Free AWK pdf book and personal updates

https://ia802309.us.archive.org/25/items/pdfy-MgN0H1joIoDVoIC7/The_AWK_Programming_Language.pdf

It's been released for free, so pick up your copy now and immerse yourself in one of the most useful languages ever devised for an operating system! :)

As to other updates:
I'm still waiting for my final sky (savannah sun) to be added to the store so I can give it as a pack freebie.  It's brilliant and gorgeous :).  I still have trouble with my sky rendering tool putting lines on certain types of skies but it's acceptable for me and frankly it's a freebie.  So I think people will live with it.  With the right bloom settings, it doesn't even show up.

Also I made significant progress on my new upcoming project.  I got a vector library (vectorial) for Lua imported into Game-Guru  and began pumping my output to it.  It works well though GG's interpretation of Lua code is quirky at best.  On top of that I have a weird error where Game-Guru will give me exactly ONE Lua error before it stops giving me any error messages at all.  Makes debugging extremely difficult.

On a side note my wife has been delving into the Unreal engine while I finish up this project for Game Guru.  I plan on joining her shortly but I'm encouraged by her work.  She's really done quite a lot for a span of 2-3 days. 

I want to wrap up my work in Game Guru with a module makers can add that will allow a significant amount of control and power to the environment.  Once that's for sale (warning, it's going to be about $15 but will absolutely be worth it) I plan on using those proceeds to buy assets for Unreal as I transition to that engine.

My new skies pack and an upcoming Review!

We're on the eve of a really big update - 1.14 for Game Guru.  Lee has finally made some pretty significant changes and as such it'll be a legitimate major version increase.

Anyways, I recently made a new skies pack, you should totally check it out here:
https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217112?page=1#msg2568526

The purchase link is here:
www.tgcstore.net/pack/10902

All that aside the first review I received was from Bugsy (Of Kshatryia fame).  I realized that he placed a few objects on the store which I hurriedly snapped up because - he's Bugsy :)

I need to take some snaps tonight for a review of his work.  It's pretty interesting how he built the walls for his buildings.  I wasn't expecting it but it allows a very free-form method of game design which explains why Kshatriya has such a great look.

So stay tuned for an update in the near future :)

Something big this way cometh

I don't usually prime the ground for my own work but I have a new bit of work on the way for Game-Guru users.

A few things that are in progress:

• Approximately (5) 1024x1024 skies (I lowered the res to save space because frankly I was losing a lot of detail in 2048x2048 due to conversion to DDS files.
• A weather system (still in the pre-dev phase)
• A day to night system (currently being worked on).

Without saying too much, the new fog shader has allowed me to do some really interesting things.  I'll make sure to keep you posted when it comes into play :)

If you haven't seen it...

Udemy.com is a training site - I have no affiliation with them beyond being a customer of theirs.  They are offering some tremendous discounts for the new year related to gamedev.  I personally picked up the blender course and unity coding course.. the awesome part is the price.  Normally their stuff is like $200 but for a very short time they're running promos in the $10-15 range.  So definitely grab a few if you can :)

Addendum to HD Game Guru Post

So there was some contention to my previous statements with respect to improving the visual fidelity of Game-Guru.

https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/216988

Specifically I was advised directly that what I was saying was a 'waste of time' for people and that simply 'changing texture size and sharpening' wouldn't improve the picture quality.

I tried to explain that the article was meant as a gateway towards people working on their own textures, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears as the same arguments got rehashed.

So I took some pictures, which are in the above thread.  I'm annotating them for this blog as well.

So there you have it.  One thing missing from these shots is the addition of static lighting, which I may use later to highlight the specular map changes. But as they weren't relevant to the conversation, I didn't use them.

I realize I get defensive about this stuff; it's only natural, IMO.  I spend hours or days writing these posts and for it to get called a waste of time by someone I generally respect - is frustrating and aggravating. 

So anyways, at least now you, the reader, have the full picture.  Truth is you could probably further improve these textures if you shot up the values higher but at that point it'd be smarter to break them up a bit more and retexture the model.