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Project Yellow?

94

Not too long ago, the Blender community was all abuzz with Project Orange excitement. In case you weren't around, here's a summary of events: a small team of Blender artists and animators got together in Amsterdam for several months. They created the world's first open movie using mostly Blender and other open source software. Their results of their work? A short film lovingly known as “Elephants Dream,” as well as a number of badly needed Blender improvements.

In the wake of Elephants Dream, many people have speculated about a “Project Orange 2.” However, there is one other idea that has floated around, and I believe that it is worthy of your attention (I do not know to whom the credit for this idea belongs, but it is most certainly not myself). I call this idea “Project Yellow.”

With all the recent enhancements to materials, animation, and the like in the post-Orange Blender releases, many wonder what the result would be if a group of artists and programmers were to again gather together to work in Amsterdam (or elsewhere), but this time to develop a game with Blender. Yes, I am referring to using the frequently-forgotten Blender Game Engine. Could a professional-quality game be created? Could it put Blender's Game Engine on the map? What game engine improvements would be the result of Project Yellow?

I imagine that the Game Engine Python API would be expanded and improved upon. If the Game Engine and Bullet Physics became more integrated with Blender's core, it could be beneficial for both realtime and pre-rendered animations. I imagine that Blender could be given a fully integrated dynamic animation engine, and softbody and liquids support might be added to the Game Engine. I imagine that at the end of Project Yellow, we would have a neat game to showcase to the rest of the world, finally demonstrating once and for all that the Blender Game Engine can be used to produce amazing work. Some of us might even be able to get jobs :)

Should a “Project Yellow” happen? I think so. After all, isn't most of the 3D work done these days, done for games?

Let's leave the decision making to the decision makers. They may or may not find the idea appealing, and we should respect their decision in either case. That being said, what are your thoughts, feelings, and ideas on the subject?

Your discussion is eagerly anticipated.

94 Comments

  1. Great idea!

    It would be great to see the possibilities of Blenders GE. And how it will handle in such an enviroment.

  2. Great idea!

    Don't let the GE die! A reference-project like this would make a lot of people interested in the GE, because it would show the capabilities like no other.

    The GE is one of the most interesting part of blender, not just for games... imagine: realtime product-visualisation, realtime architectural walkthrough, better preview-animation, etc....

    S.

  3. rpgsimmaster on

    Holy Smokes! That's an original idea and a half.
    I say that's an excellent idea, especially if it aids development of the seemingly stagnant blender game engine

  4. Great idea. Look forward to the ideas on game genre etc.
    Go ahead with your innovative and collaborative approach! ;-)

  5. Blender MMO ! ! ! ! ! !

    :) more seriously, it could open some opportunity for freelance game making. Seriously how many startup can pay the price for big houses 3D softwares?

    If you speak about a professional game, I pray it's not something like "space invader" or "shoot the penguin" type of game...

    Maybe an adventure game like "The Longest Journey". Instead of having prerendere environment, it would be in real time 3D... :D
    Why not in the same world as Emo and Proog :p ? Explore this strange world a bit?

    I think an adventure game could be a good start... With puzzles using solid body physics (or fluids? :p)

  6. Vassilios Boucer on

    Great Idea!
    .. about a Pro Game made complete with Blender 3D!
    Why not "Project Yellow" and "Orange Project 2" together at the same time!
    One Team works for the GAme making in Blender and the other on the second Orange Project Film!
    It would be Great!

  7. Yes. That would be neat. If something as addictive, groundbreaking, and as captivating as Half-life was produced, it would definitely put Blender onto the map and into the consciousness of many, many people.

  8. if i remember correctly, the game engine improvement suggestion was made by endi, who is a professional game developer right now.

  9. I would add my 2 cents : Just making a "classical" game is maybe restrictive...
    I think that with the openness of blender, we can do something realy bigger, linking the game engine to realtime sound, motion captors, multiple screens, video, verse network conectivity, etc ...
    We could work on a "immersive game and performance environment" as the blendersprint in Innsbruck began.
    I'm myself realy engaged in that way, and would be happy to contribute. (I live in Brussels, not too far from the Dam :) )

  10. one of the features i'd like: softbodies, fluids and solid bodies working together, with a good interaction; is that possible?
    any way thanks & forgive my poor english!

  11. What a killer idea. At the moment I'm looking into a game engine but more artist driven. This is what i've been looking at http://www.quest3d.com. If blenders GE can be like this where it uses visual programming we'll be in business! I'd prefer to not be outside of blender if its possible cause theres so much power at your fingertips.

  12. The first time I met Blender I started 3 months later working with the game engine. I did quite a bunch of things, tried to make games and such, but there were always a huge amount of problems with the engine which weren't directly the game designer his faults.

    When Bullet was introduced everyone thought the Game engine would get a 2nd live, and actually it did, but on physics simulation only. Currently the game engine is way too slow to make proffesional games. The creator is more optimizing then actually creating a game, find scripts, create script or find another applications to extend the blender game engine short comes, dealt with huge slowdowns, even with sectors and object culling there will be significant fps drop when you try to create fps, stretegy, simulation or whatever games.

    Ofcourse the game engine fits best to make short games, puzzles or simple simulation, but even creating a quake 3 game won't never happen without a huge redo of the graphics engine or maybe a complete engine rewrite.

    Personally I think that we shouldn't continue on the current engine but rather create a new one using Bullet, Ogre and some media liberaries, since with every blender release, game engine update or whatever, parts are broken, bugged or not working properly. The idea of logic bricks is also really nice, but as there is no way to extend the bricks yourself when you aren't familiar with c/c++, and you're pushed to use python which really removes the main idea of those logic bricks. When you try to create your game almost fully with python, you'll encounter the problem that the script have significant different results on different pc's which ruine your complete game and brings you back to logic bricks only to make it work on all pc's the same way.

    I think it would be cool if the next project would be a game project, but to make money with it or actually fund the complete project I'm sure we need a complete new rewritten game engine, else it would be a waste of time. There were sooo many project created which ran all in the same problems, bad performance or graphics limitations. I've seen lots of cool project which a few of you would still remember, but actually they never saw the light: Dracolith, Sachi Soup, Crescent Dawn (fp rpg) and lot more projects.

    I'm a fan and good user of Blender and I never would dare to flame it, except the game engine which is quite an enormous mess right now which really saddens me. I'm looking towards the ogre upgrades or else a new rewritten one before I'll ever use it again for creating games. But besides that it's a huge learning resource before really going into game creation with commercial or proffesional game engines.

  13. ooooh hell yes! great idea, i would really like to see a project yellow (or red, or ... :D)
    and the benefits for the GE resulting from this project will be really big advances after all i guess

  14. Great idea!

    *lol* : How many colours will there be?
    Blender starts from the warmer colours, indigo from the cooler ones

    2*orange (blender logo and the project orange)
    yellow

    blue (igm)
    indigo (igs, Indigo it self)
    violet (igi and the tonemapper)

    We need red and green! lol

  15. One thing to note is we dont have a "Ton" for the game engine.
    Erwin has done most of the development but I doubt he can take time for such a project. (working for sony and all)

    the GE is in C++ and Ton uses C mostly as well as Ton not being overly keen on the current GE... so Im dont know if he would want to do that or not.

    IMHO Orange 2 should be a movie, keep pushing blender in that direction and not loose focus,

    Project Yellow could happen along side this if it can get organized.

  16. I thought this might be more appropriately called "Project Purple" since the icon for the game logic bricks is purple. ;P

  17. The funny thing about this idea is that it's not a 'art' problem, it's programming one. The way the engine works can mean that it's brilliant for small to small/mid sized projects but take that the next step up and you've got a whole different level of coding needing to be done.

    I'd imagine that if a project like this were to get off the ground, it's main purpose would be to specifically push the GE from a code point of view into the realms of a serious bit of middle-ware for 'budget' games.

    Something like this has been sorely needed for a long time that's for sure!

  18. I think the whole point would be to actually use the engine in such a way that would require recoding of the engine to make it up to such a challenge, and more.

    This idea is great. If nobody can decide where to go, come to Augusta, Georgia, US (the home of the Masters' Golf Tournament) because we have sun, plenty of heat, and a downtown just waiting to be taken over by tech-companies.

  19. blender_anon on

    HUZZAH!!! I WILL FIGHT WITH VALOR AND HONOR FOR MY LORD, KING ARTHER! wait...oops. my bad. I have turrets. okay good Idea. kudos

  20. It sounds like a great idea. I would like to see the game engine incorporated into the render nodes. The render node could be rendered on the fly, to at least give you a preview of what the scene would look like when fully rendered. If you incorporated the physics engine into the rendering engine (both the game and main rendering engines) you could have more real time output and maybe even faster rendering in the process.

  21. Not only does this sound like a cool idea, but I think they should do this kind of thing every year or two anyway, even if each time it's not on such a grand scale as Elephant's Dream. Each time focus on a different aspect of blender, or at least make sure to include the use of different aspects of Blender each time. That way every aspect of Blender could be encouraged to grow.

  22. It's a wonderful idea, and something that the GE has needed for a long time, but I wonder whether it's even possible. I mean, there are basically three people who put any time into the development end of the GE. While there are plenty of talanted artists who understand the game engine, what this project would require is not so much artwork as a complete redesign of the entire engine.
    Like JD-Multi said, most of the time spent working on GE games is finding workarounds for things that are either broken or completely impossible with the current system.
    While I would absolutely LOVE to see it done, I don't think a complete rewrite of the entire engine would fit within the time constraints of an Orange-style project...

  23. Yellow is a good idea, and would/do support it, but I wouldn't mind seeing a project Red as well. Red, you ask (in keeping with the rainbow colors we have been talking about, and I recognize that initially Orange/The House of Orange has special meaning in the Netherlands), but my project "Red" would involve the long anticipated Verse script, updated to allow connections across the internet, where blender users can contribute spare CPU cycles toward rendering a large project. Yes, I know Verse was initially intended to allow collaborative modelling/animation on a local network/subnet, but 10,000 blender users, all contributing 1 frame per hour, would achieve 10,000 frames per hour. Thats 1 hour and 9 minutes of film at 24 frames per second. This is of course, an optimistic target, and CPU throttling might only allow 1 frame to be created per day. Still, it could significantly reduce/offset the amount of processing that you have to sublet to a render farm. Comments, ideas, concerns, all welcome. This would also make (quite a good) Google Summer-of-Code project.
    -bd

  24. Carlo-Rufino on

    HOLY WOW! That'd be awesome. How about working on Project Orange 2 whilst producing Project Yellow, but base Project Yellow on Project Orange 2 so that there could be a release of a movie, then the game of the movie at about the same time? And I do great VOICES and concept sketches! LEMME GET A PIECE OF THAT PROJECT YELLOW!

  25. I think its good idea, but we shouldn't put all the work load on to a single team, it should have people all over the world making models, textures, etc... So that the team "Yellow" can concentrate more on the engine itself, because modeling and texturing can take up a lot of time.

  26. actually, I think the game engine is fine the way it is.. because..

    too many tools = nothing gets done

    (cause there has to be a button for that somewhere... aah.. maybe they'll release it on the next version.. better bitch about it while it's still on becon 3!!..

    ^the devs probably think (and joke) about that :)

    -checks new features list... -noo!! ah.. maybe next time.. ooo! mo cap !! but no automodel... aaaw.. sigh.. back to the whining.. becon 1.. I still got time :)

    lol :)

  27. Yes, I agree that the game engine could use some improvements, but theres alredy a comertial level game, it's caled Club Silo. Ya.... Thats just my 2 cents.

  28. The game engine is perhaps the least documented toolset of Blender. You gotta let the expertise develop first -- in much bigger numbers.

    Good idea though.

    One suggestion: don't make another FPS, strat, RPG, flight-sim or platform jumper. Think original gameplay and concept. Think Darwinia, Spore, Black and White, Deus Ex.

    Don't let Blender just say 'me too, see?'. Let it say 'I can go as high and higher'.

  29. I think it's a great idea. I've been impressed with the GE with how easy it is to make simple games, but at the same time it is currently restrictive in making more complex games. I've been working on trying to make a multiplayer game with the Blender GE using Python asyncore for the client and Twisted for the server. It would be nice if when you make a packaged runtime of your game, Blender could automatically package external Python modules that have been imported (py2exe does something like this in order to work). This way you don't require a full Python install to run a game client. Regardless, it may be worthwhile to consider a simple networking API for the common cases (e.g. one client acts as server, other clients link to it and the state of all players are sent to all players while controlled with logic bricks), while Python modules could be used for the advanced stuff.

    I program with Python and the Blender API for the GE isn't bad, but the way Python is embedded in Blender drives me nuts. It is next to impossible to write cleanly structured code. Each individual script doesn't act like a Python module. Scripts can't import one another and there is no obvious place to put initiallization code that would be used throughout the game. Each script appears to be separate in a Blender thread (I presume) so I have to attach attributes to the GameLogic object for "globals" so scripts can communicate, and I have a script that runs once and attaches everything as a global so other scripts can talk to that initialization code without having to reinitialize that stuff themselves every frame. I may be wrong, but scoping rules also seem to be different. For example, if I create a global function and if I access it from another script it complains about undefined objects/variables within that function. In normal Python, you should be able to import from another module and not have to define the internals of the function all over again, because the function uses the scope of its own module to find what it needs. Otherwise, if the function is in the same namespace, then there also should be no problem finding the same variables/objects. This situation drastically handicaps clarity of code and code reuse.

    Here's some suggestions for the API. Code needs to be able to be initialized somewhere and accessed like normal Python modules, otherwise they need to all have the same namespace, not somewhere in between. But if this is mostly due to the limitations of how Python must be embedded, then here is also another option that may be better: scripts need a message-passing API to communicate between scripts, something a little better than the hack solution of attaching attributes to GameLogic.

  30. I think it will be as impossible to create a full game as it was impossible for orange to create a movie.
    And I'm not sure if there is something like a "short" for games.
    And even then I'm weary (angstfull) it would be possible to create something on the same level of quality that Ed is with the current GE.

  31. I was overjoyed when I heard about project orange, but because my background, I couldn't contribute much to the creative side of project orange, and I really wanted to. But with project yellow, me being a software developer, would give me the opportunity to contribute my resources (other than my money) to help make it a successful project. I'm in on this project.

  32. I think it's an awesome idea. Let me put my vote in for ECHO or another OGRE-driven project. As a game programmer with experience using Blender's GE, OGRE, and Crystal Space, I would vote for OGRE as the most modern engine with a really solid Object-Oriented structure. It would seem a tragic waste to spend a few thousand hours working with the horribly archaic current Game Engine, which is basically a joke compared to current commercial game engines. OGRE is very powerful, and a few thousand hours spent integrating it with Blender would still be paying off years from now.

  33. Really really great idea. The BGE needs a de facto example project.

    The BGE will finally get the attention it deserves and production kinks will finally be taken to.

    It's easy to make simple games with BGE, but there are obstacles that hinder its use for more complex endeavors.

  34. Quote: Joeri
    "I think it will be as impossible to create a full game as it was impossible for orange to create a movie."

    Actually blender was around that time capable for use to create a fully 3d movie or at least a huge short. It did had all the features and where not as broken as the current game engine features. But the game engine is something totaly different, there are just parts that are incredible broken. For example sounds don't play ofthen or are just bugged when dealing with the sounds actuator, the collision sensor still doesn't work properly as well the near sensor which just forget to active or something. And then the stuff where almost everything which is dynamic falls trough a floor when you start the game even with 1 blender unit high floors. When I heard of Project Orange and ED I thought, that's a challenge and it's doable, but a proffesional game with the current game engine :/ well that's something I call impossible without writing 100 times more code then they did with ED.

    I would wish them all the luck of the world if project Yellow really starts and uses the game engine to create a nice game. btw about the game from clubsilo, it looks good but you need a uber good or a well designed pc to run it smoothly while the graphics look like a something created with the quake3 engine, the blender game engine performance it.. well something to discuss about. ;)

  35. I've read some ideas about combining the Orange 2 with Yellow. Some people thought about doing a movie with a follow up game, but I got the ultimate idea. What about making a game and have Orange 2 make cut-scenes for it.

    Like some people said I think the game should take place in the world of ED too. The ED world would be great, I would imagine that it would be pretty unpredictable. But unlike ED had I think the game should have a really well written story. The story can make or break a game, just look at Half-life. Half-life has been called one of the greatest games ever, and that's not because of the graphic, it's because it had innovative gameplay (gravity gun) and an immense story.

    I would like to see the game be made kind of like Prince Of Persia (Sands of Time and Warrior Within), I do not mean have the same gameplay, even though it would be nice. What I mean is to have such a perfect blend between action and puzzles.

  36. Jacob Randal on

    THIS could be amazing! :D Sure Orange didn't make a full feature-length movie, but look how far it brought Blender! Hats off again to the artists and coders of Project Orange. :) I can only hope a team of spirited people like those who worked on Orange, will be up for this Project Yellow. Godspeed.

  37. A projeto Yello would be a great thing for Blender, as I see it as a great game production and prototype tool (one of the most efficients, too).
    I came across a few Blender´s limitations working on the Brasilia 3D project (www.brasilia3D.com.br) and such a project would be an opportunity to improve Blender´s real-time capabilities. I would love to contribute to such an effort!

  38. I have been disappointed with the gaming and computer industry, because so much wonderful interaction between computer and man, so viscerally embodied in games, has been used on nothing else. A lot of interest is expressed on architectural uses, and that is good and business-like, but what of educational uses? Or uses for the disabled among us?

    Many in the United States believe that the educational system is failing us utterly. We need alternatives. Interactive strategies need to be pursued. Blender could be a trendsetter in this regard. Imagine a biology "game" where you needed to identify a cellular structure in order to proceed? Or calculate the trajectory of a catapult to smash an enemy line? How, in short, may we trick youngsters into learning, regardless of the pathetic educational institutions extent today?

    Blender has tended recently to lurch forward in its own game of catch-up to the latest technologies. Blender should not neglect its own unique status as a whole solution to many as yet undefined problems: a complete package for liberating concepts. Free, in this sense, as in Freedom.

    Go yellow!

  39. Knightraptor on

    I really like this idea. It may be a bit too ambitious but I do not see any negative effects this project could have. At the very least it will help outline and clearly define the would-be objectives of a GE rewrite/overhaul. Project Yellow could also be a longer term project than Orange. For example, it could be split into 2 phases. The first phase would strictly be overhauling of the GE itself to a point where it would be much more usable than it is in it's current state. The second phase would be a more Orange-like process with actual production mixed with GE improvements when the situation calls for it. It will be a longer process, but unless we want the GE to die than all the critical problems must be overcome sooner or later, why not in an orange-type atmosphere?

  40. NEW HYPOTHETICAL QUESTION:
    How are Erwin's annual contests not already improving the game engine just like a project yellow would?

    Power in numbers
    The need for creative games that push the development of the game engine is already being filled. I think we all know just how large the hard core user base is. A playstation 3 was up for winning, and there were not even very many people participating. The first bullet contest had 12 entries. There were many more people that submitted auditions for the Orange Project.

    Do this. Most has been said already.
    "Project yellow" would be more like a "round table" of game engine knights, and not to produce a game, but to create this new mystical engine that we all dream of.
    1. Physics improvements (GUI widgets, soft bodies, meta objects, fluids?) - Erwin, possibly that guy that made the alternative fluids with particles?, maybe the guy working on particle recode, & the fluids dude.
    2. OpenGL2 and/or Ogre in the viewport. - Eskil, Charlie (the echo plugin guy), possibly some Ogre developers.
    3. The ability to bake hi-res meshes to low-res meshes. - already proposed in GSoC.
    4. better support for audio files. It's already possible to use a plugin for video and include those DLLs with the game (club silo is proof of concept). And music can be played with pygame easily for mp3 format or a few others. But internal sounds in Blender which can be apply volume control and doppler effects dependent on the sound's 3D location. Blender only does these effect with WAV.

    Full circle
    But all this makes the idea of creating a game more important, because without a game to show, it's hard to focus on what to develop specifically, just as Orange proved.

    If you read this far, you're a good chap. I came to the Blender community because of its game engine. I'm in full support of anything that helps it get a little better. :)

  41. Yup, I agree with JD-Multi as well. The current state of the GE, although improving more and more with each release, won't be able to make a decent game of the type of caliber seen in today's games. Possibly with the future integration of Ogre, would we even be able to think of something like Project Yellow. As is a Project Yellow would encounter many major roadblocks along the way. Bullet has improved the physics enormously, but the realtime rendering of the GE is still lacking. One would not be able to handle a large number of objects on screen. The constraints of making a large game would be too limiting, not to mention the organization of one would be a nightmare. I don't see Project Yellow as a good idea until Ogre is integrated, giving the GE better realtime rendering capabilities and game organizational structure.

  42. As far, as I see, (I didn't read all the posts, as there are some very long...), there is a 100% agreement :D

  43. Project Idea. Blender like secound life but with a difference.

    Intergration with blender irc on freenode. And each user able to run there own small world to show off with.

    Big thing is a runtime editable engine. Crystal space or Orge or current could be done runtime editable.

  44. How is this news? I find this to be a slight misuse of posting power. This is a discussion that should be held on already established forums... (blenderartists, blender, ogre, crystalspace)

  45. This would help to expose Blender to the short list of known open source game engines. And hopefully make it more mainstream with community support, tutorials, new books, plugins and anything else. I would certainly be working with it if there were update info to be found. And of course a less well hidden user interface.

  46. It's cool idea. Why there isnt any example on blender.org of good game created in blender? As in orange, during the making of game many things will be fixed or added. And then will be example that it is able to create game in GE. Now people dont know any good, long game made in blender. And then maybe someone would think about new blender plugin for browsers

  47. It's a nice occasion to tell to the world my love and attraction for GE even ... I don't play at all to computer game.

    So, Yes with enthusiasm for Project Yellow. My wish is this project focus more on the artistic content than technical : We dream of this effect for our story, how to do it and not we have this technique what we can do with. This point was successfully for Orange project.

    Today, Ogre plug-in or integration seems the prerequisite and a necessary investment for the future.
    So how to boost Charlie project?

    Here below a nice Ogre game which can let you imagine what can be done.
    http://www.clubic.com/telecharger-fiche22784-the-blob.html

    The game theme will be not an easy choise, …anyway only good things can goes out Blender spirit!

  48. As a mac user without access to the majority of free, pre-compiled game engines like Microsoft's XNA Studio, and a non-programmer without the knowledge to even compile engines like Crystal Space and Ogre, Blender sounded like a godsend when I was first introduced to it. But with the Sumo engine disabled in the first version I used, it turned out too good to be true. Still, I stuck with Blender, hoping I could somehow milk some GE goodness from it in the future.

    But despite the leaps and bounds made with the model/render/animating aspects of the program, it still isn't really suited to game development. I'm still waiting for Blender to be what I originally believed it was. With a budget of exactly $0.00 and the programming experience of a zebra, I know I'm not the only one wishing for a full re-write.

    There are a lot more artistic elements in place now than there were before the Orange project. With BSoC coming up and whisperings of a GUI overhaul in the not-too-distant future, I for one would hope Project Yellow would be a technically-focused one. Everything about the GE right now feels like a separate animal from the rest of Blender... from materials and textures to using things like curves, modifiers and constraints. I'd love to see the two systems become more unified.

  49. As a person from the industry I would have to say project Echo is on the right track by putting Ogre 3D into Blender with the Bullet Time Physics Engine and several other things. That project just needs more help than 2 people. If that project was pumped up then a lot more commercial companies would use Blender to do game development because it would act as the ultimate world builder. If this project gets completed you will have a good number of game studios automatically start developing games in blender because there are several commercial games already being produced with Ogre 3D.

    Project Echo:
    http://echo-plugin.sourceforge.net/index.php

    Ogre 3D:
    http://www.ogre3d.org/

    Ogre 3D Integrated into Max with Real Time Shading:
    http://www.ofusiontechnologies.com/

    Radial Menu System:
    http://www.blendernation.com/2006/08/15/radial-menu-concept/

    My Thoughts On Blender with Game Development for the Industry
    http://www.gameblender.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=746&forum=11

    Cheers

  50. For me, another good reason to accentuate devellopement of the GameEngine is that it is the opensource software nearest to commercial software such Flash or Director.

    It has already all qualities of Macromedia Director: 3D, video interactive, possibility of creating .exe, animation of form vectorial…

    It misses only a good webplugin and perhaps also to be able to manage the 2D interfaces more easily.

    There is no other opensource software at this level, but as it is a 3D software of we never compares it with the multi-media software commercial…

    I think that the gameengine is the largest asset of Blender to become a leader among the commercial software

    Please, do the Project Yellow

    ----
    sorry my bad English, it is Google translate...

  51. well. i am not that intersted in games at all. i love storytelling and CG and movies. And i think that the bulk of the blender users are in it for that inspiration as well. soI would def have to vote no on any game engine stuff. IMHO.....

  52. Hey all,

    just read the news. A short answer for now:

    At the moment I can only think of Blender as a central modeler and logic builder in the production pipeline of a game production. Blenders GE seems not to be as performant as to serve as an engine. (now)

    Todays games are amazingly optimized and that needs custom code compiled for the system. (PC or one platform liike xbox360)

    just my first two cents on that

  53. It would be a nice idea ;) I really like the blender game engine and I would like to see some game developed with it, or even better, to contribute :)

    Regards

  54. Hmm... I'm in. I couldn't actually go somewhere but I'd love to help on the python side of things. (api improvements?)

  55. Elephant's Dream: the Game
    How much re-work would be required to reduce the poly count in Proog and Emo and the various scenes from Elephant's Dream? The levels could flow through the various scenes from the short. Voice over would be an issue for fill in segments. This way we'd start with an existing set of objects and art and just need to revise it to the BGE and real-time play. Plus it would show cohesion between Blender's capability for film and its pipeline to game assets.

    It would be fun to try to make it through the flipping tiles while dodging the birds (I can't even begin to think of the logic block lacing yet).

  56. @rich: you can take your trolling elsewhere. this _IS_ an established forum, and this _IS_ an amazing idea.

    I think it's pretty evident that there is widespread support for a project "yellow", and I would love to see it happen! keep up the great work, community...

  57. Wow, I just read bludragon's comment, and that is an awesome idea.

    If we used distributed computing (with the virtually thousands of blender enthusiasts across the world) via a screensaver-type thing, to render frames of a movie (i realize that would kick the game part out), imagine what kind of one-up we would have over the motion picture production industry...

    Not even Pixar would have access to that kind of computing power...

    I, for one, would happily donate computing power to said project.

    Any Thoughts??

  58. Great idea! I mentioned this game ideer some time ago already.
    make it a modular multi player online game so diffrent groups can make diffrent smallmodules that are linked through the web, kinda like an adventure game, shooting and racing parts can be included too.
    If I have the time when this starts I surely contribute to such project.

  59. Project Orange is orange from the color. You can hear Ton about this at the bconf. He stated these are ready made subdomains , for projects to get an easy web start. Maybe he watches Reservoir Dogs a lot?

    But after reading all the posts I agree with Rich. This is no "news". It's not like anybody started a project Yellow. It's just another pile of "would it not be great if somebody else did something and then I can say it was my idea". That is not what blender was made by, that is not what BlenderNation was made by.

    So, david, what is the goal of all this debate?

  60. Definitely a good idea. I just hope everything is implemented in the most intelligent possible way for the future of blender game development.

    Games are really all I think about when I think of Blender's future.

    I've been telling people that Blender will turn the game industry on its head.

    It's all about using the best technology and the most open standards possible.

    I'm on the edge of my seat waiting to see what happens when the Blender project gets serious about game development.

  61. @Joeri
    David Millet is postulating in his news article. "What if...?" We don't begrudge the people who worked on Project Orange because we as a community benefitted from the new features that resulted.

    It's rather difficult to gage how many people who have commented would or would not contribute to Yellow.

    At some point someone had to come up with the idea of making a short which became Project Orange and look what happened when people did get involved. That's the point of the post for a possible Yellow.

  62. @BenA: "What if...?" is gossip, "What if the queen is gay"... Well the queen is not gay, so it's no news.
    I would think (hope) that blenderNation would stick to news, not gossip. At first I thought it was just my (mis)interpretetion. But then Rich got called a troll and the hairs in my neck started to raise.

    There are nummerous posts on ba and b.org that cover this subject, on a forum, where speculation belongs. But maybe David knows something more then we do...? If not, then I agree with Rich: He is sure to get more attention here than at a forum.

    If you want to I can get into more detail as to why this news item is bad journalism.
    You can take a look at for example his research: "However, there is one other idea that has floated around, and I believe that it is worthy of your attention (I do not know to whom the credit for this idea belongs, but it is most certainly not myself) ". No he does not know it. How interesting, a simple google could have brought him very far, or maybe do some investigating and ask people who might know. Project Green for example was mentioned at the bconf by Ton and some few people know about it.
    Ofcourse googling project Yellow now will lead to blenderNation, good job David.
    "many wonder what the result would be " Many? Really? From what source is this reliable information?

    "At some point someone had to come up with the idea of making a short which became Project Orange and look what happened when people did get involved. That's the point of the post for a possible Yellow."
    Look what misinformation can do. That's totally not what happend. Stop spreading lies. Get your facts right on a news site or go to a forum. Ton came up with the "idea" to make a short. He raised funding. He hired 6+ professional artists to take on this monster task. Organised housing, workspace, machines, software, marketing, pre-sale and after party. That's a little more than posting an idea... The Orange idea was posted after the deal was done for about 90%... So, I wonder what David knows that I don't.

    "Published by David Millet on April 7th, 2007 in Orange, 3D News"
    I think it should be filed in Heavy Speculation and I'm dreaming of Genie, not Orange and 3D News.

  63. I wanna see it happen man - it sounds great - I like to think the game engine could get an overhaul - still, that will rest on the amount of coders you can muster - I'm busy at the moment (as always) so I'm in no state to volunteer (plus there's the fact that so far, I've never even commited a single patch to the patch tracker lol) but anyhow, if you can attract enough developer attention then something pretty amazing could come out of it!

    -epat. :)

  64. This is a fantastic idea. I've been gearing up to make a (free/open) game of my own, and have played with the Blender->Ogre export tools, and got some little tech demos running. I stand to benefit quite a bit from such a project.

    So many features and enhancements came out of Project Orange's development that I'm still drinking it all in. If a similar explosion were to happen in the game area, particularly the Python bindings, I'd be a very happy camper.

    Where do I pre-order the DVD? ;^)

  65. @Joeri,

    The idea that there should be a "Project Orange" for the Game Engine has been floating around IRC for months (maybe even a year now) and there's nothing I can do to track it down to the original person that originally came up with the idea. Sorry about that. I hope you'll get over it. Perhaps the news is that this great idea is floating around IRC wating for someone to do something about it? I don't care how you decide to interpret it.

    Three more points:

    One: BlenderNation is what Bart wants it to be, and since he read this article and he is the one that actually pushed the publish button (I authored the article and did not publish it, despite the fact that it says "Published by David Millet"), I'm guessing he was supportive of this article. If you really have a problem with how Bart runs his site, I suggest you take it up with him. He's in your neck of the woods anyways, while I'm way off in the western United States. Who knows? Maybe he'd be kind enough sit down with you and treat you to a pint while he listens to your rants.

    Two: Obviously there is a lot of interest in the idea, as you can tell by the general responses to the post. If this idea had first been posted in forums, received a huge response, and then written about here, would you still be complaining? It would still be nothing more than an idea. Even just an idea can be newsworthy, and I guess the community's generally favorable response should indicate to you that Bart was right on the money when he published this.

    Three: Would you consider this an opinion piece? Newspapers, newscasts, and news sites are full of published opinion, and most newspapers have an opinions section.

    I'm just an author; if you have any other complaints, I'll be sure to forward those over to Bart, or do it yourself here: http://www.blendernation.com/submit-news/

    David

  66. Right, this was not news, it's an 'editorial'. I'll add a new category for that. I think articles such as these have a place on this site.

  67. Good morning, excuse the poverty and faultsof my language, i don't excel in english language.
    I enjoy the idea that Blender users look at the possibility of making a game. I'am working for several months (about 2 years, in reallity) on the gamedesign of a rpg/mrpg/mmorpg. This concept try to have a new approach of rpg games : no character leveling, gameplay based on Tekken (play with a pad to make combo hits) with a new esthetic to leave the classiacal races like elvel, orcs and dwarves and a real new scenario.
    A big part of this concept is that that project MUST be create with Opensource tools. For now, I am alone and start to interest people at this concept. Probably one of the most ambitious created by a non-professionnal, so surely one of the most longer and harder to realize.
    I enjoy the idea of people who would discover this project, so dont hesitate to contact me.
    Obviously, this project is free but is not transalted in english yet.
    [email protected]

  68. "Right, this was not news, it's an 'editorial'. I'll add a new category for that. I think articles such as these have a place on this site."

    I'd love to see editorials at blenderNation. Well stated by whom they are written, so we, the readers can easely read or skip them knowing they are based on jornalism or poppulism, just as in paper newspapers. I never read an editorial as NEWS HEADLINE (ever seen the blender.org homepage?) in my paper, but then again I don't read the HilversumsDagblad, maybe that's more like the Story? I don't know.

    @david:
    I'm not going to (further) repond to your post, as you will probably only feel more hurt and I wouldn't want that to be the purpose of my reply. And yes, I have Bart's email, and I already replied to the emotional mail he send me.
    I can say that a project Yellow is worth a far bigger news article or editorial then that we see here.

  69. What you need are programmers. Since the blender program is soley meant for animation, there is a slim chance of project yellow starting anytime soon. Instead, someone should start working on the project themselves. Most of you have some really good ideas, so if you know any programming, then you should start the project now.

  70. There we go.
    Project yellow being a peach.
    And Yo Franky... Well... A game?
    Frank told me at Sintel preview he enjoyed it.
    I didn't ask Ian what he thought of it.

    I thought it was a rather brave crew to start on a journey like that, and I'm almost disapointed that they didnt prove me wrong.

    ( darn spammers picking this nice topic to bump )
    Any gozzip on project bannana yet?

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