Ok, about two weeks ago, pai suggested we make a new TT. I thought it might be fun, but then I had second thoughts. Copyright laws, and many other problems might ensue. Instead, we could make a whole new game. I was thinking an MMORPG. If I manage to get a job this summer, I will probably be able to buy TGE or some other game engine that we can easily use. Like Pai said, there are so many talents here that we should be able to do this. Here is my idea for the game:

Red Strike- A mars game. Classic humans vs aliens format. I think this will be decently easy to accomplish. Now, the server will be the complicated thing- A real time battle server. We can program bots, and have it so that there is a real front in the game. We can have a huge map, and lots "CTB" spawn points. I have started to mold out the alien and human players. I decided that the aliens should be in robot suits, as this will be easier to model than some deformed creature. If anybody wishes to change this, just tell me. I can do it :P

Here are some screenies of what the players might look like.

Alien:

Human(eyes were kinda difficult, so I put a mask on):

Tell me what you think. Hell, we may even be able to make some $$ off this!

Ok! Jobs spots are open. Right now, this is a soley volenteer job, so no one will be making money... Yet XD

Director: PGG

Model Makers:
Warfare
PGG
Monica

Scriptors (SPOTS OPEN!!!):
Warfare
CannedSplam
PGG (still learning...)
Monica?
PLAYER?

Artwork:
Racer445
PGG
Jacob

If you want ot be in or out of any of these, let me know!

Forums: http://s9.invisionfree.com/RedStrikeGame/index.php?

Last edited: Tuesday, April 11, 2006 at 2:47:33 PM

Lol. Good job. If there's anything that I could do to help, feel free to ask. The theme sounds like it could be pretty cool, good luck.

Very nice! I can help too once I get my own site (radiatorgames.com) up and running and a new e-mail to go with it.
Heheh, its not up yet so dont check.
Time to check out blender again!

<--- Can do artwork.

Last edited: Monday, March 13, 2006 at 8:46:20 AM

<----Can uh...test the game..

<--- can set an forum about the game.

I can do all three.

I would like it to be you can do what ever you want. You could be a traitor alien. Stuff like that. And if you do someting you get better at it.

^ that might be possible as well. Keep the comments rolling. I am about 1/3 of the way to being able to purchase a good game engine!

Yeh, that would be neat...just as long as TT doesn't die...
I can do artwork and 3D modeling for a human also.
Hmm...I can also donate to the game engine fund if you'd like.

No offense, but the only reason I support this idea is that eventually all processors will be the new Intel ones, and as people get new computers, this game will die eventually...I would like to keep the community intact with another game.

Last edited: Monday, March 13, 2006 at 6:00:19 PM

I can test on Linux, BSD and Windows too if needed.

If you are making this with TGE, the Soldier Pack looks like a very good option. All open sourced, with everything up 'n ready.

I would like to help too, maybe with art/textures?

Wootage, we are definately going to have this done by next year, maybe!

EDIT: Ok, If we are going to do this, we will most likely need to set up a paypal account to accept donations. We are probably going to need about $500. This way, we can get the commercial version of TGE and be allowed to market the game. We will probably not be able to afford any other expansion packs that are allowed to be used for commercial use, as they are about $150. :[ Too bad...

Last edited: Monday, March 13, 2006 at 5:33:46 PM

Did some research...Most likely we will not make 250 grand on this game, so...

The Indie license is $100 per person.
The Commercial license is $495 flat.

It'd be more economical if we had 5 or fewer people working on this. That way, we'd get a lower price than (or very close to) the Commercial license, PLUS low prices on the expansion packs!

The commercial license is $395. We could get the indie version, get all the work on one computer, and then, when we are ready, upgrade to commercial. I am not sure, but I think it is against the law to sell a game with the indi version. I could be wrong though...

this is what you would read

^ in otherwords, if your game is worthy of being sold at all, we want to charge you more. If not, we'll keep your $100 and make fun of you :P

Lol, ok. SO we buy indie version, be made fun of for a little bit, and then whenever we make a lot o' money :P we gte the comercial version. Righto then!

I can soon get enough money for the Soldier Pack. I wonder...when we get Commercial...must we also upgrade our expansion packs to Commercial?
I'm gonna look at that today.

<-- can take money your guy's hadrwork puts into it

Do you think you will arn 250,000 a year?

Probably not, but if we do, something tells me the 300 will not be a worry... :P

DLed the scripting tutorial for torque. Reading it when I go down to the capital today.

EDIT: Ok, I am working on the whole ::holy scripting batman:: thing, but I have made some decisions.

We are probably going to need the tank pack and soldier pack. If we feel like it, the speeder pack. But that is it. Luckily, witht he whole marks thing, we won't have to deal with the whole tree thing. We may, however, have to do some interesting buildings... We can do that, though. No animations, no problems.

Last edited: Tuesday, March 14, 2006 at 11:59:12 AM

I'm probably going to email someone from BraveTree to find out whether it's possible to just have 2-4 people buy the Indie license (since we are making the same game this might not qualify as indie) --otherwise we will have to buy the Commercial license and content packs.

Each person interacting with the Torque source must have their own licence. It's a bummer but its what they want. $100 is a rather good deal per person considering the flexibility of the engine.

^ I know, the 2-4 people thing is an estimate of how many people will get really serious about this.

Fixed up the human head a bit... Still doesn't look as realistic as most games, but if we get the soldier pack, I will be able to fix that.

Now his cheeks don't flare out to the sides...

Good idea, I can test out the game on Mac. :)

Look what I made! :P

Want it? :P

Not to burst your bubble but...
Animations...

*cough*

more musings on game design

ramblings on game design

*ahem*

Monica, you dont need animations for cars because all the moving parts are in the wheels... Torque takes care of that...
Now, as far as coolness and being awesome is, that car really isnt realistic, but its my first model with a skin.

VN WARFARE!!!! Woot! Now I know I am not alone in the modeling world. Now I must make somehting cooler than that :P Hmmm... Human assult vehicle, maybe? I don't want to do tanks yet, but cars and stuff should be decently easy. The only part I am worried about is the animations... Not my strongsuit.

We can do this people... I just need to find a way to get the money. I got some bad news about the job I will be getting... All the money will most likely focus on on my skating, so the income will probably be somehting like $20 a month... Dern.

Lookin around I found this:
http://www.katorlegaz.com/index.php?a=download&c=Blender_3D_Model_Repository
Loads upon Loads of free blender models...
Enjoy :P

^ shiny.. Will try out and possibly modify in 3d wings..

Warfare, did you make that skin in blender, or out of blender. If you sucseded in making it out, could you maybe skin my dude up?

I made the skin in blender, but I have a program that skins objects (.obj) so yeah I could do it for you once I get an e-mail and photoshop.
Then all I need to do is impot the.obj and export as.dts :P

If you got email, then you wouldn't really need to get PS. You could just send it to me XD Thta or racer. I think I am going to update the header w/ jobs now...

I'm in for artwork and possibly scripting, which I'm still learning also...

Ok, I think before we do any more artwork, we need to actually plan the game!

Things we need to discuss:
Units
Vehicles
Buildings
Interface
Styles
DEMO (important)
Purcases
New Ideas?

For units, I think we should try to the typical selection: Normal trooper, Heavy trooper (demolition), Sniper, Some random thing. And then, there is the astoundingly hard desicion of "should they be able to pick up weapons in-game?". I am not sure if we can even do that in TGE. Well, now that I think about it, we probably could. Might save us trouble, though, if we just let them keep their weapon. Now, vehicles are a different story. I think war and I may have to may an organic alien, becuase without it, vehicle transition would be a little wierd. I have to go skate now, so if you guys couldponder this, that would be great!

I think that the options should be like you said, except have an officer instead of "some random thing" and a Marine option instead of heavy trooper. Soldiers can get into planes--no special "pilot" option.
Alien units: same as human.

Also, if we want to make it so that you can be an alien, we have to create a storyline that makes a legitimate argument for both sides; otherwise, people will just be humans.

Vehicles: Tanks, planes, Humvees. For the aliens: Mother ship, little battle ships, hovercraft. You don't have to get in a vehicle.

Buildings: Normal city buildings.

Interface: As you start the game, you see the Torque logo and a list of players to choose from (your stats and place in the game are saved). You choose a player and choose Load Saved Game, Online Game or New Game. Pick one of those options, then choose a side and unit if you are making a new game or joining a server, and voila! There should be a health bar and a place for each side where you can be healed--HQ hospital for humans, mother ship for aliens.

DEMO: You can choose sides, but there is only the normal troop option and no online servers.

Purchases: PayPal directly to PGG.

Note that all my artwork will be donated to this game. I will get no portion of the money that comes from this game.

Hmmm... I was thinking something more... Abstract. And by interface, I mean controls and stuff. Here's what I think:

We have the startup VERY similar to what monica said, but I want to specify the buttons.

Scrimmage: A quick play style mathc that forces you up against any amount of aliens or vice versa.

King of the hill: Hold mount Olypus as long as you can :)

Online: This is a new catagory in itself. You can create a server, join a "mini server" (A server hosting KOTh or scrimmage), or, you can join THE MASTER BATTLE SERVER!

Master battle server= A 24/7 server that never resets. It will be a CTB type, and will have a real time front. The only time it resets is when someone gets to the final destination (monica's HQ or mothership). If you want a look into this, look here

EDIT: racer, how bout what your paycheck WOULD be goes to PTT?

Last edited: Thursday, March 16, 2006 at 5:09:23 PM

Hey guys, great idea and I wish you all the best of luck with this project, gonna be a long road but definately worth it if you take it all the way.

I take it that PGG and Warfare you guys are using blender for your 3D objects, if that is the case I have a couple of little presents for you. A while ago I was researching 3D programmes and originally decided to use Blender, but after careful consideration (basically I hated the interface) I changed my mind and now use 3D studio max and Milkshake. I would reccomend Milkshake as its very easy to use, has built in plugins, supports easy animation and has the easiest dts exporter out of all the programms I tested (just like saving a word doc!!), to top it all its free for 30 days and only $25.00 to buy - I tell you thats a bargin!!! - definately worth you checking out could save you a lot of time. Here is the LINK TO MILKSHAKE

I just loaded up Blender to check the import and export options, bid the same with my other 3D programms and discivered that many are compatable but none have blender import/export options, except blender itself. To change between programms is very useful for modeling as its easier to do some parts in different progs. The thing is this, blender does let you import and export, amungst others, 3D studio max (3ds) wavefront (obj) and lightwave (lwo) these are popular file types which means that they can be imported and exported from milkshake and 3D studio max. This is handy if you are having problems with the blender dts exporter and adding collision meshes to your objects as these two programms have easier dts exporters than blender. It also good news as there are hundreds and hundreds of free 3D studio max, wavefront, and lightwave objects available off websites which you can import into blender, dont get hung up looking for blender files as there are very few site that offer free blender models, and Warfare has found the best one which he posted above.

Now to the juicy bit. If you are not aware there are few programms that allow you to open dts files directly, most are just to view the object like show tool pro. But there is one I use that opens dts files and many other 3D file types then allows you to save them as 3D studio max (3ds) , Milkshake (MS3D), wavefront (obj) and lightwave (lwo), these can then be imported into Blender, Milkshake, 3D studio max etc and edited. This will allow you to edit and modify any object that is used in TT. The actual programme is used to skin objects if you want but I just use it as converter mainly. Its called UNTIMATE UNWRAP 3D Again a fairly cheap programme with nearly 40 different downloadable imorters/exporters, the demo is full except it will not allow you to save files, only the full version has that option.

I do not have time to make anything for you at the moment as I've already got way to many projects on the go and have no intention of muscleing in on your project, however if you are having trouble with with Milkshake (which you should'nt - way to easy) or if blender is giving you hastle exporting to dts with collsions give me a shout as I am more than willing to do that part it for you with 3D studio max and it may save you a whole lot of time and stress, no worries at all. Again if you dont get ultimate unwrap 3D and want something converted let me know

Here is a great site for some accurate, short, quick and very useful turorials for MILKSHAKE amd ULTIMATE UNWRAP 3D

If you are looking for textures for 3D models have a look HERE and HERE there are lods of great sites full of excellent textures just google for them.

Oh and finally, as I stated way above, a little present for you blender heads. When I originally decided to use Blender, that was before I changed my mind to 3D studio max I did a whole lot of searching for plugins and scripts for the programe, luckly for you guys I never deleted them. Its a 9 meg download but worth it. I've uploaded it onto my site so get it here BLENDER PLUGINS

Once again good luck, its a hell of a colaboration you got here and with all the skills you have between the group I'm sure you will succeed.

Daz

Ohoh... Shiny. I do not use blender, though. I use wings 3d. Much better. Luckily, I think it can read blender files, AND can export to blender too, so I should be set, there. As for 3d max and milkshape, I have a mac. It is excelent, but nobody else likes them, so there are few free 3d programs.

Warfare on the other hand XD

Just started working with another vehicle. I call it... Armed troop carrier that is not done...

Will add wheels later... I want to try and stay away from treads right now.

Jet pack trooper.

Yeah

For what I help in: make your own site, donate my stuff,or keep it or whatever.

Oh yeah. We should start talking to GG people.

^ good idea, too. We need to learn the capacity of the game engine to the ful;lest extent

I was just struck with a brilliant idea. Ok, so, whenever you are playing a game, it is always annoying ‘cuase you always have the same units. What if, inside the game, there was a smaller game that was called “research”. This game would consist of codes poopin up on the computer, and some random person typing them in. The more codes you type, the more you have researched. Once you reach a new research lev el, you are allowd to make a request to the game designers about a new vehicle or weapon with improved stats. You are limited to the amount of research one person can do, and lets say only three people are allowed to do it a day. I don’t know about you guys, but if I were playing a game, that would be frikin COOL!

Unfortunately, there is something that we have completely overlooked: finacial dealings. Are we going to charge per/month, or just one fee when you buy the game. The p/m would probably make more meny, but how would we track that? We would need a database, and definately need to have a master accountant. My mom can only help so much with that (she is not good w/ databases). HOWEVER, my mom CAN help with marketing. Luckily, she is in Small Buisiness development, and has some connections and skill that will come in handy to our needs. I think this should be high on our “we really need to figure these things out” list.

If you are going to charge by the month, it better be a really good game...
I think you are getting ahead of yourself

Not to be negative but...

I think really high on your "we really need to figure these things out” list should be to make a fun game to play. And not worry about making it over-complicated et al. Don't bother thinking about selling the game until you've ACTUALLY made one.

Good luck

The members can give us different heads and then we can add them.