Future of bmax?

I think for me I will settle with the 2D abilities it uses, for the next couple of years. I don't expect it to offer any more than this, and only for a mac/pc market.

Whats your take on it? where do you think it will go?

I'd like to see it produce working games / apps for portable devices such as iPhone, Windows Mobile devices etc.

I think it will be crushed by Blitz3D v2.

Well, I hope that is what will happen.

I think Mark will dable with the syntax and add features that are used with other languages like C++, C# and Java.

I see members here providing the 'meaningful' updates - like support for established 3d engines.

Are there any plans for Blitz3D v2?

Edit: As I mentioned in other post I think BMax tries to cover a wide range of programming requirements without success
That's my opinion

Blitz3D v2==Max3D. It will come, but it could be a while.

i waaaaaaaaant b3d v2!!

I don't really care. All I really need is multithreading - other than that it addresses anything I really, really need.

No, and I don't think there would be any point either considering DirectX 7 is no longer supported by Microsoft.

I think Max is a pretty capable language, and I agree proper threading would be a great bonus especially in the continually expanding age of multiple cores and cpu's which seems to be the big next trend.

That said I think Max could also offer some useful features for the higher level. At the moment it's sort of a game programming language where you have to more or less write all of the game features yourself. It's kind of like a handy game-oriented toolkit but doesn't *directly* aid you in creating a game.

All you need is the power of your imagination to make these things real!

I've managed to work with BlitzMax + Irrlicht via Gman's great module, I really hope you can try it yourself and get the idea.

Well, to be honest BlitzMax is a relativelty better game programming language currently, this may be changed later but stick in one and finish the project is more important.

I think it will be a Directx9 update to Blitz3d

It won't ever be that.

This discussion was meant to be a fun vision of the future, not troll posting from people like cower. Please keep the thread on-topic :]

I'm hoping BRL decide to provide a few of the missing 2D functionalities which should round off the 2D side of the product.

I would say that 3d+physics+threading+2d and ide/editor enhancements+community love would enhance the product. As for 3d, part of the problem is that those easy DX7 days are over. It either takes a lot of work in the background coming up with something easy to use or you have to limit the possibilities.

I would like to see a OpenGl & DX9 driven engine with a full 3d command set in the vein of b3d, not built in like in b3d, only as a module, (like maxgui & minib3d) -no point in bulking.

Import blitz3d-opengl-dx9.core = I wish :)

BlitzMax will eventually phase out Blitz3D and BlitzPlus. The latter two are legacy products that are no longer needed, but are still supported because of their userbase. BlitzMax has a superior language and is more flexible. So, folks, stop the whining and MIGRATE! ;-)

BlitzMax will get multi-tasking and object-persistancy support and become a really powerful tool to write distributed server-side apps.

I wish MaxGUI grew out of its step-child role and became a loved child that grows to something that can be used to write really cool GUI apps. And when I talk about GUI apps, think of something in the league of Propellerhead Reason, Apple Aperture or the like. Yes, I know, the sky's the limit - or the amount of code you can write in a single person's lifetime. ;-)

Yes, I know that Brucey and his companions are doing a great job with wxMax. But I'm on a Mac, and the fully working version of wxWidgets still sits on the now deprecated Carbon API. That does not make me feel too comfortable. MaxGUI instead uses Cocoa, and I find that thought relaxing.

Other than that, a 3D engine for BlitzMax still is not on my radar screen. I'd buy it when it comes out in a version that supports OS X, but I don't need it. As boring as it sounds, but working printer support on OS X interests me more. And if BlitzMax had support for CoreAnimation - even better.

I'm only interested in BlitzMax on OS X in the first place, so I appreciate any improvement in the support of that platform. At the moment, the product and its ecosystem is too Windows-oriented for my needs. It's not a real issue, and I hope it won't become one. I still have yet to find a development tool for OS X that I like as much as BlitzMax. And, to be honest, I'm tired of looking.

Ok. Enough time wasted for today. :)

For a mac user, shure. ;)

You have access to the API, *and* BlitzMax... so... ;-)

I don't actually see MaxGUI advancing very much further in the scheme of things. I found it too constricting to be tied to it, which is why I've taken the direction I have with wxMax. However, as you may have noticed, I'm up for making the OS X implementation of MaxGUI rock-solid. No reason it's a second-class citizen, other than a lack of effort.

Given that it is a programming language firstly, and a gaming thing secondly (well, it's not like it's bursting with helpful game-writing modules), I think it has loads of potential. As Noel says, it's up to you to get the most out of it.

Of course, not all of us are willing to learn how to do B in order to improve the feature-set of A.
Thanks to BlitzMax, I've learned Objective-C, C++, and more APIs than I care to remember...

BlitzMax just gets better and better :-)

LOL.

Joking aside, it would be stupid for BRL to build a successor to B3D on anything but BlitzMax. Consider it from Mark's point of view - all the hassle of upgrading the entangled innards of B3D to DX9, or write a module for the latest and greatest compiler, with all the same syntax and cross-platform ability?

Why so many Max naysayers?

If you learned C++ from BlitzMax then you know nothing about C++

I'm not so sure that Max has a future. See what happens when Mark gets bored with one of his creations. We're still waiting for a "true" Blitz3d update that will never come...

Indeed, but that's not what I said... :-)

Why should a Blitz3D update come in the first place? It does not make any sense from a business perspective. You have the Blitz3D SDK and BlitzMax to migrate to - do it. Anything other than basing all future Blitz products on the BlitzMax foundation just does not make sense.

Why would anybody in his clear mind want to maintain two languages that are inferior to their newest sibling and that cannot do anything that the newest product line (that is BlitzMax + MaxGUI + 3D SDK) could not do either?

If there will ever be a Blitz3D 2.0, then it will be a BlitzMax with integrated 3D and GUI module. And if I am wrong, more than one billion chinese people won't give a crap. ;-)

It make no sense to "force" new customers to use blitzmax. B3D and Blitzmax are for me 2 completely different products.

I think there are more people that want to have a newer B3D Version than to buy Blitzmax. From my point of view, blitzmax needs the following thinks to have a chance (Otherwise you can take Codeblocks/minGW/allegro..irrlicht or what ever for free).

- A better IDE (At hte moment there is only blide..but blide is not for me..sorry)

- A good (and supported by BRL) GUI (Mark is working on it i think..so go on)

- A real reposity for modules like http://devpaks.org/ (stop to search every release with 20 non working downloads)

At the moment a new customer will only see a "basic like" language with some tutorials and a million of moduls where he can search something that works (also after the next update...so..supported and not 6 months old threads)

I dont say that Blitzmay is bad, but this way it has no chance to other solutions like c++ frameworks. There is no organisation in the community and the support.

All the others who want to buy a simple language to make some games for 90% of the users (windows) can buy B3D.

Sorry 4 my english, i work on it.

Because a lot of us are still using B3D.

Our low level C++ coder pretty much sees Bmax as a C wrapper that uses a standard C++ compiler and doesn't really get what all the fuss is about.

They'd be wrong, then. Max has its own compiler. Some of the modules use C components, which GCC is used to compile.

The fuss, for me is that I love the way the language works. Much better than C++ for every day coding in my book.

Brucey:
Sorry for the misunderstanding :)

kragoth, that's what makes it a legacy product that is still sold. I wouldn't expect a new version of it, though. Developing and supporting three product lines is asked too much from a small company. But, hey, as we say in Germany: "I've seen horses throwing up in front of a pharmacy." ;-)

To sum up people seem to want to extend blitzmax just a touch more and add multithreading. I think Mark will probably add a couple of language / compiler features on his route towards making the RAD style package he speaks of in his worklog.

I am happy making my 2D game at the moment, its realistic for a single person to do and compete at. There's no chance of any of us ever going to match the new standard of 3D gaming like Crysis.

I'd have loved to use something like Unity3D but its mac only, and isn't all "that" anyway.

No matter what we think, the future is fun, dont take Max too seriously nor the forum users :]

The "superior / inferior" talk in this thread will not make any friends to whom think they hold the truth.

Yes, _33, I know that people usually prefer to be buttered up and lied to. But I'm not in politics, even though I work in a highly political organization at daytime. So I just put a quote here and end the thread for me:

"Life is hilariously cruel."
- Bender

And nobody should take any of that all too seriously. This is a developer community. Not Scientology or the Catholic Church or any other religious institution. There should be a place for everybody here.

That's the spirit, Lowcs. At the end of the day, despite its shortcomings, Blitz is a damn fine language and I'm sure Mark will (eventually) come up with something that most will be pleased with.

I'm not overly bothered about 3D, but I'll get the 3D module when it comes out just to play with. Language wise, I would like to see Cesque structures for talking to external routines. Not much else I need.

I dont understand why people so badly want a next gen b3d. MAX is the next gen blitz, so a B3D command set module for max would be the logical step forward.

If you want to you can keep your program structure like b3d. Use just simple functions and types and it almost feels like the same language. The basic command set and syntax when using at this level is similar, with some minor symbol differences (eg .=\ :=. '=; and ;=: ) which are more like 'common language standard' ones.

The biggest unfamilliar difference i saw when converting some of my (non3d) apps, was the fact you need a list to track the objects of a user type, which once you understand it is actually much more powerful. You dont HAVE to learn all the OOP stuff, methods, reflection etc, if you dont want it, however i reccomended you do :)

Now ive gotten to know max a bit better i like it more and more. Especially the ability to do strict coding rules as im a sucker for spelling errors.

Hate the IDE though :(

I've heard good things about Project Studio.

as long as the future includes multithreading im staying in the wagon..

Unlikely. But I hope for the most important usage of it: Asyncron file loading.

That would already be a good step forward :)

I think a new Blitz3d that could be used as a 3d engine for max, would be a smart move. home coders love how easy it is and you have Max for the more advanced user. but making it direct X 9 or 10 would be a mistake, it has to be openGL that way it will work even with microsofts constant changes.

I think alot of the people that have moved onto blitzmax and have been coding for a few years now have forgoten that Blitz3d was what got most of us started and if blitz3d doesnt get a new version that part of the market will be lost, because when you make things harder to learn and more powerful most of the time it makes it harder for the guy starting out. Take away blitz3d what are you left with, the latest version of darkbasic and I wouldnt wish that on anybody.

But Pete, what is harder about it exactly? When I moved over I used to program exactly as I did in B+, with the exception of not having the implicit global lists Dan mentioned. What other significant differences are there that make it harder?

I don't think anyone has forgotten that they started with B3D, except those who didn't start with B3D. I guess some of us might have become painfully aware of how restricted we were in B3D, and perhaps it's unfair when you only notice it quite so strongly in hindsight.

I think most of just flat out fundamentally don't accept that it's any more difficult though. I think B3D owners are just as blinkered by their own position as we are by ours. Blitz3D owners see a lot of things they think they have to learn or relearn ( many of which they really don't have to if they don't want to ) and jump to the conclusion that if they have to learn new things to get from B3D to BMax that BMax is inherently more difficult. I think that's a false assumption though, because the newcomers you describe won't have prior knowledge of B3D. As a newcomer, I don't think BMax is any harder to learn than B3D, and there are a number of complete beginners working with it now who demonstrate that quite nicely. If there are some areas where BMax is slightly more difficult, there are certainly some where it's easier.

For instance, one thing which confuses B3D users is the inbuilt type list. All B3D types are stored in a list. One list only, and only objects of one type. BlitzMax does not have this list. Instead it lets you create as many lists as you want, and put any type of object, including a complete mix, into one list. Where a B3D programmer has to learn to think about his lists differently, a complete beginner is going to find this situation more logical and flexible in BMax. He doesn't have the preconception that lists should only contain one object.

As for the inferior/superior comment, that's just a chip on the shoulder of the odd few. When people say that BlitzMax is the superior language, they say it as a statement of empirical fact, based on it being faster, producing tighter code and having more features. I don't think anyone means that that using it makes you a better programmer or not using it makes you a worse programmer. Does using an expensive fountain pen make you a better writer than a guy who uses a pencil with a chewed end?

If anything, I'd say people who can make big impressive games in B3D are the better programmers because they're having to work harder to get the same results. Paolo, for instance, the guy who wrote Tecno. I admire the hell out of him for producing such a big slick game in a language which does not suit big or slick games. I sure as hell couldn't have written a game with that size or scope in Blitz3D.

Gabriel You have some good points. Max isnt harder to learn, its just alot of people who got blitz3d wanted it to make 3d games, at the moment you have wrappers for other engines, this is where most people will not know where to turn. What 3d engine would you use at the moment?

Ola,

Maybe I was on a different planet but I remember that Mark declared a while back that Max 3D - as originally intended and as we all imagined - is NOT gonna happen. He is trying to come up with a framework for BMax which will make it a game maker for BMax - as far as I remember.

Mark has stated that there are numerous 3D engines for BMax already and he won't be doing the same, isn't anybody listening or did I get it wrong?

IPete2.

Well there's Blitz3DSDK for that. Now before you go off and tell me how DX7 is not "new" by any definition of the word, let me explain something about Blitz3D. It was specifically designed around the DX7 feature set. This is why we haven't seen a DX9 or OpenGL version of it. Not because it's not a good idea, but because it's not possible at all. Practically all of the fixed function pipeline metaphors used in Blitz3D are no longer valid.

There is no practical way to get around Microsofts monopoly.

Well since he took the time and imagination to wrap TrueVision3D and is currently using it for more than one project, I think I can fairly confidently answer that for you. If however all you care about is Blitz3D in OpenGL, I think MiniB3D fits the bill perfectly.

No you didn't get it wrong. It's not so much that people don't listen (or even read) so much as they chose to interpret it in a way that best suits their misconceptions.

[quote}The "superior / inferior" talk in this thread will not make any friends to whom think they hold the truth.
[/quote]

If we didn't like BlitzMax we wouldn't have spent the best part of a year working on an ogre wrapper and game development framework for it. Our primary reason for developing flow is to use it ourselves. Been almost 3 years since Bmax came out and in that time we havent really been very productive on the game dev front.

Originaly because of limitations in B3D that got in the way of our project, and then a big contract job that required modern tech and proper low level scene management that B3D isn't capable of.

There are quite a few 3D solutions avaliable now, and I think Mark would be hard pressed to compete with the more mature renderers that have many years of focused development.

Will be interesting to see what he does finaly come up with.

Personally im using BlitzMax with Minib3d :)

As far as i've understood, he quit doing it in an old style way like in blitz3d and went for a 3d editor driven version. I never read that he stopped 3d at all.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the only finished cross platform 3D module for BlitzMax is Irrlicht.

What are the finished Windows 3D modules besides Irrlicht? Blitz3DSDK and 3Impact? Is Dreamotion finished?

-AF

And with Irrlicht you're without 3d sound, you're without physics, a compiled version is only available for win if i remember correctly, ...

All these "alternatives" don't look right on a first or on a second view...

I agree totally, the cross platform open source engines out there would be hard to top. Instead of beat em, join em. I think they should just go for a solid wrapper that incorporates all (or as many as possible) of the original b3d commands as closely as possible, using the same command names.

If brl abided by the LesserGPL they could make and release their own controled official version of irrlicht (or one of the existing cross platform LGPL engines) simply for compatability monitoring and call it "max3d" if they want. This would ensure only official and fully "wrapper compatible" updates were added. In the same way mods for newton and a sound system could be created too.

For example:

|---LGPL brl controlled build+source---|---------------PROPRIETRY-----------------------|
official-max3D-newton-build.a ------------------>official command wrapper ---------------\
official-max3D-3dsound-build.a ----------------->official command wrapper----------------> Blitzmax
official-max3D-irrlicht-build.a ------------------->official command wrapper --------------/

As Taumel stated above none of the alternitives 'look right' to people who only like the look and feel of B3D, whereas a set of 'official' BRL wrappers would not only 'look right' but would feel like B3D as well. This would save them a lot of hard work, time, "wheres the max 3d" earache and would make blitz max much more attractive to those wondering about buying it.

This way B3D users would feel right at home as it would be basically B3D with OGL and DX9, plus the power of MAX so most would be happy. Also those that want to use other engines/mods can still do so in the same way as before.

Using irrlicht would as well give the minimal chance that the so called "RAD" Tools could happen -> users can use irrEdit ...
Even if that sounds hard, its a fact that BRL so far did not delivery a single editor that was even near industry standards by the time it was released. The MaxIDE as well as Maplet are both good starting points ... for a project of 2-3 weeks dev time. But definitely not for the amount of time they had to be developed ...

So the tools Mark mentiones are of seriously no interest to me as i don't see a realistic chance that they will not just be useless / near useless to me. Either because there are professional behaving tools or by writting own ones.

hmm true, but cant irredit be used for other things too?

Still i would still pay full price for the just the wrapper docs and examples, if i knew there was a BRL maintained (ie reliable always working) version of the wrapped engine at the other end of it.