Shapes and Lines

It’s long time in coming, but my latest content pack has finally been sent off to the publisher (Garage Games) for release.

I didn’t end up where I was headed when I started on this content pack, but I arrived more or less where I needed to be.

In fact, I didn’t even start this as a content pack. The Enchanted Forest began as a contract gig to design and create an environment for an online MMO being developed on the Torque Game Engine.  I retained the rights to the art in return for a reduced hourly rate on the contract.  A good deal for all concerned.

After the contract was wrapped up, the pixels and polys collected virtual dust while I moved on to other things.  But eventually I came back around to it and started updating the art with normal maps and reworking a good portion of the content with the intention of releasing it for the Unity Engine and Torque game Engine Advanced.

By the time it began to resemble current gen art content, Garage Games had their shiny new Torque3D engine going strong.  Derek Bronson and Brett Seyler of GG eventually persuaded me to steer development toward Torque 3D, which would also give me an opportunity to learn the in’s and out’s of the next generation of torque tech.  And I have to admit Torque 3D is pretty damn cool and come along ways since I first started using the Torque engine back around TGE version 1.2 or something like that.

Hopefully the community will enjoy the pack and put it to good use.  There’s a dark side to the Enchanted Forest waiting to be packed up and ship along side it, but life is keeping me pretty busy right now, so that will have to wait a while.

It should launch any day now and I will post a link as soon as one is available.

-Todd

Start Slide Show with PicLens Lite

…Where’s the Corona

Following up my recent post of the Enchanted Forest demo, here’s a promotional video I just recorded that shows off the finished environment running in the Torque 3D game engine. The previous video was recorded in TGEA (Torque Game Engine Advanced), which is the last generation of Torque tech.

The most obvious differences in the video are the changes to lighting and minor global tweaks to the color palette for the environment. And the bitchin’ funky background track I added.

I hadn’t planned on posting this just yet, but things change.   So here’s a short video from an environment I’m wrapping up. Enjoy. More info later.

Some of my content pack work was recently used in the newly released game “TRINE” by developer Frozenbyte.

TRINE is a classic 2D platformer set in a beautiful 3D environment that GameSpot selected for their E3 Editors choice award, and described as ” ..the kind of world we imagined when we read storybooks and dreamed of far-off kingdoms..”.

TRINE’s a great little game with solid play mechanics and beautiful visuals. If you like playformers, I strongly recommend checking it out.

The crew over at PushButton Labs posted a video showing off some new features in GRUNTS Skirmish, and a little of the art I contributed to the project. Read more about the game Here.

Watching the video brings back memories of building forts as a kid and waging dirt clod wars. ..Derek, sorry for hiding rocks inside the dirt clods. Ok not really, those things were like depleted uranium rounds. Best dirt clod wars weapon EVER!