This Week in Game-Guru - 04/30/2018

OFFICIAL GAME-GURU NEWS:

Game-Guru has officially updated!  Queue the fireworks, beer, and cheers people!  It's the full DX11 release with all the associated Github and PP releases that we've come to know, love, and sometimes despise.

This represents a huge departure for Game-Guru and as such you will want to really give your stuff a thorough once-over before you test.

In the meantime we have a new pack to help celebrate, with full PBR models - https://www.thegamecreators.com/post/gameguru-construction-site-pack-released

There's some really nice looking stuff in those kits so give em a look!

NEW PRODUCTS IN THE STORE:

The store has a massive smattering of new products this week and while many are great (nice to see Tazman experimenting with PBR, for instance!)  - I have to say BSP shattered expectations with some damn fine looking stuff.

As you can see these are some top shelf products!  There's also some really good stuff by GraPhiX, that model guy, and relative newcomer mechanic.  Pasquill has also added some new cars, which are always worth a look.  These appear to be the first PBR enabled vehicles so give them a double take!

I also have to chime in that I love Shadow Man's style.  So I follow him on the store (amongst others) and while he's not a super-prolific author his stuff is top notch and worth a look if you're into cyberpunk/sci-fi/modern styles.

Of course most of these are available in well priced packs so spend wisely:

FREE STUFF:

Not much going on here, but we already have lots of nice new shinies to play with so let's hold off either way for next week!

THIRD PARTY TOOLS:

The latest version of the Heightmap 2 GG program is out and available for download here:
https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/218876?page=3#msg2599966

RANDOM ACTS OF CREATIVITY:

Cybernessence did a great job with some coolscripting in his upcoming game 'The Cogwheel Chronicles'.

That's the kind of inventive stuff that keeps people interested in your product, people.

IN MY OWN WORKS:

My own products will need a thorough 'going over' for the latest revision of Game-Guru.  I will need to take some time this week to set aside and test it thoroughly then bug-fix whatever new problems cropped up from the latest revision.

The book continues to slog along though I literally got NOTHING done due to my day job's total focus last week along with my family getting sick upon my return.

Keep an eye out here for more updates.  If you are encountering any problems with the Time of Day and Weather system please let me know ASAP via this blog or via the ticket system on http://en.tgcstore.net

This Week in Game-Guru - 4/23/2018

I don't have a lot of time this week, regrettably.  As mentioned previously this is when my real day job reaches it's crescendo and so I'm going to throw together something for this week and maybe post something more detailed later this week.

Thanks for bearing with me!

Game-Guru News:

Work continues on people trying to find errors and problems in the latest public preview.  Nothing really stand-out, just testing, testing and more testing!

What's New in The Store:

This stuff:

I really like TMG's diner pack - I'm interested in some nice PBR screenshots.  Gtox is continuing to make animals and Ken Charles Long is making new and improved buildings.  His previous work was good but since he's upgraded his tools it's really come a long way!

Third Party Tools:

Nada.  Sorry can't dig too deep.

Free Stuff: 

Sorry guys, this one is going to have to wait.  It usually takes an inordinate amount of time to do and I can't afford that right now.

Random Acts of Creativity:

A few minor updates on the forums here:
https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219549 - an update to Tarkus1971's urban exploration game
https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219588 - an interesting, fairly well done horror game

But of particular note, I missed the update screenshots to Wolf's shooter Acythian which look PHENOMENAL!

That is some top shelf stuff, visually.  Nicely done Wolf!

In My Own Works:

Work continues on my book though it's taking a while.  I'm hoping to get a few thousand words pounded out this week as I am going to have a lot of hours doing nothing otherwise.

This Week in Game Guru - 4/16/2018

Official Game-Guru News:

I really dig the constant release cycle we're seeing from Game-Guru and TGC now that it's gone to GitHub.  Here are the full details on the 04.14.18 PP (Public Preview) release available on steam:

https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219574

This one seems to be more of a bugfix/legacy components fix and users are reporting good results.  That means we're inching closer to a production stable build.

There's also some good PBR work being done on Mega Pack 2 (one of my favorites) - get the info here: https://www.game-guru.com/news-post/gameguru-mega-pack-2-dlc-update

New Products On The Store:

Not a lot going on but some interesting stuff.  GraPhix continues his PBR work with a nice looking bus stop.  One thing that stands out is that the glass isn't suffering that awful 'everything past the second pane gets deleted' bug so it should work flawlessly by the look of it.

There's a house set if you're interested by relative newcomer 'Homewreckers studio' and some very nice snow decals by RoseMadder (I always love innovative uses of the decal system).

Lastly there's a Randomized Sound System by Corrosion, who continues his utility scripting.  This particular one looks really useful and I might consider getting it myself.  Definitely give it a view!

Free Stuff:

Honkeyboy has some free mechs (WOO!) here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219571
Bod has revamped his old lighthouses (I'm super excited about this): https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/215012?page=16#msg2599005
JPH-Games keeps adding to his "Industrial PBR pack": https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219529#msg2599080
Graphix has honestly got too much for me to list. See his megathread here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217932?page=10

Third Party:

There's a pretty big update for AGK but that's really only useful for people using GG Loader, at least from this blog's standpoint.  Beyond that, apologies but I haven't sifted through the mountains of posts on the forum about updates.  Suffice it to say we should expect a lot of integration of utilities in the near future into GG public releases.

Random Acts of Creativity:

So this is the area I'm *MOST* excited about.  We have two mega updates here that need some attention.  Firstly, of course, is Dimoxinil's "Space Losers".  This game continues it's march towards completion and there's also a recipe for cooking eggs buried in there?  That's definitely a new one.
He's added a savegame feature, day/night transition, a friendly NPC, and a village.
Details here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217908?page=4#msg2599091

Next I noticed on the Game-Guru Discord (Yes, that is a thing - it can be found here: https://discordapp.com/channels/332652927082692609/332652927082692609  )

That DuchenKuke had posted a pretty awesome update and test video for his upcoming fallout/STALKER style game.  You can watch that video here (highly recommended as it's informative just in the sense of learning how to use terrain effectively):

This is absolutely gorgeous and he's done a great job.  My comments in full can be found at the video.

In My Own Works:

Ugh.  Don't remind me that I have more work to do.  I added about 3000 words last week to my book, which is pushing 145 pages now, unformatted.  There is a ton of extra work to do.

This Week in Game-Guru - 4/9/2018

Apologies for last week.  I missed the update completely as my day job as Chief Linux Systems Engineer is reaching it's yearly crescendo (culminating in early May) and so I'm finding myself exceptionally busy, compared to what I would only term the 'off season' where it's much easier to focus on secondary tasks, which unfortunately this blog falls into.

As such you may notice for a few weeks a reduced focus on this blog but I promise you it will return as soon as I can steadily manage it.  I'd like to give a quick shout-out to Graphix for a freebie he sent me (unsolicited) as thanks for the blog.  Give his products a look here - he's been doing some great things with the new PBR system. 

OFFICIAL GAME-GURU NEWS:

Not sure what I can say here.  Work continues, Preben is doing a lot of fantastic things with the shaders for DX11 but there's some serious issues that are still being worked on.  So as such we're stuck with a more updated public preview edition but hopefully will see movement forward towards a stable 'release' sometime soon.  To be sure, this is not the upgrade path I'd have chosen if I were Lee.

NEW PRODUCTS IN THE STORE:

Teabone (the king of clutter objects, IMO) has released a few new pieces of high quality clutter objects, notably some paintings.

There's also some interesting medieval horror objects by Lafette that literally the first words out of my mouth were (and I quote): "Wow!  That's.. really really nice.  I mean that's absolutely top shelf stuff."  And the best part is?  They're EXTREMELY WELL PRICED.  I mean the entire pack is something like 7 dollars, US.   This is something on the level of Wizard of ID level of quality, for a fraction of the price.  Definitely worth the investment.

FREE STUFF:

There's a fairly large body of 'free stuff' to go through:
First of all, Bod has made some new PBR remakes of his old stuff that look great!
Second we have Lafette (same one as above) making some 'free little mountains' which honestly are fantastic!  I hope to be able to include them with my book!
Thirdly we have a 'free PBR industrial pack' by JPH Games. 
Here's a script for making a MOHAA (Medal of Honor, Allied Assault man I haven't played that game in a lonnnng time) style bomb script: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219519
And lastly there's a pretty great script set of RPG style functions. 

All in all, a pretty solid week for freebies!

THIRD PARTY TOOLS:

Some news:  The Heightmap Importation tool is being integrated into the GitHub source - eventually!  Still, this is a huge bit of news and I'm excited to see it finally getting it's day in the sun.

Also GG loader by Preben has gotten another update of some underwater shaders.  That guy has a lot of free time.  I don't know how he does it.


RANDOM ACTS OF CREATIVITY:
There's too much to cover (cries quietly)...*takes a deep breath*

Bugsy added cubemapping to some objects in his Redacted2 shooter - https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/216903?page=3#msg2595699

Murmia, that weird game by 'beanz' is coming along nicely: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/218909?page=1#msg2597459

Death House of Barker Creek by new creator 'HellreaperX' looks like a solid first attempt: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219542

Urban Explorer by Tarkus1971 looks promising but needs some fine tuning: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219549

Lastly there's a really fantastic update by Cybernessence that needs to be seen to be believed for his Cogwheel Chronicles masterwork.  His day night transitions are looking good! https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/213870?page=4

IN MY OWN WORKS:

The book is making steady progress though a lot of the lower hanging fruit is taken.  One interesting tidbit I posted online which readers of this blog might find interesting is my analysis of what's wrong with using the base AI without a navigation mesh for it:

https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219508#msg2598602

Check it out.  I'll discuss it in more depth in the book, by a large margin.