major B3D update, would you pay?

I'm just being curious, but who here, would pay for a major update in the Blitz3D engine?

Simple as that

Dabz

ah so you are making one`?

major update means what exactly?

Erm, a update from BRL that includes a lot of requests from B3D users, to help them carry on their current projects (Such as the DXTC request from Ross C and Evak/Mustang)

I don't need anything like that, I'm just being curious! :)



Give me about three years and I'll let you know! :D LOL

Dabz

..well..of course I will pay for new stuff like DXTC, sdaders, etc..but I think we will pay that, just under different name and thats MAX3D module..

Yeh, I would - I like B3D's easy-to-use functionallity - which is why I am eagerly awaiting Cobra.

YES!!! I'D PAY...

hey ENAY, lend me a few bucks, will ya...

ok, then put your hands up and hand over your gold card!!!

:)

seriously... if i could access the Blitz3D api directly, and if a few dx9 thingees were added to Blitz3D, i would pay...

--Mike

I wish B3D could be ported to Bmax with a few of the current issues fixed and DXTC. And get all the fancy shader stuff bolted on later.

Yes, I would, no it won't happen.

Darkheart

We know! ;)

Though, where's the harm in asking! :)

Dabz

I would def pay. I've spend alot of time getting to know blitz3d. I'd love them to be added!

...And here it is again. This exact same thread popped up a month or so ago as well.

> hey ENAY, lend me a few bucks, will ya...

Would you like 3?

No, I wouldn't. You can't keep hacking things into an out of date engine without everything falling apart. Blitz3d is really getting on now, and I know it seems daunting to have to learn something new, but you really don't have much choice if what you have isn't enough for you.

Learning a new engine is almost certainly far less daunting than you think. I've been playing with TV3D for about a week and most of that have been debugging my wrapper, and although I'm finding plenty of things I can't quite get right or whatever, I have animated models, my own simple shadow system, custom HLSL shaders, and integrated physics functioning. Yes, it takes a while to get the hang of, but not nearly as long as you'll spend working around all the problems you'd have with B3D if all this new stuff was hacked in.

Besides, two of B3D's biggest flaws are it's completely unoptimized renderer and it's horribly slow skeletal animation. Those would require a complete rewrite of the render engine, and a complete rewrite with DX8/9 which is very different from DX7. It's just too much to expect.

Definately! I have no need for texture compression atm but I'd gladly pay for a native stencil shadow system!!

AFAIK, Blitz may be 4+ years old now but there's alot of superb stuff out there that's been written with it. Fancy shader effects don't turn a pish game into a good game so I'll be sticking with it for a while longer at least.

this has been talked about loads of times, and it will be till the end of time. The thing is Blitz research can only code as fast as they can and ATM they have loads on thier plate with Max3d etc so I dont think this would appear any time soon unless people pay in advance thats the only way I can see it happening.

At the moment I think they are doing a lot but not Max3D ... Max 1.18 is still not at the point where not 20" bugreports spawn after the update (or are bumped as still not fixed)

I agree with Gabriel...stop asking for something that will take a big effort and you wont even want when its done!

I never asked for anything, I also said that I dont need shaders/DXTC etc etc

If you read the post at the top... I (As in, myself), am curious of who would pay for an update!

No-one I can see in this thread is demanding an update, everyone knows fine well that they'll have to wait until Max3D!!!

If this subject has been touched before, then I apologise!

Dabz

:)

Instead of threads hoping, begging, encouraging or ( in the case of this thread ) casually discussing in the hopes of interesting BRL with promises of money for B3D to be worked upon, I think you would be better off reiterating Noel's plea for B3D to be open-sourced. It's practical, it doesn't affect those people who don't care and it doesn't take much effort on BRL's part.

Then instead of using third party libs, these things could at least be hacked into the engine itself. I still think you'll end up with a buggy language which regularly vomits on itself, but it's the best chance you have, in my opinion.

I have no hopes with anything, I've stated that I dont need all the bells and whistles of DirectX whatever... I use Blitz+/C++ for nearly all of my projects, I'm completly useless with 3D, the limitions of B3D dont effect me, as I'm probably still years behind anyway!

I started a thread just wondering, that's all... I couldnt give a flying bollock what BRL updates, I know, and I've stated many times before, that BRL should be left to their own devices!

All I have done is ask a simple question... Yet again... I'M JUST BEING CURIOUS...

Anyway, good idea about noels open-source idea!

Dabz

I didn't actually say YOU were hoping. Just that people who were discussing it were. In the same way that my comments about the effort involved in learning a new engine weren't particularly aimed at you, neither were these comments. Just in general, relating to the topic.

And who were they exactly? You must truely think were a bunch of idiots ... behave yourself.

I don't think it's a big deal to add DXTC. If Tom Speed could add it, then don't see why it would take much effort by the creators.

I've either missed the context of what you were saying, or you missed mine... Either way, no worries...

That's the thing with forums, you say one thing, other people may see a slightly different thing! ;)

Group hug everyone! :D

Dabz

:)

Excuse me? I had no such opinion of anyone until you posted that completely unnecessary ( and somewhat confusing ) comment. In fact, I was suggesting what I believed was a more promising way of getting features added, which is what I thought at least some people wanted.

But apparently, I'm way off base. So since I don't want the features myself and wouldn't use them if they were added, I won't waste my time trying to help others when I clearly don't understand.

if people dont want bmax because they want it easyer then cobra is coming soon (psionic is testing it at the moment) which looks like blitz3d with new graphics stuff added or you could go for the Leadwerks Sim engine which is writen in blitz max but will be scripted so should be easy to pickup. i may bite the bullet and learn max when we get the 3d module although the work on the ogre wrapper looks like it may be good.

Come-on, lets us all put the hand-bags away and carry on the discussion at hand!

Gabriel has a fair point with making B3D open-sourced, my guess is that there are plenty of programmers here who would love to get inside B3D, and even have the capacity to push the engine even further. I mean, the modding community strive on stuff like this!

Eventually, BlitzMax will be Marks only bread and butter, so why not? (<--- As in, what do you think)

Dabz

Damien and I realized a while ago that Blitz was pretty much dead in the water. If there had been these features last year I'd have jumped on them.

But like Gabriel said, if the feature was added, I probably wouldn't use it anyway since after not using blitz for a couple of months, and having a damned good but frustrating project that hits too many blitz limitations, it really is better to move on.

Blitz3D is based on DX7. It would be extremly hard to rewrite it for DX9, just to add some features people want (shaders etc.).
I think it would be easier to start from scratch, and that's exactly what happened. BMAX is a highly efficient compiler and its upcoming 3D module will make it the next Blitz3D.

Although some people are working on their own 3D modules, I guess the BRL 3D module is likely to become the standard.

I remember once it was said BMAX and its 3D module will come with a converter script that allows to port Blitz3D programs to BMax (well, 98% of all commands maybe). I will purchase this as soon as it's released.

that sounds like a plan to me jf... but if Mark released the Blitz3D lib like they have over at TGC, i'd license it immediately just to be able to code in c++ :)

or BMax for that matter...

--Mike

I think it would be a big Job to get Blitz3D to DX9. Look what happened when Mark tried to fix the dep issue in B3D. We ended up with a broken blitz and 5 updates later it was finnaly fixed.

Your best bet would be to save yer pennies for Max3D. Or just make small 3d games with Blitz3D as, even though it's missing features, it's still a great product.

I'd like to see Unicode and GUI with Blitz3D... as this will be a killer thing(Blitz3D + BlitzPlus + Internationalization)

And other nice addons like DXTC, DX9/8.1 support(used DX8.1 SDK, it nice except lacking of shaders, and DX81 comes with WinXP)

However I'm looking forward Max3D, I just care its released as Statically linked or as DLL (if statically linked, I hope it to be granular to avoid big executables.)

..I'll repeat again..I'll pay for update and it doesnt mean that I'm 'hoping' something from BRL..for DirectX platform I already find my horse (PR6), so, things I will probably pay for (update) will come in shape of Max3D, and thats it..

I would not pay for a b3d module

I'm all for bmax now, love the syntax, speed ..etc
So i will pay for the BMAX 3D module.