This Week in GameGuru - 10/27/2019

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.

Another week, another belated TWIGG report.
Unfortunately this is turning into the norm for me as I am consistently overwhelmed by real world factors that hopefully will slow down come early next year.
In the interim I will crank these out as often and as on time as I can manage.

GameGuru News

 

This week we've seen a significant amount of activity on 'project V3' on github.  Some of what I'm seeing there is very exciting!

https://github.com/TheGameCreators/GameGuruRepo/commits/ProjectV3

Notable elements include an update to Character Creator, load time tweaks, GUI updates and more.
Very exciting stuff!

The SUPERB enhanced weapon pack is on sale this week as well for as low as you will likely ever see it - definitely pick it up now if you are ever going to pick it up!

What's Good in the Store

Finally got my Cyberpunk Noir guns up

If you are a book purchaser and haven't gotten a redemption code for them, please let me know!

Book sales have obviously tapered off; like games they have a really big front end and a longer back end.  If you haven't purchased a copy, try using this code to save 20%:  AITGG230
Use it at this link here:
https://www.crcpress.com/An-Introduction-to-GameGuru/Messina/p/book/9781138612631

You can also find the additional book resources there for free under 'additional resources'.

This week also had several great packs show up:

Gtox added a prehistoric critter pack (GameGuru Ark clone, anyone?)

And Fredgames77 continues rapidly cranking out high quality models, this time in the form of a building tool pack!

Free Stuff

https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/221251 Mipastu put in a pretty clever fix for AI getting stuck on walls and corners by making an 'AI wall' which essentially allows you to keep them from getting to problem areas.  Definitely worth the download.

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

Looks like BOTR is integrating his heightmap importer INTO GameGuru's github code as a branch.  This is very exciting to me and I'm really hoping we see that additional functionality implemented sooner rather than later! Additional details can be found here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/221100#msg2622732

Random Acts of Creativity(WIPs)

Synchromesh has added some new music to his excellent Protascope game (by DuchenKuke): https://youtu.be/9qDAmpCIb-4

Cybernessence put up a new screenshot for his epic GameGuru work "The CogWheel Chronicles":

And this blurb about the latest changes he's made:

"I've re-written the player swimming to use the physics capsule, it's much better now - though it did need a new lua command to fine tune it (SetWorldGravity) - which will come in handy for the barsoom levels too.

I also updated the in-game terrain loading to load associated entities (it was only loading terrain and grass before from the fpm and positioning anywhere in the world) and added the DCO to it, to keep silky smooth play. The memory seems to be paging in and out properly, so if I load one terrain/level part then delete and load another the memory is smoothing out. Still got a lot of testing to do to make sure this holds up with 16 different fpm's loaded on the fly, and I did hit a 'random' crash bug that took me days and days to find (this was in my added mods not GG stock code) ."

He's done incredible work which I hope to see integrated by middle of next year at the latest.  Time will tell though!

Naelurec has some updates with details and technical information but also these great new menu screenshots:

Really simple, clever, and clean.  I like it a lot.  You can get more info here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/221152?page=1#msg2622551

In My Own Works

I've recently begun putting together another HQ space skies set, but run into some snags.  Expect a few freebies of my throwaways along with a new pack on the store in the near future!

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!

This Week in GameGuru - 08/12/2019

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.

As you can see, this week I've included a disclaimer as I've received feedback that the way this blog is syndicated on www.game-guru.com, www.thegamecreators.com, blogarama, and gamedev.net can lead to some confusion as to the nature of these news releases. I will be including this disclaimer going forward to help clarify for those who are not familiar with my work.

While I realize that some people may disagree with my methodologies, at the same time you are free to do so.  I do reside and live in the United States of America and our rights of free speech are important to me.  I make every effort to ensure that I do not denigrate or diminish anyone's work.  If you take issue with the way I portray YOUR PERSONAL PRODUCTS then please contact me.

Thanks for your time, everyone - I now consider that issue at an end.  Also, a special note at the end so make sure you read all the way through - big news about my book! :)

GameGuru News

Per GitHub the latest information is that there is a trial version being added to GameGuru where you can use it for around 7 days before having to purchase it.  This will likely add a number of new potential buyers to the product so keep a close eye out for those new guys and gals!

Also it appears there is a relatively minor change that will allow standalones to be exported without encryption so as to allow entity sharing?  I'm not sure what that one is for but I'm sure it'll make sense eventually.

I can also soft confirm that ... other interesting things are going on with GG.  That's the most I'll say for the moment!

What's Good in The Store

FredGames77 continues to pump out high quality assets at a record pace.  While we've all likely got a huge stash of boxes, the quality on his recent submission is definitely worth a look:

You get 10 'pack cases' (boxes) for $10 (currently on sale for $5!) - a very reasonable offer.  These are high quality to boot with low poly count and excellent PBR texturing.  Get yours here: https://www.tgcstore.net/pack/11145

There's also this interesting grub enemy creature by Gtox:

Get yours here: https://www.tgcstore.net/product/33376

Free Stuff

Honkeyboy added some horns to Character Creator: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220945

Not bad work.  I will admit my book's materials ALSO include some donated Character Creator attachments so keep an eye out for that as well. He's got additional ones here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220945#msg2618825
They include a rice farmer's hat, knight's templar's helm, skeleton warrior, and another set of demon horns.

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

 

This week I caught wind of a pretty interesting blog tutorial on the best mods for Blender 2.8 (which recently dropped).  If you use Blender actively check it out here:   https://cgcookie.com/articles/the-top-10-modeling-addons-for-blender-2-8

The latest official GameGuru tutorial video was posted online: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMqPsVpy2Ag

There were actually a number of non-english tutorials being posted.  Some work reasonably well enough with youtube's auto-translate function if you're interested:

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEova6DMa5Q

Work continues on the '3d Asset Manager' program for GG - it has come such a long way in such a short period.  The latest info can be found here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220822?page=5#msg2618874

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

Bod this week made a really serious Taxicab..which turned into a police car... which turned into this awesome street racer with neon lights and alpha-planed headlights.  https://youtu.be/dw8mi4z7isg

Bonesy also made more forward momentum through steady refinement of his cyber-fi game:

One of the more interesting bits is a new user named "Trollbae" posted one of his friends creations from amateur work in the EBE and it's an impressive manor house:

I have to admit this is quality work for someone who is just trying out the EBE and GameGuru.  It shows a pretty clear ease for new users and I proves a bit to some of us older hats that maybe the EBE is worth using from time to time after all!

Tarkus1971 posted an update to his 'Urban Histories' game that I am personally very interested in seeing - apparently he's reworking it from scratch.  More info here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220589?page=1#msg2619135

Solar is working on a side project called "Zombie Central".  It's a suburban zombie city crawl.
https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220974#msg2619073

This is because his other project, Kaboom Foxie is apparently nearly complete.

In My Own Works

And lastly, in my own big news (if you even made it this far to the end of this report) ... is my book is FINALLY released!

https://www.crcpress.com/An-Introduction-to-GameGuru/Messina/p/book/9781138612631

That's right!  The first start to finish guide for making and selling a game in GameGuru is finally here! The book is 426 pages in print with a significant error index, Lua, FPI Guide, 20+ chapters on GameGuru and Game Development in general.

The assets for this (demo maps, character creator addons, custom weapons,  custom static entities, some generously donated other materials, all my scripts, skies and textures...) are all going to be uploaded TONIGHT by 12PM EST.

I will also be giving away some promotional copies for FREE in the coming week.  So keep your eyes peeled on Discord and on the Forums for more details.

For those interested, there is a special 20% off discount code I have through my publisher you can use that is valid until the END OF THE YEAR - AITGG230 

FOR THOSE NOT PURCHASING THE BOOK, THE ASSETS WILL BE POSTED TO THE STORE IN THE COMING WEEK OR SO FOR PURCHASE.  

This Week in GameGuru - 07/08/2019

Well, I'm back, finally.  My life is still absolute chaos from the baby's arrival but I've been able to shore up enough time to put together a GameGuru report for everyone. Deepest apologies for missing anything, but there's a tremendous backlog to work through.

GameGuru News

Obviously the biggest news here is that the big patch dropped.  By the time you see this, the newest patch will likely have trickled from the public preview (a sort of open beta) to the main branch.  This huge, expansive update has a significant number of major bugfixes from numerous community members such as T-Bone, BoredOfTheRings, Defy, Preben and others.  It also has some back end work from Lee.  It purports to provide:

• 41 Major fixes. 
• Lots of water fixes
• Z Depth issues,
• Glass casting shadows
• And many other fixes for long time issues. More info can be found here: https://www.thegamecreators.com/post/gameguru-publicpreview-released

I am really looking forward to having a chance to test this myself. Of note are the apparently now functional lightmapping system, which has been a MAJOR thorn in the side of the DX11 builds along with some serious memory work.

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

I made a nearly complete guide to the projectile system here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220802

A third party asset management tool is in the works, which I find particularly exciting: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220822

The GameGuru youtube official channel has posted a number of recent updates for usage tutorials: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1q1e3Q9IKMk4nDlAGb_5Jg/videos

What's Good in the Store

Mad Lobster put up a really excellent film pack of PBR assets.

This is an exceptionally high quality pack and is definitely a must-buy if you use these types of materials.

Sula finally got around to making his cars into a pack, it's pricey but definitely worth the cost if you need a large number of European vehicles that are PBR enabled.

FredGames has put together an interesting Sci-Fi snap-together kit.

Beyond that T-Bone has put together several interesting script and clutter pieces, check his artist page here: https://www.tgcstore.net/artist/45855

Tarkus1971 has been hard at work at music assets, which are generally speaking great quality for the price: https://www.tgcstore.net/artist/219730

And lastly Graphix has been hard at work on many of his own assets such as fences, graveyards and the more.

Free Stuff

A great number of free assets were released recently.  Wolf, in particular, posted a massive megathread of all of his free stuff.

This is a definite must-visit for anyone who hasn't obtained his high quality DNIS assets.

Tarkus1971 put up a new music track called a retro volca?  I'm not familiar with it but his work up to this point has been really decent.  Get your copy here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/213190?page=5#msg2617272

MaiaCombra put together a decayed burlap decal

This should have good utility in a war torn of post apocalyptic environment.

And also several other items such as a mobile interface and a retexture of HarryWever's crane.

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

This section will likely not be as updated as it should be because simply there's too much to pour over.  I will attempt to capture some of the more interesting things I've seen recently.

Far and away I absolutely loved T-bone (Teabone)'s 'garbage cleanup simulator' found at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRo_vt1tY60



Duchenkuke posted a kitschy project that might have some potential. It gave me a few laughs, at least, the video can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItHmZyKs1rU

Amenmoses has been doing wonderful things with particles: https://vimeo.com/345087887

Solar's project Resist: Revolution is still looking like it's making good forward progress: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/218343/newest

Honkeyboy is back with some interesting work.  While it may need some polish, be aware he does some pretty interesting work with his Lua code so keep an eye on it for that reason if no other strikes your fancy: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220833

Newcomer "J-Dup" put some interesting work into a project called "The Last Dweller". 

More info and a video can be found here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220872

Cybernessence has continued his phenomenal work on GameGuru and his project:

The above picture illustrates in the author's words: "Just updated the terrain shader to use combined textures, diffuse with specular in alpha and normal with ao in alpha channel.

This saves texture memory and the results for terrain really pop (the ao really make a big difference), it's now looking a lot like how the basic unity PBR terrain does ..."

A host of new and updated works really flooded my research here and I apologize for those I missed.  Keep writing your updates so I can see the latest and greatest screenshots to help plug your projects with!

In My Own Works

One of the harder tasks I've had over the past few weeks is balancing a demanding publisher's schedule while dealing with a new baby.  I've had numerous revisions, requests, and the like to fix up  my book or change various bits about it.  It's been difficult to find time but I've found a way to stay on schedule, even if that means making the updates at 3AM while holding a screaming infant.

Also of note I made a private Discord server with many of the heavy hitters of GameGuru, specifically to help facilitate changes faster in our community.  That went into play shortly before my daughter's arrival so I'd like to think it helped a bit with getting this latest update out into the world.

This Week in GameGuru - 06/03/2019

This will likely be my last update for 2-3 weeks.  This is due to the imminent delivery of my third child.

GameGuru News 

This week we had an info-drop on github with an update from Lee.  You can see the full details of it here but the latest essentially confirms that he's got a heavy focus on multiplayer and VR:
 https://github.com/TheGameCreators/GameGuruRepo/commit/243fbd39d2085a9265a67810a232c481150c69ed

While this is disappointing from a bug-fixing standpoint, it is at least some form of development so I'm curious to see when this thing is planned on going live. 

Lastly if you haven't taken a look at the thread on the forums about the lack of official word (I don't count, sorry!) then check here:  https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220783?page=2

What's Good in the Store

Nothing new this week, sorry guys.  My camerakit is still on sale at half off, so pick it up now before it falls off sale!

https://www.tgcstore.net/product/31048

Free Stuff 

Graphix made a free cubemap skybox of a winter forest: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217932?page=14#msg2615957

JPH made a six-pack of free PBR skyscrapers.  https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219734?page=2#msg2615961

Third party Tools and Tutorials 

BOTR continues his impressive work on an FPSC to GG importer.  This pipeline could really save some of the level creation of GG, considering the terrain engine is the biggest slowdown for the system.  TGC would do well to leverage projects like this.  

Defy is looking at putting together a dev log, but continues some important off the books work on saving and loading.  He may have a solution to some very serious problems with the current setup.  Time will tell!

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

This week we saw a great demo of Slaur3n's cowboy survival game. 

The video shows a fairly high level of refinement for a GameGuru Game and I recommend all GG developers watch this for a good idea of some interesting new gameplay considerations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7ZfYsLA_dA&feature=youtu.be

Meanwhile, Bod has been plugging away at getting functional vehicles more functional by adding a working speedometer!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHf6EjWIGxE

My 'Silent Hill GG-Style' Game is available for download after having been updated to DX11: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/216959#msg2615894
Be gentle, it reflects my game design from 3 years ago and I did little to actually change it beyond making it work in DX11.

DenZelik updated his game Neir:

While the asset use is fairly tame, I do like seeing that he's worked on custom inventory and HUDs so keep an eye on this one!

In My Own Works

This week I got sick of the stumbling blocks I kept hitting with the projectile system.  Between talking to EAI, Preben, and others I came to the conclusion I would need to dig into GG's root source code to figure out what was happening. My goal was to create a tennis-ball like weapon that would do no damage but interact from a physics standpoint with the game engine.  So in short, a very similar weapon to what's in Unreal.

https://youtu.be/6N2OSD-COt4 Thankfully I was able to find the problem and will make sure that my tutorial (to be posted soon) will have this information in it! 

This Week in GameGuru - 05/05/2019

GameGuru News

This week in GameGuru we have several 'info drops' of interest.  Firstly, if you missed it, on youtube was a recent video by Lee with respect to using GG Loader with GameGuru.  This could, perhaps, signal a shift towards a more formal cross platform pipeline between AGK and GG.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcMrV7OqfeQ

Also recently a DLC pack deal was posted with this snippet of information:


"It's been a slow start to the year for official updates, but rest assured a lot of activity is happening in the background which we'll be able to reveal to you in the near future. What we can say for now is that we are working on aspects of the file management system for better compatibility with Windows 10, some multiplayer technology additions, a little code refactoring and upgrading the internal source code to Visual Studio 2017.
May will also see us tackle a few of the points you have posted to our issues tracker, so if you have something you would like to report and it's not yet recorded on GitHub, you can do so here:
https://github.com/TheGameCreators/GameGuruRepo/issues"

This lines up from what I've heard unofficially. If you take a look at the 'AlphaSite' code base, you'll notice a lot of recent moves towards adding Photon Multiplayer code and VR support.  While this is all very interesting and potentially game-changing it also is somewhat worrisome as an outside observer as there are nearly 265 outstanding issues on the issues tracker and I truly hope we see more than a 'few' bugfixes.  This engine's incredible potential is being hampered by a backlog of bugs and quality of life improvements for critical features such as a meta-searchable entitybank, better UI controls and improved terrain functionality.

I am, however, extremely hopeful that the new update will include at least a good chunk of fixes for outstanding issues such as the math error for the widget (where it slides exponentially if you are on the 'backside' of it.). Time will tell, but historically it's proven that every major update typically brings back a large number of old users to 'give it a whirl'. 

What's Good in The Store

This week it looks like Valentin321 has continued adding to his repository of Soviet themed assets.

Sula put in some last minute cars, old european cars that are oddly remniscient of the old American Chevy Nova (from the 80's). 

A few packs were added, notables are Graphix's beautiful picket fence kit and BSP's very impressive 2k skies pack volume 2. 

Also my Time of day and Weather kit + Skies pack is on sale this week for 12.95 until the 10th.  Make sure you get your copy if you haven't already gotten one! I will be adding the new 4k Space Skies to this kit shortly and increasing the price to reflect it, so if you want to get those skies for a bargain, this is the best time to do it!

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

BOTR continues to grind out work on his heightmap importation tool for GG.  He's now getting a split-loading system in where you can load multiple terrain types.  It's an interesting experiment, get more details here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219806?page=3#msg2615271

AmenMoses posted a video of his highly impressive physics-based gear library that is a work in progress but will likely see release soon for those who don't mind getting their hands dirty with Lua code: https://vimeo.com/334314785

Wolf did a great write-up on '10 easy tips to make working with GG easier' which has some pretty high quality info in it, like how to make any plant into functional vegetation. Many of the these are covered in my book as well but it's nice to see the information making it's way through the public sphere!

Dvader has been breaking into the map file and digging around.  Interesting stuff, I remember trying the same thing about a year ago and eventually giving up after running out of time. 

Free Stuff

HarryWever(Dagored) put up a free windmill for those interested: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/210761?page=6#msg2615188 - They look great with the dynamically cast shadows from the built-in sun. 

Amenmoses posted a script for Graphix's free piping that allows functional gauges: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217932?page=14#msg2615070

Amenmoses also put together a variation on his vehicle script to make a very cool little boat: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220055?page=1#msg2615182

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

Recently Belidos showed a very interesting video of his recent work on an isometric RPG kit which included an inventory system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FslhDHYSwHM

And because I inadvertently missed it, there was a fantastic piece of work demonstrated by Bod and Amenmoses showing multiple vehicles which can be driven via video.  I would recommend this highly as a must-watch: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220598?page=2#msg2614858

Teabone's recent work on his D&D inspired gelatinous cube has come a long way - I'm definitely liking the progress:

He's put a lot of time into trying to size it properly and get the 'jiggle' correct.

Ignite has some new interesting details on it's design philosophy and recent updates: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220722#msg2614998
Notably he's added:
Three light sources, each with different behaviours (actual weapons shown are placeholders atm).

•   Movement penalties based on light choice.
•   Death, respawning, and resetting of light source attributes.
•   Safezones.

Good stuff. I always like to see people thinking outside of the box.

Solar's project, 'Resist: Revolution' is apparently still being worked on and some good screenshots were recently posted:

Not bad at all!  Keep up the good work guys.

In My Own Works

Recently I posted some teasers to Facebook and various areas of Discord of the weapons work I'm having done by an artist via Commission.  It's come along well.  We're about halfway through the list of proposed items and so far I'm really pleased with the results. I've also been working heavily with GameGuru's gunspec file and projectile files to help create some impressive effects for these guns ranging from flamethrowers to plasma launchers. I'd say I feel as if I have full mastery on this and will likely do a write-up on it in the near future or try to get a last-minute inclusion to the book.

In the meantime, enjoy the screenshots of some of the guns that are still works in progress but are nearing completion:

Once we're all done I'll release these for purchase on the TGCstore ahead of the book for those who don't intend to buy the book (which will include free versions with it).

Again, for those who are interested, the book's publication date is AUGUST 19th, 2019.  I hope to see you all soon with details about additional features I will be including with the book!

This Week in GameGuru - 04/29/2019

Apologies are in order for being out last week. My day job has us do an out-of-town Biannual disaster recovery event which requires me to travel and work throughout the week.

That said there's a lot to cover, let's get to it!

GameGuru News

I've been told that things are in the pipeline, though no specifics have been given.  Expect news probably in the next few weeks with respect to that.

Rumblings from the community seem to indicate a fairly large shift centering around Multiplayer but I really hope that we also see a major spate of bugfixes given that there's a fairly heavy amount of open issues on GitHub. Once again, time will tell.

For now, your best choice is to look at what Cybernessence (see below) is doing.

What's Good In the Store

This week's totally subjective analysis of store items is.. fairly extensive.  Significant amounts of creativity went into the new items on the store!

There's a superb AFV from relative newcomer Zubil0:

You can get your copy here, it's well priced at a meager $2.50!

Campana productions put out a torture pack, if you're needing something more gruesome for your project.

Graphix has been prolific in his recent PBR additions, with everything from shipping containers to fencing packs.


Sula has put together a city and road pack that is fully PBR enabled.

Full kit includes 31 fully PBR modeled entities for building roads and cities!

This is one of my few 'must buy' kits for this year, in my opinion.  For the price, it's a great deal that will help you put together some really convincing cityscapes.

Dagored has been working diligently on his exploding bridges set and I have to say...

It's more than satisfying.  It also allows for some interesting game dynamics so definitely take a look and see if it's your speed. For me, it definitely fits in well with other destructible entities such as rolfy's old exploding city set.  Get your copy here: https://www.tgcstore.net/pack/11100

The music scene on the store has been exploding as well. I unfortunately haven't had time to review them all but there's some really excellent stuff that's been posted in the past few days such as:
PDKMusic's 'Wasteland Blues' music pack: https://www.tgcstore.net/product/32353

Tarkus's several recent works, all horror related and recently put into the 'decay' pack: https://www.tgcstore.net/pack/11098


There's a lot more on the store as well.  Some of the recent changes to the store, by the way, include a direct link to the GCSS discord on the seller's page and some more orientation towards providing support for other engines.

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nO05fYSVoNQ Maiacombra made a great tutorial on how to update your models to use the illumination shader.

Apparently Vishnu Studio has finished their 'Vishnu Packer' program.  This fully featured program provides significant installation support for GameGuru standalones.  You can get your free copy here:

https://vishnupacker.webs.com/vishnustudio.htm

In an update near and dear to my heart, BOTR has is working on updating his Heightmap 2 GG tool.

https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219806?page=3#msg2614988 

Free Stuff

AmenMoses has been hard at work on several new scripts - the most recent of which is a 'freeze player' script that works for pausing the player's movement to allow specific events to play out: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220055?page=1#msg2614939

He is apparently also working on a 'gear library' which allows mechanical gears to function in GG.  Very cool stuff.

There's a free 'Sci-Fi Music' library on the TGCStore.  Pick up your copy here: https://www.tgcstore.net/product/32337

Graphix dropped some pipes and gauges, all PBR enabled here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217932?page=14#msg2614784

Lafette put out an easter pack:

and also a beautiful fantasy loot and chest set

Thanks to all the content creators who are willing to provide freebies to the community.

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

Foremost, the most recent work by Synchromesh on Protascope 'Phase 2' is looking really solid.  I'd say this is a great contender for a high end demo of what kind of work GameGuru is capable of.

https://youtu.be/Vih47nE8QGY

Phase 2 Test Description youtu.be

The project Screos by Insane6 is coming along.  New screenshots were posted here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220691#msg2615012

Cybernessence continues dropping huge amounts of information about his changes to the engine in his custom variation that will purportedly be merged into the main branch.  In this case, he's pretty much made it clear he's heavy on trying to fix the lighting system.  A great deal of new info can be found here and while technical in nature, it's quite inspiring and I truly wish him the best on his work! https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/213870?page=5#msg2614959 

An interesting concept called 'Ignite' is on the forums where a player doesn't fight enemies but uses a torch to stay 'alive' that must remain lit.  Interesting concept, I'm hoping to see some more fleshing out on this.   

Wolf has gone on to Unity, which is a shame but is rather predictable.  Many of the older hats have lost interest in waiting for updates, but often return when a major patch is released.  So we'll see you again soon!

 Lastly is an interesting project called 'Die Zombie Sausage, Die!' ... it has to be seen to be believed.

In My Own Works

This month has been mostly about building the sidecar content for the book, stabilizing deals and the like with people who are creating content to come with the book. My weapons developer has been making great strides towards some high quality weapons for purchasers of the book.  I'm really looking forward to releasing the content as soon as possible!

This Week in GameGuru - 04/15/2019

GameGuru News 

Nothing currently.  I've put out feelers with Deb and the team @ TGC for more details but so far there's nothing to report.  Github shows no forward momentum at this time either aside from a single ambient occlusion error listed on the issues tracker.  Details available here:

https://github.com/TheGameCreators/GameGuruRepo/commit/786ab7246e0b6d64f008ff30d81b0bef7fc518ac

So assuming we're hitting a phase of community development in the future I can offer one bit of hope for those still using GameGuru or new to it - Cybernessence.  His work in progress, 'The Cogwheel Chronicles' has a lot of custom code to it which will eventually find it's way (per his words on the forum) into the engine itself.  That said, I think many of us would truly appreciate some forward motion from the core team at TGC so here's to hoping their silence is indicative of that work!

What's Good in The Store

This week I added my pack freebie "Lonely Ice" to two different packs - owners of the 4K HD Space Skies pack will get it - as will the many Bonus Sampler Pack owners out there!  If you're looking for a low-priced way to check out one of the new 4K Skies, this is definitely the best option.  The Bonus Sampler's normal price is $1.50!

Beyond that we've got some other excellent work on the store this week:

BSP appears to have taken up the gauntlet I threw down with my skies and put together some good looking earth-based skies in high res (2k by 2k) -  https://www.tgcstore.net/pack/11099

Dagored put together some awesome exploding bridges.  I can see some serious potential with these.  Take a look at them here: https://www.tgcstore.net/pack/11100

Long-time artist "Northern" put up what looks like the beginnings of a picnic kit.  There's no pack to speak of yet though the models are of moderate quality and would be suitable as elements in most GG quality games.

Of particular note this week we have Gtox's 'Scarecrow' which features some really slick animation and fits the horror theme well. 

I highly recommend picking this up if you're making a high quality horror game in GameGuru, you can find it here: https://www.tgcstore.net/product/32636

Third-party Tools and Tutorials

This week Defy posted what I'd call one of the most important threads for GameGuru in 5 years - a very detailed breakdown memory consumption by the map size and some tips on how to keep that size down.  If you're an advanced user, you need to read this: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220706

I will be keeping it in my reference list on my blog (http://gamegurureport.blogspot.com) as well.

Also this week MaiaCombra put together a fairly basic tutorial that is worth the 20 minutes if you're a new user on how to make a horror-style game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9V5ZJJTONs


This week we also found out Vishnu Packer has added GameGuru Support:

This should help distribution of GameGuru Games for the layperson. 

Bored of the Rings is adding a fix to autowelder soon - details here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219806?page=2#msg2614590

Free Stuff

Lafette made a building for everyone: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220474?page=2#msg2614566

JPH made some PBR trees: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/219734?page=2#msg2614521

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

This week saw some notable projects add to their portfolios as well as a few new ones.


LentheMan continues his work on his train scene for the cowboy shooter:

You can see the lighting start to really come together here.

Tarkus1971's 'Urban Histories' game had a video posted ... see it here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220589?page=1#msg2614408

Maiacombra is putting together an outdoor military-style shooter: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220701

Scienceboy came back to his long-refined project "Twin Worlds" and posted some interesting teaser screenshots:

You can see more here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/208185?page=9#msg2614553 

And as mentioned in the news section, Cybernessence has some interesting work he's been doing.  Lately it appears that he's working with light probes to create a flashlight shadow from the dynamic flashlight light source.  Remember, he's mentioned these changes will get merged into GG when he's completed so this bodes well for the rest of us.

He provided a demo picture that is 'highly exaggerated' to give some sense of what he's doing.  Granted it doesn't look pretty but remember this picture is more of a technical demo than anything else:

Per Cybernessence: "Hugely exaggerated picture for illustration. There are no lights other than the sun in this scene. The sky and floor are being treated as ambient light sources (the probe fired as I approached) - notice the red from the floor on the wooden boards around the top of the building."

More details here: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/213870?page=5#msg2614527

In My Own Works

This week I got my first batch of verifications from the publisher.  I also got wind of the pricing and asked about that - it appears the pricing is going to range from around $50 USD to $69USD.  That's a touch higher than expected.  I'm waiting for some words back on that as I know that's a bit much.  In other news, weapons development for the sidecar materials going with the book is coming along well.  I am pleased at what I've gotten thus far and look forward to revealing the full breadth of materials once the book is released.  Purchasers of the book will receive a copy of them for free, along with many of my other products including the Advanced Weather and Time of Day system.

This Week in GameGuru - 04/08/2019

GameGuru News

The attic pack is on sale.
Also, apparently (from the monthly newsletter):

"In the background, we have also received a new version of the GLTF importer code from a freelancer who helped create it, and although it only does static textured models at this stage, we are considering adding this new file format to the Model Importer in a future update.

We are also looking closely at a new multiplayer technology too, which will finally allow non-Steam non-owners of GameGuru to play multiplayer sessions with their friends, so watch out for official news on that in the next few months."

That's kind of neat, I guess?  I'm still anxious to hear about the bugfixes purportedly in the pipeline though.

Free Stuff

Grobyken put together a really good looking war-torn building model:

Get yours here - https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/217711?page=5#msg2614215

Third Party Tools and Tutorials

Some interesting info here in this AI thread: https://forum.game-guru.com/thread/220670

A user named 'Nevin' has been making several video tutorials on GameGuru including some basic scripting topics. You can find them here:

• Hunger in Games
• Color Video Text
• Object Rotation via Script
• Triggers Tutorial

What's Good in the Store

This week there's been a lot of updates.  Lots of subjectively good things.

Dagored's got a great looking Apache chopper, Wolf's made some interesting Sci-Fi containers, Mad Lobster continues his film/photo set work, and Graphix put together some excellent looking PBR assets.

Random Acts of Creativity (WIPs)

Wolf's been working more on Acythian and fine-tuning his scenery:

A new project called "Sereos" (Serious?) made it's rounds with some decent looking screenshots:

Synchromesh added some new pieces to protascope and I have to say I'm super excited to see more work being done on this:

And I'm happy to report that Len the Man has been continuing his cowboy shooter, fine tuning his lighting and level design to produce some really nice looking results:

Keep doing the good work everyone! So far, it seems to be a very productive year for the community.

In My Own Works

The book's secondary materials are grinding along. I've also got edits to make on a very strict timeline to make the August 19th production deadline.

I've finally settled on my 'pack freebie' space sky for the new 4k kit. Owners of the 'Bonus Sampler' will get this included, as well as those who own the 4k HD Space Skies set will also receive this.
A teaser is included below and this should be added within the week!

Have a great week, everyone!