Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jan Ciger]

On 12/05/2012 08:18 PM, Terry Welsh wrote:

Hi Jan,
Thanks for all the tips and the article. I wanted to use an RPM and
DEB for this release because I really like the way Linux can resolve
dependencies for packaged software. Unfortunately, making packages is
hard to get right and there is much room for error.


Actually the basic packages that only unpack files somewhere and set 
permissions are not hard. On the other hand, dependency resolution is 
not something you want in a proprietary game - it would likely pull in a 
wrong version of the library and make your application crash or fail 
because that exact version isn't available for the version of the 
distro. You need to bundle your dependencies with the application. You 
can get some inspiration in how SecondLife client is being distributed 
(even though it is GPL licensed) or Skype.



If I was making
something open source I'd definitely try to go through distro
maintainers. When I get some more time I want to look harder at tools
like MojoSetup, Makeself, and Nixstaller. They get a lot of use by
other indie game developers.


Please don't. These Windows-like "next->next .." graphical installers 
are a nightmare in Linux, because they must have root permissions to 
install into system directories. More often than not the user will not 
know how to start it with root permissions, often the X variables are 
clobbered by su or sudo for security reasons and the installer will just 
fail with a cryptic error. They also make it easy for the user to make a 
mistake and install it into a wrong place (such as /usr), accidentally 
overwriting distro-provided shared libraries with something you are 
shipping = disaster. Finally, running black-box stuff with root 
permissions is a really bad idea - one mistake/bug in the installer and 
your system is a toast.


A tarball or self-extracting shar script are perfectly sufficient. If 
you want an rpm or deb, build systems such as CMake/CPack or autotools 
can generate one for you automatically. I do recommend CMake with CPack 
because it is excellent for cross-platform applications, autotools are a 
royal PITA. CPack can automatically build a Windows installer, 
rpms/debs/tars for Linux and I think also a package/installer for Mac.


Regards,

Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

Hi Jan,
Thanks for all the tips and the article. I wanted to use an RPM and
DEB for this release because I really like the way Linux can resolve
dependencies for packaged software. Unfortunately, making packages is
hard to get right and there is much room for error. If I was making
something open source I'd definitely try to go through distro
maintainers. When I get some more time I want to look harder at tools
like MojoSetup, Makeself, and Nixstaller. They get a lot of use by
other indie game developers.
--
Terry Welsh
www.reallyslick.com

>
> On 12/04/2012 12:59 AM, Terry Welsh wrote:
>>  I love developing on Linux, but
>> windowing and packaging seem to be big issues. I supposed it's because
>> of the scattered nature of Linux (many distros with many desktop
>> managers, and packaging systems).
>
> Actually, the way to go is to prepare something that can be distributed
> and then work with the packagers of the distros instead of trying to
> supply your own "installer". They will handle the packaging, integration
> with various desktop environments within their distro and even
> distribution for you.
>
> The ideal case is when your application is open source - then make sure
> that the build system is sane (i.e. something similar to the ./configure
> && ./make && make install) and you should be set.
>
> If you application is not open source, then it is tad more complex. If
> you are still allowing free redistribution, then the above still
> applies, but you need to prepare something that is easy to install and
> actually runs on the target distro - e.g. a statically linked file in a
> tar.gz file, with all the required data. Make sure to not hardwire any
> paths, because different distros put things in different places and
> without source code they couldn't patch your application to integrate
> well. For example, Adobe Acrobat Reader is/used to be commonly
> distributed in this way.
>
> If you application is purely closed source and not allowing free
> redistribution, then you are on your own. However, a binary either
> packaged with all its dependencies or statically linked and stored in a
> tar.gz file will run on any modern distribution. Targeting recent Fedora
> or Ubuntu is a safe bet that will probably cover some 80% of the user
> base, because those distributions are popular and many others are based
> on them or using same software versions.
>
> Don't bother with the various window manager integration - you will
> always get it wrong for someone (e.g. Mageia has different KDE/Gnome
> menus than Fedora which has them yet different than SuSE ...). The users
> are smart enough to make a shortcut in the menu themselves if that is
> what they want and when you are working with the distro packagers
> directly, they will take care of it anyway.
>
> There is also this, more technical article from 2005, but it applies the
> same today as it did back then:
> http://onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2005/03/31/packaging.html
>
> Regards,
>
> Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jan Ciger]

On 12/04/2012 12:59 AM, Terry Welsh wrote:

 I love developing on Linux, but
windowing and packaging seem to be big issues. I supposed it's because
of the scattered nature of Linux (many distros with many desktop
managers, and packaging systems).


Actually, the way to go is to prepare something that can be distributed 
and then work with the packagers of the distros instead of trying to 
supply your own "installer". They will handle the packaging, integration 
with various desktop environments within their distro and even 
distribution for you.


The ideal case is when your application is open source - then make sure 
that the build system is sane (i.e. something similar to the ./configure 
&& ./make && make install) and you should be set.


If you application is not open source, then it is tad more complex. If 
you are still allowing free redistribution, then the above still 
applies, but you need to prepare something that is easy to install and 
actually runs on the target distro - e.g. a statically linked file in a 
tar.gz file, with all the required data. Make sure to not hardwire any 
paths, because different distros put things in different places and 
without source code they couldn't patch your application to integrate 
well. For example, Adobe Acrobat Reader is/used to be commonly 
distributed in this way.


If you application is purely closed source and not allowing free 
redistribution, then you are on your own. However, a binary either 
packaged with all its dependencies or statically linked and stored in a 
tar.gz file will run on any modern distribution. Targeting recent Fedora 
or Ubuntu is a safe bet that will probably cover some 80% of the user 
base, because those distributions are popular and many others are based 
on them or using same software versions.


Don't bother with the various window manager integration - you will 
always get it wrong for someone (e.g. Mageia has different KDE/Gnome 
menus than Fedora which has them yet different than SuSE ...). The users 
are smart enough to make a shortcut in the menu themselves if that is 
what they want and when you are working with the distro packagers 
directly, they will take care of it anyway.


There is also this, more technical article from 2005, but it applies the 
same today as it did back then:

http://onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2005/03/31/packaging.html

Regards,

Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

H Ulrich,
That was mostly a joke. Mostly :) My current plan is to do an OS X
port if the game actually makes enough money on Windows and Linux. I
actually gave up on Apple in 1995 because MacOS was so amazingly
unstable. So I just don't happen to have any Apple equipment or enough
space for any at the moment.
- Terry
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Tue, 04 Dec 2012 13:12:34 +1100
> From: Ulrich Hertlein 
> To: OpenSceneGraph Users 
> Subject: Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo
> Message-ID: <50bd5c12.5050...@sandbox.de>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> Hi Terry,
>
> On 3/12/12 12:30, Terry Welsh wrote:
>>> From: "Thomas Hogarth" 
>>> Really like the dust clouds kicking up as you approach the ground. Glow 
>>> effect is great too.
>>>
>>> I'm running windows 7 on a Mac Book via Parallels.
>>>
>> Thanks, I spent a long time on the particles and glow. And maybe I
>> won't have to port to OS X after all :) The glow might be a bit
>
> Please do consider an OS X port!  Since you seem to be using SDL and OSG it 
> might not be
> that difficult.  And the packaging *can* be slightly more straight forward 
> than on Linux :-}
>
> Cheers,
> /ulrich
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Ulrich Hertlein]

Hi Terry,

On 3/12/12 12:30, Terry Welsh wrote:
>> From: "Thomas Hogarth" 
>> Really like the dust clouds kicking up as you approach the ground. Glow 
>> effect is great too.
>>
>> I'm running windows 7 on a Mac Book via Parallels.
>>
> Thanks, I spent a long time on the particles and glow. And maybe I
> won't have to port to OS X after all :) The glow might be a bit

Please do consider an OS X port!  Since you seem to be using SDL and OSG it 
might not be
that difficult.  And the packaging *can* be slightly more straight forward than 
on Linux :-}

Cheers,
/ulrich

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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

> Great work! It really looks like a game where you need to practice to
> get better, which I love. Graphically I love your particle effects (the
> rotation with movement and all), the lighting on weapon impact, the way
> the ship's thrust effect changes when you take damage, etc. Lots of
> little things that show your attention to detail.
>
> My kids loved to find new and brutal ways to destroy the ship and/or
> kill the little people. I guess that's one kind of emergent gameplay you
> might not have planned for... :-)
>
Thanks J-S. Glad you spotted the attention to detail :) Some friends'
kids have had the same sort of reaction. I was surprised that 6- to
10-year-olds seem to love this game more than the target audience
(slightly patient old-school tunnel-flyer fans).

> About the multi-screen issues Jan mentioned, I didn't have any problem
> like that on Windows 7 x64. Looks like SDL's handling of multi-screen
> setups is inconsistent indeed. Any reason you didn't do your own
> windowing based on GraphicsWindowWin32 and GraphicsWindowX11? You might
> have more control that way. Using SDL for sound and input doesn't force
> you to use it for windowing too...
>
I always prefer to let code so widely tested as SDL or OSG to do as
much as possible, windowing included. I love developing on Linux, but
windowing and packaging seem to be big issues. I supposed it's because
of the scattered nature of Linux (many distros with many desktop
managers, and packaging systems).

> Good luck for the eventual release of the full game!
>
> J-S


> OK, that wasn't really a complaint. I haven't had that issue with your game
> myself, but it is something commonly overlooked so I wanted to bring it up.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jan

Cool, I didn't take it as a complaint.  Sorry if I gave you that
impression.  I really appreciate all the feedback, good or bad, so
please don't hesitate to send more.
- Terry
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jan Ciger]

Hello,

On Mon, Dec 3, 2012 at 2:30 AM, Terry Welsh  wrote:

> Ryan and Sam of SDL appear to be aware of the xrandr issues (and
> understand them a lot better than me), so I'm hoping this gets fixed
> properly with SDL 2.0. I'll keep your solution in mind if things don't
> improve.
>
> Graphics cards have had a lot of fill for a while now, so I am hoping
> to completely avoid in-game resolution choosing. Retrobooster has a
> fullscreen glow pass, which worried me about this at first. However,
> it runs plenty fast on Intel 2500 and 4000 at 1920x1200, so fill will
> probably only be an issue at 2560x1600 or on multi-monitor setups.
>


My idea behind being able to choose resolution is not performance, but
being able to force the game into
a "smaller" (one monitor only) setup. That is a workaround that (kinda)
works for ex. for World of Warcraft on Linux, which otherwise also suffers
from the SDL bug (thanks to Wine).


> Pressing Esc to pause, also releases the mouse. This seems to work
> well enough, and I haven't heard any user complaints so far.
> Hopefully, it will stay that way.
>

OK, that wasn't really a complaint. I haven't had that issue with your game
myself, but it is something commonly overlooked so I wanted to bring it up.

Regards,

Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

> From: "Thomas Hogarth" 
> Really like the dust clouds kicking up as you approach the ground. Glow 
> effect is great too.
>
> I'm running windows 7 on a Mac Book via Parallels.
>
Thanks, I spent a long time on the particles and glow. And maybe I
won't have to port to OS X after all :) The glow might be a bit
expensive. I knew glow artifacts would really be exaggerated by all
the black in the backgrounds, so I had to make it very clean and get
rid of all the flicker.


> From: Eric Wing 
> Congrats Terry!
> (Did you make the game harder?)
>
Yes, you were to good at it.  Grrr.


> From: Jan Ciger 
> > Thanks for the insight.  Press Alt-Enter to switch to windowed mode.
> >
> That isn't really obvious to find, neither the switch to windowed mode -
> shouldn't that be in the options somewhere?
>
Yes. Nothing about the game is actually finished, so I'm sure I'll get
to that eventually.

> Regarding the SDL problem - I think the only reliable way to get around
> this is to *not* use the buggy full screen functionality in SDL.
> Unfortunately SDL uses xrandr to determine the screen size and that
> doesn't report that the screen is actually two monitors, but that there
> is one screen 3840x1200 in size (in my case). I think that has to do
> with the Nvidia's Twinview - Xinerama interaction.
>
> A better solution is to request an undecorated window with the size of
> the screen (and let user pick the resolution in the settings!) instead
> and set it to be on top. That pretty much does the same thing as full
> screen setting.
>
Ryan and Sam of SDL appear to be aware of the xrandr issues (and
understand them a lot better than me), so I'm hoping this gets fixed
properly with SDL 2.0. I'll keep your solution in mind if things don't
improve.

Graphics cards have had a lot of fill for a while now, so I am hoping
to completely avoid in-game resolution choosing. Retrobooster has a
fullscreen glow pass, which worried me about this at first. However,
it runs plenty fast on Intel 2500 and 4000 at 1920x1200, so fill will
probably only be an issue at 2560x1600 or on multi-monitor setups.

> Mouse can be always grabbed, that is not a problem. Even though it is
> quite evil in windowed mode - make sure that there is a key or something
> to ungrab if you need to pause the game and switch to another window
> temporarily. That is another common usability issue in Linux game ports.
>
Pressing Esc to pause, also releases the mouse. This seems to work
well enough, and I haven't heard any user complaints so far.
Hopefully, it will stay that way.

- Terry
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jean-Sébastien Guay]

Hi Terry,

A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first 
playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see 
some crazy OSG action. 
http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html


Great work! It really looks like a game where you need to practice to 
get better, which I love. Graphically I love your particle effects (the 
rotation with movement and all), the lighting on weapon impact, the way 
the ship's thrust effect changes when you take damage, etc. Lots of 
little things that show your attention to detail.


My kids loved to find new and brutal ways to destroy the ship and/or 
kill the little people. I guess that's one kind of emergent gameplay you 
might not have planned for... :-)


About the multi-screen issues Jan mentioned, I didn't have any problem 
like that on Windows 7 x64. Looks like SDL's handling of multi-screen 
setups is inconsistent indeed. Any reason you didn't do your own 
windowing based on GraphicsWindowWin32 and GraphicsWindowX11? You might 
have more control that way. Using SDL for sound and input doesn't force 
you to use it for windowing too...


Good luck for the eventual release of the full game!

J-S

--
__
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http://whitestar02.dyndns-web.com/

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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jan Ciger]

Hello Terry,

On 12/01/2012 10:55 PM, Terry Welsh wrote:

Hi Jan,
Thanks for the insight.  Press Alt-Enter to switch to windowed mode.



That isn't really obvious to find, neither the switch to windowed mode - 
shouldn't that be in the options somewhere?


Regarding the SDL problem - I think the only reliable way to get around 
this is to *not* use the buggy full screen functionality in SDL. 
Unfortunately SDL uses xrandr to determine the screen size and that 
doesn't report that the screen is actually two monitors, but that there 
is one screen 3840x1200 in size (in my case). I think that has to do 
with the Nvidia's Twinview - Xinerama interaction.


A better solution is to request an undecorated window with the size of 
the screen (and let user pick the resolution in the settings!) instead 
and set it to be on top. That pretty much does the same thing as full 
screen setting.


Mouse can be always grabbed, that is not a problem. Even though it is 
quite evil in windowed mode - make sure that there is a key or something 
to ungrab if you need to pause the game and switch to another window 
temporarily. That is another common usability issue in Linux game ports.


As I said before, these are really common problems with many Linux 
games, because most people simply assume that SDL works - except it 
doesn't always :(


Regards,

Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Eric Wing]

On 11/29/12, Terry Welsh  wrote:
> A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first
> playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see some
> crazy OSG action. http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html
> --
> Terry Welsh
> www.reallyslick.com
>

Congrats Terry!
(Did you make the game harder?)

-Eric
-- 
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http://playcontrol.net/iphonegamebook/
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Thomas Hogarth]

Looks and plays great,

Really like the dust clouds kicking up as you approach the ground. Glow effect 
is great too.

I'm running windows 7 on a Mac Book via Parallels.

Tom

--
Read this topic online here:
http://forum.openscenegraph.org/viewtopic.php?p=51318#51318





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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

Hi Jan,
Thanks for the insight.  Press Alt-Enter to switch to windowed mode.

I only have one monitor at home and have not done any multi-monitor testing
or planning yet. Also, I figured it was premature to do anything like that
since I want to switch to SDL 2.0 eventually. I tried 2.0 about a month ago
and fullscreen didn't work at all, so the switch wasn't possible for this
release. Ryan Gordon has been busy trying to fix fullscreen on Linux once
and for all:
https://mail.gnome.org/archives/wm-spec-list/2012-October/msg1.html

Another option (if fullscreen remains a mess on Linux) is to start the
Linux version in windowed mode. However, this can only work of the game can
reliably lock the mouse to the window during gameplay (if it leaves the
window and changes focus, you'll crash and die). I have had inconsistent
results with this so far.

I hear about similar problems on Windows with my old OpenGL screensavers,
and I have never heard of a solid catch-all multi-monitor solution on any
platform. Seems like it's only ever possible to get consistent behavior
with one monitor :(
--
Terry Welsh
www.reallyslick.com


Cool, well done!
>
> I have only a little nitpick - on Linux with Twinview the game starts
> stretched across both screens, making it unplayable (the ship is
> directly between the two monitors). Please, make sure that one can
> actually constrain the resolution and/or play in a window, don't rely on
> SDL setting up a full screen window for you. The problem with Twinview
> or Xinerama on Linux is a long standing, annoying SDL bug and the only
> way how to work it around for many games is to disable the second screen
> - annoying.
>
> Regards,
>
> Jan
>
>
>
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Jan Ciger]

Hello,

On 11/30/2012 02:00 AM, Terry Welsh wrote:

A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first
playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see some
crazy OSG action. http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html


Cool, well done!

I have only a little nitpick - on Linux with Twinview the game starts 
stretched across both screens, making it unplayable (the ship is 
directly between the two monitors). Please, make sure that one can 
actually constrain the resolution and/or play in a window, don't rely on 
SDL setting up a full screen window for you. The problem with Twinview 
or Xinerama on Linux is a long standing, annoying SDL bug and the only 
way how to work it around for many games is to disable the second screen 
- annoying.


Regards,

Jan
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Chris Hanson]

Cool looking stuff! Keep up the good work.


On Thu, Nov 29, 2012 at 6:00 PM, Terry Welsh  wrote:

> A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first
> playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see some
> crazy OSG action. http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html
> --
> Terry Welsh
> www.reallyslick.com
>
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>


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http://www.alphapixel.com/
Training • Consulting • Contracting
3D • Scene Graphs (Open Scene Graph/OSG) • OpenGL 2 • OpenGL 3 • OpenGL 4 •
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Re: [osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Wang Rui]

Unbelievable! That's really a nice work. :-)

Wang Rui



2012/11/30 Terry Welsh 

> A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first
> playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see some
> crazy OSG action. http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html
> --
> Terry Welsh
> www.reallyslick.com
>
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>
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[osg-users] Retrobooster playable demo

[Terry Welsh]

A little more blatant self-promotion here. I just released the first
playable demo of my OSG-based game. Check it out if you want to see some
crazy OSG action. http://www.reallyslick.com/retrobooster/downloads.html
--
Terry Welsh
www.reallyslick.com
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