Hi Lee and everybody. I just wandering when will the next update be.
i know there is a lot of work going on with major work that are being done on the Ai and other stuff, I know we normally get big updates with all the problems and fixes over a long period of testing.
but it would be so nice if we could have a Mini update in the meantime on fixes already been done that wont cause any problems if released to keep us going on with our projects. Bigger problems and work can then happen when its finally ready for the update.

Lee would it be possible to gives us a Mini update on small fixes that has already been fixed and that you know would not make any problems if released . small stuff that irritates the life out off some off the users, stuff that you know will not have problems if you release it, but would make a world of difference to some of the users that can have the small fixes to carry on with there projects and test's they are busy with.

Just a Thought

Thanks again for all the hard work Lee and every one that is part off the continuous improvements and updates.

Pcs.

Hi PCS

I know it can be frustrating waiting for news and updates but you answered your own question



Testing a big update or a small update takes just as long unfortunately, sometimes you get a domino effect where the littlest of fixes would have a massive impact on something else so its best just to hold tight i am sure something will arrive soon

@GraPhiX, yes i hope so as well.
hopefully before Xmas, lol

I've been wondering for a while now, does Game Guru have a development roadmap? You know, like a plan on what features to fix/bring in and when? I always would have assumed no because the community always had the voting board and that dictated what bit of GG was developed next. However, since the move to GitHub, and work on PBR, that voting board has been taken away.

Now would be a good opportunity to establish a plan for the short and medium term, even if all but one of the developers are effectively volunteers. At the moment, it feels like GG is being developed a little bit here, a little bit there; one week it's AI, the next there's talk of completely rebuilding Character Creator, and all the while PBR still isn't 100% finished. Just feels like GG is being pulled in all directions at once recently.

AE

Avenging Eagle yes i agree 100% with you on what you have said. and at this moment in time everyone and i include myself wants a piece of the cake so to speak.
Someone need to put long term , sort term and quick fix project plans on the table, with if they have the man power nominate the volunteers who will work on the different projects, and display it somewhere were even if a newbie arrive he can have a quick look and see exactly who is working on what ant what is the long and short term plans or projects.

Also just a thought

If nothing is released this month don't expect anything soon as christmas is just around the corner and things always go quiet for a couple of months at this time of year.

Belidos, i hope you are wrong. lol we need Christmas goodies.

I think pretty much the plan at the moment is to be continuously working on fixing bugs and fixes, alongside one major update, and for other lesser features to be added by the community. Not sure for certain, but i think the way it's working is he is constantly updating beta with fixes, and then all those fixes will be released in one go to public preview a couple of months down the line with the next major update, rinse repeat.

I think the issues tracker on github is the new roadmap, so i'm expecting to see some improvements here and there and occasionally a new development such as particles which GraPhiX and AmenMoses are working on currently or what Lee has overhauled, such as the importer which works very well with FBX.
This year has been good, the development has increased tremendously thanks to Lee and all contributors on github.

As I understand it:
Lee has his own roadmap with needed additions, but just Lee knows what he is working on next(influenced by the community (steam and forum). Other developers do their own stuff. There is a long term plan, but we do not know. Lee also not know what I do, so it is fair
Github is for issues and random requests. So developers like me can see what features are needed and implement them. Bugs get fixed when a developer find them. Some bugs are harder to track than others, so they need a lot more time to fix. I would give all my money to a guy who implement a "find bug" feature in VisualStudio.

Why we do not see some mini updates?
Lee works in the master branch(maybe he has local branches on his HD, but he only updates the master). So the master always includes the latest features from Lee(even if they are beta) and Bug fixes. I wrote a mail and I also requested it in the survey, that Lee should also work in a branch and rollout the master with Bug fixes more often, but who knows if he read it.

I asked myself very often why we need these monster updates. Small updates hold the product alive, in my opinion, but I am not connected to TGC, so it is not my decision.

See, if it were my project, I'd be tasking my volunteers to look at certain areas from the roadmap rather than letting them go off and do their own thing. I realise they are only volunteers and of course Lee has no real power over what they choose to spend their free time doing, but it would help if everyone worked towards common goals.

For example, PBR. It's still not finished as far as I'm concerned, but if you tasked one or two users to look in-depth at developing the shaders and render pipeline, another to look at lighting, another working in tandem with Lee on the back-end, I think we'd be closer to a finished feature. All these DLC packs are being updated, all these new DLC packs being commissioned, yet PBR is currently only available at a public preview level, not as a general release for the average user on Steam. I would be pretty annoyed if I bought those media packs as a new user, only to discover I had to upgrade to an experimental (and therefore more unstable) version of GG just to use those assets properly.

Of course there's always going to have to be a certain amount of bug fixing going on in the background, which is why I totally agree with you that little-and-often updates are preferable to occasional monster ones.

AE

Probably because it looks good when the update is launched with so many new features and bug fixes

I'm fairly happy waiting myself. Mini updates are ok and all, but not if they break your game. Having a big update on occasion helps stop things breaking as often. Of course there's the other side - a new feature you know is being added that you really want for your game Swings and roundabouts.

@AE with regards to shaders, Preben is pretty much working on them full time, theres been a constant flow of changes and additions to the shaders, plus other volunteers are helping out too. So really were covered pretty eell for shaders which lee free for other stuff, at the moment hes working on the importer and making some great leaps with it.

Mini updates should only contain bug fixes, not more! No features, no changes to any part of the game engine! If your game is build on a bug, that´s maybe not the best idea.


The goal is "Make GG better". We live in different time zones, we have different knowledge about the source, different native languages and different experience with C++. If I need to help AmenMoses with his great physic and particle work, I would keep him more off his work than help him, cause I have no clue about all this stuff.

You need to be patient. The next update will come and maybe it will blow your mind

Sure, but that doesn't mean all the fixes will work New bugs can be introduced from them, it's part of the dev cycle As far as I am aware, I have never based any game on a bug! I've had plenty updates that break my games though Not because there was a bug, but because new changes have simply broken old code.

I think I should write a guide "How to develop with GG". This things are easy to avoid.


Yes, and then we can fix this bug and roll out again. At the moment if a bug fix destroys your game, you need to wait half a year for the fix. Is this better? In every company bugs are over features in the priority list, in this forum not, cause some guys are afraid of bug fixes? I really hope Lee will ignore such statements and just do it, like the hated "going OpenSource" plan. Everybody want to prevent it, but now they are really happy with all the features Preben implement.

To get a reason why we need mini updates, look at the issue board. We have "reminder/bump issues", issues of fixed bugs, enhancement issues, which are needed because we have a bug in the engine and so on. This is annoying, because the real bugs are overcome in the sheer number of issues.

This discussion is over, because I can not argument against the fear of some forum members.

i still vote for mini updates. it will make our life's much better.

Or break things much faster !!
Then there's even more for Lee to concentrate on . Instead of one list after big update there will be loads of little ones constantly.

In terms of roadmap TGC has their own and the contributors can work on whatever they choose to based on their own interest.

Lee however did mention he is looking at ways to improve he quality of characters in Game Guru and exploring possible 3rd party options. Or improving the current CC. So there is some focus that we can see evident.

Not always, especially if you have not touched GG in a year or more.

There are bugs in GG that have been around for years, regardless of update frequency... I also never said bugs destroyed games, just caused them to break and have to be fixed. Not all problems are bugs either, just updates to how things work, which then need to be re-coded.

Regarding the opensource thing, I thought it was a good idea myself. My only real concerns were for TGC and people perhaps taking advantage of it to get a free copy of GG. In practise it has worked really well I would say.

Normally we get a big update, then lots of micro ones to fix issues that may have been introduced. So we sort of get both, just a lack of updates when new more complex items are introduced for a BIG update. Unfortunately as we all know there are often bugs that just want to stay put and never seem to get resolved or just keep coming back!

Perhaps when we have all the features we want, we will finally get a major bug fix. In fact perhaps that could be a focus of a future update? A bugbash cycle