BGE DEV: New features are now going into trunk, starting with the BGE harmony branch

[Ace Dragon]

You read it correctly, the BGE harmony branch has just been merged into trunk.
http://lists.blender.org/pipermail/b...ay/045320.html

For those who were waiting months to see major new BGE features due to the fact of 2.63 being mainly centered around Bmesh, it is starting to look like 2.64 will be a great release for BGE users.

For now at least, the ability to play with the new graphical goodies such as sunlamp shadows is only a matter of finding a new trunk build for your system on Graphicall.
http://lists.blender.org/pipermail/b...ay/045320.html

[Rubbernuke]

Great news!

And cheers for your persistence on pressing for BGE improvements!

[SolarLune]

Extremely great news. Glad to hear it. Also, thanks for pressing it. I'm glad to see that Kupoman and Moguri's work isn't going unnoticed.

[kevincorrigan]

I agree, and am very exited

[AD-Edge]

Excellent!!

[Bigbob]

Great! Thanks for the effort and mainly for light textures (new TODO for my game :-) )
But what about the general performance? Was it increased?

[klauser]

Very nice, I've been following the Harmony Branch for a while now and have been using svn-builds, but its nice to have it merged into the trunk. The guys that worked on this are brilliant. The BGE is getting more and more interesting with all these nice additions to it.

[derda]

Yeah! The only thing I need anymore is an opportunity to get the shadows working with transparent objects...

[SolarLune]

I think I asked this before - you can toggle shadow casting with the Shadow button in the material, so it would be nice if objects would always cast shadows if that button is enabled, and never cast them if it's disabled.

[RossBlenderArt]

Great news for the BGE.

[Moguri]

I think I asked this before - you can toggle shadow casting with the Shadow button in the material, so it would be nice if objects would always cast shadows if that button is enabled, and never cast them if it's disabled.

Unless I'm mis-understanding you, this is already implemented.

As for BGE features for 2.64, 2.63 was indeed focused on BMesh, which caused a few BGE projects to be delayed going into trunk (Harmony was ready and reviewed in time for 2.63, but was postponed to 2.64 due to BMesh). However, around the time Harmony got delayed a group of devs had decided that we'd try to focus some effort into making 2.64 something of a BGE release. So, if you've got patches, now is the time to get them reviewed. Sooner rather than later since we only have a couple of weeks or so before BCon1 is over, which is when the big stuff gets merged in.

[SolarLune]

I think it's because my post was a 'tack-on' to the post above - transparent objects can't currently cast shadows. They never seem to cast shadows, unless you have clip alpha on, but then the object's not transparent at all - it's either invisible, or visible.

EDIT: If it's a technology barrier, like it can't render the shadows because transparent objects are rendered after opaque physical objects and shadows, then that's fine. But if it's possible, I think it would be a nice feature to add. Even if it's not added, we at least can fake it with light cookies. Thanks again, Moguri!

Wow, that's great to hear. 2.64's kind of a BGE release, huh? Hopefully the Candy and Cucumber branches will get in (at least partially), too.

[BlendingBGE]

Yes! Finnaly!! Great news!

Unless I'm mis-understanding you, this is already implemented.

As for BGE features for 2.64, 2.63 was indeed focused on BMesh, which caused a few BGE projects to be delayed going into trunk (Harmony was ready and reviewed in time for 2.63, but was postponed to 2.64 due to BMesh). However, around the time Harmony got delayed a group of devs had decided that we'd try to focus some effort into making 2.64 something of a BGE release. So, if you've got patches, now is the time to get them reviewed. Sooner rather than later since we only have a couple of weeks or so before BCon1 is over, which is when the big stuff gets merged in.

This means you can start working on phase 2, right?Since you are done with phase 1.

[Ace Dragon]

However, around the time Harmony got delayed a group of devs had decided that we'd try to focus some effort into making 2.64 something of a BGE release. So, if you've got patches, now is the time to get them reviewed. Sooner rather than later since we only have a couple of weeks or so before BCon1 is over, which is when the big stuff gets merged in.

Personally, I'm hoping to see the rest of the Cucumber branch merged in (which includes features such as support for more than 2 UVMaps and collision layers). Since Kupoman was also in charge of that project, I don't see any major quality concerns that would prevent those features from being merged in.

Also, my personal opinion is that we at least also try to get these patches in, even if they require some edits by the dev. commiting them.

Image clipping and object mapping support.
http://projects.blender.org/tracker/..._id=9&atid=127

"Character" object physics type
http://projects.blender.org/tracker/..._id=9&atid=127

The work on enhancing group functionality as mentioned in this thread. (You might need to poke Moerdn for the code)
http://blenderartists.org/forum/show...ghlight=groups

And the work that was done to optimize the rasterizer and scenegraph as seen in this thread (also by Moerdn)
http://blenderartists.org/forum/show...ght=rasterizer

[ndee]

Wow... this is great to hear! I am looking forward for this release! What are you planning to get in to this release moguri and kupoman? Except harmony?
Is candy a target for this release too?(mokazon and martinsh)
Thanks for all this awesome work!

[BlendingBGE]

Yes, moerdn done so many good improvements, just needs to be reviewed and implemented! Rasterizer improvements are really needed.

[ndee]

this would be really great if some rasterizer improvements will go in too

[leonnn]

WOW, that is awesome, thanks ace dragon for share the news, I guess now I ll have to learn some other things on belender, great, great, great, great!

[agoose77]

2.49 to 2.64 Will be like the developments between the 1800s and 2000s. In 200 years man progressed from horse and carriage to space travel. In over 15 releases, Blender moved from texFace to Awesomeness!

Humour (or not!?) aside, Blender is actually moving at quite a pace. As one who has complained about the stale nature of the development in the Game Engine, I have been quietly pleased with the amount of devotion and hard work that all of the developers have expressed in the last year (and before in some cases).
I would like to thank on behalf of all of the "user base" for the Game Engine the Stokes, who have spent a great deal of their time working with developers, and their own projects, to provide everyone with a better engine. They may have their own motives, but the end result has been greatly beneficial to us all.
I would like to thank Moerdn for expressing progression and exploration into the bottlenecks the engine faces.
I would like to thank Martinsh for his shader work, and mokazon for working with him to develop hard coded patches.
I would, interestingly, like to thank Crumpet for his perseverance. He has, on many occasions seen less than friendly feedback, and even though I too can find some of his efforts slightly off-putting, he has given many of us the ability to see a feasible end goal, especially in the tutorial videos (Sources contest), which has astounded me at the very least.
Anyone else I have omitted; If you have contributed toward the Blender Source (and not added poorly structured / documented code ) please feel free to give yourselves a metaphorical pat on the back, and/or shout out at me!
Keep it up, everyone. I'm very proud to be a member of a society who all show support to even the most repeated, basic and poorly worded questions, and let's not change that; we're well known for our hospitality.

[moerdn]

working constraints for group instances:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2779060/BGE/...straints.patch

api improvement for groups and instances, naming updated and being used for about six months in production environment
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2779060/BGE/...eference.patch

regression files:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2779060/BGE/...ion_moerdn.zip

lod stuff is working so far, but user interface is not really ready. Rasterizer stuff is still in 'exploring' state.. still to the fact of running short of time.

greetings,
moerdn