The main advantages of TA3D over other TA-like RTS

[Balthazar]

Well, it would be nice to add all the good things (and maybe a bad ones) about TA3D in one thread.

Let`s disscuss the main advantages of TA3D over TA, Spring and so on...

I`ll start:

Advantages:
- TA3D keeps the original TA style
- TA3D have a mega-zoom feature, that`s really kicks ass
- TA3D is free of cost and will soon have it`s own set of free resources to run
- TA3D is fast-evolving engine with support of modern visual features
- cool (user friendly) graphical user interface Razz with skins and themes
- single player, mutliplayer (with auto map downloading) and campaign modes
- compatible with TA mods
- modders-friendly engine, much more flexible
- support for saving/loading games and
- support for in-game user-defined music

Disadvanatges:
- the game is still a little buggy under Win32 and ATI cards
- the rendering part of engine isn`t perfect (perspective part and horisontal lines near the eges of the screen) on Win32


Well, suggestions are wellcome, let`s fill the list as much as we can

[Vampiloup]

Disadvantages :

- No auto-installer.

- Need additional libraries you have to search, download, theninstall generally by configure/make (funny how when a software don't have auto-installer, he need additional rare stuff).

- install the additionnal libraries and most of their prequisites by "configure/make" all by yourself and hope you can dodge the "configure" errors, as 15 years in the past (i hate remembering that).


Until theses two are not changed, all the "advantages" have no importance for 99.99 % players and TA is no more than a geek project "acclaimed" by internet bloggers but with a real limited player base.

You know already that. I hope you find a solution.


And the advantages ? Don't know : I'm still in the "configure error" phase (My standard allegro installation frighten AllegroGL, the poor little thing...).

[zuzuf]

That's for the source package. Did you try the binary packages ? They require no extra manipulation, just extract the archive, install TA resources using the install script and play ...

but of course TA3D reached a state where we should provide such an installer. We're working on OS integration, mainly paths to resources. I hope we'll be able to release deb/rpm packages for 0.5.0 (and create a repository for those packages and their dependencies )

[Vampiloup]

The... woops. I'm the king of morons. I try that immediately.

[milipili]

I can provide a script to generate DEB packages. And the Windows Installer is nearly ready.

[Balthazar]

That would be very nice Thanks!

[Vampiloup]

And then, we just have to use deb2rpm for have a rpm, too (remember when all the good stuff was on Debian ?).

[zuzuf]

good news

[hirsoft]

TA3D scaling (when scaling is not a fixed perspective it is difficult to watch), and the point of view (no matter how hard swing lens, showing the vertical objects are those who look past), also closer to the surface after so many edges and corners, and have not dealt with before the original explosion effect.

It's perfect when TA3D do those.

[xpoy]

The main advantages of TA3D over other TA-like RTS is zuzuf and milipili

[zuzuf]

I appreciate this

[milipili]

I disagree for my part. zuzuf almost done the whole work

[xpoy]

You are Well-deserved.

[2Ben]

Sorry I don't really get it. It is said on your website that "ça tourne que sous windows à l'heure actuelle (portage linux pas encore achevé) ", speaking about Spring (well, you don't mention Spring, but you speak about a competing project).
When is the last time you tried Spring ? It's been perfectly working on Linux since years.
It, of course, also uses 3D acceleration, great visual effects, and a complete 3D FPS view if needed.

Add to the list of Disadvantages of TA3D : lack of the ton of maps, mods, huge community etc.

That said, TA3D looks fine, I just don't see why you need to tell untruthful things about Spring to promote your project...

By the way, unless I'm mistaken (which I might be), the original TA engine was open-sourced, but not the content (maps etc), which is why Spring doesn't use the original maps. How do people play TA3D with the original maps if they don't own the original game ?

Anyway, good luck and keep coding, there's never enough free projects

Alban

[zuzuf]

Well, this part of the site has not been updated for years (it's nearly as old as TA3D itself) ... at the time it was written it was true but it was a long time ago, I really should update a few things. TA source code has not been open sourced at all, all the TA like engines had to be made from observation and data about OTA file formats and they all work very differently. Also you can still play third party maps even if you don't own TA.

[2Ben]

Oh, well of course in this case, I take back my remarks I'm quite a fan of Spring so I was a bit concerned...

Well, keep up the good work, I'll have a try at TA3D soon I guess !

Take care,

Alban

[zuzuf]

I've updated a few things, it should sound more correct now

[DOT]

Disadvanatges:
- the game is still a little buggy under Win32 and ATI cards

That is quite obvious that ATI card fails alot on OpenGL
since their ,,support" for OpenGL just sometimes fucking sucks

i am not myself an ATI user but i readed alot that mainy (This and Spring RTS)
ATI users encounters often problemm with it which Nvidia users dont
and Intel baw

[Balthazar]

ATI user is here Nothing to see here - move along )

I mean - at the current stage ATI cards are fully functional in Ta3D, just disable the texture compression.

[DOT]

well i mean the older ones seems to have more problemm with OpenGL