I think the license of Gamestudio is a strong selling argument (especially in the lower editions). But in the end if you compare the A7 Pro edition with Torque commercial then it will be the same (price and EULA). You can produce games, business applications or screen-savers with both of them.

Networking has some problems, but the msot problem people experience actually is the fact, that you have to UNDERSTAND how networking works.

Ok, A7 does some movement prediction itself if wanted, but that's only part of it. If you want efficient network code, you first need to get into it - this is where most people fail.

Can anyone point me to the complete version of the A7 3D GameStudio license? On the website it says under No Royalties:

Quote:

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As owner of any Gamestudio/A7 single edition you can freely publish and distribute your applications. You don't need to pay royalties, you don't need to show credits, you don't need to ask for permission. There is only one exception. It's illegal to use Gamestudio for games that propagate genocide against a certain group, race, nation or religion existing in today's real world.

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In the past i've forgotten which version, but with A4/A5 or maybe A6, I can remember a little line about showing on exhibitions and tv-shows or something like that. This is no longer the same with A7?

Edit nvm found it in the manual:

Quote:

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The right for royalty free distribution does not automatically include the right to use or broadcast GameStudio applications for commercial purposes at public places, in TV shows, and in arcade machines. In such a case please contact the support to find out whether a one time license fee is required or not. For a repeated logo-free broadcast of a Gamestudio application within a TV show series, normally a one time fee of US $ 800 per application, or US $ 2400 for an unlimited number of applications, is required.

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Father_Frank: I absolutely agree with you about the GS license being a strong selling point. I'm still taking one last look around, but am most likely going to go with the Pro version of GS. However, GS Pro and Torque Commercial no longer are even close in licensing. As of the last EULA change in December your rights under the Commercial license of Torque (any version) are exremely limiting. Almost funny. One of the things their license disallows are virtual worlds. But hey, if I drop Kork into the level editor with a tree and a rock I've just created a "virtual world". They say they don't mean exactly that, but what it says it what it says.

Firoball: Thanks for the info. I figured as much, that's usually the way it is. That's not a problem as long as the basics are solid enough to work with. I like the fact that people here are a little more "honest" about the software. Makes things a lot easier than when you're told up front that a product can do something easily with no effort and it's all built-in. I don't mind limitations or issues if I know about them up front, and it makes me feel a lot more comfortable with a product when people are willing to talk about it.

D3D: Ya, that's the only thing I could find. Sounds good to me. And if GS can help me put out a product that someone wants to put on TV I'll gladly shell out the extra $800.

I've often been lambasted on these boards as being too much of a 3DGS fan boy when Torque comes up. But the fact is that 3DGS has certain inherent advantages over other engines that can't be denied: they've been around for over a decade, they started from a game engine and not from a game that was then turned to an engine (tribes = torque), and their licensing agreement has been the same for as long as I can remember.

A few personal anecdotes of my troubles with Torque:
[rant]

1) 5 years ago, their EULA forced you to publish through them... that was relaxed the next year but then all these different versions came up... and then TNL came out and it wasn't clear if it was included with Torque or separate... and now the EULA has changed again so tht if you game isn't entertaining (ie: if you game is boring?), you can't make it with Torque. It seems that every year they have a new EULA which would drive me NUTS as my project is multi-year and I would have be checking every day to make sure I'm using the software legally.

2) The torque staff has always rubbed me the wrong way. Davey is a fine enough guy, but at conferences he is like a fanboy on crack... always there, always butting in, always extolling the virtues of torque. No biggie really. But Jay. Oh Jay is another story. He has an air of, how shall I say, condecention about him that I can't shake. At one conference, we were all in the same room, eating drinking talking. I was at a table with Kelly Reud who is creating a Sex Ed game... pay attention, sex ed, teaching about responsible sex, no "leisure suit larry", not "Hot Coffee: the game", education. As we are talking about her project (she uses/used 3DGS for it), Jay came over to the table. The subject came and Kelly struck up the topic of Sex Ed game with Jay. I'll never forget the look of derision he game her as he told her, boldly and unrepentant, that Torque's EULA would NEVER allow such a game to be created and then walked off just like that. Uuuuuu... that really hit home as to the mentality of the people running it.

3) They have massive educational infiltration yet it's pretty much like throwing a baby into a pool, turning a way, and expecting them to do the butterfly stroke on their own! At a recent class that I taught, neither I nor the students could get the games they made into an EXE... spent SO much time trying to get it to work only to come to the conclusion that the version the school was using apperently wouldn't allow it! So while the Course Objective asked for an EXE and I know Torque was involved in the creation of the class (it's for a huge school after all), I guess they either sold them the wrong license, misled them, or the production path to a simple EXE is so tough that it will take you more than 8 weeks to figure out.

4) Don't even get me started on the pricing scheme. 5 Years ago there was 1 version... two years after 3... now everything is broken up and you have to pay for it separately. I belive the calculation was made that to get the same functionality as 900 USD 3DGS, you would have to pay 1200 USD for all the torque componenets. Don't know if that is still true but I still don't like having to "piece together" my game engine and then, down the line, like the EULA, have these version shift, mutate, and divide so that, again like the EULA, I never know WHAT the heck I have or can do!
[/rant]

I've never looked back since I chose 3DGS over Torque. People mention time and time again how much more professional Torque and yet there are no more games that have come out of Torque than have come out of 3DGS (I mean c'mon: marble blast, think tanks, orbz... these games have been around for at least 5 years and yet they claim to be more successful than other engines? )

JustOneOldMan: 3DGS has it's limits, no one will deny that. But the one limit that it doesn't have is that in the hands of a capable developer, you can prototype a game in no time flat. In the hands of an experienced developer, there is nothing preventing you from making ANY single player game out there. Multi Player (my specialty) IS lacking and it is my personal opinion that they focus too much on the flashy, shadery, good looking side of things instead of the more technically relevant aspects of programming a game, but that doesn't stop me from using it or from creating my game.

And just so you know, on the MMP tip, I've spent 4 years with 3DGS, 2 years developing our current system, and we have a working (albeit unstable) MMOG system. Our holy grail is to stabalize it enough that a) we can publish it without any problems (annoying that what happens in the development version doesn't happen in the published version) and b) that the server can stay up for longer than a few days. But the point I'm trying to make is that even something as tough as a MMP game can be done with 3DGS, with --just like any other engine-- a lot of blood, sweat and tears!

fastlane69: Nice writeup, and I couldn't agree more with all points. Though Jay is no longer with the company. No loss to the customers, and I agree about the attitude.

There were some things I liked about GG, some I just let go, and then over time some that just put me completely off. Constantly telling anyone who asked questions that they "were doing us a favor" even letting us have the tech. And "what do you expect for $100?", though I ended up putting in thousands.

I didn't mind when Melv started developing T2D (now TGB) and it was going to be marketed as its own product. I liked the idea so I bought it. One of the selling points for me was that one of the examples coming with it was going to be a pool game and I thought "Cool, I'll get a look at 2D ball physics in the new engine". Last minute they pulled that example and made a for sale game out of it.

Next they came out with TGE 1.5, and their policy of free updates changed. If you wanted the update, you paid again. I could see that on a major revision, but they made some bug fixes over 1.4 and threw in a couple of lame tools. Still, I paid it.

Somewhere in there I also bought TGEA, whole other story.

Then they came out with the Commercial Pro licensing for TGB for people who didn't want to worry about splash screens or what kind of game they made. Again I thought "Great", and I paid. Now I can't do that either.

They do have their tech out there in a few good areas, good marketing I suppose, but GG is now a long way from an Indie freindly place. Game dev being only a hobby for me I just don't have time to piss around with a bunch of cocky, arrogant people who are apparently extremely offended at having people ask questions about their software, business judgement, or ethics. I've made a good living from computers longer than some of them have been alive (33 years), and I don't know it all for crap's sake.

On the limitations of 3DGS - they all have their limits and any softwre is only as good as the person on the keyboard. That's not a problem, I have no illusions about my capabilities. I just want to play at game dev. I've just been out looking for decent software with decent support, and it looks like it will be 3DGS. I checked it out 4 years ago before I went with Torque and decided against it. Bad choice on my part. GG is probably the biggest reason I recently decided to create my own site so devs could have a place to hang out without being pummeled by "fan-boys" and "wanna-be-god-like" employees.

Anyway, good writeup fastlane...

Quote:

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Though Jay is no longer with the company

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I did not know that!
Hmmm... the term "rats leaving a sinking ship" comes to mind...

He posted a blog a few days ago saying that he was doing really well in his new venture, but that he missed GG. Blah, blah, blah...

I actually feel bad for a few of the GG employees over there that try hard to do good things, but you can really see that "I am the Walrus" attitude permeating through the whole place.

I and many others have complained for years over there about documentation, only to be hammered hard by employees and fan-boys alike. I was amazed at the very nice help file/tutorial/examples that came with the 3DGS/Lite-C demos, they've been very helpful. Why GG refuses to do that I'll never know. And this new TDN (Torque Development Network) site they created and have been touting could be nice, but it's basically a user supported wiki area because GG still refuses to put out real documentation.

Anyway, I could piss an moan about this forever. Better to just drop it and move on, I guess. I did, though, go to the DevMaster engine database and put in my two cents about the EULA crap in a short review. Felt obligated to do that for others checking out engines.

By the way, I like your logo on your website. Guess I should come up with something for mine. I'm no good at art, so I'll have to see what I can make with a box and a circle...

Wait until you further read into the 3dgs manual. You'll have lots of joy with a mixture of C-sCript examples and Lite-C snippets
I'm used to that as I'musing this product for over 10 years, but I think for someone new this will be very confusing. They're working on it, though (some manual pages just slip...)