Category: Game Development

ShaderMap 4 is a Windows based commercial application for rapidly creating texture maps. You can start from a single diffuse map and rapidly generate normal, height, ambient occlusion and other maps. You can also generate maps from a 3D object, using a very quick and easy workflow.

Key Shadermap 4 features include:

• Fast Map Generation

Select a mode and source type then load the source file – ShaderMap will create a project generating maps from the source. It’s that easy.

• Bake Maps from 3D

Load a 3d model into the project grid and render normal maps, AO, curve, color ID, and depth from the model geometry.

• Speed and Memory

Maps are rendered using 32 bit floating point pixels and stored in 16 bit memory to ensure both speed and efficient memory usage.

• Editor Exchange

Export any map to your favorite image editor at any time. Once done, save the map and the it will be brought back into ShaderMap.

• Scripting with LUA

Export LUA scripts for any project. Control batch scripting of multiple source files, map rendering, setup lighting and more with the LUA API.

• Map Filters

Use the Filter Tab to add additional filters to any Map. Auto Edge, Brightness, Contrast, Blur, High Pass, Shadow, Highlight and more.

• Normal Map Editor

Paint normal and displacement to the SM4 layer system. Transform, scale, paint, and use tools to modify normal vectors.

• PBR Materials

Generate Roughness and Metalness maps. The Start screen PBR Mode automatically packs maps into RMA and RMAD formats.

ShaderMap has a free version available with a Pro version available to buy for $49 USD. You can check Shadermap out in action in the video below.

GameDev News Applications Review

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AudioMass is an open source browser based audio editor in the same vein as Audacity, designed to run in the browser but to not behave like a typical web applications.

Features of AudioMass include:

• Loading Audio, navigating the waveform, zoom and pan
• Visualization of frequency levels
• Peak and distortion signaling
• Cutting/Pasting/Trimming parts of the audio
• Inverting and Reversing Audio
• Exporting to mp3
• Modifying volume levels
• Fade In/Out
• Compressor
• Normalization
• Reverb
• Delay
• Distortion
• Pitch Shift
• Keeps track of states so you can undo mistakes
• Offline support!

The source code is available on GitHub but unfortunately does not currently have a license attached rendering it dangerous to use for now.  Hopefully a license is added in the future.  You can learn more about AudioMass and see it in action in the video below.

GameDev News JavaScript

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EA have just released the game client source code for Command and Conquer, both Red Alert and Tiberian Dawn versions.   This code is used to generate a DLL that is then hosted in the game engine and will enable modders to create new content for the about to be released Command & Conquer Remastered.

The source code is available on GitHub under the GPLv3 license.  This is not a complete release, it does not include game assets, nor does it ship with the game engine itself.  Instead you can use this source to create game DLLs that are run in the engine.  The code however is extremely well documented and is a nice peek behind the curtain of a successful commercial game.

You can learn more about the code release in the video below.

GameDev News CPP

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Thanks in part to a $50,000 award from the Mozilla foundation, the Godot game engine is gaining the ability to be run in a web browser.   You can try it out right here if you have the latest version of a Chrome based browser, or Firefox Nightly.

Explanation for the rationale for Godot in a Browser from the Godot news page:

Godot Engine supports exporting games to the HTML5 platform (i.e. browsers). Given that the editor itself is written using the Godot Engine API it should be possible to run the editor in browsers as well.

The reason why the editor wasn’t able to run in browsers up until now was due to some historical Web browsers limitations, mostly lack of support for threading, but also file system access.

With the introduction of WebAssembly, WebAssembly threads, Javascript SharedArrayBuffer, and possibly an upcoming Native FileSystem API, it should now be possible to have an almost-native user experience when running the editor on the Web.

This will be beneficial in many ways to the engine itself for multiple reasons:

1. It will lower the barrier for new users, which will be able to try out the engine without the need to download anything.
2. Any modification towards reaching that goal will also improve the HTML5 export itself (given that the editor is made like a Godot game).
3. It will allow to use Godot in a reasonable way in environments where installing/downloading applications is not an option (e.g. schools’ computers and tablets), fostering the usage of the engine for educational purposes (which is something we, as an open source community, deeply believe in).

This DOES NOT mean that Godot will move completely to the Web, nor that the Web browsers version will be the recommended way for professional development, but it will be an additional option for cases where it might be useful (again, pick the education sector as an example).

Perhaps the most interesting part is the future plans for mobile usage:

• Virtual keyboard in the HTML5 plaform, for working text input in mobile devices.
• Persistence support, WebDAV integration.
• Gestures for the editor, allowing using the editor from touch devices (this will also be beneficial to make native Android or iOS versions of the editor for example).

These features, as well as Dropbox support, could truly bring Godot to Android, iOS or ChromeOS devices in the future!  You can learn more about Godot in the Browser in this video.  This is the second project to bring Godot to the browser, details of the first ‘Godot.Online’ is available here.  Note, Godot.online is not an official Godot project.

GameDev News Godot HTML5

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Today we are talking about Heroic Lab’s Nakama.  Nakama is an open source (as well as hosted and managed) solution for the networking side of the game development side of game development.  In October of 2019, Heroic Labs became a premium sponsor of the Godot Game Engine. This week Heroic Labs announced they are now sponsoring the recently open sourced* Defold Game engine.

Details from the Heroic Labs blog:

Today we are pleased to announce that Heroic Labs has joined the Defold Foundation as their first corporate partner in order to further support and expand open-source tools within the game development community.

The Defold Foundation has been formed to maintain and grow the newly open-sourced Defold game engine which was originally created by one of the world’s leading interactive games companies, King Digital Entertainment, to power their incredibly popular titles.

This partnership with the Defold Foundation has enabled us to join forces to create an open-source client library that integrates Nakama and Defold tightly together to enable developers to take advantage of the full range of client APIs found within Nakama including authentication, matchmaking, leaderboards, multiplayer, realtime chat, and much more.

At Heroic Labs we are firm believers in open-source tools and software being the future of game development; with the steady increase in the popularity of gaming, specifically online and social play, developers need access to tools that enable them to move quickly and provide the most engaging experiences to their players regardless of platform without service lock-in.

You can learn more about the Nakama server here and browse the available open source solutions on GitHub.  Learn more about Heroic Labs and Nakama in the video below.  If you want to learn more about Nakama, unfortunately we do not have a tutorial on the subject, but Nathan at GDQuest does, check it out.

*source available, not technically open source as per OSI definitions.

GameDev News Defold Godot

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