I've been looking around at some indie games out there just to get an idea of how people approach their FPS games. Interesting enough, there are quite a number of game developers that actually develop their engines themselves. There is this one guy in particular who is working on an open world zombie game which graphically reminds me very much of what is currently achievable in Reloaded. But seems to run extremely well. He details a bit in the video below how he has achieved this:









I really like the way he goes about performance. The way the trees billboard at a far distance and the way the shadows change quality based on the players distance from them. What really gets me is the way the night and day cycles affect the sun position and global light (ambient light). These are all things I'm hoping Reloaded can get down packed before we really move forward with things I personally feel aren't as critical (Multiplayer, 3rd person, Character Creator).



I'm glad to hear that the material index has been worked on for Reloaded. Hopefully we'll have the ability to have a wide range with this for things like marsh, broken glass, puddles, etc.



Additionally, I really like the work he's done with audio in terms of 3D sound. I know some members of our community have tackled this via LUA, but core implementations would be ideal.

That's impressive! I wonder if they'll ever put their engine up for sale?

now this guy knows his stuff, very impressed at the speed and shadows and amount of zombies and hit detection etc, very good indeed, the night and day is fantastic stuff.

If only Reloaded was like this but i fear its already behind the times.



His performance looks great the shadows are spot on



Also the engine is finished and and took him 2 years to do it by himself and has unlimited terrain.

Looks pretty good, although he does mention he is using middleware for the trees, so it's not really an engine from scratch. Looking at that video, and in honesty the dev would have had better sense uploading it at a decent res, 480p? Hard to tell precisely, but Reloaded looks nicer in comparison visually, but obviously can't handle scenes as busy as that yet very well. Very nice looking engine though, and may give Lee some ideas, although again as this is probably dx10 or higher, it may be that some things just aren't readily available in dx9. I'm still surprised that, when quads were added to Reloaded, it never saw a performance gain. Obviously something is up if massively lower poly counts don't help matters.

A better video 1080p



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAktDuw0xn8&list=UU40VZV9KlssCwFtwMVBsv6Q

Yah I think he mentioned he's using Spedtree. I remember looking into it way back in a game development class and it was fairly costly so I never go to really poke around with it.



He makes use of lightrays, flashlight, ragdolls and even his distant fog system seems to look very similar to reloaded too. I feel were not too far from achieving what he has. I really think the way he handles the vegetation and shadow qualities is where he gets his performance boosts from. If our limitations are coming from dx9 , is it possible to go higher at this point?



I've also noticed in another video of his he had issues with AMD processors but managed to fix the issues related to it. Noticed with Reloaded, the experience is different from each person's computer; perhaps its not just the video card memory and ram at fault but also what brands of video cards and processors people may be using?







In this video you can also see he's using cells, much like Fallout and Skyrim, allows for you to have a pretty much limitless map. The benifits of using cells can be seen in the video below:

I watched many of the videos.



This succeeds to be far superior than Reloaded can hope to ever be at the moment because the guys is concentrating on the core and getting it right before trying to add everything that can be thought of and to run before he can walk.



He has far superior everything as far as it goes to date with his work. You cant even begin to compare for example The Escape demo with his output even at the stage he is at given that both the engines are still in early development stage. One succeeds and delivers a playable dynamic acceptable game play and the other does not apart from the visual superiority and terrain, veg and world generation system and other things that leave Reloaded behind standing in the dust standing.



I would be happier if I could walk around a world like and looking like that though of course I don't like zombies and zombie games!



His engine succeeds because game world, game dynamics, game play and Yes visuals too in the overall scene environment should look quite impressive and they do in his case. The detail of whether you have a very fine quality highlight on your weapons barrel not so important as it will do nothing much for improving the game experience. The enveloping experience is what matters and for that you need the things he has. Bottom line is it has to be "playable and enjoyable" at fast speeds and the other main things which make it so.



Not really trying to compare as as usual that's not fair but there are clear reasons why all kinds of engines appeal and why others don't and why some use some and some use others.



Impressive is one word I used which may be a guide. Can't say the Reloaded, Escape Demo Visuals, Videos or example Game Play in any way is Impressive to me as it looks like a dog and with an almost empty game level world.



Not sure what kind of machine one needs to run it but if I look at the environment apart from the AI and any end user features which I will leave out and just looking closely at the environment, terrain system generation capability, veg, grass trees and quality of the lighting and shadow system for all those things in general the quality of shadows cast is light years head of Reloaded.



Day and Night Cycle and torch is good and for me at a least would destroy my system if Reloaded tried to achieve it. I had noticed that at one stage his fps was showing at around 57 fps so no idea if that could be maintained into the future with him.



Still impressive is the word.



No buildings I can see there yet and one as always can only comment on what one sees but I don't Reloaded will ever compete with that.



We will have to wait and see. As said you can only relate to what is and not what might be at any given time.



Anyway the engine work to date there looks very good to me thus far. It's a pleasure to watch even.

We had this debate when Reloaded was announced and I still feel that the performance crowd was shouted down by the "if it doesn't have dynamic shadows, I'm not buying it" crowd. There's so much I want to say, but around here pretty-pretty is still the selling point so they have to follow the money.

What he's done is impressive and that's because he built a solid base. Even in my very limited programming experience I've come to learn that you make it work before adding features. I just hope that Reloaded can end up as well as this.

Does he discuss his plans for the engine anywhere?

as i recall it was originally based on a fpsc boosted, not a new engine, with lots of added features, he was originally going on tiles still, and play area of 200 x 200 then as with the software things change, as to pretty pretty shadows, it is important to get the lighting and shadows and what you are going to do with the engine in mind and added early, this works so you can then see what you have left, i dont think the pretty stuff would of changed anything, as the way lee works is the way he works, different approaches has happened, he is adapting and speeding up the engine, which may i say is limited due to x9 end of. and that alone and the fact he is working on a low end comp to appease the zx spectrum pc owners, who kick up a huge fuss, this guys engine what specs was it on? exactly we see a nice working engine and running well. mine runs well with lots of goodies. i think reloaded will get there, if they stop vearing off to do multi player or

side orders of
CONKIT, or CHARACTER CREATOR.
which have nothing to do with the engine and just creation tools for the community. so i think people who want conkit should keep out of dissing things as conkit is another pair of hands taken away from the engine. and multiplayers too.


graphics and fps and good ai make the core end of. i think at this point we should see 109 and see where they go next. i do think the guy who did this engine has good techniques and maybe some food for thought for tgc. but we have no idea how reloaded is going to turn out. as much as i get frustrated and i do. i calm down then make some prep work it sooths me.

happy days

no offence towards anyone this is a good debate and therefore taken as a debate. i love you all

I am really glad there is assistant for these types of features for Reloaded. A great way to have multiple aspects of the engine develop at the same time.

Okay lets be serious. This looks a good game that is being made from scratch, using a few middle-ware tools to help speed up the process. It looks impressive. For one person it looks awesome. However it is a game, and not a game maker. There is a subtle difference here that may be missed when comparing the two. Obviously there will be some sort of editor for this, but a good chunk of the functionality will be coded and not readily accessible from an editor like Reloaded. I don't see it as a direct comparison at all, bar the indie nature and the fact it is an fps. It is not aimed as anything but an game as far as end users are concerned. Obviously there may be Lua or another scripting language that is supported in the same way other games have it, but it is not aimed at games makers specifically.

Reloaded, has it's issues, we all have our individual gripes. It certainly needs to be improved before it could be said to fulfill it's promises. Can you believe that originally, Lee expected to have Reloaded's engine practically done and dusted within 4 months? That includes one month transferring from AGK to Reloaded. Yes, 4 months, and we are now approaching 2 years. Even to my ears 4 months sounded a bit optimistic, but that was the tone at the time.

So both have been in dev for around the same amount of time by the sounds. Reloaded looks to be a little (ahem) behind it in terms of performance and map size. However, I don't think it is so far away it cannot get to a similar level. Being a Game making tool rather than just a game rather helps though I feel, and the added complications of making a general purpose engine that will be used for all sorts of games, rather than an engine for one game is a lot harder to achieve. So we need to be fair in comparisons. If this uses middle-ware, then it is not a cheap option and I imagine there are potential licensing issues as well for anything other than the game he licensed them for.

No doubt it is very nice looking, considering the amount of real estate on display, but it is still a game, and not an engine you can use to make your own games. Not yet anyway

I have to say I'm not overly impressed with this zombie survival game. I'd say this guy has wasted 2 years with what he could have done in Unity in a couple of days. Seriously. It's just one big basic terrain with some trees and grass and a single zombie model that walks, runs, attacks, and dies. Give me one zombie model and with Unity and UFPS, I could duplicate that scene in a day.

You are correct.

Products are not directly comparable and not to be so. different products, different use......

However the objective of both at the end of the day is the same - to deploy a playable game and its in that light and spirit that comments are made or should be and should be taken and not from a game makers perspective. The objective of Reloaded at the end of the day is the same. Correctly you cant compare and should not compare a game maker with a game but you can consider the end game you can make with your game maker - i.e. your compiled game with another game.

Thus we are just considering the aspects in that light as to the end objective and its appeal and not the appeal during the development process.

But in any case though we tend to do so Reloaded should not really be compared by us to anything. It is what it is and the capabilities and results and so on will differ from other products. Don't worry too much about what others do only what Reloaded does and we don't really need to look at other products to know where Reloaded is and where it may possibly be improved.

Its an indie engine and we should look at it in that light. We should expect something to meet that status in itself and be reasonable - work in a stable manner during development and game play to a reasonable expected standard. I don't think we should expect too much but the opinion of what to expect and what individuals think of as reasonable I guess will vary.

That's probably what a majority view would say and governed perhaps in this world by the number of sales it receives as being the measure of success rightly or wrongly

I would agree that given that Reloaded can at least achieve a level of reasonability, not unrealistic expectations and extremes and then it will be seen to be successful in its objectives if it does indeed meet those few basic reasonable core objectives. If more is possible then all well and good and very welcome.

But can you do it with Reloaded?

Lets just lay back, relax, breathe through our pants and wait what the new beta will bring. If its not what whe hoped for whe can still form a neat little polite lynch mob and torch FPSCR in an old barn. Till then...patience.



Lets also remember old FPSC and how well Lee is improving everything.







-Wolf

LOL, I'm not sure how to do that exactly, but when I try visualizing it, it's hilarious and rather disgusting at the same time! I love it! Anyway, like has been said, this is a game, not a game-maker. Whether you like the game or not, there is still an engine of some sort behind all that and what I'm most impressed with is the procedurally generated terrain. I have no idea how that is done, but I have yet (that I know of) to see one with buildings and streets. This was touched on in another thread some months back, and I remember there being a demo in DBPro that did the same, though not as pretty (it was ten years ago, after all). That type of endless world does have some interesting possibilities for games, though, even if the zombie thing doesn't suit your interest. Things like this, though, are a nice diversion while we wait oh so patiently for v. 1.009!

Actually his latest build has roads, inventory, structure building system, mountains, weather and other elements. But indeed its a slow process and he could have just picked up an existing engine and worked from there and have had his game in BETA by now.



Also only reason why I'm "comparing", is to show his process of where Reloaded was at its infancy and where we could have improved and still can. Hoping that maybe some of his techniques may lend to some helpful tips as a resource/reference. If you check out all his videos related to the Titan Engine, he even touches on material indexing, particle collisions and interesting ways about going about them that we may not have considered. Also the forward motion ragdoll effect is pretty eye-catching. But foremost he has somehow been able to get away with a lot more going on at the respect of performance at such an early stage. Though this can be a result of his 3rd party support (Speedtree, etc).



Basically I noticed a lot of the research for Reloaded included playing FPS games; so I figured showing this would also be beneficial in research for mechanics.



No harm intended by this thread. I'm consistently impressed with each new development with Reloaded. Perhaps a bit impatient when it comes to performance. I'm really taken back by how much work Lee has put into Reloaded and am of course confident in Reloaded's future. I've been supporting TGC for many years. I must say I am even more impressed with how many bugs Lee has been able to plow through this week in such a short time.

I recently bought an alpha version of Reflex FPS, an upcoming game that pays homage to the classics like Quake and Unreal Tournament. The engine itself is being developed from scratch by just a few people, and it is already pretty remarkable with beautiful particle systems, fluid movement and a powerful integrated map editor (even though they still only have placeholder media).







My favorite part is the map editor, which allows you to bake the lighting in real-time while still exploring the WIP map. It's something I hadn't really seen before, coming from old map editors like Hammer where you'd have to wait a long time to build the lights. Here's a video I made demonstrating the editor feature.







I realize again that this is a GAME not a GAME CREATOR, but the underlying engine itself could be worth taking some pointers from as it has impressed me highly.