Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

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crimsom
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Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by crimsom »

Most of the content in this game is community driven anyways, with out the community no one would really play this game as the default tracks and traction properties suck to put it nicely.

Port the game to unity, or release the code on Github so the community can port it with a MIT license.

Doing this would allow.

-over 125 fps
-more support for community mods and tweaks
-Faster development and bug fixes
-way more detailed tracks and lighting.
-proper LOD optimization
-multi threaded support
-Better particle effects and physics
-community content packs and dedicated E sport mods.

Among a lot of other things

Time to release the code so it can be ported as a team effort this obviously wont effect the sale of your old game for quite a few years as the GUID is still required for online racing. Mx bikes sucks and is going to continue to suck so it would nice if this could be released I'm sure it would help the quality of MX games significantly as Gyro physics of motocross are likely quite hard to program.
JiBuS
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by JiBuS »

Can't agree more on this... Im asking myself why it hasn't been done before....

Looking forward to a big major update, but i think i should be dead when it will happen.
Ash
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by Ash »

The open Source was already asked here: http://forum.mxsimulator.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=27074
But JLV will never do it because, it will be the opendoor for more hacker on the game.

Port the game to unity: It's not possible, JLV will have to rebuild all the game if he decide to switch to better graphic engine. And based on the involvement of JLV last years, it will never rebuild his game.
The best we can hope it other game will be released in next years by other developer on Unity or Unreal Engine.
jlv
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by jlv »

I'm not a fan of texture splatting terrain engines like Unity. This is not a step forward IMO.

My plan for the next big update is:
1. Eliminate all OpenGL 3.1 deprecated stuff the game uses now (Mostly immediate mode rendering calls used for text/hud/ui stuff.) and require 3.1 as the baseline.
2. Redo the terrain engine so it draws in larger batches instead of fans of 8 triangles. This will eliminate thousands of draw calls which will really help performance.
3. Redo the terrain texturing to use large textures instead of lots of smaller textures. The large textures weren't available on some GPUs I had to support when I wrote it but those GPUs aren't widely used anymore.
4. Since the terrain textures won't be scattered across dozens of different textures it should be practical to do instant decal updates. (With some restrictions. You won't be able to insert a decal under another one, but dropping one on top should be no problem.)
5. For erode, get rid of the static shading/normals and instead recalculate it in the fragment shader. This will be slower for static terrain but way faster when erode is happening. Supporting old fixed function OpenGL was a limitation here but with 3.1 as the baseline this isn't a problem.
6. "Infinite" scrolling terrain.

Switching to 64 bits was actually the first step in all this. Now that that's done I'll be getting started on step one in this list. The other stuff will all be part of a complete terrain engine rewrite. I'm looking forward to this. While I'm a fan of keeping compatibility, there's no denying that requiring 3.1 features will be liberating. Hopefully I'm done jumping through Microsoft joystick API hoops and can get started on serious stuff now.

Open source is something I wanted to do when it stopped selling, but the cheaters really make that hard. I could probably keep the game/physics code closed and make the rendering a separate open source module for people to play with. But I'm not sure anyone would bother. The sad thing is the game has a pretty cool scripting system now and it's pretty much ignored. The people who can code seem more interested in writing cheats.
Josh Vanderhoof
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If you email, put "MX Simulator" in the subject to make sure it gets through my spam filter.
Ash
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by Ash »

Thanks for these details. Does dynamique shadow are in your roadmap ? It's a little thing who will increase a lot the beauty of the game.
jlv wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 1:38 amOpen source is something I wanted to do when it stopped selling, but the cheaters really make that hard. [...] The people who can code seem more interested in writing cheats.
Maybe you can try to move to private project and share it only with people who know how to script and who are trustworthy people. Like that, they could help you to create features when you work on deep code (rework the menu, create favorite for skins, add animations, preview of skin on menu, ...).
JiBuS
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by JiBuS »

Just only one thing that could be really enjoyable, is the ability to save a setup by his category like: /writesuspension /writestability /writesetup (for the whole setup). Im really annoyed by the fact that I have a ton of setups, with almost all different advanced stability setup, and everytime I want to test a suspension for example, I have to reset the stability I had before the /readsetup. I hope you understand me :)
motokid499
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by motokid499 »

JiBuS wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 3:30 pm Just only one thing that could be really enjoyable, is the ability to save a setup by his category like: /writesuspension /writestability /writesetup (for the whole setup). Im really annoyed by the fact that I have a ton of setups, with almost all different advanced stability setup, and everytime I want to test a suspension for example, I have to reset the stability I had before the /readsetup. I hope you understand me :)
I support this

Also super excited to follow the progress, sounds like some good things are coming!
Tanner Rogers
Ash
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by Ash »

JiBuS wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 3:30 pm Just only one thing that could be really enjoyable, is the ability to save a setup by his category like: /writesuspension /writestability /writesetup (for the whole setup). Im really annoyed by the fact that I have a ton of setups, with almost all different advanced stability setup, and everytime I want to test a suspension for example, I have to reset the stability I had before the /readsetup. I hope you understand me :)
You already can. Save your setup, go on your personnal folder > "setup" folder, edit your setup with notepad and remove lines you don't want. When you will write "/readsetup ...." only lines who stay on the file will be apply ;)
Andy_Hack
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by Andy_Hack »

As good as open source and all the possibilties sound, I still think as long as jlv has interest in the game and like now even says he's really working on a major update, it's pointless to make it available for everyone and if so, i think keeping the game/physics code closed is a must.
Let's be honest, jlv made this game and even if we might not always agree with him or aren't happy with slow updates or the current ancient graphics, I personally still stand behind him, because I think his decisions are usually really good for this game as a whole, without him this game would literally not be what it is/was and we shouldn't forget to respect that!

I'm pumped that apparently a major update finally happens, that would bring lots of old and new people in i think and it would keep MXS from getting extinct in the near future.

As I said, if this really happens i think we should ATLEAST start a gofundme for jlv to support him, after all lots of people play this game for 10+ years and never had to pay a single penny on an update, which is quite unusual.

Thanks jlv!
*fancy signature*
d4u5d6u7 wrote:good staff, nice skins, like
jlv
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by jlv »

Ash wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 1:11 pm Thanks for these details. Does dynamique shadow are in your roadmap ? It's a little thing who will increase a lot the beauty of the game.
I want to get the framerate issues solved before that. Once the terrain isn't wasting so many draw calls I'll think about shadows.
Josh Vanderhoof
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LKR47
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by LKR47 »

jlv wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 1:38 am I'm not a fan of texture splatting terrain engines like Unity. This is not a step forward IMO.
The terrain system has plagued me for years. Like you said, all the texturing is done through splatmaps with no option to rotate or scale textures independently. A lot has to be done with a custom terrain shader, for instance, anti-tiling which you see in this red box, as well as baking decals directly into the shader which is how we have to get our details like ruts and dozer tracks. Super inconvenient.
Image

Luckily, Unity has a dedicated terrain team now so hopefully the terrain system will get better in the next couple of years. Right now if you want to do relatively anything like the current mxs system you have to do some trickery with the terrain UVs or use a custom mesh.
Image
baker
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by baker »

Andy_Hack wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 11:43 pm As I said, if this really happens i think we should ATLEAST start a gofundme for jlv to support him, after all lots of people play this game for 10+ years and never had to pay a single penny on an update, which is quite unusual.

Thanks jlv!
Million dollar idea Andy.
sethypeety
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by sethypeety »

baker wrote: Mon Sep 06, 2021 1:26 am
Andy_Hack wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 11:43 pm As I said, if this really happens i think we should ATLEAST start a gofundme for jlv to support him, after all lots of people play this game for 10+ years and never had to pay a single penny on an update, which is quite unusual.

Thanks jlv!
Million dollar idea Andy.
It's been 5 years since I've payed JLV money for this game, I would 100% be willing to throw more money his way if it means this game continues to get support or even full overhaul.
Image
brendenNWmx31
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by brendenNWmx31 »

I second this! Although I've been mostly quiet in the community, I would definitely donate more money to JLV for updates to this game. Still playing daily almost 12 years later. Still the best motocross game ever created. MX Sim is the GOAT!
al167
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Re: Port the engine to unity/other engine, or release it to the public.

Post by al167 »

jlv wrote: Thu Mar 18, 2021 1:38 ame
Hi guys!
Nice plan, Is this the first detailed dev plan i see here for mx sim?

Man its been a long time since posting on these forums or playing mxs, but i still love and check in here every now and again hoping for a MXS 2 "buy it now" button, or a major update. looks promising and please do go all out in making it not at all backwards compatible with any mxs user content. seriously, especially with the riding gear, id like a clean fresh start.

Recently I've been getting into MX bikes, I brought it years back when it first came out and back then the physics where arcadey and terrible, I've been watching the progress on it, and the other day i gave it another go, and man i have to say it has some pretty nice features!, some bad too, but its a work in progress also, but it gave me that same feeling i had when first getting into mx sim. i was impressed.

I'm curious JLV, have you put any time into playing MX bikes? there is something about it that is special, just like MX sim, the way Piboso tackled the job at simulating an mx bike is so different to you, but just like in mxs it "feels right" but different. that is after you traverse the learning curve.

i really appreciate the UI in MXbikes, im too old to remember all the commands for mx sim. man id love to see a nice UI for mx sim, having a 3d view when choosing bikes and gear ect, a live server lobby in game, help boxes for settings. and no commands!!!!! being able to change different parts of your gear, save setups, help bubbles for settings ect ect ect
any chance of adding a new UI to your dev list?

Cheers
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