How much would you pay for Ca3DE on CD?

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Carsten
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How much would you pay for Ca3DE on CD?

Post by Carsten » 2007-02-22, 16:21

Hi all,

I'm currently considering selling copies of the latest Ca3DE Demo and SDK on CD.
Each CD would have the following features:
  • contain the latest Ca3DE Demo (same file as available for download),
  • contain the latest SDK (same file as available for download),
  • the Demo and the SDK would be properly merged into each other, no manual integration necessary,
  • especially useful if you have a slow and/or expensive internet connection,
  • no installation necessary, just insert CD and double-click to go,
  • the Wiki documentation for off-line browsing,
  • all the external libraries that Ca3DE uses (TODO: provide list),
  • debug libraries,
  • goodies: the whole collection of Ca3DE screen-shots (including those from early development), Ca3DE wallpapers, etc.
  • ...
Please let me know your opinion by posting here and/or dropping your vote at http://www.Ca3D-Engine.de :up:
Thanks!
Last edited by Carsten on 2007-04-01, 11:42, edited 3 times in total.
Best regards,
Carsten
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Thrawn
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Post by Thrawn » 2007-02-22, 16:37

Hi,

I think there is no need to buy the CD at all as the content can be downloaded anyways. The only chance to really sell a CD without "hurting" the spread of Ca3DE is special content.

There are 2 sorts of special content I can imagine (that would not negatively affect the download version):
  • Video tutorials
  • Large texture, sound and model resources
Greetings,
Thrawn
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Post by Carsten » 2007-02-22, 17:16

Hi Thrawn,

your suggestion is a good one, and I'll certainly consider it.

My main intention with selling CDs however is to help people who have a slow, expensive or volume-limited internet connection by saving them almost 500 MB of downloads... (I recently even got phone calls in this regard, where the lengthy downloads were repeatedly prematurely aborting).
Well, anyways, please vote, everybody! :dots: :thx:
Best regards,
Carsten
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Post by theguywhogoton » 2007-03-25, 23:07

I would pay.... from the screen shots I see...$35 Canadian...also you should take the suggestions and post a couple examples of games...I can't find any on the site...and by selling CD's do you mean off of the site? Or are you going to find away to make multiple copies and ship them world-wide to Wal-Mart O.o that would be the best!
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Good market segment..

Post by [IS04]-Michael_S_Siebert » 2007-05-10, 09:39

Hey,

what I could really imagine for the product in the future, would be a CD set with tutorial videos, documentation, the engine itself, basic templates and examples, textures etc.. Basically a whole production surrounding on a set of maybe two 700mb CD's.. This whole package at a resonable price ranging from 60€/$ to 100€/$ dollars.. Production cost per unit would probably lie around €1.50-€2.50, but could be lowered 30% by pressing via poland, who have a lower price tag on pressing and printing..
This all could become a perfect addition to the low priced commercial engine market segment, which is dominated by the Torque engine currently by Garage Games, but could become a nice alternative when done right, the potentual surely is high enouth for such a production.. The needed promotion for it could be done in the various game developer forums and sites by bannering and direct PR via press reviews.. I'm sure it would be featured in various ways..

If you have distribution queries, just make a call.. :)
Regards from a far away place,

Michael S. Siebert
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Post by Carsten » 2007-05-10, 16:50

Thanks for the great input, Michael! I'll definitively keep it in mind all the issues you mentioned! I'm currently familiarizing myself with Wink for a whole set of new tutorials, and also hope that a few other Ca3DE core features can be finished soon. Then it would be a great time to seriously get a charge of e.g. 100 CDs pressed, and see how they sell. ;)
(You seem to have contacts to companies to print and press CDs... - I'll come back to you...! ;) )
Best regards,
Carsten
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Post by Jojimbo » 2007-05-31, 09:40

I would not worry too much Carsten about providing CD's,whether selling them or not,you're a genuine "nice guy" and it's good you think of others who don't have very fast download speeds,but I think we can assume most people already have good cable,asdl connectivity and super machines to go with it.
However,selling CD's,or online content such as the Ca3D-Engine for would-be hobbyists and possible commerial gamemakers is another thing altogether and well worth a deeper look,how better then,from someone who is a 3D artist hobbyist,would-be gamemaker to comment on exactly the sort of thing people like me look for while trawling 3D game engine sites for an cheap engine that you don't need to be a rocket scientist to operate.

Torque? got that,it's not very user friendly imho,the large terrain issue with the TGEA is still a long way from solving.Garage games give a good service,help is there but you need at least basic knowledge in C++ to even get it compiled is a headache,especially if you're more geared around making models,textures,animations etc etc the list is endless...so from a perspective of a frustrated "game maker" what do I need,or anybody else that is,or even,what am I looking for that would make me hand over $200 for an indie license to keep me happy?
I'll tell you what I would like to see....

1.Large terrains which can be accessed for editing from a gui console.

Let me dispell the myth of "large terrains" because any idiot that thinks he wants a 25+ km square terrain for his game,especially for a FPS has got a nasty little shock.I have had experience trying to populate a 25km square map and I tell you it's no fun,especially when you want to be realistic.I am not saying it's not possible to vegetate or forest such an area,but if you want to hone in on detail like I do,and make it look good,anywhere from 5-20km square is plenty,unless you can develop magic tools to spawn and seed everything and lets face it,it would look crap,close up anyway,and the point of it all for me is virtual reality.
Of course,making rooms I want to include here,but the most important thing is the GUI in the Editor.The FPSC game creator has an excellent gui and is pretty friendly,so is the A6 gamemaker,but they don't have the "large" terrain support,not yet anyways last time I looked.So to cap it all in this section,all things to do with making your world goes here and a possible punter like me :D doesn't want to spend 3-4 years learning how to code C++,you Carsten have done that part for me :wink: all I have to do is use your great UI to let my imagination go rampant.

2.A decent model base.

It don't have to be GRAW quality,thats my job,but it needs to be a realistic base to work from.You only need one playermodel,thats all you get from Torque,but the AI and animations need to be half way decent and be upgradable and most importantly...easily introduced into your game world.There is always going to be some coding to be done,attaching sounds etc but this can be easily handled with note pad.Basic stuff included as ai following,knowing its being shot at etc etc,clever enough to take cover.This include basic vehicles,cars tanks,hell they can be poly block for all I care as long as the wheel and tracks turn,the guns fire and you can jump from turret to turret,boats,aircraft and all accessable from a friendly user gui,and modable from programs such as GMAX etc etc.

If you can provide this I'll pay,and I can't think of anyone who actually deserves to take that step more than yourself all the work you put into your baby 8) was well impressed with the quality of the demo.

Anyway end of rant :lol: I'm gonna DL your SDK,guess I'll be needing to learn a whole new set of file types,I haven't tried the sdk for at least 2 years looking forward to delving into it.Lol
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Post by Carsten » 2007-06-01, 14:38

Dear Jojimbo,

thank you very much for your detailed reply, I appreciate it very much! :)
Jojimbo wrote:1.Large terrains which can be accessed for editing from a gui console.
Okay, I certainly understand that support for large terrains is very important - this is why Ca3DE comes with very large terrain support built-in. However, as you pointed out, terrain "live" editing inside CaWE is still missing, but I plan to provide a new, appropriate tool for CaWE soon: a new CaWE tool that allows to reshape (rise, lower, flatten etc.) terrain as well as to modify its material, texture and color.

Moreover, with large terrains, I think it is crucial that vegetation can automatically (or at least semi-automatically) be planted while maintaining very good realism. Several approaches (each of which can be combined with manual planting) are possible: e.g. a parametric approach as in Terragen (where you set min/max angles/heights and other parameters for a given vegetation type), something like in Terragen but scripted in Lua, or texture-maps that work as vegetation species density maps that are used to control a random planting algorithm.

As with the terrain GUI editing, auto-planting of vegetation is a feature that is currently on my TODO list.

2.A decent model base.
That in turn is very difficult for me to provide, as is anything else that is related to artwork. However, from your description I conclude that by "model base", you mean something much broader than only a model library (including AI, scripting, pre-made game elements (like tanks), etc.).
Well, personally, I think that scripting is one of the most important components of this concept, and that's exactly what I'm currently working on. :) And if I may say so, the scripting code is making very good progress, and while implementing it, it also gives rise to plenty of code design enhancements in other game-related code (like the network packet handling). Ca3DE had no map/entity scripting support at all not long ago, and the soon to be released changes (which will take until July 2007 though) are among the top enhancements planned for this year.

To summarize, it's great to hear that you like Ca3DE, and although not everything that you mentioned is already implemented, I'm constantly working on it, and of course I'd be happy to hear your suggestions any time. In fact, the more precise and detailed your suggestions are, the easier (and thus faster) will they for me to implement. :up:
Best regards,
Carsten
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Post by Jojimbo » 2007-06-02, 02:06

by base i meant something in your hands to work with,lets say for instance a pretty good player model,with some attached equipment,gunbelt ammo pouch,backpack,helmet.these three child attachments would be modifyable to your own needs,i could say turn a mediocre soldier model into a high resvirtual usmc iraq model.

his weapon,including iron sights,again a mediocre turnable into really cool,after all ca3d is a modders paradise :D where i could do all this but its no point having a great looking model and gun if he walks around like he just took a dump in his combat pants :oops: so here he is gonna need decent animations connected to decent sounds,and a good fps arms model anims to boot.the animation we would need are...

walk/run/crawl/jump (basic movement)

kneel/prone/stand (at rest anims "right click to bring weapon up to aim and left click to fire" this could be scriptable? and a really cool cool feature)

throw/

put/take (put and take prolly the same anim,calls up a script to rob corpses or recieve ammo off buddies,could even just use "use" anim for a scripted function by choice of a drop down menu,take,put,get in,open,close,build etc etc)

death (ragdoll?)

plus we need both 1st and 3rd person perspectives.

this is the kind of thing to move towards,we do know it can be done its nothing new-I personally want to makw a ww2 based "game" but also apart from the obvious have it a requirement of the game mechanics to have food and water as essential survival requirements.
I want the main player to "encounter" other entities who "follow" but can be ordered around like command lines such as "stay here,go there,hide,follow me,take cover" i know i may be asking too much and i realise my game idea may take possibly 5 years or more to accomplish but hey it's going to be fun making it.Imagine you are a soldier,you have to provide for dependants (actively forage and build shelters) and a dog in a vast world in all weathers while in search of a fabled homeland in the midst of a world war.

I presumed a large terrain of immense proportions,but level designed 5-10km would be ample,plus would help to keep the realization easier as each would have a definitive realistic goal.
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Post by Carsten » 2007-06-02, 12:11

Jojimbo, again thank you very much for your detailed feed-back. :)
However, I think that most items in your list are very game/MOD specific. For example, there is always an extra animation that another team expects to be among the standard features, and this in turn makes it very difficult for me to provide a set of standard anims that everyone is happy with.
However, I would of course be happy to help with the development of such a standard model and - maybe more important - I'll be happy to provide support for anyone who does.
Best regards,
Carsten
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