This Week in GameGuru - 09/04/2019

This article represents solely the opinion of the author and does not reflect the opinions or views of r The Game Creators, it's employees, or subordinates.  It likewise does not reflect the views or opinions of www.tgcstore.net and it's staff.  The author receives no compensation for this work and it is done solely as a service for the GameGuru community at large.

I wish I could describe the absolute chaos of my life right now.  It is impressive, in a biblical sense.  This unfortunately has impacted my ability to do these updates.  I will continue to attempt to get these out in a reasonably timely fashion.

As such, this week the work almost didn't get done.  I have a lot of ground to cover and a limited amount of time to dedicate to this so let's get to it.

GameGuru News

Let's just say some interesting things are going on behind the scenes.  I am not at liberty yet to discuss but I think many of you will be pleased with the end result of it.

Cybernessence has continued his excellent modifications to the engine which I still eagerly anticipate seeing added to the main engine branch.  Some of the changes he's made are monumental in effect.  One big update is a draw call optimizer that he's used by Preben that seems to make enormous impact on the engine's ability to batch draw calls and improve speed.

Currently a great number of big items are in the pipeline or implemented:

1. Draw Call Optimizer
2. Convex hull shapes
3. FBX importer
4. Makehuman pipelining
5. Trial version of GG
6. Other known/discernable updates (If you check github it's clear there's a VR/Multiplayer angle being worked in the background just by gleaning little bits and pieces). 

There's also more beyond that I'm aware of but not at liberty to discuss.

What's Good in the Store

Unfortunately can't do this this week.  This is far and away the most time consuming part of my weekly updates and as such I cannot afford the time for it at the moment.  I hope to get back on the train for this next week. This week it was 'do this and delay until monday or don't do this and get it out this week late'.  I chose the latter.

Free Stuff

Belidos posted some free medieval characters (always nice to get characters!): https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/221044

A track I accidentally  overlooked was added for free by tarkus1971: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/213190?page=5#msg2619604

Third Party Tips and Tutorials

TGC keeps posting more tutorials, now in a second more detailed series:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oHsxCMoD9g

Random Acts Of Creativity (WIPs)

In by far the largest component of this, I have a huge amount of updates to cover.

Bonesy is continuing work on his Cyberfi game, now including some of the assets available to purchasers of my book.  Nice to see this stuff finally filtering down.  I'm still working on getting it on the store but if you have purchased it and want the assets early, please let me know.

Teabone posted a beautiful forest screenshot in which he's tuned and optimized his forest using many of the techniques I outline in my book to get a smooth 58-60 FPS with many trees:

Synchromesh has evolved his Protascope game to include Dagored's excellent drone entity from his sci-fi set (I own it myself and love it).

Also newcomer Maverick put together an awesome looking airship out of what looks to be a mishmash of EBE and free assets. Nice work!

Maverick also made this great looking waterfall and used a clever solution to do it - an inverted smoke decal! 

Peri32 made a fantastic video literally as I was typing this of his walkcycle for a Taxi-Driver inspired game based I assume on the movie from the 70's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A22mDKiP5DE

The environment is top notch and it's a great use of GG's abilities near as I can tell.

In My Own Works

Well, the publisher posted the files online... then removed them.  So now I have to get them to add them back in.  *shakes head*.  Like I said, my life is pretty chaotic right now.  I have final touches being done to the art for the 'Cyber Noir' pack that is free for book purchasers.

A teaser of what to expect for assets:

And some weapons too:

So keep your eyes peeled and make sure you keep some info on your purchase so I can validate it to give you a code :)

Lastly, I'm working out the final details with TGC on my book giveaway contest.  There will be some minor stipulations but three copies will be up for grabs.  I should have this finalized for next weeks report!

Thanks again to everyone who purchased a copy of my book.  I deeply appreciate your support on this labor of love. I've recently started getting pictures from purchasers:

This to me is the coolest part of this whole process - seeing an actual copy in hand for purchasers!