History of a newbie game maker

[Halifax]

Oh I was simply just saying that if you did use reference pictures, if it was possible that we could see them. That's all it meant.

[Auradrummer]

Ah, ok. Understood now.

[cassini]

Day 39. Newton seems to be very burocratic. I found too much problems configuring it, and it's support aren't very good. So, I used the collision of Irrlicht to achieve what I desired.

...

Day 42. I implemented a driving method. Now I can drive my car around my track. Except by the collision, because when the track raises a bit the car collides with it. Too bad. Now I have to study collisions to make the car 'climb' the track.

Actually if you already have your car physics model running and all you need is collision, you can just use a collision library like Opcode. ODE uses it and it is open source.
Also must physics engines allow you to use the collision part only.
It should be simpler and more exact than trying getting collision working with Irrlitch from the scratch .

[sio2]

do you think that possibly we could take a peak.

I think you mean peek.

[Halifax]

do you think that possibly we could take a peak.

I think you mean peek.

Oh yes true. Typing while studying is a horrible practice, haha.

[Auradrummer]

Hey Cassini,

I'm convinced that you are right. I made contact with some experienced programmers, and they said exactly what you said.

I really thought that Newton is very burocratic in the beginning and PhysiX don't have an way to be modified, if I needed.

JP said that he don't believe that I'll need to modify something, as PhysX is very well constructed engine. But, to avoid discover it by myself, I dedicated a bit more to Newton and started to understand better. Now I'm using Newton and making a very slow progress, but making progress.

PS.: Sorry for the delay, but the 'notify me when a reply is posted' is not working.

[Halifax]

Honestly, I think you should try out the PhysX demo for cars. They show that PhysX is so extensible that they make 5 different cars of varying types. I think they are a big rig, regular car, sports car, F1 car, and a truck. I honestly think that PhysX is the best solution for you, but if you want to go with Newton that is your choice.

[Auradrummer]

Halifax,

The problem I thought is, for example, my car have, together the regular engine (weaker than a F1 engine) a turbofan. The consequence is that when you activate the turbofan, you won't gain more torque in rear wheels, but another independent propulsion with a very different behavior, like don't spin over grass, works better if the car is out of the ground and counter act the braking forces in a different way. I want to reproduce this kind of events in my game, and I have no idea how to do it with PhysX.

[Halifax]

Ah, okay, I see. Have you tried reading the tutorials?

[dlangdev]

Hi Auradrummer,

If you're familiar with Maya's "set driven keys" you can use that on irrlicht.

how?

you can setup a couple of animation clips for those and then label them.

on your irrlicht game runtime, simply define a state of the automobile and play the animation clip when it enters a state.

no need to do fancy-schmancy physics.

[cassini]

Quite frankly I do not see how Physx will be the best solution when all physics APIs have the capacity to implement very good vehicles of various types?

If you use Newton there is no reason why you shouldn’t be able to implement what you want. You can also make it with ODE, or Bullet
On the other hand you can also check out Havok, Intel just released for free http://tryhavok.intel.com/

[Auradrummer]

The e-mail notification is a problem. I was unaware of those posts.

Halifax: I have another reason to not use PhysX. I'm a bit afraid that NVidia make PhysX not free in the near future. And, as well said Cassini, Newton fits in my need (at least seems too). I received a demo of Newton 2.0, and is really impressive management of collision and car behavior. I think I don't need anything better than it from now. And, after all of it, I had to close eyes and appoint to one of them, as I will need some years do decide what is the better. Thanks for your suggestion, I'm sure I'll try PhysX in the future.

Dlangdev: This is what I call a 'Hot Tip'!! I don't work with Maya, my 'business' is Lightwave, but is a very nice information you gave me. I'll look onto it when I use more complicated animations, be sure! Thanks!

Cassini: Is what I think. Newton give me the idea of more possibilities. I think I can reach my objectives with it with no problems.