Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
I am just saying as an example tom At 08:36 p.m. 8/03/2011, you wrote: Hi Shaun, Ummm...Philips products are not .NET based. Why would he put it on his site? On 3/6/11, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: phil. Direct links to the installers or redist packages or both dotnet and other components should be present on the site. I have all requirements though. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
aah thanks for clarifying that. At 01:09 a.m. 9/03/2011, you wrote: Hi Shaun, The issue with SFML crashing on exit had nothing to do with OpenAL though. That is a bug in sfml-window.dll, and for reasons no one has figured out it conflicts with some Windows XP vidio drivers. However, it works perfectly fine on the same system using Linux, and Mac OS users haven't seen this bug either. As for the 3d panning I explained that in a prior e-mail as well. Basically, I was using sfml-audio.dll which was a middleware wrapper for OpenAL. Unfortunately, sfml-audio, while decent for most uses, doesn't completely expose the OpenAL API so someone can't just add a pan control using SFML. However, if youwrite your own pan control for OpenAL directly then I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be too bad. HTH On 3/7/11, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: WELL i PLAYED A BETA OF MOTA WHERE SFML KEPT CRASHING ON EXIT. aS FAR AS i COULD SEE THE 3D PAN CONTROL WAS A BIT WEIRD, BUT FOR THE MOST PART SOUND WAS QUITE GOOD. iTS NOT AS SMOOTH AS DIRECT SOUND. iN SERTAIN SITUATIONS WITH SOME SOUNDCARDS LIKE IN THE GAME TEAM, OPENAL WILL NOT INITIALISE AT ALL. tHOUGH i SUSPECT THIS IS THE IMPLIMENTATION AS IN MOTA IT DID. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, Philip wrote: In my upcoming game, for instance, there is a patch of quicksand that you cannot jump across. You can attempt to run over it, but there is a very high risk that you will get stuck and die. Right next to it is a swinging vine that you have to catch but that alone doesn't cary you over the quicksand either, even if you jump to the right when the vine is swinging as far to the right as it can go. Instead you need to climb up the vine, above which is a branch that you can climb on and then catch another vine which is just to the right of the quicksand to climb down again. That, to me, is a perfectly logical puzzle and my game will be full of those. My reply: Well, that sounds pretty fair to me. It is certainly better than the usual traps like simply jumping over a trap. This requires a little logic to solve which I'm certainly eager to see. So I'm certainly eager to try your new game once it is ready to test/play. Philip wrote: Again, personal preference must be the final judge as you say. And I think that it is a good thing that we have vastly different approaches, as we will end up making two vastly different sidescrollers. My reply: Agreed. If nothing else I think we both have learned that different opinions about things like this is good for everyone. That means even though we both might be producing side-scrollers the way we approach different things like traps means we will produce two completely unique products. That's exactly what the VI gaming community needs. For far too long it seamed like every other game release was another Space Invaders clone/knock-off and I really got burned out on playing them. So I am glad that we are at least beginning to open up the side-scroller/platformer style of games for the VI community which up until now has been pretty much limited to Super Liam, Tarzan Junior, Hunter, etc. Now, though, as we have discussed we really can explore it to its fullest, and see where it leads. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, Speaking of puzzles. You mention things like pushing a certain switch to unlock a door in another room, but I don't really see that as a puzzle. I see that more as a random action that just happens to do something. I mean, there is no logic that explains why this switch should or should not open that particular door. Do you see where I'm coming from? In other words you would not be able to figure it out with an intelligent process of deduction, you would have to try things at random to see what happens or be told by someone else. Puzzles that are in some way connected to what they actually do, I would call those proper puzzles. But just pressing a certain switch somewhere has no logical connection with the door in question in my mind. Another problem with this is the environment setting. My upcoming game is set in a jungle, and there would be no logic for me to use switches or similar high-tech devices to accomplish things. I could make it so that you had to jump on a certain stone to accomplish something but it wouldn't make any logical sense, it would just be something you had to do to progress but there would be no particular reason for doing so. These kinds of puzzles turn me away from a game rather quickly, since if I don't see a reason why I have to do something it doesn't really create an enjoyable experience. It becomes guesswork rather than gaming. What are your views on this? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 7:45 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. My reply: Yeah, I understand. This is purely a matter of personal preference. I happen to like maze games so obviously that genre of game is apealing to me where you aren't into mazes so it is less enjoyable for you. Philip wrote: As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. My reply: Yeah, I know. Writing accessible games is a thankless job with too much work, too little time, and not enough money to do it proper. I know just creating Mysteries of the Ancients I'm working myself to the bone trying to create the kind of side-scroller I want to play and it is not easy. There is just too much work to do with too little time to do it in. Add to that I'm working on a very slim budget so certain sounds, voice acting, whatever has to slide until I have the money to add them. That said, there are small things we can do to make our games more like the mainstream counterparts that would greatly improve the game play in my personal opinion. For example, in a lot of classic Nintendo adventure games there might be a treasure chest on the floor. It is locked, and you can't open it without unlocking it. Well, as you look around the room there might be a button, switch, or pressure plate on the floor that unlocks the chest. If you jump and land on the button/pressure plate the chest pops open revealing a bunch of jewls. You know, something like that doesn't take a lot to program, but I haven't found really any accessible games begin to explore these types of game play elements. Which probably brings me to one more reason why accessible games aren't as advanced as mainstream games. Most of the VI game developers have been blind from birth and have no experience playing mainstream games. They are creating games from a limited background with games in general. It may not have occurred to them to add in little puzzles like jump on this or that switch to open the tresure chest or pull this lever to unlock a door in the next room etc. Yet these kinds of puzzle elements have been around for years in mainstream games. I believe this is because most blind game developers hasn't had any prior experience with mainstream games before they started writing this or that game. Philip wrote: If we had a team of perhaps 30 or 50 programmers working for a full 6 or 12 months on a title with a few million dollar budget, I am positive that we would certainly catch up. My reply: No doubt. If I had that kind of time and money I could hire the best sound engineers, programmers, musicians, and produce something on par witht he mainstream market. However, like you say that isn't going to happen so we have to make do with what we got. Philip wrote: Until the development stops being a hobby and becomes the full time activity of a semi large company dedicated to audio games, we will be standing on pretty much the same spot. Sure
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Greetings Philip. You could apply the switch/button concept to your jungle game, too. Say a player comes to a stream but is unable to swim. The player might have to explore around the stream to find a series of boulders which he/she can push into the stream to form a dam or logs to make a bridge. I tend to agree with Thomas. I love games that have subtle puzzle type elements, like finding the right gem that fits into the slot of a statue, which reveals a hidden passage that contains a button that you have to hit to make a bridge drop down, etc. Further examples for your jungle game might involve swinging on a vine over a crevice to reach a ledge that has a bee hive. You'd have to get wax from the hive to use as a medium for making a candle, which one could place in one of the sconces in an ancient jungle temple, which when lit would cause an event to happen. Furthermore, the player might jump on the altar, causing it to drop into the ground, serving as the trigger for a secret door. Kai - Original Message - From: Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com To: Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 1:24 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Thomas, Speaking of puzzles. You mention things like pushing a certain switch to unlock a door in another room, but I don't really see that as a puzzle. I see that more as a random action that just happens to do something. I mean, there is no logic that explains why this switch should or should not open that particular door. Do you see where I'm coming from? In other words you would not be able to figure it out with an intelligent process of deduction, you would have to try things at random to see what happens or be told by someone else. Puzzles that are in some way connected to what they actually do, I would call those proper puzzles. But just pressing a certain switch somewhere has no logical connection with the door in question in my mind. Another problem with this is the environment setting. My upcoming game is set in a jungle, and there would be no logic for me to use switches or similar high-tech devices to accomplish things. I could make it so that you had to jump on a certain stone to accomplish something but it wouldn't make any logical sense, it would just be something you had to do to progress but there would be no particular reason for doing so. These kinds of puzzles turn me away from a game rather quickly, since if I don't see a reason why I have to do something it doesn't really create an enjoyable experience. It becomes guesswork rather than gaming. What are your views on this? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 7:45 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. My reply: Yeah, I understand. This is purely a matter of personal preference. I happen to like maze games so obviously that genre of game is apealing to me where you aren't into mazes so it is less enjoyable for you. Philip wrote: As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. My reply: Yeah, I know. Writing accessible games is a thankless job with too much work, too little time, and not enough money to do it proper. I know just creating Mysteries of the Ancients I'm working myself to the bone trying to create the kind of side-scroller I want to play and it is not easy. There is just too much work to do with too little time to do it in. Add to that I'm working on a very slim budget so certain sounds, voice acting, whatever has to slide until I have the money to add them. That said, there are small things we can do to make our games more like the mainstream counterparts that would greatly improve the game play in my personal opinion. For example, in a lot of classic Nintendo adventure games there might be a treasure chest on the floor. It is locked, and you can't open it without unlocking it. Well, as you look around the room there might be a button, switch, or pressure plate on the floor that unlocks the chest. If you jump and land on the button/pressure plate the chest pops open revealing a bunch of jewls. You know, something like that doesn't take a lot to program, but I haven't found really any accessible games begin to explore these types of game play elements. Which probably brings me to one more reason why accessible games aren't as advanced as mainstream games. Most of the VI game
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hello Kai, Oh don't get me wrong, I am not at all against subtle puzzles. What I was refering to are those puzzles that don't seem to have any logic to them. All your examples have some logic, such as pushing rocks into a stream and climbing over them. That's something I might certainly do. What I'm talking about is pressing something in one room that makes something happen in another room for no particular reason. There is a clear purpose for pushing rocks into the river and one could figure that out from shere deductive reasoning, but what is there to suggest that a switch might make a platform fall down somewhere? This is the difference that I'm talking about. Of course, as always these are my very personal opinions and only what I enjoy as a gamer. If these are the types of puzzles that people want to see I am not the one to refuse to add them, but it's not something that I myself particularly enjoy. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Kai kaixi...@sbcglobal.net To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 10:50 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Greetings Philip. You could apply the switch/button concept to your jungle game, too. Say a player comes to a stream but is unable to swim. The player might have to explore around the stream to find a series of boulders which he/she can push into the stream to form a dam or logs to make a bridge. I tend to agree with Thomas. I love games that have subtle puzzle type elements, like finding the right gem that fits into the slot of a statue, which reveals a hidden passage that contains a button that you have to hit to make a bridge drop down, etc. Further examples for your jungle game might involve swinging on a vine over a crevice to reach a ledge that has a bee hive. You'd have to get wax from the hive to use as a medium for making a candle, which one could place in one of the sconces in an ancient jungle temple, which when lit would cause an event to happen. Furthermore, the player might jump on the altar, causing it to drop into the ground, serving as the trigger for a secret door. Kai - Original Message - From: Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com To: Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 1:24 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Thomas, Speaking of puzzles. You mention things like pushing a certain switch to unlock a door in another room, but I don't really see that as a puzzle. I see that more as a random action that just happens to do something. I mean, there is no logic that explains why this switch should or should not open that particular door. Do you see where I'm coming from? In other words you would not be able to figure it out with an intelligent process of deduction, you would have to try things at random to see what happens or be told by someone else. Puzzles that are in some way connected to what they actually do, I would call those proper puzzles. But just pressing a certain switch somewhere has no logical connection with the door in question in my mind. Another problem with this is the environment setting. My upcoming game is set in a jungle, and there would be no logic for me to use switches or similar high-tech devices to accomplish things. I could make it so that you had to jump on a certain stone to accomplish something but it wouldn't make any logical sense, it would just be something you had to do to progress but there would be no particular reason for doing so. These kinds of puzzles turn me away from a game rather quickly, since if I don't see a reason why I have to do something it doesn't really create an enjoyable experience. It becomes guesswork rather than gaming. What are your views on this? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Wednesday, March 09, 2011 7:45 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. My reply: Yeah, I understand. This is purely a matter of personal preference. I happen to like maze games so obviously that genre of game is apealing to me where you aren't into mazes so it is less enjoyable for you. Philip wrote: As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. My reply: Yeah, I know. Writing accessible games is a thankless job with too much work, too little time, and not enough money to do it proper. I know just creating Mysteries
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, That message summarized things quite neatly. For my own part it isn't that I am unable to play games with guesswork, and certainly not due to an inability to create them. But your switch versus jungle example perfectly illustrates my point. While it might be obvious in this particular case that the switch will due the trick, there is no actual logic that says so. And that is the whole difference between the tree over the river, and the switch. It is very much logical that you might cut down a tree and make it fall across the water in order to climb over, where as pressing random switches doesn't present the same logic at all. Again, it might be easy enough to do but there is no sense in actually doing so. In my upcoming game, for instance, there is a patch of quicksand that you cannot jump across. You can attempt to run over it, but there is a very high risk that you will get stuck and die. Right next to it is a swinging vine that you have to catch but that alone doesn't cary you over the quicksand either, even if you jump to the right when the vine is swinging as far to the right as it can go. Instead you need to climb up the vine, above which is a branch that you can climb on and then catch another vine which is just to the right of the quicksand to climb down again. That, to me, is a perfectly logical puzzle and my game will be full of those. Again, personal preference must be the final judge as you say. And I think that it is a good thing that we have vastly different approaches, as we will end up making two vastly different sidescrollers. Smile. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2011 5:36 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Well, always as author/creator of the game it is up to you how you want to create your puzzles. If you think putting a switch or lever in another room is a bad idea don't do it that way. As I mentioned in my prior post most of the time the switch, button, etc is in the same room as the item to unlock. For example, in Tomb Raider Anniversary one of the first obsticals to pass is a room filled with poison darts. You can either try and avoid them, or you can climb up the wall and push a switch which will disable the dart traps. This is in the same room and a quick inspection will show that there is a switch high up on the wall. I don't think it takes too much logic and/or ddeduction to figure out that a switch high up on the wall most likely disables the dart traps. Make sense? In one of the Classic NES games I use to play there were locked tresure chests scattered around the levels with special items in them. They weren't particularly hard to open. Usually, there was a green button in the middle of the room you would jump on and when you did the lid would pop open on the chests. Little things like that weren't hard to figure out, but added so much more to the game play for me. However, I've played plenty of games where the switch, lever, button wasn't located in the same place. In Tomb Raider Prophecy, for example, you might be in a room with a locked door. You might have to run up a staircase, go right, flip the switch, and hurry back to the dor before it closes again. I'm use to that kind of puzzle element because I've played lots of games like that. I certainly agree it doesn't make any logical sense, but it does require some experimentation, and/or practice to figure it out. In my opinion that is exactly the kind of thing that makes me play a game over and over again until I figure it out. The less obvious the puzzle the harder the game is to figure out and play. I don't like games if they are too simple or too easy to play. As far as a jungle environment goes there are a number of things you can do that is logical and still have some sort of puzzle element in them. What if you are trying to cross a river filled with hungry crocodiles. Well, there might be some way to create a makeshift bridge. There might be a big tree nearby you can cut down to cross the river, or you can use boulders to create a foot bridge across the river. Perhaps there is a large tree with a vine on it you have to use in order to swing across the river. You see, it doesn't have to necessarily be high tech. Just obsticals etc you have to do a little thinking to figure out how to resolve. One puzzle element I've recently encountered in a game is shooting switches from a distance. For instance, if you are in the jungle and you have to get from one cliff to another there might be a drawbridge you have to lower to get to the other side. You might use your bow and arrow to shoot an arrow across the chasm, hit the switch, and the drawbridge will fall down. These kinds of puzzle elements are becoming quite common in mainstream games, I think make sense, and I'd personally
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, I know what you mean, and agree with you. But I also feel that it very much depends on what types of games you make. You, being a lover of all things that is 3d as far as I can gather, probably see it as a much bigger issue not being able to take advantage of the fabulous sound that a true 3d landscape can give. But personally I tend to produce games that don't require 3d at all or can function very well without it. I choose to do this as to not force my users to go out and buy additional hardware in order to play my game. The community is small enough as it is and sales are sparse, and so limiting them even further by having above average hardware requirements would be like shooting myself in the foot. I know for a fact that I would not personally go out and buy a surround sound setup to play an audio game. Being a hobby musician and recording engineer I spend all my money on improving my studio, and it'd have to be a pretty darn good game that could make me take money away from my next high-end microphone purchase to not only pay for the game itself but also to go out and get special gaming hardware. If you really wanted to impose the requirement of a full 3d setup to play your future games, you should probably have a special stereo mode available as well that does not use the 3d simulation features of the renderer since I, among others whom I've spoken to, find those a lot harder to comprehend when listening as compared to normal stereo. As for OpenAl, I remember at the time that the thought of silently bundling it with my installer didn't even cross my mind. I was not aware that this was even possible back then, and so didn't look around for options. Might be a good thing that I didn't, though, or I wouldn't have Streemway. Smile. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 8:37 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: How does OpenAl handle 3d simulation with normal headphones? I found that to be the main issue with the 3d rendering in DirectSound. It gave a very poor experience for those who did not actually have a 5.1 setup which I do not, and I believe most people will be using stereo either through headphones or speakers. My reply: Well, unfortunately not very well I'm afraid. That's the problem with FMOD, OpenAL, DirectSound, etc. In order to get high quality 3d virtual audio you have to have the hardware to do it. Either a set of 5.1 headphones such as I have, or go out and buy yourself a set of 5.1 surround sound speakers. The proper hardware is really a requirement if you plan to get true 3d virtualization using OpenAL, XAudio2, FMOD, whatever. Which is really the source of the problem for us as game developers. The ggaming technologies are litterally growing by leaps and bounds and weather you are using Linux, Mac OS, or Windows there are decent APIs that render pretty realistic 5.1 surround sound. The problem is that computers don't ship with a set of Creative Labs 5.1 pro gaming speakers etc so in order to get the kind of speakers you need that is another $75 to $99 investment which most gamers won't bother paying for unless they have a need for it which creates a kind of chicken and egg situation. Gamers won't buy 5.1 surround sound speakers or headphones because at present there aren't that many games that really need it. On the other hand developers such as you and I hesitate to include 5.1 surround sound in our games because if they don't have the hardware to begin with there is no reason to bother with it. they won't hear it, and if anything it won't sound that good on a ordinary set of stereo speakers or headphones. I don't really know what to do about that myself, because it seams like a case of darned if you do and darned if you don't. Philip wrote: I did look at OpenAl a few years ago before I decided to have Streemway developed, but got discouraged by the fact that it could not be bundled in with the game as far as I could gather at the time. My reply: Hmmm..I don't know about that. As far as I know there is no restriction of bundling OpenAL with your product as long as you provide a copy of the end user license agreement for it. Plus there are now two different branches of OpenAL now. there is a copy of OpenAL, the original version hosted and maintained by Creative Labs, and another one called OpenAL Soft. OpenAL Soft is the version run on Linux and Mac OS as their version his being regularly updated, and is the version I would use for development since it appears to be better maintained/updated. As far as redistribution goes I'm not sure what you read to give you that impression that it can't be bundled with a product. I know with Linux apps there is a very good reason why they would be seperate packages/installers because
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I know what you mean, and agree with you. But I also feel that it very much depends on what types of games you make. You, being a lover of all things that is 3d as far as I can gather, probably see it as a much bigger issue not being able to take advantage of the fabulous sound that a true 3d landscape can give. My reply: Very true. I think my love of3d first-person and third-person games has to do with the fact that by the 1990's I was both sighted and was playing games like Quake, Doom, Tomb Raider, Jedi Knight, Elite Force, etc on a regular basis. Quite naturally I got use to that style of game, and after I lost my sight they happened to be the most inaccessible from a gaming standpoint. I was very excited when GMA produced Shades of Doom, because they proved it was possible to create those kinds of games and make them relatively accessible to a blind gamer. That's when I really began to seriously think about creating my own games, because I understood if I didn't do it I doubted many others would really produce games I would like. For instance, let's look at Q9 for a moment. Don't get me wrong I like the game, but it is a bit on the simplistic side from my point of view. It sort of reminds me of the old walk along beat-m-up arcade games from the 1980's where you basically walked along beat up a thug, enemy ninja, alien, whatever and then walked along until the next enemy appeared. Once and a while there were traps and things like that to avoid/jump over too. While that style of game isn't bad, many of them are quite famous, all the same they really went out of fassion in the late 80's and early 90's. By the mid 90's everything had gone from the 2d platformers to first-person and third-person and really added a totally different dimention to gaming. Which was exactly where I was when I lost my sight. So you are right. I am especially hit hard by the fact I'm probably one of the only accessible game developers willing to spend the time and money on 5.1 surround sound. That doesn't mean my customers are though which really puts me in something of a bind. I can use a generic pan control which works for stereo setups, but just doesn't sound the same and is a tad bit infurior for me since I've put a few hundred into getting a high quality audio setup for games. Philip wrote: I choose to do this as to not force my users to go out and buy additional hardware in order to play my game. The community is small enough as it is and sales are sparse, and so limiting them even further by having above average hardware requirements would be like shooting myself in the foot. My reply: Yes, I know. As it happens the Windows release of MOTA 3D which is still in production currently uses only stereo and 3d for that exact reason. I realise in order to sell it someone has to have the proper equipment/hardware and why put extra work into 3d audio if 99% of the community can't even use it anyway. Plus as has bmentioned DirectSound and Windows 7 don't exactly get along together and the 3d audio doesn't work correctly on Win Vista/Windows 7. So I've decided to hold off on 3d audio until I have access to something like XAudio2. At that time I'll decide what to do. Probably it will have to offer both stereo and 3d virtualization depending on the persons setup as you said. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, Oh Q9 is definitely simplistic, and that was one of my goals when designing it. It was not initially intended to be commercial at all, it was a commission from the institute for the blind over here. They wanted a game for children aged between 10 and 14, and Q9 was the result. But by the terms of my contract I retained all the rights to the production, so I extended the game with a bunch of extra levels and a boss etc, and sold it in English. But when I started out I did so with the intention of creating a simplistic game that someone with no gaming experience whatsoever could just pick up and play. And I reached that goal. The game is very simple, while still offering some points of interest. My upcoming game, while still a sidescroller, is leaps and bounds above Q9 in every respect. Personally I don't know very much about video games, and since I can't really play them (at least not in the same way a sighted person could), I don't have any particular interest in them. So while the gaming industry might have moved away from platformers, I still very much enjoy them and so I will create them. Smile. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 9:46 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I know what you mean, and agree with you. But I also feel that it very much depends on what types of games you make. You, being a lover of all things that is 3d as far as I can gather, probably see it as a much bigger issue not being able to take advantage of the fabulous sound that a true 3d landscape can give. My reply: Very true. I think my love of3d first-person and third-person games has to do with the fact that by the 1990's I was both sighted and was playing games like Quake, Doom, Tomb Raider, Jedi Knight, Elite Force, etc on a regular basis. Quite naturally I got use to that style of game, and after I lost my sight they happened to be the most inaccessible from a gaming standpoint. I was very excited when GMA produced Shades of Doom, because they proved it was possible to create those kinds of games and make them relatively accessible to a blind gamer. That's when I really began to seriously think about creating my own games, because I understood if I didn't do it I doubted many others would really produce games I would like. For instance, let's look at Q9 for a moment. Don't get me wrong I like the game, but it is a bit on the simplistic side from my point of view. It sort of reminds me of the old walk along beat-m-up arcade games from the 1980's where you basically walked along beat up a thug, enemy ninja, alien, whatever and then walked along until the next enemy appeared. Once and a while there were traps and things like that to avoid/jump over too. While that style of game isn't bad, many of them are quite famous, all the same they really went out of fassion in the late 80's and early 90's. By the mid 90's everything had gone from the 2d platformers to first-person and third-person and really added a totally different dimention to gaming. Which was exactly where I was when I lost my sight. So you are right. I am especially hit hard by the fact I'm probably one of the only accessible game developers willing to spend the time and money on 5.1 surround sound. That doesn't mean my customers are though which really puts me in something of a bind. I can use a generic pan control which works for stereo setups, but just doesn't sound the same and is a tad bit infurior for me since I've put a few hundred into getting a high quality audio setup for games. Philip wrote: I choose to do this as to not force my users to go out and buy additional hardware in order to play my game. The community is small enough as it is and sales are sparse, and so limiting them even further by having above average hardware requirements would be like shooting myself in the foot. My reply: Yes, I know. As it happens the Windows release of MOTA 3D which is still in production currently uses only stereo and 3d for that exact reason. I realise in order to sell it someone has to have the proper equipment/hardware and why put extra work into 3d audio if 99% of the community can't even use it anyway. Plus as has bmentioned DirectSound and Windows 7 don't exactly get along together and the 3d audio doesn't work correctly on Win Vista/Windows 7. So I've decided to hold off on 3d audio until I have access to something like XAudio2. At that time I'll decide what to do. Probably it will have to offer both stereo and 3d virtualization depending on the persons setup as you said. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
WELL i PLAYED A BETA OF MOTA WHERE SFML KEPT CRASHING ON EXIT. aS FAR AS i COULD SEE THE 3D PAN CONTROL WAS A BIT WEIRD, BUT FOR THE MOST PART SOUND WAS QUITE GOOD. iTS NOT AS SMOOTH AS DIRECT SOUND. iN SERTAIN SITUATIONS WITH SOME SOUNDCARDS LIKE IN THE GAME TEAM, OPENAL WILL NOT INITIALISE AT ALL. tHOUGH i SUSPECT THIS IS THE IMPLIMENTATION AS IN MOTA IT DID. At 10:50 a.m. 8/03/2011, you wrote: Hi Thomas, How does OpenAl handle 3d simulation with normal headphones? I found that to be the main issue with the 3d rendering in DirectSound. It gave a very poor experience for those who did not actually have a 5.1 setup which I do not, and I believe most people will be using stereo either through headphones or speakers. I have not yet tested the 3d functions of XAudio2, as I primarily make sidescroller and adventure games. Like many others I get easily lost in the full 3d fps titles, not so much because I am unable to hear where things are located but more because I can never seem to figure out exactly how I'm facing and how the passages twist and turn etc, and these have only really been 2d games. Add yet another dimention and I have a feeling I'd be truly lost. Lol. I did look at OpenAl a few years ago before I decided to have Streemway developed, but got discouraged by the fact that it could not be bundled in with the game as far as I could gather at the time. The user had to run yet another instalation package which made me decide to skip it. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 2:07 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi, Yes and no. It is true that OpenAL doesn't come with a stereo pan control, but I've read a few articles on how to essentually create your own pan control provided you are wrapping OpenAL directly. Which I wasn't doing around beta 14/beta 15. When I was working on betas 14/15 I thought I would try my hand at using an open source piece of middleware called SFML highly recommended by a lister. As it turns out SFML is buggy on Windows XP, and the audio API for SFML doesn't expose the complete OpenAL API. That meant I had no way to extend OpenAL and add a pan control because it wasn't accessing it directly. The way to get around that problem is to write your own middleware like Streemway which wraps OpenAL and you can add a custom pan control and any custom DSP effects you want. OpenAL is a fairly decent audio library all things considered and I think in time with some development and experimentation I can produce something equal to XAudio2 and Streemway once I have a chanse to write my own middleware API. In the mean time I'm still using SFML 1.6 for the Linux versions of my games and the panning isn't too bad using the 3d audio control. It just takes a bit of math to try and make it pan cleanly. However, where it really shines is 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound. Which is mainly what I need anyway for my FPS games. HTH On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi Thomas, Also, with OpenAl wouldn't you be suffering from the inferior panning control? Or rather, the lack of one. Granted XAudio2 doesn't have one either, but as we've discussed it is perfectly possible to build one that works exactly as in DirectSound which is what Streemway implements. You still get all the 3d features, of course, as well as the ability to both use the provided effects and insert your own dsp code. Streemway exposes these features, and so will BGT. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Shaun, The issue with SFML crashing on exit had nothing to do with OpenAL though. That is a bug in sfml-window.dll, and for reasons no one has figured out it conflicts with some Windows XP vidio drivers. However, it works perfectly fine on the same system using Linux, and Mac OS users haven't seen this bug either. As for the 3d panning I explained that in a prior e-mail as well. Basically, I was using sfml-audio.dll which was a middleware wrapper for OpenAL. Unfortunately, sfml-audio, while decent for most uses, doesn't completely expose the OpenAL API so someone can't just add a pan control using SFML. However, if youwrite your own pan control for OpenAL directly then I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be too bad. HTH On 3/7/11, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: WELL i PLAYED A BETA OF MOTA WHERE SFML KEPT CRASHING ON EXIT. aS FAR AS i COULD SEE THE 3D PAN CONTROL WAS A BIT WEIRD, BUT FOR THE MOST PART SOUND WAS QUITE GOOD. iTS NOT AS SMOOTH AS DIRECT SOUND. iN SERTAIN SITUATIONS WITH SOME SOUNDCARDS LIKE IN THE GAME TEAM, OPENAL WILL NOT INITIALISE AT ALL. tHOUGH i SUSPECT THIS IS THE IMPLIMENTATION AS IN MOTA IT DID. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. Granted my spacial skills aren't the best, but this is not the primary reason why I prefer sidescrollers. As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. If we had a team of perhaps 30 or 50 programmers working for a full 6 or 12 months on a title with a few million dollar budget, I am positive that we would certainly catch up. But until that happens, we are stuck with hobbyists, some of whom without an actual company, producing the games. I am currently running Blastbay Studios as a full time business and so am making very rapid progress on my new game, but at one point or another I am going to seek employment as a full time programmer in a regular company. When that happens, there will be very few games from Blastbay Studios. I will be on a similar schedule as yourself, where game development is only done when I have a few moments free and personal matters don't come in the way. Right now I can dedicate all my time to product development, and this is exactly my point. Until the development stops being a hobby and becomes the full time activity of a semi large company dedicated to audio games, we will be standing on pretty much the same spot. Sure there will be advances every now and then, but I'm guessing we're still roughly 20 years behind the mainstream industry. And I also fear that what I stated above will never happen, because there simply is not enough money in the community to warrent a large scale business venture. I am going to make one last attempt with this game and see if I can have it translated into either Japanese or perhaps Mandarin, as I feel that those are markets that have not yet been properly tapped into. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 1:52 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: Oh Q9 is definitely simplistic, and that was one of my goals when designing it. It was not initially intended to be commercial at all, it was a commission from the institute for the blind over here. My reply: Oh, I see. That makes a lot of sense, and explains a lot of the behind the scenes development of the game. Philip wrote: My upcoming game, while still a sidescroller, is leaps and bounds above Q9 in every respect. My reply: That's nice to hear. I can't wait to check it out. Even though side-scrollers aren't that common any more in the mainstream market I can remember playing Megaman, Mario, Castlevania, Prince of Persia, etc all of which had far more depth and complexity than Q9. Which I'd like to see games of that quality made accessible. It isn't that I have anything against side-scrollers, but more the fact that I can't really get into Hunter, Super Liam, Q9, etc because they just don't live up to my standards. I can't help but compare them to the mainstream games of the 80's and 90's I played and unfortunately there is a lot of things that could make those games better such as more traps, puzzles, moving platforms, perhaps a 2d maze to crawl through, timed locks, whatever. There are hundreds of things I know about that would be simple and easy to add, but haven't been tried in audio games yet.At least not until MOTA which is sort of my testbed for making some of these ideas accessible. Philip wrote: Personally I don't know very much about video games, and since I can't really play them (at least not in the same way a sighted person could), I don't have any particular interest in them. So while the gaming industry might have moved away from platformers, I still very much enjoy them and so I will create them. My reply: Oh, I didn't mean to say I don't like platformers, but more that there is a big difference in game play between a 2d platformer and a big 3d first-person game. One of the big differences is that first-person games generally have more areas to explore, and usually the levels are laid out as one big maze which I always find fun. It is kind of funny alot of the VI gamers here on list say they don't like Shades of Doom and other first-person games because they always get lost. Its like they missed the entire point which is the levels are intentionally laid out as a large maze. You are suppose to get lost and have fun figuring out where to go and what to do. That's where the replay value comes in because you have to work on the maze for several hours perhaps days until you understand the layout of the level and can progress further
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, PersonallyIdon't have any problems with the mazes per say. My beef is that there are nine mazes, and the ninth is the only one that really matters. The other eight could've been 2, 10, 150, or a million and itwould amount to the same thing. Best Regards, Hayden -Original Message- From: gamers-boun...@audyssey.org [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of Philip Bennefall Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 7:06 AM To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Thomas, I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. Granted my spacial skills aren't the best, but this is not the primary reason why I prefer sidescrollers. As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. If we had a team of perhaps 30 or 50 programmers working for a full 6 or 12 months on a title with a few million dollar budget, I am positive that we would certainly catch up. But until that happens, we are stuck with hobbyists, some of whom without an actual company, producing the games. I am currently running Blastbay Studios as a full time business and so am making very rapid progress on my new game, but at one point or another I am going to seek employment as a full time programmer in a regular company. When that happens, there will be very few games from Blastbay Studios. I will be on a similar schedule as yourself, where game development is only done when I have a few moments free and personal matters don't come in the way. Right now I can dedicate all my time to product development, and this is exactly my point. Until the development stops being a hobby and becomes the full time activity of a semi large company dedicated to audio games, we will be standing on pretty much the same spot. Sure there will be advances every now and then, but I'm guessing we're still roughly 20 years behind the mainstream industry. And I also fear that what I stated above will never happen, because there simply is not enough money in the community to warrent a large scale business venture. I am going to make one last attempt with this game and see if I can have it translated into either Japanese or perhaps Mandarin, as I feel that those are markets that have not yet been properly tapped into. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2011 1:52 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Philip wrote: Oh Q9 is definitely simplistic, and that was one of my goals when designing it. It was not initially intended to be commercial at all, it was a commission from the institute for the blind over here. My reply: Oh, I see. That makes a lot of sense, and explains a lot of the behind the scenes development of the game. Philip wrote: My upcoming game, while still a sidescroller, is leaps and bounds above Q9 in every respect. My reply: That's nice to hear. I can't wait to check it out. Even though side-scrollers aren't that common any more in the mainstream market I can remember playing Megaman, Mario, Castlevania, Prince of Persia, etc all of which had far more depth and complexity than Q9. Which I'd like to see games of that quality made accessible. It isn't that I have anything against side-scrollers, but more the fact that I can't really get into Hunter, Super Liam, Q9, etc because they just don't live up to my standards. I can't help but compare them to the mainstream games of the 80's and 90's I played and unfortunately there is a lot of things that could make those games better such as more traps, puzzles, moving platforms, perhaps a 2d maze to crawl through, timed locks, whatever. There are hundreds of things I know about that would be simple and easy to add, but haven't been tried in audio games yet.At least not until MOTA which is sort of my testbed for making some of these ideas accessible. Philip wrote: Personally I don't know very much about video games, and since I can't really play them (at least not in the same way a sighted person could), I don't have any particular interest in them. So while the gaming industry might have moved away from platformers, I still very much enjoy them and so I will create them. My reply: Oh, I didn't mean to say I don't like platformers, but more that there is a big difference in game play between a 2d platformer and a big 3d first-person game. One of the big differences is that first-person games generally have more areas to explore, and usually the levels are laid out as one big maze which I always find
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, Philip wrote: I don't have much trouble navigating in a game such as Monkey Business or Shades of Doom. I just don't find them very interesting, because I spend more time trying to figure out where I am going than actually doing things. In my mind, figuring out a maze is not enjoyable. My reply: Yeah, I understand. This is purely a matter of personal preference. I happen to like maze games so obviously that genre of game is apealing to me where you aren't into mazes so it is less enjoyable for you. Philip wrote: As for audio games not being as developed as mainstream ones, I think the reasons behind that are fairly obvious to both of us. Time, number of programmers, and money. My reply: Yeah, I know. Writing accessible games is a thankless job with too much work, too little time, and not enough money to do it proper. I know just creating Mysteries of the Ancients I'm working myself to the bone trying to create the kind of side-scroller I want to play and it is not easy. There is just too much work to do with too little time to do it in. Add to that I'm working on a very slim budget so certain sounds, voice acting, whatever has to slide until I have the money to add them. That said, there are small things we can do to make our games more like the mainstream counterparts that would greatly improve the game play in my personal opinion. For example, in a lot of classic Nintendo adventure games there might be a treasure chest on the floor. It is locked, and you can't open it without unlocking it. Well, as you look around the room there might be a button, switch, or pressure plate on the floor that unlocks the chest. If you jump and land on the button/pressure plate the chest pops open revealing a bunch of jewls. You know, something like that doesn't take a lot to program, but I haven't found really any accessible games begin to explore these types of game play elements. Which probably brings me to one more reason why accessible games aren't as advanced as mainstream games. Most of the VI game developers have been blind from birth and have no experience playing mainstream games. They are creating games from a limited background with games in general. It may not have occurred to them to add in little puzzles like jump on this or that switch to open the tresure chest or pull this lever to unlock a door in the next room etc. Yet these kinds of puzzle elements have been around for years in mainstream games. I believe this is because most blind game developers hasn't had any prior experience with mainstream games before they started writing this or that game. Philip wrote: If we had a team of perhaps 30 or 50 programmers working for a full 6 or 12 months on a title with a few million dollar budget, I am positive that we would certainly catch up. My reply: No doubt. If I had that kind of time and money I could hire the best sound engineers, programmers, musicians, and produce something on par witht he mainstream market. However, like you say that isn't going to happen so we have to make do with what we got. Philip wrote: Until the development stops being a hobby and becomes the full time activity of a semi large company dedicated to audio games, we will be standing on pretty much the same spot. Sure there will be advances every now and then, but I'm guessing we're still roughly 20 years behind the mainstream industry. My reply: Probably. Its hard to gage where we are in terms of the mainstream developers, because not every accessible game developer is aiming for high tech or advanced gaming. I know with Mysteries of the Ancients I'm aming for a game more or less on par with the Tomb Raider side-scrollers produced in the late 90's for the Nintendo Gameboy. In fact I've been using Tomb Raider Nightmare Stone and Tomb Raider Prophecy for ideas here and there as both are side-scrollers and much of what is in them can be made accessible. So perhaps 15 years behind the mainstream for a game like MOTA. Shades of Doom is quite a lot like Dom I and Doom II. The original doom game came out in 1993 and Doom II came out in 1995. If we use that as the beginnings of first-person action games for the mainstream market Shades of Doom puts us at roughly 15 to 18 years behind the mainstream market in terms of first-person based games alone. So saying we are about 15 to 20 years behind is probably about right. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi, Yes and no. It is true that OpenAL doesn't come with a stereo pan control, but I've read a few articles on how to essentually create your own pan control provided you are wrapping OpenAL directly. Which I wasn't doing around beta 14/beta 15. When I was working on betas 14/15 I thought I would try my hand at using an open source piece of middleware called SFML highly recommended by a lister. As it turns out SFML is buggy on Windows XP, and the audio API for SFML doesn't expose the complete OpenAL API. That meant I had no way to extend OpenAL and add a pan control because it wasn't accessing it directly. The way to get around that problem is to write your own middleware like Streemway which wraps OpenAL and you can add a custom pan control and any custom DSP effects you want. OpenAL is a fairly decent audio library all things considered and I think in time with some development and experimentation I can produce something equal to XAudio2 and Streemway once I have a chanse to write my own middleware API. In the mean time I'm still using SFML 1.6 for the Linux versions of my games and the panning isn't too bad using the 3d audio control. It just takes a bit of math to try and make it pan cleanly. However, where it really shines is 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound. Which is mainly what I need anyway for my FPS games. HTH On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi Thomas, Also, with OpenAl wouldn't you be suffering from the inferior panning control? Or rather, the lack of one. Granted XAudio2 doesn't have one either, but as we've discussed it is perfectly possible to build one that works exactly as in DirectSound which is what Streemway implements. You still get all the 3d features, of course, as well as the ability to both use the provided effects and insert your own dsp code. Streemway exposes these features, and so will BGT. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
phil. Direct links to the installers or redist packages or both dotnet and other components should be present on the site. I have all requirements though. At 01:28 a.m. 7/03/2011, you wrote: Hi all, I have been following the recent discussions about the best way to either automatically upgrade DirectX, or check in the setup program whether the necessary components are installed. There seemed to be some confusion regarding this, so I spent some time yesterday evening researching it. The following article is the result: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5121962/DirectX.txt I would like to know what you all think of my approach, especially other developers. I will include this article as part of the BGT package, probably with an example InnoSetup script that sets up the components that BGT uses which are XAudio2 from the June2010 SDK, and X3dAudio from the February 2010 SDK. These are the latest versions available to date. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, How does OpenAl handle 3d simulation with normal headphones? I found that to be the main issue with the 3d rendering in DirectSound. It gave a very poor experience for those who did not actually have a 5.1 setup which I do not, and I believe most people will be using stereo either through headphones or speakers. I have not yet tested the 3d functions of XAudio2, as I primarily make sidescroller and adventure games. Like many others I get easily lost in the full 3d fps titles, not so much because I am unable to hear where things are located but more because I can never seem to figure out exactly how I'm facing and how the passages twist and turn etc, and these have only really been 2d games. Add yet another dimention and I have a feeling I'd be truly lost. Lol. I did look at OpenAl a few years ago before I decided to have Streemway developed, but got discouraged by the fact that it could not be bundled in with the game as far as I could gather at the time. The user had to run yet another instalation package which made me decide to skip it. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 2:07 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi, Yes and no. It is true that OpenAL doesn't come with a stereo pan control, but I've read a few articles on how to essentually create your own pan control provided you are wrapping OpenAL directly. Which I wasn't doing around beta 14/beta 15. When I was working on betas 14/15 I thought I would try my hand at using an open source piece of middleware called SFML highly recommended by a lister. As it turns out SFML is buggy on Windows XP, and the audio API for SFML doesn't expose the complete OpenAL API. That meant I had no way to extend OpenAL and add a pan control because it wasn't accessing it directly. The way to get around that problem is to write your own middleware like Streemway which wraps OpenAL and you can add a custom pan control and any custom DSP effects you want. OpenAL is a fairly decent audio library all things considered and I think in time with some development and experimentation I can produce something equal to XAudio2 and Streemway once I have a chanse to write my own middleware API. In the mean time I'm still using SFML 1.6 for the Linux versions of my games and the panning isn't too bad using the 3d audio control. It just takes a bit of math to try and make it pan cleanly. However, where it really shines is 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound. Which is mainly what I need anyway for my FPS games. HTH On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi Thomas, Also, with OpenAl wouldn't you be suffering from the inferior panning control? Or rather, the lack of one. Granted XAudio2 doesn't have one either, but as we've discussed it is perfectly possible to build one that works exactly as in DirectSound which is what Streemway implements. You still get all the 3d features, of course, as well as the ability to both use the provided effects and insert your own dsp code. Streemway exposes these features, and so will BGT. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Shaun, Ummm...Philips products are not .NET based. Why would he put it on his site? On 3/6/11, shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com wrote: phil. Direct links to the installers or redist packages or both dotnet and other components should be present on the site. I have all requirements though. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, Philip wrote: How does OpenAl handle 3d simulation with normal headphones? I found that to be the main issue with the 3d rendering in DirectSound. It gave a very poor experience for those who did not actually have a 5.1 setup which I do not, and I believe most people will be using stereo either through headphones or speakers. My reply: Well, unfortunately not very well I'm afraid. That's the problem with FMOD, OpenAL, DirectSound, etc. In order to get high quality 3d virtual audio you have to have the hardware to do it. Either a set of 5.1 headphones such as I have, or go out and buy yourself a set of 5.1 surround sound speakers. The proper hardware is really a requirement if you plan to get true 3d virtualization using OpenAL, XAudio2, FMOD, whatever. Which is really the source of the problem for us as game developers. The ggaming technologies are litterally growing by leaps and bounds and weather you are using Linux, Mac OS, or Windows there are decent APIs that render pretty realistic 5.1 surround sound. The problem is that computers don't ship with a set of Creative Labs 5.1 pro gaming speakers etc so in order to get the kind of speakers you need that is another $75 to $99 investment which most gamers won't bother paying for unless they have a need for it which creates a kind of chicken and egg situation. Gamers won't buy 5.1 surround sound speakers or headphones because at present there aren't that many games that really need it. On the other hand developers such as you and I hesitate to include 5.1 surround sound in our games because if they don't have the hardware to begin with there is no reason to bother with it. they won't hear it, and if anything it won't sound that good on a ordinary set of stereo speakers or headphones. I don't really know what to do about that myself, because it seams like a case of darned if you do and darned if you don't. Philip wrote: I did look at OpenAl a few years ago before I decided to have Streemway developed, but got discouraged by the fact that it could not be bundled in with the game as far as I could gather at the time. My reply: Hmmm..I don't know about that. As far as I know there is no restriction of bundling OpenAL with your product as long as you provide a copy of the end user license agreement for it. Plus there are now two different branches of OpenAL now. there is a copy of OpenAL, the original version hosted and maintained by Creative Labs, and another one called OpenAL Soft. OpenAL Soft is the version run on Linux and Mac OS as their version his being regularly updated, and is the version I would use for development since it appears to be better maintained/updated. As far as redistribution goes I'm not sure what you read to give you that impression that it can't be bundled with a product. I know with Linux apps there is a very good reason why they would be seperate packages/installers because it has to do with how the operating system is maintained. If you were to install a game using apt-get it would detect missing components and install them as necessary. For example, doing apt-get install mota-1.0-i386.deb would first initiate a dependency check and if OpenAL-Soft wasn't installed it would prompt you to install. If you Answer yes it would go to the Ubuntu or Debian application repository, fetch the necessary package, install it and then install the game. This is actually one of the strengths of the Linux deb and rpm package managers because it takes all the guess work out of figuring out if this or that component is missing or not. If it is missing it will just install it for you.This may or may not be what you are talking about. HTH --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi, How did you do that? I mean when I click a dropbox link, I have to download the file. But I was not required. How do I make it so people don't have to download the file? I mean, could you please tell me? - Original Message - From: Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com To: Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Sunday, March 06, 2011 12:28 PM Subject: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi all, I have been following the recent discussions about the best way to either automatically upgrade DirectX, or check in the setup program whether the necessary components are installed. There seemed to be some confusion regarding this, so I spent some time yesterday evening researching it. The following article is the result: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5121962/DirectX.txt I would like to know what you all think of my approach, especially other developers. I will include this article as part of the BGT package, probably with an example InnoSetup script that sets up the components that BGT uses which are XAudio2 from the June2010 SDK, and X3dAudio from the February 2010 SDK. These are the latest versions available to date. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi, that's a browser dependend thing. for instance, any plain text or html file will always just be viewed. they're small anyway so it isn't a problem. audio files are dependent on your setup. firefox is able to stream most audio files. Internet explorer can also do it if windows media player is set as the default, but if winamp is installed I find it'll frequently force the open command, meaning the browser will download it to a temporary directory, and then let winamp open it. Then there are other files like zips or executables. Those definitely can't just be streamed or viewed so you just have to download them. - Original Message - From: Shiny protector muhamme...@googlemail.com To: Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Sunday, March 06, 2011 1:57 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi, How did you do that? I mean when I click a dropbox link, I have to download the file. But I was not required. How do I make it so people don't have to download the file? I mean, could you please tell me? __ Information from ESET Smart Security, version of virus signature database 5266 (20100709) __ The message was checked by ESET Smart Security. http://www.eset.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Peter, Thanks. That helped. -Original Message- From: gamers-boun...@audyssey.org [mailto:gamers-boun...@audyssey.org] On Behalf Of Pitermach Sent: 06 March 2011 14:37 To: Gamers Discussion list Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi, that's a browser dependend thing. for instance, any plain text or html file will always just be viewed. they're small anyway so it isn't a problem. audio files are dependent on your setup. firefox is able to stream most audio files. Internet explorer can also do it if windows media player is set as the default, but if winamp is installed I find it'll frequently force the open command, meaning the browser will download it to a temporary directory, and then let winamp open it. Then there are other files like zips or executables. Those definitely can't just be streamed or viewed so you just have to download them. - Original Message - From: Shiny protector muhamme...@googlemail.com To: Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Sunday, March 06, 2011 1:57 PM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi, How did you do that? I mean when I click a dropbox link, I have to download the file. But I was not required. How do I make it so people don't have to download the file? I mean, could you please tell me? __ Information from ESET Smart Security, version of virus signature database 5266 (20100709) __ The message was checked by ESET Smart Security. http://www.eset.com --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Shaun, At least for my own games I will not have links to Microsoft. I much prefer including everything into my own installation package and not forcing the user to do any kind of manual upgrade. I don't care about the .net wrappers or the Direct3d library etc so I have no reason to include these in my own titles. In the case of BGT, however, I will include this article along with an example on how to set up the silent install with InnoSetup, and each individual developer is then free to make his or her own choice as to how DirectX should be provided to the end user. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: shaun everiss sm.ever...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 3:23 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX phil. Direct links to the installers or redist packages or both dotnet and other components should be present on the site. I have all requirements though. At 01:28 a.m. 7/03/2011, you wrote: Hi all, I have been following the recent discussions about the best way to either automatically upgrade DirectX, or check in the setup program whether the necessary components are installed. There seemed to be some confusion regarding this, so I spent some time yesterday evening researching it. The following article is the result: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5121962/DirectX.txt I would like to know what you all think of my approach, especially other developers. I will include this article as part of the BGT package, probably with an example InnoSetup script that sets up the components that BGT uses which are XAudio2 from the June2010 SDK, and X3dAudio from the February 2010 SDK. These are the latest versions available to date. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, that was a very good article, and straight to the point. I've encountered the same issues as you discuss, and at the moment that's why I host the full DirectX runtime on my website. Still I'd be very interested in your Inno Setup scripts so I can update XAudio2, X3D, etc in the background as I'm likely going to be using those components in the Genesis 3D engine myself in the not too distant future. Like you I'd rather not have to depend on people figuring out if they have the right versions of the libraries installed and just do it. In fact, I need to do this with the Visual C++ runtimes as well as I'm getting a bit tired of people not having them and e-mailing support for help when I could just bundle them in as a silent install. Cheers! On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi all, I have been following the recent discussions about the best way to either automatically upgrade DirectX, or check in the setup program whether the necessary components are installed. There seemed to be some confusion regarding this, so I spent some time yesterday evening researching it. The following article is the result: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5121962/DirectX.txt I would like to know what you all think of my approach, especially other developers. I will include this article as part of the BGT package, probably with an example InnoSetup script that sets up the components that BGT uses which are XAudio2 from the June2010 SDK, and X3dAudio from the February 2010 SDK. These are the latest versions available to date. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, The link I used to get my initial example is: http://zetacentauri.com/blog/?p=74 A little out of date in terms of what libraries it uses but still very much functional. The only annoyance was the issue with the license agreement, but since I am making a commercial game I have no problem forbidding users to redistribute my installer. All I do for my upcoming game is to add XAudio2 and X3dAudio to my setup and that's that. As simple as can be. Do you plan to write your own XAudio2 wrapper, or were you refering to using the updated Streemway? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 4:33 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, that was a very good article, and straight to the point. I've encountered the same issues as you discuss, and at the moment that's why I host the full DirectX runtime on my website. Still I'd be very interested in your Inno Setup scripts so I can update XAudio2, X3D, etc in the background as I'm likely going to be using those components in the Genesis 3D engine myself in the not too distant future. Like you I'd rather not have to depend on people figuring out if they have the right versions of the libraries installed and just do it. In fact, I need to do this with the Visual C++ runtimes as well as I'm getting a bit tired of people not having them and e-mailing support for help when I could just bundle them in as a silent install. Cheers! On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi all, I have been following the recent discussions about the best way to either automatically upgrade DirectX, or check in the setup program whether the necessary components are installed. There seemed to be some confusion regarding this, so I spent some time yesterday evening researching it. The following article is the result: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5121962/DirectX.txt I would like to know what you all think of my approach, especially other developers. I will include this article as part of the BGT package, probably with an example InnoSetup script that sets up the components that BGT uses which are XAudio2 from the June2010 SDK, and X3dAudio from the February 2010 SDK. These are the latest versions available to date. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org. --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Philip, Thanks. Hopefully that will help me get this working with DirectX. I really need to streamline my installs so that these dependencies get installed without the end user figuring out if they have the correct dependencies. As far as XAudio2 goes I'm planning on upgrading to the new Streemway when you make it available to me. I'd really hate to write my own middleware wrapper for it when I'm already a licensed Streemway user. Although, unfortunately I'm involved in writing my own middleware wrapper for OpenAL on the Linux side, and since OpenAL is cross-platform there really isn't any reason I couldn't use that instead of XAudio2 if I wanted. However, XAudio2 handles memory far better than OpenAL which is why I'm planning on using XAudio2 for the Windows engine. Cheers! On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi Thomas, The link I used to get my initial example is: http://zetacentauri.com/blog/?p=74 A little out of date in terms of what libraries it uses but still very much functional. The only annoyance was the issue with the license agreement, but since I am making a commercial game I have no problem forbidding users to redistribute my installer. All I do for my upcoming game is to add XAudio2 and X3dAudio to my setup and that's that. As simple as can be. Do you plan to write your own XAudio2 wrapper, or were you refering to using the updated Streemway? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX
Hi Thomas, Also, with OpenAl wouldn't you be suffering from the inferior panning control? Or rather, the lack of one. Granted XAudio2 doesn't have one either, but as we've discussed it is perfectly possible to build one that works exactly as in DirectSound which is what Streemway implements. You still get all the 3d features, of course, as well as the ability to both use the provided effects and insert your own dsp code. Streemway exposes these features, and so will BGT. Kind regards, Philip Bennefall - Original Message - From: Thomas Ward thomasward1...@gmail.com To: phi...@blastbay.com; Gamers Discussion list gamers@audyssey.org Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 5:05 AM Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Seamlessly upgrading DirectX Hi Philip, Thanks. Hopefully that will help me get this working with DirectX. I really need to streamline my installs so that these dependencies get installed without the end user figuring out if they have the correct dependencies. As far as XAudio2 goes I'm planning on upgrading to the new Streemway when you make it available to me. I'd really hate to write my own middleware wrapper for it when I'm already a licensed Streemway user. Although, unfortunately I'm involved in writing my own middleware wrapper for OpenAL on the Linux side, and since OpenAL is cross-platform there really isn't any reason I couldn't use that instead of XAudio2 if I wanted. However, XAudio2 handles memory far better than OpenAL which is why I'm planning on using XAudio2 for the Windows engine. Cheers! On 3/6/11, Philip Bennefall phi...@blastbay.com wrote: Hi Thomas, The link I used to get my initial example is: http://zetacentauri.com/blog/?p=74 A little out of date in terms of what libraries it uses but still very much functional. The only annoyance was the issue with the license agreement, but since I am making a commercial game I have no problem forbidding users to redistribute my installer. All I do for my upcoming game is to add XAudio2 and X3dAudio to my setup and that's that. As simple as can be. Do you plan to write your own XAudio2 wrapper, or were you refering to using the updated Streemway? Kind regards, Philip Bennefall --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
