What do you want from the developers moving forward?

[dendwaler]

A few things comes into my mind that i would like to have as soon as possible.

The support of occluders in PyPRP for Blender to improve performance of bigger ages. I need them desperately.

I would like to be able to put objects in ages or get them out quickly , without needing to export the whole age.
(For my age "turtle isle " i already had export times of nearly 50 Minutes! on a quad core )

I want to see the result after altering objects or changed texturing immediately "in game"
and switch the object to blender visa versa.

and Bump map support!

[Aloys]

First of all, I know this is not gonna be a popular opinion; but I think working on updating the Max plug is a misdirected effort. How many people actually use Max? Especially in our community? 4? 5? Blender might not be Max functionnality wise, but it works, it's free, and all current Age writers already know it. And in some ways it's actually easier to use than Max (it's a subjective thing, but I can't stand Max's interface.)

Well there is 4 now because of the version required wich is almost impossible to find and so old that no one wants to use it.

Also there is quite a lot of people out there that know how to use max or other more mainstream modelers that do not want to make the effort to learn blender because of how different the interface is.

Look at guys like Loshem (not sure of the name) that made the model of the Guild Hall in the official forums and who wanted to port it in the game, like many of the people that have a lot of experience with modeling he does not want to use either Blender or Max 7 because it's such a pain to completly change your workflow and I would really like to see people like him make ages for uru.

It's the core of the problem. Each group (Blender/Max) probably don't want to spend a lot of time learning a very different software (Max/Blender). It is true that by adding proper Max support for recent versions we would definitely expand the community of Age creators. The question is: how many people would it bring it versus how much work would it require?
I think we already have an established community of Age creators; and we would probably lost a lot of them by moving to a different software that most of us don't have (and are not whiling to 'download'). Since the commmunity has a limited number of coders we need to choose what to do. And IMO in the short term, it is more interesting to update PyPRP rather than the Max Plasma plugin.
I try to say that as objectively as possible: I may not like Max, but if needed I could use it. Heck, I did learn Blender although I couldn't stand it at first either.

I'd like to be able to set the system requirements at a solid DirectX 9.0

haha, I had forgotten about that.. Uru did came out in 2003..

[Tweek]

Lehm did the Guild Hall IIRC

I think focus should be on Blender still, it's the most open available program to use. Sure some in the community have Max (I myself have an old version of 6 kicking around I think), but for those coming into it new Blender is going to be the better choice as it doesn't cost a stupid amount of money, and you don't have to acquire it through "shady" means.

I'm not saying abandon Max, should be an area of work, but I don't think it should be the area of work.

[D'Lanor]

One thing we're seriously considering is breaking network and PRP compatibility with Cyan's servers and data. This will allow us a wider range of options in the future. I hope that since many of you will have to re-export your ages for the CWE engine anyway, you'll be willing to work with us when we change things.

This part worries me. It is a known fact that most age writers want their ages to be part of the D'ni universe. How would that be possible without the MOULa content?

At this point there is no MOULa content license so the MOULa ages cannot be (legally) ported to an incompatible client. If we had been willing to give up the original content we could have moved to a different engine long ago.

[kaelisebonrai]

One thing we're seriously considering is breaking network and PRP compatibility with Cyan's servers and data. This will allow us a wider range of options in the future. I hope that since many of you will have to re-export your ages for the CWE engine anyway, you'll be willing to work with us when we change things.

This part worries me. It is a known fact that most age writers want their ages to be part of the D'ni universe. How would that be possible without the MOULa content?

At this point there is no MOULa content license so the MOULa ages cannot be (legally) ported to an incompatible client. If we had been willing to give up the original content we could have moved to a different engine long ago.

We've been operating with converted content for a long time now - we can do the same for this. Deal with it. =) If you don't want to - please don't don't use a version of the source that adds the incompatible features =)

[Whilyam]

Yeah, we can't legally port Minkata from MOULa to CC, but that hasn't stopped us. As far as I know, the rules haven't change (we just have never abided by them XD)

[Aloys]

Unless I'm mistaken breaking PRP compatibilty will *have* to be done at some point if the physics engine needs to be changed, right? (cross platform issue mostly)

[D'Lanor]

All can say is this: A long awaited gesture has been made. Now is the time to start painting those grey hats white.

That being said, I really wish Cyan had thrown in the content with the OS deal. Surely they must know there is still a stalemate situation.

[Whilyam]

I think until the stalemate is actually resolved, the hats should remain grey. Don't you agree that we should fully hold up our side of the bargain when Cyan has fully upheld theirs?

[GPNMilano]

All can say is this: A long awaited gesture has been made. Now is the time to start painting those grey hats white.

That being said, I really wish Cyan had thrown in the content with the OS deal. Surely they must know there is still a stalemate situation.

There's no stalemate isue at hand really. It'd been nice if Cyan had thrown in the content with the OS. However, what they have given to open source is the engine and plugin code. What this means is that, if we wish to stay compatible, what we can do is update both. This will allow Cyan to also have access to a plugin that will allow them to export new versions of their content when the engine requires it. It'd be like any other age creator who will need to rexport their stuff when changes in the engine breaks prp compatibility. What this ulitmately would come down to is the above querie by Aloys about wether or not we should update the plugin. If it means staying compatible with Cyan's artistic content, then we'll have to so that Cyan will be able to update their stuff.