[WIP] Cynum : 3D Chat for Facebook

Linaxys · Post by **Linaxys** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 4:00 pm

Cynum is a Firefox plugin embedding a 3D Chat with the Irrlicht 3D Engine into Firefox using OpenGL, it will work under Windows at the moment, I will do my best to port it under MacOSX* if I can finally release a finished project to the public for the first time in my life.

(*) I will try to port it on Linux too, but OpenGL failed to load under Firefox with Linux the first time I tried.

Why on facebook ?
I've always been dreaming about making my own 3D Chat since 5 years, because I was tired about ActiveWorlds being so much expansive everytime I wanted to build my own world and show them to friends...

Here are the main reasons I'm doing this on Facebook :
- I love Facebook.
- Facebook gives me the perfect resolution we need : 720 * 540.
- There are a lot of users, they won't need to create another account to login into the universe.
- Users will just have to install a plugin that will download the main Cynum's DLL and load it inside firefox.

Planned Features (There will be more, as soon as I feel that I can do them) :
- Meet people right from Facebook, invite them to join the universe and explore new worlds freely with them !
- Build your home, island, dream, and everything else you want to see and share with other people around you.
- Make your own avatar, wear clothes made by other users.
- You can have your own world, build it as you want, like an IRC channel.
- Fullscreen mode if we can ?

Project Status :
[08/04/09] - Plugin is loading, unloading perfectly, there are no crashes found, it will unload and reload perfectly.
[08/04/09] - I made the character, a simple cube, yes, that's how I always begin.
[08/04/09] - Camera System, third person camera that you can rotate, I plan the ability to switch FPS and TPS.
[08/04/09] - Movement, we can walk around, I'm making the flying mode.
[13/04/09] - Terrain System, we have infinite ground right now.
[13/04/09] - Working on the object editing system, we should at least be able to move, rotate, delete and place a new object.
- Terrain editing feature, edit the terrain by vertex and save data into a binary file.
- Terrain texturing feature, change a texture on a quad, must run on at least Intel GMA 950 (no Vertex Shader/Pixel Shader).
- Object scripting system, give the objects some interactions.
- Camera System, rework it, and make a FPS/TPS switch available.
- Plan more than that !

What I am looking for :
I am currently looking for some help, I've been always working alone, but I have a really huge motivation for this project, then I am looking for some people to work with.

- 3D Artists, for models and textures. ( 0 / ?? )
- Character animators. ( 0 / ?? )
- GUI Designers. ( 0 / 1 )

Current Screenshots:

The beginning, not really exciting, since everyone can do that, but the most important part was the integration into Firefox :

If you are interested to work in this project, feel free to PM me.
I will open a forum in my Facebook Application page if you have a facebook profile too for more infos, ToDo lists, and more talk about the work.

Thanks for reading, I will post some replies in case I bring some updates.

Cloudef · Post by **Cloudef** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 7:42 pm

Looks really promising!
I hope you can do opera support too, tho its closed browser so it may be hard :/ Atleast linux version would rock =)

BlindSide · Post by **BlindSide** » Wed Apr 08, 2009 11:31 pm

Hey this looks great, and it's a great idea. Keep it up!

Frank Dodd · Post by **Frank Dodd** » Fri Apr 10, 2009 8:09 am

Great work, I think this could be really big! Facebook is a great way to promote it and gather up users too.

Linaxys · Post by **Linaxys** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 5:52 pm

Thanks for your replies guys

I didn't think that I was going to get a good welcome like this one, just because it's the first time I'm announcing something I'm doing seriously

I hope you can do opera support too, tho its closed browser so it may be hard :/ Atleast linux version would rock =)

Awww, Opera...
I don't think I really can do this under Opera.
I'm planning to do this on IE and Mac Safari (if Safari isn't locked too!)

- Update -

I've finally found a decent way to get an infinite editable ground, vertices data will be saved inside a binary file, only non-zero Y vertices will be saved for more optimization.

Now working the Object Editing feature...

The resolution will not be very large, then we will move/rotate the objects with the mouse and CTRL/SHIFT key.

The "Events" field is a little scripting, I plan to do the scripting like this :

Code: Select all

set texture grass2
set alpha 0.8
click alert "Hello World!"

This code will simply make the object changes it's texture to grass2.jpg, set it's opacity to 0.8 and display a message with "Hello World!" when we click on it.

More to come...

Frank Dodd · Post by **Frank Dodd** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 11:00 pm

How about firefox? I believe its market share is only second to IE.

Linaxys · Post by **Linaxys** » Tue Apr 14, 2009 4:15 am

Frank Dodd wrote:How about firefox? I believe its market share is only second to IE.

Yes, I'm still keeping doing it for Firefox, it's the simplest way right now

Frank Dodd · Post by **Frank Dodd** » Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:00 pm

<Slaps self> cool, perhaps I should have re-read he origonal post