Sorry your browser is not supported!

This can really be directed toward anyone who's used Calgari's GameSpace. I think I'm ready to finally move up from 3D Canvas Pro (while a good starter package, it is a tremendous resource hog! I can't stand the SLOWWWWWNESSS anymore!) to a more professional package. GameSpace looks to me like the next logical step, but there doesn't seem to be a trial version. Can someone give me pros and cons of this new package?

Hey, roswell. I haven't used gameSpace, but I have used an older version of trueSpace before. I think they're both pretty similar, just gameSpace is more geared towards game-making. What I'd suggest is downloading a trial version of trueSpace from Caligari and checking it out that way.

Best regards, mate.

You can download a trial of Truespace 6.6 which has similar modelling and animation tools.

Hmm...Well, Caligari is offering trueSpace 5.2 for $149 right now. I'm wondering which would be a better deal. Rich tells me that gameSpace is only overshadowed by the rendering options available in a more high-performance 3D package. Would trueSpace 5.2 offer those options, and have the same ease of modelling as gameSpace? If so, 5.2 looks to be the package of choice until Halloween (when the sale ends).

One of the modelers on my team had GameSpace, he seemed to enjoy it, but as we talked he kept going back to MilkShape3D, Wings3D, and TrueSpace 5.X.

Iam tempted to pick it up tho. It looks fairly decent. I dont have a real great modeler. Other then MilkShape3D, and the RESOURCE HOG 3D Canvas Pro.

I have

Wings 3D
MilkShape 3D
TrueSpace 3.2
3D Canvas Pro
Quill 3D
Modeler that comes with A6

When I have to model, I use Wings more then anything, but Quill is something that I do enjoy, its learning curve is a little wiggy, but its decent.

For levels I still use Cartography Shop 3D more then anything else. Its by far the best. Its followed me from Dark Basic, Blitz Basic, Torque to A6. Its the best level editor out there. Even converted some friends into using it for dungeons, and such.

from what i see it has a game plugin.
and works in some way with milkshape and their going to keep up with game file types.

Hello,

I have only one comment about the firm Caligari. If you want a bugy software, interface full of small icons, that all looks more or less the same, then go for it. I'd bought both TrueSpace 5 and Ispace and was both waste of my money. But go ahead, try for yourself. Been there, I will never buy a software from Caligari again.

Have a nice day,

Tomaz

I dont like Truespace's GUI I think they really suck.

But once you get past that, Truespace is really good. Ive never had it crash on me.

3D Canvas on the other hand, its so buggy, and slow its unusable. But ill try it when I go up to 3gb of ram.

I wouldn't buy regular TS 5.2 for games work as it apparntly has exporting issues. If you bought TS 5.2 you would need to buy a gamepak for $299 to get the same features as Gamespace.

Gamespace is based on TS 6.6 as well, so it is probably better anyway. I don't own Gamespace so I can't tell you whether it's really worth buying or not, but it seems okay.

Totally false. Exporting with Truespace5.2 is no problem. I've even found a way to export animations to dbp with the Inverse Kinematics.

http://www.theothersideworks.com/ts.htm

@tomazmb

You really should reconsider. The work interface is no where near difficult. In fact, once you're adjusted, it becomes one of the fastest modeling tools around.

@all

For the price, it's a good buy, and there's loads of resources on the internet.(Plus, yours truly, hangs around these forums more than is good for me )

Right now, If I were someone looking into Truespace/gamespace, I would do this.

1- Download the free truespace 3.2, or any of the trials of 4-6.
2- Give yourself 2 good hours of just messing around with the interface.

I do agree, that I was at first frustrated with the interface, but would soon come to love it. You just can't give up on these things, they're designed in the manner they were intended.(speed,flexibility, and accessibility)

I agree with tomazmb truespace sucks a waste if money only thing its got good is the .X exporter. .

Have you read nothing I've said in my above post?

Obviously you just havn't given it enough time, and it's kinda ridiculous to say something sucks without backing it up.

Really, I wanna know what sucks about it. I bet I can solve your problem in a short anwser.

Caligari is the best. They have the best softwares!!!

gameSpace - The Quick Low-Down...

(3DS Max fanatics - nothing to see here... move along now)

There have been a few issues with gameSpace v1.0 since it's release: slow startup times (1 min 20 sec for me on one system). This is due to some issue with the stock plugins, and has been resolved already for me and some others who were bold enough to use the "Win98 Patch" on XP as well. Another issue: the .X exporter randomly hangs gS. This is unfortunate for DBP users like me.

There will be a service pack released this week, and hopefully it will address the above issues and more.

In general, gS is a *serious* modelling program (trueSpace has always had more bang for the buck than any other modeller, IMO). Caligari has gotten their ".X format" act together. gS can export IK animation, bone+skin animation, and will copy texture files to the output directory. Three key features that most other apps don't do (at least altogether). (3DS Max fanatics - go away! I will ignore you!). tS has had sucky support for .X in the past, but with gS, they finally got it right.

Features...

gS has a SLEW of features... just check out the site, it's pretty much accurate (if a little vague). As someone mentioned, it's based on tS 6.6, so it's got the full monty in there for modelling - not some old version prettied up a bit. However, if you want to do ray-tracing, radiosity, AVIs, etc., gS is NOT what you want - the rendering features from tS 6.6 have been taken out. If you want them - go get tS 6.6, then wait for "gamePack" to be released to give your tS 6.6 the gS format import/export capabilities (for significant $$$ I might add).

For the beginner...

Well, I'm only beginning to scratch the surface of gS (mostly just lack of time so far). The interface, while some don't like tS interfaces in general, it has been changed, enhanced and fine tuned over the years, and it is now more sensible than ever with gS. Yep... there are tons of buttons with little pictures that you don't know what they mean at first, but you get used to them. And if you don't like the way things are laid out... you can change it all to suit you.

The object manipulation tools make more sense than any other app I've used... wanna stretch an object in a direction - you just go for the "cage" on the end of the object that makes sense, grab it in the right place, and voila, your stretching. You don't have to move the mouse all the way across the screen to click a button to change to "stretch" mode (or remember which F-keys to hit), and then click two other buttons to specify which axes to allow/disallow - you just click near the object on the "cage", with a particular button, and move in a particular direction to get a particular operation. At first it was all very daunting, but after going through the first few tutorials, it all becomes clear that this stuff makes *sense* and minimizes the time wasted fighting with the interface (Milkshape, 3DC, etc., all suffer from rigidity of the interface - you'll understand when you start getting the hang of gS).

Game formats...

Given there's a special Milkshape and "fire off MS" plugin there in gS, you get all the MS formats for import/export (and that list is extensive). Sure, it'd be nice to have gS itself support them all natively, and Caligari seems to be motivated to add these natively to gS, but I personally don't want to wait to use gS while they implement them all. Plus, Caligari, as wells as the current gS user base, would prefer Caligari spend time on support for *new* game formats for now. If having MS embedded in there is too "ugly" for you... you might want to look elsewhere. I don't need those formats, so I don't even notice it's there. One point of note though... some have claimed that there is a poly-limit in the special MS that could give you trouble, but IMO, it sounded like it was plenty for "low-poly" modelling and animation. School up on the MS issues yourself if it's a major buying point.

Boned animation...

Everyone wants it. I must say, gS has some pretty slick features for boned animation. In my brief tests, it's pretty darn easy to add bones to a mesh and start animating it, complete with skin deformation. Unfortunately, at some point (probably patch 5), the DBP .X loader got broken and patch 5.1b can't load a boned animation (boy was I ticked after making my first boned animation with gS - and then trying to load in into DBP!). But Mike has assured me on the bug reports forum that the new .X converter DLL will be released soon and it can load boned animations.

Textures...

gS does have some very nice procedural texturing capabilities, and some really cool ray-tracing-style "shaders" for creating materials (not to be confused with DX8/9 hardware pixel and vertex shaders - no support for that in gS). The bad part - this is no good for use on 3D objects that you want to export and use in DBP (or most any game engine). The good part is that you can use these shaders and procedural textures as a "texture studio" to generate your own texture maps... complete with bump-mapping, transparency, and all the standard stuff that looks really cool in a ray-tracer. A feature called "texture baking" can be used to apply these pre-rendered texture maps to your objects, then your back in business. I haven't gotten that far with gS yet however, so I don't know the details of how it all works... yet...

The SDK and Python...

Well, I love Python, so that was a selling point that tipped me "over the edge" - just on general principle. Unfortunately, getting information on the actual particulars of what you can and cannot do with gS Python has been, let's say, "irritating". Fortunately, I've gotten some answers here and there and it seems Caligari is in fact going to beef up the Python support, and they've provided me with enough info. to play around with gS Python, make objects, etc. And it appears you can even create GUI elements (using the normal PythonWin module for that type of stuff) to make entry dialogs and such. It's clear from the scant docs, the Python support was written for tS 4.X and hasn't changed much at all since then. Hopefully, that will change in the near future. One final note - it's Python 1.5.2, which is pretty "old". Python 2.4 is currently in development. Still, Python 1.5.2 is still a "good" version IMO, although it'd be nice for gS Python to be kept current with the entire "world" that is Python so we can be sure to have access to all the Python extension packages out there, etc.

The "tsx" SDK... well it's not even released yet. And won't be for another several weeks. On one hand, since they claimed there was an API, as a "feature", it should've been there at release. On the other hands, the SDK is never fully ironed out until right at release, so noone wants to hold up release just for them to right the docs, and finalize the SDK. The somewhat "irritating" aspect is that in my endeavors get some real, "meaty" information about Python, I kept getting the same ole drone over and over about how "you should do that kind of thing with the SDK, Python probably won't cut it", but they couldn't really tell me specifics about why.

Price...

Well, $299 is a big chunk o'change (pre-order was only $199 - but too late for that now). From what I hear, Caligari has a 30-day money-back guarantee, so, if you don't like it, get your money back (double-check for yourself tho' before you drop the $$$). (3DS Max fanatics - go away with your "free" educational versions!!! I'm still ignoring you!!!)

Hope this helps...