Trajectory (my first Torque game) well under way… except for a couple o’ small naggin’ details!
I’ve been hackin’ out a project called Trajectory – which I’m not gonna go into lots of detail about until I’m ready to post screen shots, etc. I plan on it being ready at the end of May, but, real life could get in the way.
But I discovered some seriously interesting things while I was hacking out Trajectory. I had been starting the game in Single Player mode, without really thinking too much about it. Finally started the game in Multiplayer mode (which is important, since it’s a Multiplayer only game!) and discovered uh…. oops. While the weapons and ammo system work just fine in multi-player, the actual GUI and most of the player commands don’t work in multiplayer mode. Big oops – just gotta go back and do some rework here and there, no big deal. It’s just one of those conceptual problems – I’m used to working with Single Player only games, and when I started hacking on Trajectory, it started as all experemental stuff to see what I liked, and it evolved into the game it’s self.Â
For a while I was putting in 16 hour days on Trajectory, unluckly real life caught up with me. Gotta put a new radiator in the Caddy, gotta get my armor ready for the next local SCA event – and here’s the one that makes it all worth mentioning – getting my newest catapult (a roman Onager style catapult) ready for showin’ off and firing for kids at the next RenFair here in Wichita.Â
Yes – I’m one o’ those nutcases that love to build things like catapults. This is my second catapult – well, Onager in particular. It’s a baby – 2 foot by 4 foot foot print, but, the last one took the accuracy competition we entered it in. The one after this will be a 4 foot by 8 foot monster made from 6 x 6 lumber. I’ll toss a link to pics of it one o’ these days after the firing mechanism is finished (right now you have to manually fire it.)
But – what in the world would that have to do with developing games on Torque? Well, not much except to warn people that there are some nutcases who have licensed the engine. That, and the game I’m working on it called Trajectory – and directly relates to things like Catapults and ballistics 🙂
One major bitch about the Torque engine so far – the GUI editor / GUI system. Damn it sucks – I’m still tryin’ to work out a good way of doing all the onscreen controls that I need for the game, and have it be resolution independant. Documentation, IMHO is a problem too – but not a really really bad problem. Some quick hacking and you can figure out what’s going on with any given section. But it’s annoying sometimes. If I get the chance, I’ll write documentation for everything that I find, and hand it over to one o’ the people working on documentation.
One more thing before I close this way-too-long .plan: When I’m done with the first game (Trajectory) I’m thinking of making it commercially available, but, also contributing it back to all the Torque licensees. Not sure how that would work yet – but the game isn’t complete so it’s a non-issue at the moment 😉
Bryan Buschmann  (Apr 17, 2002 at 10:58)
Can’t wait to see pics of the catapults. Those would probably qualify as a zoning hazard where I live. 🙂 People are so uptight around here. Have you ever played Ballistics? Its like Extreme-G in a tube, pretty neat, fast as all hell. Maybe not even close to your idea but the names sound alike. 🙂 Good luck.
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr  (Apr 17, 2002 at 11:06) Â
LAUGH! Well, my neighbors are pretty used to my ecentricities – but, firing the catapult where I live at is outta the question. My back yard is WAY too small – I need a large park or football field.Â
Nope – Ballistics and Trajectory are nothin’ alike . 🙂
lksdg  (Apr 17, 2002 at 19:27)
I liked Rampart, it was a fun game