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Possibly a new engine ?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Dean Wang, Nov 18, 2018.

  1. Dean Wang

    Dean Wang
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    I feel like the Torque3D engine is too old for beam, I can barely render rain :/

    I think it would be better for you developers to switch to something more up to date (example : Unreal Engine 4, Unity, or even CryEngine)

    To be completely honest, no one liked the idea of BeamNG in Torque3D, Beam looks fine and runs fine in CryEngine.

    I'm just saying, if you guys don't do something about this game, I'm afraid that Beam is going to be forgotten because almost all racing games / sim games have multiplayer and a decent optimization now.

    By the way the UI haven't been improved that much at all...
     
    #1 Dean Wang, Nov 18, 2018
    • Agree Agree x 3
  2. Kueso

    Kueso
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    completely agree.
    IDK if this has to do with that engine in particular, but the map editor is a crashing mess now.
     
    #2 Kueso, Nov 18, 2018
  3. Aboroath

    Aboroath
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    Switching engines will probably never happen. Too much time and energy has been expended and would most likely be viewed as heresy and an insult by the devs.
    Doing this would also most certainly destroy a huge chunk of the modability of BeamNG. Additionally, the devs are not interested in paying licensing fees etc. that would crop up
    using someone else's engine.

    They are committed to doing this with T3D and making it their own custom engine as I currently understand it.

    Another developer to help work on specified areas? A publisher with deep pockets? Sell the technology to the highest bidder?...who knows what lies ahead.
    All I know is it will take years to get this project prime time ready as the devs appear well entrenched with the current path. If that is their intention then all I'm asking
    is to just come out and say it for all to hear and we move on I guess.
     
    #3 Aboroath, Nov 18, 2018
    • Agree Agree x 5
    • Informative Informative x 1
  4. Kueso

    Kueso
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    Ah I see
    I didnt realize that it would take so long to switch and be that much of a pain. My bad.
     
    #4 Kueso, Nov 18, 2018
  5. Aboroath

    Aboroath
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    I might also add the accessibility of source code of a licensed engine would probably be very problematic?, and with T3D being open source that allows
    the devs to do what they do. This could very possibly be ignorant conjecture on my part but it's in the realm of what I understand.
     
    #5 Aboroath, Nov 18, 2018
  6. Nadeox1

    Nadeox1
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    BeamNG Team

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    Engines are a complex topic.
    Most people think just about the graphics when thinking to them,
    not the overlying systems that pushes everything together.

    Multi-threading is, as far I know, one of the big points often ignored
    How an engine uses your CPU, how the BeamNG physics uses your CPU and so on.
    We have this bad habit of placing informative posts in places where they don't get much spotlight.
    @estama made an interesting post recently on a thread regarding Linux
    I'm no expert on this, but I will share that little I know about this.
    Modern engines are built around multi-threading. This is not necessarily good for BeamNG as we need to leave space for the physics itself.
    Torque3D is an old engine yes, but it was built when most CPUs were single core. This gives us a big advantaged in have more headroom for the physics and UI.

    So, understand this is not only about who has the fanciest graphics when it comes to engines.
    It's also the underlying systems, how it's implemented, if it's good for our use-case, if the tools are easy to use (something that wasn't not much in CryEngine afaik) and so on.

    Also the existing indie-licences were not a thing back in the days.

    We do have in the works many optimizations (main focus points lately, as integral part of Italy's development) and changes to remove some dust of the engines (where possible).


    We have made a detailed blog post about this, hard to miss. We are working on this.
    Our focus is on the new UI, were we are tackling down all these performance issues the current one has.
    You won't see improvements until we do the switch.

    Lot depends on your settings.
    Check my 'simple_map' level, where I managed to get some passable rain effects.
     
    #6 Nadeox1, Nov 18, 2018
    Last edited: Nov 18, 2018
    • Agree Agree x 3
  7. bob.blunderton

    bob.blunderton
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    @Nadeox1 ah yes, Single-core engines. This can be awesome - Unfortunately this can be bad, if your a certain Bob Blunderton who shall remain nameless... and you drown said engine's single-core ability with 65536 draw calls without even trying :x
    At-least I know of this now, and am changing my build style a bit (more connected UV's, more mosaic textures, and more combined objects as Bethesda's Gamebryo engine does pre-run-time, in the editor). If only I had known years ago. To my defense I didn't even know what a draw call was until about 2 years into mapping for BeamNG.

    Gotta love this game. I guess if it was easy, someone else would have already done this type of game years ago.
     
    #7 bob.blunderton, Dec 1, 2018
    • Like Like x 2
    • Agree Agree x 1
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