|
A Little Background:
Okay.
Imagine that you live in a world where nothing ever happens. This world
of your imagination is essentially static. The clouds don't move,
the grass doesn't move, your feet don't even move when you walk. Welcome
to the
world of
Ben3D
1.0.
I designed
and built the Ben3D engine a few years ago. I was really bored, and it
was something new and different. The engine handles model movement,
collision detection, and loading - all you have to do is provide the
models. Heh. Great idea right! Something like the doom engine, but mine
too play with. It would be perfect. Little did I know those would quickly
become famous last words.
This game (if you really want to call it a game) demonstrates simple
collision detection and movement. Your character slides along walls instead
of walking through them and the camera trails behind him at all times.
It uses a unique script-based language to configure the world at startup.
The models are included with the source, so you can modify them however
you wish (the models for this game were created in Meshworks, so you'll
have
to have it too modify them. A demo of Meshworks will do the trick, and
is available from www.codenautics.com.)
To play, click the download link at the top of this page. Run the game
and select the Models folder in the open dialog box that appears. A large
window will appear. A few moments later, the loading screen will become
visible and the world will be created. When this has finished (it really
shouldn't take very long) the camera will zoom down behind the player.
You can control the character with the arrow keys. Try running him into
grass. He stops and slides along the grass in the direction he is pointing.
This effect, though it may seem painfully simple, is actually quite a challenge.That
is just about all the application does. If you have RealBasic, you
might try looking at the source code. It's pretty badly commented, but
I would be glad to answer any questions you have.
Requirements:
While this game is not visually that impressive, it does require a graphics
accelerator. My laptop has an 8 MB video card and it runs fine. You will
also need Quesa (www.quesa.org). Quesa is an alternative to OpenGL and
provides the 3D infrastructure necessary for the game. It is suggested
that you have a display capable of 1024 x 768, but I think 800 x 600
would work fine too. Finally, you must have OS X, or at least CarbonLib.
Version History:
- 1.0 = This is the first
real version of Ben3D. It is what you see here. There is another,
newer version. See the Projects section for details.
- J. Benjamin Gotow
webmaster@gotow.net
|
