Reasons why you still use Gamestudio

#1: Because it's still around.

#2: Because you're still around.

Because I'm familiar with it (-> it's easy to do the stuff I want) and I'm too lazy to learn another scripting language.

Also, Acknex is not that bad, just outdated as fuck and unattractive.
( still didn't loose hope for a big, unexpected change ;( )

#3: Knowing the API better than my own wallet.

Easy to remember, powerful in use.
400 LoC and you get a wonderful isometric sprite renderer with animations and packing:
http://ps.masterq32.de/?664

#4: Because JCL.

#5: I define my own workflow and how I want to organize my project.

#6 because it's AckCon time

#7 useless A3 Tools might stay useless after all, but become more fancy with a real WMP exporter which needs to be written in Lite-C for Acknex.

#8 because it is as outdated as I am okay, a more serious one: I've ever planned to develop only for Windows (sadly not sponsored by Bill Gates), and to make an in-game editor (i.e. I don't need a shiny editor like in Unity).

#9 imo the easiest 3D game engine to start with. lite-c supports experimental way of programming used by hobbyists like me, code debugging is not a big pain (despite a lot of missing features in SED), that enables me to develop a quite complex RTS game system. object oriented programming would require a more professionally structured programming (I am trying to achieve it).

#10 because it is possible to win a pro license. it gave my project a significant performance boost, that now meets my requirements (and finally prevented me from switching to Esenthel engine last autumn, which was a good decision, as I cannot customize there the movement and collision system without engine source access, what is easy with lite-c).

#11 collision is not bounded to PhysX only

#12 low system requirements both for development and playing.

#13 I know it well enough, and have made my tools I need.

#14 Science!

#15 my crappy video driver can't work with Rayne3D

#16 UE4 needs some time to learn (but probably will use it for creating nice little games for pc and android)

#17 wait(1)

#18 Unpredictable Results

@^: LOL, reminds me of my failed sky-shader attempt, one of many unpredicted results I had :

Awesome, nice wallpaper!

#18 Unpredictable Results


http://image.bayimg.com/86f760cf1e828bb0f31075e44b95d83340287f2e.jpg

#19 I like SED's simple interface (even though it misses some functions).

#20 Royalty free.

I'm using Progammers Notepad 2 for coding Gamestudio. It has the same features as SED (Code Jumper, simple autocomplete, ...) but no in-editor help. But i have never used it... You can run Gamestudio as a custom tool what works fine.

Thanks for the tip, though the in-editor help is important for me. Also is that something like Notepad++? I have used that one for modding and it is/was pretty good.

is there a lite-c plugin or data file for pnotepad2 that you can share with us?

If you know the API well, it won't be needed. Standard C/C++ Syntax Highlighting and adding a custom tool will be sufficient. I'm having my defaults with "-nx 200 -diag" and another tool with only "-nx 200"
(diag is useful but not always necessary for smaller scripts)

#21 Stable and run great on older computers
#22 Well documented and easy to use
#23 vec_functions
#24 Beacuse 3dgs have everything i need to finish my game
#25 Beacuse i have friends here
#26 Because when we are in a hopeless situation, we see light and JCL inside
#27 Beacuse there is no alternative
#28 Beacuse i win a pro license

It's really good, just not flashy.

#29: No Refunds

#30: JCL sent me a PM with a link to google maps with a pin point on my house. He said he would cut me so bad I'de wish he hadn't cut me so bad - if I ever stopped using game studio.

#31: It's easier to blame game studio for not having new age features then admit my shortcomings as an indie game designer.

#32: If game studio was better I would have completed my game by now.

#33: My friends don't like me.

#34: I have 10 gallons of liquid brain ideas and game studio is the pin hole I pump it through.

#35: There are no bugs, WED and MED are incredibly useful tools, the library of over 100+ shaders conveniently included with the engine (rather then being splattered everywhere in the forums like it was projectile diarrhoea that couldn't wait for someone to sit down before ejecting from their ass like a buckshot) is very good, the wiki is updated weekly and has no broken links or ***OUTDATED REASON: CUZ LOL*** casting a shadow over useless information, the built in AI pathfinding system that requires only a simple function call to return directions to apply with c_move, the built in shadow mapping is gorgeous I'm so glad that frames raping stencil shadow crap got canned and shot into space.

#36: Game studio goes in dry and doesn't stop, but it kisses me after. Sometimes it hits me, but I usually deserve it. I burn't the roast last night and it was upset because the meeting at work didn't go well. It's better when WED and MED don't say anything, game studio only gets angrier and hits me harder. But it's ok! Gamestudio loves me.

#37: Helpful people on the forum like superku and

#38: I'm not in game design to make money so I don't really give a fuck.

#39: I secretly want to make money making games but I pretend I don't.

#40: The forum is cool.

I love you too. <3

, sounds like quite a love-hate relation you got there

I have to emphasize that again.

#6 because it's AckCon time
I'm still amazed how well we were able to work in parallel on one project.

To some extend you recognize that nearly everybody is doing something related to development, music, design professionally. With an ordinary group of people we would not have had so much fun and success. This comunity is definitely something special!

I do agree with Firo, we worked together very well. Maybe it's because at these things we can just "be ourselves" to the fullest and thus we get to know each other much better than you would with random people. We simply get better in "sync" because we share the same interest and can communicate that with each other without having that feeling of someone "judging" us for it.

Or maybe I'm just reading too much into it. I love you guys <3 AckCon afterglow is a funny thing...

Ah Ackcon is pretty much the opposite to my job which feels like being captured in some mental home where they do human experiments which excessive boredom interchanging with assigning last minute task out of nowhere to people who seem unable to cooperate properly.

Yeah, I pretty much figured out I have the wrong job and the current one is slowly but very constantly draining my remaining sanity, and you guys keep showing me what I should really do instead. I just don't have any idea... how...

Do what i did. Get fired and start a new company!

p.s. getting fired part was not intentional. If they had not fired me i'd still be working there.

Because it is easy! No seriously, you won't like Unity!

Mhmmm...,well

1. It`s very affordable

2. Right from the beginning Conitec provided an awesome update activity, critics was taken seriously and suggestions of the customers implemented.

3. I like to be upset from time to time, when things go wrong. When the problem is solved, the way is free go on ;-)).

4. It works, once you understood how.

5. The scripting languages, because they are the best interface between the engine, the maps/worlds and the customer. I really don`t want to become a C++ programmer dealing with all the complexity of a DirectX graphic engine and Windows. I want to focus on my 3D worlds, design and gameplay.

6. Getting older and older, I cannot think about changing to any other game engine, simply because I am used to it.

7. Have a look at "Süpercan", to see what you can do with GSTD.

Uuuups... forgot George Pirveau and the AUM and all other helpful spirits, who make 3DGST a special expierience

I laugh at yout 2nd point. Although it was true 2 years ago(before the dreaded zorro showed up) but not valid anymore.

5th point is the point of using an engine, all engines provide you with an intefarce that does not require you to touch directx

V8.40 - released September 2, 2012

Almost two years since last release... ouch.

And most of the Forecast features are listed with 100%... but they're not released, and nothing is ever added to Forecast.
It's a pitty, because you can really work well with thwe engine. Just the tooling/IDE and import issues are killing it....

some of them mentioned in the beta thread as coming in next update (dll creation, and real-time generated static shadows on terrain). but the date of next update is not mentioned. they were originally said to come with new WED announced at least 2 years ago, but staying on 75% since May 2013.

so another reason beside 3dgs: immutability.

by the way A8.45 is latest version released in Feb.

Oh, thought it was still beta. Anyway, does not really matter much to the situation.

I don't use acknex anymore. I stopped for good a couple years ago when I was prototyping a very fast-paced first-person shoot-em-up game and one of the engine's most basic features (think it was the GENIUS flag) didn't work correctly. Got fed up with it and ended the project right then and there.

Having said that, acknex is not a great engine, but I might've kept using it today if that hadn't happened to me. If you're not allergic to programming, acknex gives you a convenient way to work and is actually a pretty great prototyping tool. Too bad it always lacked Linux and Mac support.

Sidenote: when I was writing Barony's engine, my exposure to acknex meant a number of little things ended up coming from the way it worked. By this point I've forgotten several of them, but a big one was giving all entities a large array of multipurpose variables named "skills".

skills: the thing that Jcl mentioned as it would not be implemented if he made the engine recently (only one pointer instead)

That would've been way more elegant, but man, they're so convenient anyway!

And when it comes to my game I'm not all that concerned with memory footprint or anything anyway. If I need more I'll just increase the size of the array, hahaha!

imo it is very good to have and flexible especially for prototyping, no need for memory handling stuff at all. but it can make me lazy and my work messy, leading to finally clearing them and moving skill parameters inside structs where they should be.

Skills have always been both: convenient and messy

Because I'm afraid to touch a real engine.

Because I love it...

because UE4.7 delayed a lot and I had time to rewrite my editor

love!

hope its free of bugs ( 4ex that ent_decal one )...sometime.
once i dreamed of new buildin shader - allround - kit, something like shadeC[great btw] but integrated, optimized not unstable third party. today a complete bug free version would be totally enough4 me.