:
> 
> Steve Baker wrote:
> 
> >> Yes, but i think that it will be easier to get graphic artists, when there are
> >> bigger teams.
> >
> >Well, that may or may not be the case - it's pretty illogical though.  If a game
> >engine exists with enough features to do the job - why should the number of people
> 
> I think part of the problem is in the "enough features to do the job".
> Have a look at the Quake/Halflife/... mod scene. There are tons of good
> graphics artists / modelers / map designers etc out there, but they're
> concentrating around the two or three best games, correction, game
> *engines*. The engines that produce good quality output and, even more
> important, that let them realize their visions best, the engines that offer
> the most possibilities, the most useful hooks for added functionality, the
> ones that are most extensible, the ones whose (?) behavior can be modified
> most.

I guess so - but the point about freeware games is that they can (in essence)
change ANY part of the game behaviour because the programmers are sitting
there waiting to be told what fancy features the artists need.  If an
amateur Quake artist wants something that Quake can't currently do, there
is no use going to Carmack and asking for that feature to be added.

However, if someone were creating *gorgeous* new levels for one of my games
and wanted something added, I'd be very anxious to accomodate them.

Perhaps that's a message that is not well understood.

It would help *greatly* if artists could be involved when the game engine
is being written too - it's easier to build features in as you generate
the code than it is to hang them off the edges after it's done.

> And it's not that these people are Windows fanatics. They're not. The
> problem is that Linux doesn't have an interesting environment for them: No
> killer game engine, often immature or non-existent tools (Steve - do you
> have a powerful graphical track editor for your kart game? Can you
> import/use models created in 3DStudio?)

TuxKart *can* import 3Dstudio files...I don't have 3D studio - so it's hard
to know how well I do on that score - all I can do is pick up other people's
files and try to load them....but it's there.
 
> If enough people team up and do their thing properly, then they can come up
> with such a killer engine and the matching tools. And then it's mainly a
> matter of (1) persuading 1 or 2 artists to design some demo "level" and (2)
> show that demo & a list of the most exciting features & the tools to the
> artists.

Yep - I think that's it.

> Especially if the stuff is cross-platform (like most of the game
> libraries developed right now).

Indeed - everything I do is cross-platform.

> >    Codey Ventually - and his annoying brother Bugsy.
> 
> :)

Bugsy has been working on my code overnight - so I'd better go
and see what he's been doing  :-)

-- 
Steve Baker   HomeEmail: <sjbaker1@airmail.net>
              WorkEmail: <sjbaker@link.com>
              HomePage : http://web2.airmail.net/sjbaker1
              Projects : http://plib.sourceforge.net
                         http://tuxaqfh.sourceforge.net
                         http://tuxkart.sourceforge.net
                         http://prettypoly.sourceforge.net

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