Clustering Decision

I had a chat with one of the programmers on Thursday last week & they were saying that the torque engine could be run on a Linux OS using OpenGL [ I think], but it would be not up to standard, so we are going with Windows Server 2003 Enterprise.
Windows 2008 Server in very heavy in the use of hardware so we are not going with this OS.

Cluster

I am looking into setting up a cluster using Fedora 9. The OS comes with an option to set one up in its configuration.
I will let you know of any luck with this.

GUI

I have made a document just drafting the GUI layout. It's only a draft for the demo we are creating. It will have three splash screens, first one will be the West Coast Tafe logo, the second will display the Torgue Game Engine Advanced logo and the last will be the menu which has the Mini-Tanks heading with a picture of a tank and the buttons which will allow you to start the game, join multiplayer, go into options, have a read about mini-tanks and also a quit game button.

(Dhiren Adatia)...Dizzy

Milestone Approaching

The date of the First project milestone is 10:30am, 23rd of september 2008. Make a note in your diaries and pay attention as a location will be announced before then.

I'll let the guys talk about what goals they are aiming for for the milestone. Make it in your calander and come by and take a look.

Terrain, The First Milestone and Game Structure

Terrain
We have random terrain being generated at the start of a mission, although it only uses the simplest methods of the Terraformer since there appears to be no information on how to format the variable information when using multiple terraforming methods. This isn't really a problem though as there is very little noticable difference when the extra methods are used to terraform the terrain.
Placing objects on the map such as bases, foliage, rocks, etc. is my next task. Placing non-interactive objects should be easily assomplished using the shape replicator and using a suggestion from Jordan bases and other interactive objects will be placed at markers scattered around the map.

The First Milestone
The generation of random terrain at mission start has been my primary goal for the first milestone. Since this has been achieved I can focus on attempting to place objects on the and to texture the terrain appropriately. I will approach the remaining tasks for the random generation of maps by firstly dealing with texturing the terrain, then placing static shapes, and finally placing interactive shapes.

Game Structure
We've decided that levels will be run on the server and at mission start a new terrain with objects will be created. This means that several copies of Torque will have to run on the server as the multiplayer host for each level we are running. These copies should be suitably customised for there purpose so as to not waste resources on the server.

Clustering

I have decided just to go with Windows Server 03 Enterprise for the clustering, as server 08 requires to much resources which we simply do not have due to the increase in the number of servers needed.

Terraformer Script

I've managed to run the Terraformer tool through script, meaning now we have a method to generate terrain when a mission loads. So now I just need to provide random values for the variables that musst be passed.