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