Phodex Games

Thank you this is actually helpful :), but the problem is I want to release the entity. To give a more precice example. I have an item inside my gameworld, lets say its a bread model. And the script attached to it has the following code inside: function Script:Use(player) self.itemClass:Use(player) --adds item to player inventory self.entity:Release() end if I say self.entity:AddRef() before release it obviously is not releasing it, but I want to remove my item as the player grabs it. Or am I using Release totally wrong and should I come up with a system like: function Script:Use(player) self.itemClass:Use(player) self.entity:Hide() self.disabled = false end I thought as the item is not needed anymore I just release it. The problem is it may be used/be target of some other entity/script etc.

Hi Leadwerks fellows I think some of you may run into the same problem once in a while. The problem is the following. My AI wants to grab an item, but if, for whatever reason, this item gets released, while the AI is moving towards the item, the game just crashes, with no error. The same happens if I grab an item as a player and release the entity in my function, I fixed this by releasing the entity some time later in the loop. And yes I am testing my variables if they are nil, so I guess this could not be the problem... I think this has to do with the order how the loops are iterated through and I kind of understand the problem, but how to overcome this. Any safe solutions on how to release an entity, which is used somewhere else in the code? Thanks for reading so far and thanks for your help in advance! Markus from Phodex Games

Welcome dear reader to my first Blog entry. In the following you will get a first impression of what I am working on. So lets not lose any more time and get started! What is the Phodex Framework? The Phodex Framework is created with the intention to provide common systems and mechanics to be able to create cool first person and especially role playing games within the Leadwerks Game Engine. "Leadwerks Game Engine is the easiest way to make 3D games." and "It's everything you need to make games, all in one place." With the Phodex Framework it try to also follow the general idea of Leadwerks, accessibility, simplicity and power. What does the Phodex Framework provide? Ok now lets get more specific. Here just a few things the Framework consist of: Highly intelligent AI System based on Goal Oriented Action Planning (GOAP) Userfriendly design and focus on accessibility and simplicity High costumization for all systems Questcreation System Different behaviors and designs for nearly every system of the Framework First person player controller with all you need Full-Blown combat system for melee and rangeweapons "Character Set" which lets you costumize every NPC (Combat Style, Behavior, Attributes, Animations, ...) External tools like the Questcreator and Charactercreator to improve accessibility Many common systems, like dialogs, inventories, questlog, levelsystem and more There is much more planned and this list does, of course, not go into detail, but now you can at least imagine what my plan is. How far is the development? I am worked on this since about one year and five months now and I can finally say that the Phodex Framework is finished. I cut off some features and as you may have noticed the direction the framework has changed from beeing a jack of all trades towards a framework for a very specific task, creating FPS and RPG games. Finished in this manner, does not really mean the work is done, I still will improve many systems and will implement some new ones, but the Framework now generally consists of all it needs to get started. Ok enough talk, lets show some stuff. Thank you for reading so far this is your reward: Of course this is not the final product I imagine, its just some stuff I put together in some lazy afternoons , but I tought it would be unfair to remain you without any visual impressions . The models are from an assetpack I recently bought and as well are not final and are just a placeholder. Anyway I think the scene looks pretty atmospheric . About me: My name is Markus and I am the head of Phodex Games. I am very glad to be able to study "Digital Media", which includes many topics relevant for game development. Besides design and art I am also very interested in technical stuff and therefore studied "Electrical Engeneering" for a while, which I am very glad for as it helped me understanding many of the technical aspects of computers, coding and ultimately in games. This is my second gamedev related project and I really love what I am doing and are passionated to create something good. My aim is to provide the best possible product, I can achieve and to help people by providing games which make them feel good :). Conclusion: If you have any ideas, suggestions, or wishes of what you would like to see in the Framework, feel free to tell me in the comments. If you find any errors, feel free to tell me, as english is not my native language. I wish you a wonderful day and stay cool . Markus from Phodex

@Thirsty Panther Thank you a lot exactly what I wanted. Have a nice day

Hi, I was thinking about a day night cycle for my next project. I found shadmars day night cycle shader, but can't find any working download link? However, even if I get my hands on his shader, I think I still need to adjust some stuff. Do you know any good tutorial/documentation, or can explain how I generally would create a day night cylce in Leadwerks? Thanks! Markus form Phodex

Its very good to know Leadwerks is supporting VR now. I find this highly interesting, although I wont focus on VR at the moment. I think this really could be the future!

@gamecreator Yeah true, thats something I have not considered yet, thanks.

Hi, I was lately thinking about converting all my code from Lua to C++. Without knowing the size of my project, do you estaminate this is something taking very long, like more then 2 months, or is this something you could do within a week (I maybe have about 60-80 scripts) if you are working hard on it? Furthermore do you see any advantages in doing this (or better said is it worth the time) and I am not talking about speed, I much more mean the libraries that C++ offers and the more precice debugging. Thanks for your ideas and Merry Christmas.

Hi Leadwerkers, I am intensively using this engine for more than a year now and I have met a lot of people having trouble getting started with game development and especially with coding. As Leadwerks promotes itself in beeing a beginner friendly engine, I guess there should be a lot of beginners around. I really would like to come up with something, helping those of you having difficulties and getting started with game development and coding, to be able to create the games you have in your minds. Therefore I quickly created a google survey, to be able to suit the content to your needs. If you have a tiny bit of time and would like to see content related to this topic, I would be happy if you would participate . Have a nice day! Markus from Phodex -> To the survey <-

Wow, this is looking pretty good now. Still did not fix, the shadow problem, but I guess it is related to the model itself. Maybe have to do some cleaning/fixing. Thanks a lot for the tip with the fog, this adds a lot of atmosphere to the scene. Another thing I found out myself, was, that its a good idea, to disable the shadow casting in the materials, for all the details on the house (Door, Bricks, Windows), but keep the shadows for the basement, walls & roof.

@Thirsty Panther Thanks, will take a look at them soon! @Josh Ok currently playing around with this commands ^^. Will show the results here as I am done. Thanks!

@Josh Okey thank you so far :). I will try your advices and see what I can get out of it, but I actually don't know how to add fog? Is it a Post Effects Shader? Dont find it in my shader folder. As I have time and can't find a solution of my own, I would really like to take your offer, for looking into my project. I just need to create a new project packing the files in, as my current one is a little huge to share... P.S.: I think I need a lot to learn about shaders, shadow casting and the whole process of rendering, which is a knowledge gap of mine.

Hi, I recently had a lot of fun, playing around with some low poly stuff. Unfortunately a problem occured, I am having pretty often, I haven't found a good fix yet. I dont know, shadow rendering in LW is weird, or I most likley just dont understand it. Look how, the shadow at the leaves of this tree just disappears, after you are 20 meters away: This does not really happen (or at least it does not look as ugly) for this tree: Another example that shows my problem is this. On the right is is how it is rendered in Blender. What I want is kind of the same shadow type, but including an shadow the house is drawing on the ground. And do you see that door? Looks super ugly. I would be glad if sombody can point me towards a solution. I know, that you can take effect on this by calculating the normals, but what settings would you recommend for low poly? To bring it to the point, this is what I want it to look like. I think the funny thing is that the lightning of the scenes below, are "worse" more simplisitc as the one leadwerks includes, but the shadows are consistent on farer distances and fit the low poly style. I need this for creating a good overall look for my project. I am thankful for any documentation, information you can give me for setting up a scene like this in Leadwerks. Thanks for your answers in advance! Markus

Hi guys, this time I have something special for you. A video containing some real "ingame" footage, so you can finally see how the things, I am writing and talking about, actually look like. This is also the last blog entry for this devblog (I may just rename it/reuse it for the next project, because it will build upon the PHFW). Find out more by watching the video. Enjoy it and of course tell me your thoughts! For those of you, now wondering, if the Framework will ever be available for public, or what will happen with it, I first recommend you reading my last blog entry. There you can see, whats happening, actually is not to far away from, what the actual plan was. I am just cutting off some features, focusing on the strengths of the framework (which are first person, rpg like games) and just start creating a game with it, to test it in practice, as explained in the said blog post. So to nail it down, this means, if the Framework success in delivering an cool tool for creating my game and I can see value for others in it, I will come back thinking about publishing it and I actually see no reason, the Framework should fail :). Game Dev Tip #4: Regarding what I said in the video, I give you the advice to take a close look on what you are doing at the moment. Keep in mind how important it is to focus on the essential things. Focus on what you are best in, not on fixing what you are bad in. Do your projects go in the direction you want them to go? Really sit down, take your time and seriously think about it. It can be amazing what results you can get afterwards. The Game Dev Tip series will most likely continue as the new blog starts. Stay cool and be excited! Markus from Phodex

@jen Thank you . Well writing the blog doesn't take that much time, maybe 30 - 45 minutes per post. The videos do take a little longer, from 1 - 2 hours , its depends. Regarding the whole project, I spend almost all of my free time in. I am doing this content creation & gamedev stuff for quiet a while now and are glad you find this seems well thought out, as this is what I planned to achieve ^^.

Thank you :). I understand this is a little bit confusing, but if you read my last blog post its no so far away from my former plan. There you can read I would like to test the framework in practice before thinking about publishing, and thats what I am doing by now. The thing that changed is, that I focus on the strengths of the framework (First Person, Fantasy, Roleplaying Games) and stop generalizing it. So to bring it to the point, lets say it this way: As my first game is as I expect it to be and the Framework did well and I also can see value for others in it, I will come back thining about sharing it with others. But thanks for the objection, was a good one. I also wish you a wonderful chrismas and thank you for sharing your thoughts.

Thank you ! And its getting better from day to day ^^

Hi its me again , as promised last time, I will talk about publishing and what my plans are with the Phodex Framework. Next time I continue posting the progress of the Framework. So I made myself some toughts about that topic. I am working very hard on this project and I think it has some very good attempts and intuitive systems, but still is pretty far away from meeting my expectations. When I started making the Framework, my intention was to create all the systems, as userfriendly, clean, efficient and intuitive as possible to later beeing able to have a good workflow and also a lot of fun when designing my next game. So what I came up with, after I made my toughts, is, that before thinking about publishing (and pricing) I would like to prove the quality of the product in practice, by creating a more or less small game with the Phodex Framework. If it feels good working with the framework and the result of the outcoming game meets expectations then its time to seriously think about (commercially?) publishing the project. If not, I can use this experience to fix the errors or improve the systems and then offer you, the costumer, the product I would like to provide, an intuitive, easy and yet powerful tool for creating (especially First Person) games that unleashes the true power of Leadwerks. To sum up, lets put it all in a nutshell. The Framework will be published, if the quality is as I expect it to be and after I created a representative game with it. Thats it so far. Below, as always you find your gamedev tip. Have a nice day and stay cool ! Game Dev Tip #3: If you don't do it already, you should definetly make use of structured To-Do lists, if you want to get really efficient. You can get one step further and categorize the tasks by importance. A - Has an huge impact on your goal, B - Should be done, C - Can be done. I also can recommend to use One Note to keep track of your goals and your larger and smaller To-Do Lists. If you want to know more about One Note and its powers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7PYPl5WSVA&t=255s Markus from Phodex

Hey its me again, as you can see I was working hard . As I want to spend as much time as possible on the project, lets quickly go through whats new. This is the first version of the PHFW (Phodex Framework) Toolkit now including the "Item Creator", besides the recently presented Animation Manager. I guess the picture is pretty self explaining . The Item Creator generates a file out of the settings you made which then can be loaded into the "Item Script" inside Leadwerks. The creator makes it very easy and fun creating new interesting items and definetly improves your workflow, which is one of the aims of the Phodex Framework. In the following you can see how the test city I build of my test level scene enhances: As last time here is your Gamedev Tip : Game Dev Tip #2: If you are searching for a simple and quick solution for creating textures this tool may be interesting for you. It is ideal for beginners, you can quickly get cool results and its really cheap. With some training you can create pretty noticable textures with this tool called Zeuxis: Procedural Texture Generator. Link: http://store.steampowered.com/app/366550/Zeuxis__procedural_texture_generator/# Thats it for this time, I hope you enjoyed reading . As promised last time, I tried to focus even more on visual content. Do you like that? Does it make reading my Blog more interesting. Feel free to tell me your toughts! Next time I will get more general, about how and if the Phodex Framework gets published, so be excited and as always stay cool ! Markus from Phodex

Hello dear reader, First of all, as I recently though on how to make the blog more interesting and valuable for you to read, I thought it would be a cool idea if I provide a gamedev specifc tip (can be everything from productivity, to technical stuff, to marketing) at the end of every blog entry. I would be really happy, if you tell me what you think of this idea. Back to topic. I want to present what I am working at the moment. Last time it were some animations and rigs. I had some more trouble with them then expected and needed to do all that stuff again (rigging and animations). As they are just meant for a visual impact for me to be able to build and optimise the systems (e.g combat, movement) they don't look very professional, but my intention was not to create high quality game ready animations . Enough about the past, I will showcase the animations any time soon, as we take a look on the combat system maybe. So what I am doing now? Well I made some good progress and have some quite cool stuff to show. I was heavily working on my npc/character system (called "Character Set"). The NPC is now able to wear diffrent cloths. Already provided are: Helmet, Body, Gloves, Legs, Boots. At the moment I am working on the weapon system. So you can easily equip, range and melee weapons to the character. As I slowly would like to get a little bit more into detail here the settings for the character set: As you see I try to keep everything as clean and userfriendly as possible. A very cool thing are the "NPC Settings" which gives the systems a lot of power as it keeps the script settings clean, and gives you a lot of options to costumize the way your NPC behaves. It even gives you access to some technical stuff you can change, so there are no boundaries for you when using diffrent rigs/animation systems etc. Maybe I will talk more detailed about the whole AI/Character Set stuff another time. Another cool progress I made is the "PHFW Animation Manager". As my system works not with the Animation name (e.g "Walking", "Running"), but with the animation index, this tool is very helpful. Why I use the animation index you may ask. Well I use my own animation playing system (not the Leadwerks "PlayAnimation" function) and unfortunately the "SetAnimationFrame" function of Leadwerks does not provide to use animation names. To work around this I created this tool. This is the first external tool for the phodex framework and there are some more to come, I will then, most likley, put them into a huge toolset. There you can also set various keyframes needed for the combat system, so the tool can still be helpful, if the "SetAnimationFrame" function gets enhanced. This is how it currently looks (its like a pre alpha :D, just set up the rough system) So as promised here is the tip: Game Dev Tip #1: If you have a problem, you struggle with for a long time and you just can't find a solution. Stop working and do something completely diffrent (for example go outside and take a walk), then come back with a fresh mind and you will be suprised what great effect this can have, how you find new ideas, or simply get new motivation. I hope that helps some of you. I try to provide some more visual content to show in the future as I know its much more fun to watch pictures & videos instead of reading long and boring texts . Just the best and stay cool . Markus from Phodex

Hi, this time I provide a closer look into the Framework. The graphic below shows what the Framework contains of and how far the diffrent elements are developed. The green bubbles inside the red ones indicate how much progress has been made for the specific feature. More green means more progress. Empty (complete red) bubbles mean this feature hasn't been worked on yet. For the best result (as its a pretty huge image) click the image to load it in full size and use the zoom tool to take a closer look. This graphic may not be complete and I may add or remove some features, it also does not take asset creation into account. It should just give you an overview on what exactly I am planning to do with the Framework on the technical side. As you can see the whole framework (PHFW = Phodex Framwork) is at about 65% progress. The most work needs to be done on the Gameplay and System side. Many features are there already, but are still very primitive and provisional. Let me know what you think of the graphic. Did it help you understanding the Framwork, or did you find it pretty confusing at all? Stay cool and have a nice day! Markus from Phodex

Hi @HeadClot. In the next blog entry I will provide more information about the progress of the Phodex Framework. In general, I am not sure about the whole publishing stuff. It is not even sure if I will make the project available for public. What I can say is that I plan to publish some features/mechanics on the workshop and I definetly think about making it available for public, so stay tuned .

Hi after I exported my hands model as mdl (with Leadwerks Blender exporter) many of the animations were malformed? Anyone had the same problem? This makes the exporter pretty useless for me, as it works fine when I export as fbx. This is how it looks in LW: An this is how it looks originally: Thank you in advance!

Hi Leadwerkers , this time just a short entry showing some of the stuff I recently made. I think it looks pretty cool and wanted to share it with you. Some cool bow & crossbow rigs: Some examples of the new combat animations (WIP): Soon to be seen ingame and in action. Stay tuned and have a nice day . Markus from Phodex.

@macklebee Thank you! Looks exactly what I was searching for. Will take a look at this as I have some time.