[Bf-committers] Working on Big Patch for GE...

[Brian Eason]

    Well after being a user of the Blender Game Engine almost since the
beginning, I have a pretty good idea of what the rest of the GE users want.
So, after waiting years and never getting quite enough I just decided to
take a look at the source.  Wasn't to long till I was making my own custom
builds.  Unfortunately these were tailored to my style and way of working
and as a result not very user friendly.  So I pretty much kept my work to
myself, It was more of a learning experience that anything else.
    I already have my own Game Dev package (GE, Modeling tools, all that
good stuff).  Made it myself and I love it, but I didn't make it for public
use I made it for my own use, mainly cus Blender's GE just wasn't cutting it
for me.  But then I see the rest of the guys who use the GE, and the
majority only know alot or very little python.  Very few know C++/C and even
those who do don't want to do the work to get involved in blender's
development.  They want so much and yet none of them are to lazy to get it
them selves, they just wait and hope that what they want will come.

    To get to the point of all this...
    I'm working on multiple reasonably sized patches for the Game Engine.
The one with highest priority right now is a large set of mesh tools
available to the user though python.  There are a few new files the most
significant being KX_PolygonProxy and KX_EdgeProxy.  There will also be
selection groups, so a user may add verts,polygons, or edges to one of these
groups then perform a single operation on all of the groups contents as a
whole.  I will also be implementing basic mesh editing tools such as,
addition of verts/polygons/edges (given the verts that the last two require
exist), recalculation of normals, rotating/slight bending of normals,
extrusion of polygons, breaking verts, destroying verts/faces/edges, moving
verts along normals(shrink/flatten), and using the "disp" button in the
material buttons to displace verts based off of texture information (most
useful for height maps).  This is all off the top of my head as I write
this, I assure you the written list is much longer.  Or could you imaging
the creation of trees and foliage on randomly generated landscapes???  Or
cutting holes in things then filling them up (Rocket Launcher + Concrete
Wall = Big Hole).

    OK now that that's part is done with...  I have another smaller project
that will be more actively worked on when I finish the mesh stuff.  It is
the creation of texture information in real time along with a few preset
tools for specific tasks.  One of those tools I plan to implement is real
time texture shadows and would be used in conjunction with the mesh tools
(some kind of adaptive mesh that the texture is applied to).  Another use
could be low res texture reflections, but that would be much more costly
than texture shadows and I will probably not include it unless testing shows
otherwise.  There are also possibilities for render to texture.

    Well I guess that's It for now.  Please tell me your thoughts.  And if
you prefer that this stuff didn't happen plz tell me ASAP so I don't get to
deep to have to just throw it all away.

Thx,
Brian
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