Re: [Audyssey] New Version of Soundscape Explorer

[Ken The PionEar]

It's a community project. Right now it's extremely basic--pardon the pun. 
You just walk around and listen to the environment. You can add to the map, 
both regions and objects. It's a breakthrough for me because I've finally 
programmed  something that uses external maps, which means being able to 
develop games with multiple levels. The game's not even a week old yet, and 
the movement is still clunky.
The main point is a community-based game engine, completely open-source all 
the way. There are two very good game engines written in VB6, the GMA game 
engine and the one Aprone made for Swamp, but the community doesn't have 
access to either one. I'm having, therefore, to reinvent the wheel--for a 
third time--and it's frustrating to say the least, and this engine is going 
to end all that frustration if we work hard on it together. Then people can 
branch off and make their own games, using this as a foundation. The engine 
is already fully 3d, so you can travel in every dimension.
The current difficulties are key input, as I talked a bit about last night, 
and distances in 3d--getting things to sound loud when you're close, but not 
audible when you're far away.
By the way, I use the same key configuration I used in Heywire. I, j, k and 
l are one cursor cross. The move you forward and backward, and turn you left 
and right.
D, e, s, and f are the other. They make you ascend, descend, and strafe left 
and right. (Strafing isn't actually implemented yet but will be soon.)
In the next phase I'm going to incorporate a basic combat system. Next, I'm 
going to make the marching band actually move. What I'm going to do is to 
have street intersections marked out on the map. Cars and other mobile 
objects will move along the streets until they get to each intersection. 
Then, they will choose whether to continue in the same direction, make a 
u-turn, turn left, or turn right. Other things, like the bands, will move 
along sidewalks, making the same types of choices whenever they reach a 
crosswalk.
By this time, of course, it's going to be necessary to create a map making 
program so you don't have to enter all the data by hand. I also plan to take 
full advantage of the effects that DirectX offers, like reverb, echo and so 
on.
So what started out as a way to get sound effects in 3d for music, which was 
the intended purpose, has already become a lot more in my mind. None of the 
things i've posted seem impossible to me, the way they did a year ago, and 
i'm not sure why. My biggest mental block was mapping, and now that i've got 
that worked out the rest doesn't seem as hard.
The real beauty, though, is that you, the community, can add to this 
too--both code and items. I'm not sure if there is a way to create a sort of 
code wiki, but that's what i'd do if I knew how.

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