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So yeah, I thought I'd make a different type of game, but ooohhhhhhh no that was not going to happen.

First off, the game I decided to make was an [b]Off Road Racing game[/b] so I had to use some dynamic physics on the player, but we all know that's a stupid idea for a start.

I fumbled around through ODE physics trying to get it working, but it turns out its missing 3 commands, oh no :(

Then I tried DarkPhysics which left me dissatisfied last time I tried it. Nevertheless, I pursued and after dealing with the fact the angle retrieval is messed up (so that instead of rotating by 0,180,0 its actually 180,0,180 8-#)
Eventually I moved onto vehicle physics because, you know, that's like, a sensible idea. WRONG :) In order to use vehicle physics (just like softbodies) you need to download 2 new programs and get a degree in witchcraft and wizardry.

So I then decided instead of automatically setting up the vehicle badly... I'd attach "capsules" to a box for wheels and see how that went. :) Surprisingly well actually, after I discovered all the commands for applying local force to an object.

Stage 1 complete.

Now, stage 2 was originally proposed before I even made the vehicle physics engine part behave. Stage 2 was making terrains in T.ED.

Now, I looked at T.ED 2 weekends ago and thought:
"Hell yeh, that looks awesome, and the demo works wonders and seems really logical!"
So I applied to PayPal to transfer £20 to my account from my bank.
5-7 days passed and I got the money in last Friday (28/05/2010)
I got home after a long day at college at about 5:00 and went onto TGC to order T.ED.
Done, ordered. - 24 hours wait? - nope, because it was a weekend. - Fine, 72 hours wait :( - nope, wrong again, it was a bank holiday weekend 8-#

So 96 hours later, I turned on my PC today to find 3 emails (for some reason) giving me the links and stuff to download T.ED.
I clicked the link and Google Chrome gave me it's equivalent of a 404 error. 8-# I clicked it again and it decided to work. (Weird)

After downloading T.ED and installing I think to myself:
"Woo, finally I've got it and I can make a kick ass .X terrain for our main project!"
WRONG

I open T.ED and I'm presented with a res choosing screen :S (not sure why you'd want that for a windowed program, but whatever) I choose option 2 (res 1024x768) just to be safe then press anykey on the next screen.

After pressing anykey the whole window's contents goes black (cls) and my PC becomes a big pile of lag, with the cursor refreshing every second or 2. (Maybe it's just loading? - Nope..... leaving it for a while didn't change anything)

So I try to resize the window, seeing as it's half stuck under my task bar (which is on the left of my desktop)

I laggily resize the window and position it more in the middle of my screen and eventually T.ED kicks into action and I leave the black screen of lag.

When I get onto T.ED I realise there are flickering rendering artefacts all over the screen for no apparent reason other than "this is the unregistered version" so I think:
"Right, first thing to do is put in my registration details"
That done, the artefacts are still there 8-#

I attempt to do some terrain editing in the horribly bugged out T.ED interface I'm presented with and then try exporting a terrain to a .X file.

Well, I should have known that would never work, I mean who downloads a modelling program to try and use what they've modelled... that's like the dumbest idea in the world. 8-#

Attempting to export to .X gives me a roughly similar box to the 1 in the T.ED Demo that I had looked through to make sure all the features I needed were there. (Only it was missing a few that the Demo had) I set things the way I think I want them exported and click export to save it somewhere.

I name the file something silly like Egg.x so I'd be able to recognise it easily.

I go to the directory I saved it in and I get some file called Egg.prq or something and Egg.x (Turns out Egg.x is the exported props file (which of course included no props, as I didn't place any))

So in my attempt to verify I'm not being a retard or something, I try to load Egg.x into our main project in place of the temporary terrain we were using for debugging.

I notice the menu now has the same visual artefacts T.ED was displaying. I thought:
"Oh no, maybe I really have broken my graphics card! :O!"
So I try to enter the game and get:
[i]It failed to load the 3D object at line whatever[/i] 8-#
- then hurriedly restart my computer.

After I get back, I realise my graphics card isn't broken as everything renders fine, until I open T.ED, then everything starts to break.

So where does this leave me?

It leaves me:
[b]*[/b] [i]96[/i] + [i]howeverlongittakestogetasolution[/i] hours less development time
[b]*[/b] £22.31 less money
[b]*[/b] No working terrain .X exporter

What am I to do?
Why is this all so difficult?
Are racing games with terrain really this blimmin difficult?
8-#