Bridge Commander Universe

Darkthunder · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 03:06 PM

Howdy all you forum writers out there Grin

No disrespect to any of the gods who make BC great, and definitely no disrespect to the guy who ultimately came up with the idea for the BC2 mod: Raven Night

All the mods, ships etc that has come out over the years have prolonged BC's lifetime considerably. And i'm fairly sure i'm not the first to think that the BC engine is kinda old considering todays standards. A mod as grand as BC2 might not be suited for the old BC engine, so I was wondering from you experts:

How difficult would it be to make an entirely new engine based on BC tech, for the BC2 mod? Ultimately, creating a new GAME called BC2 rather then a mod. If it's made as a free game, there wouldn't be any legal repurcussions and the only thing that this new engine would have in common with the old BC engine, would be that its Star Trek, and capable of using BC mods (such as the ships, nanofx, scripts etc). I'm sure the python language isn't limited to BC, the only thing that is limted to BC is the usage of the NetImmerse format for the models.

The idea of making a new engine, would allow the usage of more detailed models to be used, such as those from Lightwave/3DS Max etc as well as the ones already created in NIF.

Regardless of how you guys decide to go about this, I will most definitely play the BC2 mod and i'm very interested in assisting for developing an MPMP for BC2, but the latter depends primarily on what "the powers that be" decide, in this case Raven Night and darkshimmer.

I hope not to get flamed, for asking these kinda questions here. I just thought it might be a good idea to make BC2 even greater. Would be happy to hear some positive response on this subject Smile

jwattsjr · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 03:33 PM

Darkthunder,
I fixed up your post and moved it from Tech Support.

About the new engine... I think this has been brought up before. Let me do some digging.

Darkthunder · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 03:37 PM

Thanks for fixing the thread. Dont know why I couldnt post a new topic here to begin with. Oh well Smile

jwattsjr · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 04:06 PM

No problem. Wink

I did find an older thread buried on the last page. Here's a link.

**Armondikov** · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 06:14 PM

It was considered at the start but it's too difficult to come up with engines from scratch, it would be a coding nightmare, especially for an amature project.

blaXXer · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 06:18 PM

yup, definately armond.
I and some firends of mine just strted writing an engine fpr a simple space shooter...and it is a coding nightmare... Razz

Matsch-Klon · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 06:21 PM

Licensing a professional engine would be too expensive, wouldn't it?

**Raven Night** · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 06:50 PM

Yes.

We are too small a company to afford it. The most we were offered was 800,000, and that would get eaten up within 5 months lol.

We would need at least 3 Mil to make a completely new game. We have 80 grand for 3 mods. You do the math lol.

The mods will attract capital. That is the point. Show others what we can do with restrictions and make them pay the tab for endless possibilities.

Guest · **Posted**: 08-18-2004 06:59 PM

Andy867 · Cadet 4th Class Joined: 10 Aug 2004 Posts: 7

What about using like the Farcry engine or something similar, or other engines that aren't as well known as engines like Doom3, Quake, etc.

**Raven Night** · **Posted**: 08-19-2004 07:31 AM

There are less expensive engines out there....believe me, we have tried them all. This is the engine we want. We just have to find someone to finance the cost of the new Netimmerse engine. That will be a tall order, mind you, especially in this climate.

The more high profile quality people we get involved in the mod, the more likely we will attract capital. Remember.......even if all the ducks fell into a row, we would still need to licence the TNG universe from Viacom, and that is a HUGE expense.

**Armondikov** · **Posted**: 08-20-2004 06:39 PM

Lisence is the biggy here, stuff like Star Trek is copyrighted and protected to insane levels. I couldn't say Spock without having a lawyer next to me.

Andy867 · Cadet 4th Class Joined: 10 Aug 2004 Posts: 7

Yea, I know how that goes (personally) but we won't go into details:) Wink

gdluque · **Posted**: 10-04-2004 04:00 PM

**Armondikov** · **Posted**: 10-04-2004 06:19 PM

Typo, its $80,000. If it were 800k we could pay proffessionals to knock this out. Although 90% would go on the liscence.

gdluque · **Posted**: 10-04-2004 06:33 PM

Guest · **Posted**: 10-08-2004 03:44 AM

MLeo · **Posted**: 10-08-2004 07:32 AM

**DamoclesX** · **Posted**: 10-23-2004 05:40 PM

New engine?

I hope you are going to get real programmers

I"m working with 2 total crack programmers and between them what we are doing, and that is BUILDING upon an existing engine, is going to take 2 years at least.

Going from nothing, to just what bc has now will take you 2 years, then add another year to put in what you want, and then, maby, just MABY if you had half competent people you will have something that wont sell for 15$

NEver mind that I can pretty much promise while there are some artists on this forum, none of you know how to do normal maps, parallex mapping, or want to deal with some of the amazingly annoying crap that comes down when you design an engine.

For example, the IFH engine, needs the models to have totaly closed objects, that means no deleting hidden faces, or you screw up the stencil shadows.. sounds easy eh, well, for those of you who optimized your model you just lost a majro tool, now you have to keep all those hidden faces to form a solid object or you hosed the shadows.

As for normal maps.. unless you got the LICENCE for max7, around 50,000 for a commercial game last time I checked, your gonna have to use a bunch of annoying tools to create normals, I Tryed, not fun, not fun at all.

parallex maps are new so you might not need them, they are used like bumps but a hell of a lot better, I belive they are cross platform as well.

As for a 3 mil budget

wtf are you drinking???
honestly lol

Starshatter, the budget had to be maby 5000 dollars if that.

80 grand for mods

raven
you seriously need me to run your company cause.. lol.. thats such a waste lol

No dis-respect, but, myself and 2 others have done more in 2 months of work then bc2 has done since it started, and thats working TOTALY blind with models that are total junk, a mod sdk that is laughable, and nobody to help us but the guy who built the game, and is swamped with patches

Now that we are building with the ability to know exactly what the engine requires, we have improved perfocmance and visuals by 10 fold.. in 2 months... without 80 grand.. with 80 grand in my pocket I could provide all the models, 2d AND 3d art, interface graphics and design, weapon graphics, special effects, sound effects, all that for a totaly new space sim...and none of it needing to be purchased, in fact over the next few years I"ll be doing that.. and probably for a lot less lol!!

lets see
what else can I rant on about...

your idea to attract captial is good, but flawed
what guarantee do you have any of those models were not fluke shots, how do you know the textures were not ripped, how long did it take? did it take your star modeler 4 weeks to do a model? that wont cut it.

How does that rank up with others, does it show real effects, spec, bumps, weather effects all that crap.

and even if so, what contracts do you have? how can the investors know you will get those people to help out, can you ever get them, and what promis is there that they will be able to stick it through.

this is fun, been a while since I have had the chance to rant about something lol

meh thats enough

Iv been through most of this crap in the last few months, we had investors on the line , and were looking at a 1 million freaking loan/investmen when I said no way and backed out.. why? because it was not possible, you cant get that kind of overhead with a team with no experience, with no idea what you are getting into, and expect it to work.

Also, most people talk the talk, but when it gets down to working on something, 10 hours a day, having to go up against people who are better then you in probably every aspect, working on a ship you cant stand, probably from a concept drawing that does not line up its not fun, all the time the axe is hanging over your head knowing you have to get this done cause the next one is waiting... it gets annoying

ah fook it, thats enough ranting for now lol

raven, you want to put nightsoft back on the map of producing a game, talk to me, we got it lined up and I dont think we even need money at this point.

**Raven Night** · **Posted**: 10-24-2004 04:45 AM

Good hunger man.

I am sure we will be chatting. Dont think I have forgotten about you.

OOPSTER · Cadet 4th Class Joined: 26 Sep 2006 Posts: 14

i made a post on a new engine, in the bc general ... Honestly BC engine is OLD and outdated. instead of getting a new one, can't we just Mod it to include new stuff ? Upgrade the engine with the latest one ? or make a patch that will upgrade the old one into the new one make it a mod thing for free. ??

**Nebula** · **Posted**: 05-24-2007 03:04 AM

We can't rly mod the old engine unless we pick apart the exe ( and thats a no no ) the best we can do is modify the open ended part of BC and so far we've done a great job... btw don't bring back old and dead threads. Even if this place needs more activity. lol

OOPSTER · Cadet 4th Class Joined: 26 Sep 2006 Posts: 14

Oh you mean even if this entire site is DEAD ?

JimmyB76 · **Posted**: 12-29-2007 02:26 PM

lol more or less...

everyone is at BCC these days - thats where the party is...