[Sphere] Sphere 2 Released

Server isnt down, but your ip may be blocked.. post the first set of digits from your ip and I can unblock it..

Even my ip seems to be blocked as I cannot access screens and the site...The first two values of my IP are :- 10.12

cant wait to see them !

82.35.2.xxx
Thx.

volumetric clouds?! you mean like...real volumetric clouds? O_O this is awesome

downloading the demo right now ... buying the full version soon after it i guess

Yikes. That's all I can say. That's a good yikes, obviously.

@Matt

I downloaded the demo. But this is only version 1.1 ...

I just ordered 2.0, but also recieved 1.1. Sent an email and just waiting for the update.

WOW...looks good! Can't wait to see it in realtime

Thanks for doing such a good job...and also for offering it for free to Sphere1 customers!

Hi Matt

I trying to get my Sphere 1 working and I get this



Plus sent an email about free upgrade

How fast is the rendering with all the shaders on?

This is much old syntax in the demo. It's not supported anymore in A6.5.
I have the same errors.
I removed all old syntax in the scripts but the DLL Functions are also not working with A6.5.

Yes they are



This is the latest beta.
But I don't think this is the sphere 2.0

Sorry, the DLL Functions are working with A6.5. It was my mistake. I forgot to copy the DLL in the Ack Plugin folder.

Respect.

Maybe you can focus more on non-vegetation shader support from now on. Things which come into my mind is haze, depth of field, motionblur (fullscreen, objectwise), etc. as default/template feature inside Sphere as well as other "very specific" things.

all I can say is wow, and I can't wait for my download link,

thanks matt

cool! looking forward to my link as well

what are the other features?
I would LOVE to see depth of field in the future...

Thanks
Drew

also volumetric clouds are a nice addition, time to kick some crysis muffin!

killer, just got my link, that was fast! I'm jumping into the new version now...

thanks Matt

me too. sweet, big download

I have downloaded the demoversion. It says version 1.1.
(date sphere.dll is 18-09-2005, that can't be right or ?)

When I try to run the demo I get an error;
Error(97): Syntax error - nonexistent/empty function remove
error in script or level

???????
Regards,
Frits

Somehow I didnt upload the new demo right, i am reuploading it, please try again in a little bit.

It's very impressive. I really am excited about the opportunities this will open up for level design. Particularly exciting to me is using the vegetation system with my own, weird unique plants..

The real time shadows are pretty good, I guess one day precalculated lightmaps will be pretty outdated, won't they, as graphics cards are better at this kind of thing? Will this kind of polymesh + real time shadow rendering replace lightmaps and scene management? I have a very high end graphics card, so it works reasonably well, but I think it might be about 2 years before the average graphics card catches up.

Imagine a blender level exporter tool with which you could set up lighting, then it is all exported, with lights converted into sphere lights adjusted to the same values, to give a wysiwyg lighting effect.

Matt, are the splatmap terrains in the outdoor level created with IceX 2? If not, how did you do the terrain multitexturing-- with a paint editor?

I love the water effects, just lovely work. What a bargain at that price too.
Kudos and thanks for the great plugin..

Splat maps are made simply in photoshop.... just a combination of red and green.

Any chance depth of field will make it into an upcoming sphere version?

Habe mir gerade mal die Demo gezogen, wollte entpacken bekomm aber nen Error irgentwas von unerwartetes Archiv ende...

Ich glaub du musst die Demo mal neu hochladen...

cYa Angel

I got a missing DLL error: d3dx9_30.dll. I've downloaded this file and put it in the sphere demo folder and it works. Great stuff!

You don't speak German, do you? Here is what Angel sayd: "I downloaded the demo and when I tried to unpack it I got an unexpected end of archive error."

i had the same problem now it works.

WHen you get an error like "unexpected end of archive error" it means the download went bad. Download it again.

Ok ure right Foxhound my mistake ^^

cYa Angel

coolyjooly,

see me as a new customer very soon (just gotta wait gfor my paycheck).

this is SWEEET stuff

I've got my update! Thanks a lot for the fast response!

I feel stupid, but I still can't get it to work!

Error message: "Malfunction W1523 Sp_devicereset not found in DLL"!

Sweet, this looks amazing Matt, very nice!

Cheers

what? it's really not a photograph? *g*

work on the highest level, as always. congratulations matt to this brilliant piece of hard work and to it's completion.

If you do, I'd buy it right away as I've been after depth of field for quite some time and I'd be able to come up with some use for the other effects

Hmm... seems like I'll be needing a new 3d Card, I've been waiting to have an excuse to upgrade.

Thanks,
Matt

Render to Texture, HDR, Water, Bloom, Parallax, Multitextured Terrain, Depth of View, Haze, Motion Blur, Soft Shadows. Awesome, me too! I would buy this right away if it would be more user friendly then my experience with Sphere.

ATM I have some problems with published version of Sphere2 and thus I can't say how much I like it, quick run from WED looks great though. When I just want to add parallax shader to my model-based room, it takes me ages to figure out howto use Sphere without all the demo files. I need to use my own models. With the parallax shader from aum53 i'm able to create the desired effect in minutes.

1: Copy DLL, .FX shaders + associated files to new project folder
2: Call DLL with include <dll_initialize.wdl>; inside my own mainscript
3: Call .FX shaders with include <shader_initialize.wdl>; inside my own mainscript
4: Call .FX shaders actions with include <shader_actions.wdl>; inside my own mainscript
5: Easy optimize and make changes to effects trough a shader_vars.wdl script and WED properties flags.

Build|Run|Fun

If the future DLL is easy to use as the 5 steps above, with those effect you mentioned and combined with a little tutorial howto optimize and configure the effects, i'm the first to buy it or perhaps second because Matt_Coles was before me

Would be nice and real timesaver if someone write a step by step tutorial on howto use Sphere2 with your own out of models created world, but guess that isn't going to happen?

Anyways it would be sad day for Conitec because if you create this DLL, i'm not going to buy GameStudio Professional.

Dusty

I'm not sure exacly what you are asking for.. but SPhere is very easy to get working if you use the demo setup.. that's why its there.. just chnage the models to your own.. and it will work.

Matt, you are right about replacing the models inside the demo with my own models. Actualy I did it this way with and while using Sphere 1.1 after reading and understanding the meaning of "Bring it to Sphere" instead of adding Sphere to.

However this is more work for using -some- shader effect(s) inside your own project right? Because you must first 'hack' the 114MB Sphere2 demo level by removing models, script code etc, and replace 'reverse engineer' those with your own.

Personally I would find it much more easier if I had a little step by step tutorial for learning howto do it on my own with the bare-minimum, creating a level with my own models and about howto apply Sphere it's features. I would be happy to pay extra for it when you release Sphere3 in the future.

When I think of it. While you worked on Sphere2. You could have documented all these steps you needed to take in order to create the levels (not programming the dll or howto model), but about the mystery how when where and why you used shaders/models/textures/c-script in order to make it to the working demo as seen today, without working backwards.

Anyways i'm not ungrateful. Those effects you get with Sphere for it's price. The fact one may do anything with the artwork and also freely distribute his/her Sphere powered game commercialy without paying royalties, is a real bargon on itself!

How about someone download the Sphere2 demo and create a complete tutorial based of the demo. This way people like me can learn from the bare-minimum howto do it on their own with their own models and scripts and use of the shaders. If someone would do this in George Pirvu style and share it with all Sphere users. I buy Sphere2 for you!?

Dusty

What do you mean using sphere demo and replacing its models with your own , I have never used sphere , but this sounds like it would be limiting for making a game. Can anyone explain a bit more what this means ?

With Sphere you are encouraged (but not limited) to use the demo as a starting point for your own Sphere powered game. This makes it easier when you have less experience with programming. I could for instance just replace the level model with my own model to make it look more personal visually.

Guess if you are experienced programmer, glancing at Sphere_doc and the demo files is enough to do your own levels in the future, without having to reverse engineer the demo level or reading a step by step tutorial.

Dusty

Noone my texture looks so good as your!! How you make that!!
But moat important what you do with water - so real!!

Who managed to run the update?


I didn't, my sphere.dll seems to be corrupted. The old versions run with the old dll, but they start the same error message as the new version.

just Dled it, copied the dll, and works like a charm

hm...I can run the update without any problems (p4 3.2Ghz, 1024 RAM, x800 pro, WindowsXP). The outdoor-demo runs with about 30 fps (switching off the grass increases the fps most...up to 45 fps), the indoor-demo runs exremly smooth with over 80 fps.

Sphere2 provides better results than seen in Oblivion . I'm pretty sure the framerate could be increased, if the trees (...wich look awesomly good) woulden't count 2000-3000 triangles...but this can of course be changed by the user.

@Cardboardhomie = Pappenheimer in english Have you installed the latest directX?

This gives me hope!

I don't think that it needs a newer version than the first version.

I re-download the update... well, I'll see...

EDIT:

No difference. Same error message, and its follow ups of error messages, seems that there can't any of the dll functions be found!

I don't ´have any idea. I guess that I forgot to do something simple something obvious...

und die sphere.dll haste auch ganz sicher in den gamestudio acknex_plugins ordner reinkopiert??

pictures are very impressive. (i like 'bumped' clouds)
thanks for great work, Matt!
Sad, i have nvidia fx5200 (tried your 'Sphere v1 demo' - fps drops remarkably). 'Sphere v2' will be my 1st buy after upgrading my video.

@ Loopix: How did you measure fps in the indoor level? If I press F11 the Sphere lights go out. Did you write a custom fps script?

@ Lion_TS: Lets hope people buying a Sphere2 powered game, don't mind upgrading their graphicscard and shell out a few 100 dollars too. Hmm j/k lets go on bughunt

While Sphere2 looks very beautiful if and when I run from WED, to bad I still can't run (sphere.dll is inside the published folder) a published .exe powered with the Sphere2 Engine. My current card should not be a problem because otherwise it would not even run from WED in the first place..




Dusty

@ Matt_Aufderheide:

My Workstation

Pentium Dual Core 2,6GHz
1024 MB RAM
Windows XP SP2 Home Edition
DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
Nvidia Geforce 6600 256MB ps/vs 3.0
Nvidia Driver 9.1.4.7 WHQL
GameStudio A6.40.5 Commercial
Sphere 2.0 Full version

Here are my steps:

01: Unpack 'Update_Sphere_2_Full.zip'
02: Create new directory on drive C named 'Sphere'
03: Copy content of 'Update_Sphere_2_Full' to C:\Sphere
04: Copy the 'sphere.dll' to 'acknex_plugins' directory
05: Open 'demo_inside.wmp' in WED
06: Build the 'demo_inside.wmp' in WED
07: Save 'demo_inside.wmp' in WED
08: Run the 'demo_inside.wmp' from WED (all is fine)
09: Publish the 'demo_inside.wmp' from WED
10: Copy 'sphere.dll' into 'sphere_demo.cd' directory
11: Run 'sphere_demo.exe' from C:\Sphere\sphere_demo.cd
12: First error see: Error1

Error1


Tried to solve problem: copy 'images' folder from C:\Sphere into published C:\Sphere\sphere_demo.cd directory.

Now Error1 is gone, but when I run the published exe it will crash and the debugger trow a JiT with the message: Unhandled exception at 0x057f8d3b in sphere_demo.exe: 0xC0000005: Access violation reading location 0x00000000.

Running the game from command prompt with -wnd prevents the computer from further problems. Because then I can cancel to debug the exception, which I could not do when I run the published .exe in full screen as it would then be impossible to use keys like described on Error1 image.

edit:

So at this point I can run the published game without the missing .dds error if I copy the 'images' directory from the C:\Sphere directory into the published direcory 'C:\Sphere\sphere_demo.cd', However it will still crash and trow the JiT after a few seconds and there is no content (just black if in full screen or the little white screen if in -wnd mode) on screen, Sphere seems to be still bussy processing something.

Hmm this is strange, when I remove the 'sphere.dll' from the published folder the published demo runs and the options screen is displayed with the nice Sphere2 image. I can select indoor and outdoor, the levels load, but they are almost empty -> just few objects like stones, trees, creature are visible and blue-greyish background can be seen. Also no more exception from the debugger nor from gamestudio engine about any missing files. This doesn't look good, maybe a little funny though. What could be wrong here!?



Dusty

JiT crash? I take it that means no error message? Anyways, the demo published fine over here, so ... Did you try that?
Edit: Lol, sorry ... not exactly sober over here... Strange that it doesn't work though,

Cheers

MAN I WANT TO PLAY WITH THIS BUT I DONT HAVE COMMERCIAL VERSION

Ok I got a little closer to solve the problem, actualy I solved it. I think there is a problem when someone would try to publish the demo_inside.wmp level. Because a lot of .fx files didn't got copied to the published folder. Why? I don't know yet. Anyone can confirm this?

Please be kind and remove the previous published directory if there is any and then try to build and publish the inside_demo.wmp level NOT the Island_demo_2.wmp, then put sphere.dll into that directory and run the exe from the published directory with -wnd otherwise perhaps you lockup the computer.

Now you can't run the game and get missing .dds error right? Don't press OK, the time I did that my computer hung. Just click CANCEL. You need to first copy the 'images' folder and copy over the missing .fx files to the published directory, then it runs fine.

@ Matt_Aufderheide:

Why doesn't Sphere2 give error message about missing shaders? Or does it do that, but it's prevented by the debugger and trow a exception instead? Also why do you keep these lines inside indoor_demo.wmp:

Code:

---

	wad {
		0 0 0 0 0
		<d:\program files\gstudio6\wads\damned.wad> 1
	}

	folder {
		<d:\program files\gstudio6\damned\textures> 1
	}

---

Dusty

My offer still stands btw:

How about someone download the Sphere2 demo and create a complete tutorial based of the demo. This way people like me can learn from the bare-minimum howto do it on their own with their own models and scripts and use of the shaders. If someone would do this in George Pirvu style (just to say how good it must be ) and share it with all Sphere users. I'll buy Sphere2 for you!? Just ask for details i'm very serious.

Amazing tool.

It runs very fine. And the fact that I can switch off certain features to speed up FPS on lower system is a very good addition.

The columetric clouds are absolutely amazing. I never saw such a great animated sky in a game so far.

The parallax mapping at the ground is very cool and the foam at the shoreline adds to it.

I really felt like wandering through an island of the latest Oblivion-game.

PS: To Dusty. I really thought about creating a manual with lots of pictures and additional help regarding modelling and texturing. But that would become a little book very fast. So I think it is no task to do it for free. I could do it if there would be enough people willing to pay a few bucks (maybe 5 $, I am not sure how many users are in need of it).

But at the other hand Matt could do it himself.

i guess that'd be great if you create a tut. but i'd appreciate that it would lead step by step from an empty level and zero script to a small level.. including setting up models etc.

Year a tutorial would be great.

Last year Tester adapt "sphere 1.1" scrypt, to use with Templates (6.31.4). If someone could do the same with "sphere2" and the actual version (6.40.5) it will be great.

@ Frank_G: I would be also very interested in such manual. Doesn't have to become a book though, that take to much time. Only thing is that I and a lot of other people don't have 3D Studio Max. However i'm saving money and in the near future i'm going to buy a modeling suite in the 500-1000 dollar range, that is if I can't learn doing it in Blender. Guess the same princepals would apply.

@ Ello: Yes that was exactly what I meant. Although there is a Sphere_doc, it doesn't learn me everything about the how when where and why sth. Sure I could replace Matt's artwork with my own scripts and models, but it takes way to much time. I don't realy understand what i'm doing without a manual. So what I can make with the sphere engine isn't going to look real good. At least not this year.

A clean start with an empty level, slowely working up to building a little demo level with all topics such as models, textures, lights, scripts, shaders covered would be awesome. I hope that Matt, while he works on the Sphere 3.0 engine in the near future, would take the time to document the steps he takes building a working level. Not the modeling part, but how he put it altogether and some tips for when using models or textures how they best apply with shaders.

@ maximo: Sphere 2.0 is compatible with GameStudio A6.40.5, or did you mean someone adapt Sphere 2.0 to work with A6.31.4? The last would be strange thing to do, because the current acknex engine version is working better.

--------------------

Anyways at least I have figured out how to measure fps while running inside_demolevel, I hit F11 and ESC. Also finaly understand why Sphere 2.0 didn't worked when I published the project. Other people don't seem to have problems with it. But on my system it didn't copied all the images and shaders to the published directory.

The last time I thought it would just happen when I build and publish the inside demo. However after trying to build and publish the outside demo the same problem occurred with the missing images/shaders.

Solved this by copy the 'images' folder + all shaders .fx's to the published directory. I should have known why my level looked so strange, because in the past with IceX 2.0 there was a similar problem, only that time with .fx files not being named right and therefore the level didn't displayed properly. However, back then it did give me a warning message.

Sphere 2.0 doesn't give me any warning about the missing .fx's problem. The only details I got was that an unhandled exception occurred within sphere_demo.exe. Perhaps this is due to the c++ debugger captured the error beforehand and tried to debug it. I don't know the answer yet.

Dusty

Dusty:
Basically you could create the contents even in MED. Blender works fine and so does Lightwave (with the exporter) or any other big tool. Believe me, your artwork will not automatically get better with a 1000 $ software. Painting, knowing how to create several details, experience and many tutorials are the key. And good models can even created with very cheap modellers.

Additionally it is important to know how to create normalmaps, height maps, alpha channels and to add that into the appropriate images. Since this is not mentioned in the txt file I could imagine that many people need more info's about that.

@ Frank_G:

Yes you are right. I have seen what some people can do with MED although it takes them much more time and stress I guess. Anyways it's true, buying a expensive modeling suite doesn't make anyone an artist. That is something which should already be inside the indivdual. But, I like being creative and was actualy saving money to buy A6 Pro. However, due to the fact I bought and have options to purchase third party softwares for the features, I don't need to anymore.

Perhaps if I figure out howto model inside Blender from the tutorials I do not need to buy any commercial 3d modeling software and save the money for something important. Also I don't make a living out of this like many other people, just want to learn and understand how 'they' do it and try doing it myself for fun (but seriously) in my free time.

About the normalmaps, height maps, alpha channels. This is indeed very important. I have had many many problems before understanding howto apply model based level with A6 & Sphere 1.1 addon in the past and still make mistakes, because I have learned the most from reading tutorials or just doing stupid things until they worked and documented everything what I was doing.

My most common trouble was with:

1: saving textures formats .tga/.dds
3: create normal, height, diffuse, maps, alpha channels
3: create, tile textures and apply them on 3d objects
4: 3d models size, the grid, quant and real world
5: lighting everthing the right way

Dusty

Matt-
what is the easiest way to turn off the main menu? Its so deeply integrated into the system, I dont want a menu...
Also, I cant seem to get Bloom working in the inside level...looks like its on in the outdoor. Where do i turn it on?

Thanks

Bloom does work in the inside, its just no tas noticeable because it has a brightness cutoff, the inside is darker than the outside. Look at the brightest spot on a wall and then turn it off, you will see it.

I'm not sure why you dont want a menu, but you could hack it so it doesnt appear and it just loads a level.

Matt,

I'm getting at best 4 fps. I have a GeForce FX 5500. Is that good enough? What do you recomend?

Thanks,

lucidman

lucidman: The FX series does a quite bad job with rendering shader 2.0.

Just downloaded and installed the acknex engine update 6.50.2 on my computer. Then I tried to build and run the Indoor demo from WED. Only it gives the following error message:



And every time I press the OK button it trows another similar error message. The Outdoor demo runs fine.

Dusty

And there is a problem with the latest Beta 6.53. I get only a black screen.

But it works fine in the public 6.4 version of Gamestudio.

@ Pappenheimer:

You need d3d9x_30.dll or just download the latest DirectX update and it will be fine.

Dusty

it works fine over here (geforce go 6800 ultra) beside that the terrain is rendered black. the dx-update was my last hope

Ello are you saying Sphere 2.0 is working with A6.50.2? Because I have it working in 6.40.5, but after updating to the newest acknex engine version it trows error message about empty pointer when the Indoor demo is run. The outside level works though.

Dusty

I am very impressed with the screenshots. I never used or tried the Sphere 1.1 / demo because I didnt want to rollback my 3dgs installation... but I'm looking forward to buy it very soon (meaning.. today, tomorrow )

I would like to know what are the system and GPU requeriments to run a game with Sphere. I want my game to be compatible with older/lower graphic cards too, even if I have to turn off some features.

I'm downloading the demo right now.

Good work!
Emilio

Sphere needs pixel shader 2.0 support

Does Sphere 2 include some things for visual editing water and others parameters like a grass map etc .. ?
Or is it all by coding ?

Grass Map is a simple bitmap. You can edit that with PS or TheGIMP.

well i tried it and as far as it goes... beautiful... but the problem? i have a pci nvidia fx 5200..... you know the rest..

What version you using? my self I won't be using th sphere 2.0 for a while my current system doesn't support sm 2.0 , in about nine months I'll have a new system , btw @matt outstanding screenie .

Question, say you make little examples with the Sphere2 engine. Would it be the better to include the demo-dll inside the download? I only want to include the full Sphere-dll when I ever make a full game, or will some features not work?

Another question, would it be possible to run the packed dll? I mean with molebox I protect the content, will I be able to do the same with this dll or must it not be packed?

Dusty

You can include whcihcever version you want.. the demo dll is the same execpt it has the copyright notice

could you make a exe demo, Matt?

Hello Everyone :-)

Got me the DemoLevel of Sphere 2.0 and it looks very amazing to me.
With the trees lightly moving, the cool looking water and also the Sky with the clouds ... very neat :-)

At the moment I can quickrun the IslandDemo2. When I go for publishing, I get an Error: "Can't open file 'screen.png'" Publishes anyway.When I try running the published Exe, I get the following Error: "Malfunction W1301: Tree_Main_1A.DDS Can't open file". So, got the same Problem, Dusty described and solved earlier in this topic. Will go after that.

My Profile: P4 2Ghz, 512MB-RAM, Win 2000, A6.40.4 PRO, DX 9.0c Oct06


Have a nice day, all of You :-)

C.U. soon,

R.E.Z.

Hey there.
I have problem running the outdoor.
The errors are generally error code : E1513.
I get the errors like:
Crash in sp_init_Water
Crash in sp_init_Shoreline
Crash in sp_init_Treetype

and so on..


I remember i had similar problem once with sphere one , but then i fixed it i don't know how. Any help would be appreciated.


I have a6.40.2
Directx oct 2006.
Copy the dll to the acknex plugins as well.


Thanks,

REZ and Aram,

within this and the other Sphere Thread there is surely somewhere written how to solve this!

REZ, your problem is probably the same that duty had and solved!

Aram, your problem could be the same that I had and solved!