Moving TDM to new engine?

[grayman]

Personally, I would rather see the original T1 & T2 missions remade in TDM (as a complete mission pack)... just for the beautiful graphics alone.

 

Copyright on those missions prevents this.

[stumpy]

if you want to switch tdm over to the unreal engine or any other engine that only uses models to create the world then rope arrows would need a complete re-write, or suck it up with that system that was used in t4 for rope arrows, where the rope uncoils from a roof anchor point.

 

and a probable rewrite of the physics engine for crates, plates and other movable item you can scatter around here, there, and everywhere. anyone notice how fixed in place items were in t4.

Edited October 10, 2018 by stumpy

[peter_spy]

 

if you want to switch tdm over to the unreal engine or any other engine that only uses models to create the world then rope arrows would need a complete re-write, or suck it up with that system that was used in t4 for rope arrows, where the rope uncoils from a roof anchor point.

 

Why is that so? I'm making a mission that is 100% models surrounded with caulk, and rope arrows work just fine. It's just a question of how you break up your model into proper materials. If it can be done in idtech4, I'm sure it can be done in UE4.

[HMart]

Personally, I would rather see the original T1 & T2 missions remade in TDM (as a complete mission pack)... just for the beautiful graphics alone.

 

 

 

Copyright on those missions prevents this.

 

 

Copyright indeed prevents you from copying thief story, characters, names and places BUT imo the gameplay is not copyrighted nor is the missions layouts, if you want to make a TDM mission based on a thief mission layout you can, just make sure to not refer to places and characters from thief and never use assets (textures, models, audio, etc) from thief. I'm sure some TDM mission makers got inspiration from thief missions.

 

About the engine change, yes rope arrows work fine with models, like Judith said is all based on what material the arrow hits not if is a model or a world brush, TDM like rope arrows are perfectly possible in UE4 and because it uses a better physics engine they would look even better, but who cares, this conversation has already been discussed and arrived to a consensus, TDM will never change engines, period. Also TDM fortunately for now has motivated coders with sufficient knowledge to update the engine further, imo making this question even more irrelevant.

Edited October 10, 2018 by HMart

[Oktokolo]

Did TTLG sell the rights on old games with the thief IP? Could they theoretically still allow the TDM community to recreate T1 or T2? If so, maybe asking them would be a good idea. They surely like TDM more than T4...

[peter_spy]

Otherside Entertainment, which was formed by people who include ex-LGS employees (Paul Neurath), hinted that they might do something with Thief (or Thief-like) once they finished Underworld Ascendant. Not sure if they have rights.

[Petike the Taffer]

Did TTLG sell the rights on old games with the thief IP? Could they theoretically still allow the TDM community to recreate T1 or T2? If so, maybe asking them would be a good idea. They surely like TDM more than T4...

 

Like with Deus Ex, I doubt Eidos will ever sell the rights to Thief. They might not do anything with it, but copyright law is on their side, as long as they own the IP. As has been said many, many times over the last decade, this is a not-for-profit game project, and it aims to recreate the gameplay and atmosphere of Thief, and do so without any need for the copyrighted elements. It doesn't and cannot aim to recreate Thief itself. Even if someone magically donated the rights to the TDM team, TDM has been its own thing for such a long time, that integrating the gained IP would be pointless and legally too complex (maybe outright impossible, but the veterans on the dev team knows this more in-depth than me).

 

Additionally, people should get it out of their heads that the already meagre resources the current TDM team has are to be directed at slavishly recreating levels from Thief. If someone wants to try that, purely for private use, he or she can try it. But it won't be legally publishable, and will never get onto an official FMs list.

 

If people want to get creative, they should make their own Thief-inspired content, especially the missions, and avoid copying (you can homage, and some TDM authors have done that perfectly, without ever lazily recreating anything.) Currently, there seems to be a shortage of good modelers and riggers on the team, who could help add new AI characters to the game. Some people have been clamouring for the more original-looking humanoid monsters to get made, so if someone has the skills and talent, they can try their hand at that.

 

Even as a Thief afficionado, I would never make an FM, in this engine or the original ones, that would be based on Garrett and the setting he inhabits. Not to brag, but I tend to respect the creative work of others. TDM is the perfect title for people to develop their own interesting characters and plotlines, without the need to parasite on the Thief trilogy's contents and art. An overview I finished just this week, of all the various storyline series TDM already has at this point, involving many different thief and even non-thief characters, speaks volumes about the potential. It's incredibly encouraging, speaks to the creativity of the TDM community, its older and newer members alike. If all goes well, I'd prefer to add to it in the near future. Maybe even this autumn, who knows.

Edited October 12, 2018 by Petike the Taffer

[Springheel]

An overview I finished just this week,

 

 

That's a cool idea, thanks for doing that.

 

This piece needs updating though:

 

Series' status: In development, but currently on hiatus

 

 

The Crucible project was declared dead about a year ago and the missions were put up for adoption or returned to their original authors. It is no longer in development, and definitely shouldn't be characterized as "the main campaign for the future of TDM".

[Skaruts]

(...)

 

Biggest issue: AI code. Our Id Tech 4 GPL license is almost certainly incompatible with the license for UE4.

(Pathfinding, Stim Response, Weapon Damage, Door Handling, etc.)

 

If there is someway to reconcile the GPL licenses to allow our AI code to be integrated into UE4 then there is

some sliver of hope. If not the meat of the project would need to be rebuilt from scratch (no hope).

 

Entity Defs. We would need to either covert all Entities to whatever the equivalent is in UE4 or make some sort of

alias structure that reads id Tech 4 Entities and relays them as UE4 versions.

 

(See above AI \ GPL issue. If id Tech 4 code can be ported into UE4 then this can be made easier.)

 

(...)

 

Bottom line:

 

If the GPL code integration issues are resolvable, a good coder or two could get the meat of the project ported to UE4 in about 1.5 to 2 years.

 

If there is no legal way to merge in our AI code or other id Tech 4 (or derived code) then it would be a lot like starting from scratch. 4 years or more

of work.

 

(...)

 

Is it just me or licensing is just a load of bullshit that only serves to prevent people from being as inventive as they would otherwise be, and get in the way of innovation?

 

It's really the impression I get. That and also for companies to abuse the legal system to try to screw over the competition in court.

Edited October 13, 2018 by Skaruts

[Destined]

 

Is it just me or licensing is just a load of bullshit that only serves to prevent people from being as inventive as they would otherwise be, and get in the way of innovation?

 

It's really the impression I get. That and also for companies to abuse the legal system to try to screw over the competition in court.

Look for other discussions about copyright for that; there have been plenty on this board. It is understandable that people want to portect their IP, which took a lot of effort (and as a consequence money) to create, so they don't want people to just pick it up and do what they want with it. Still, I understand your frustration as many gameworlds are now dead due to licencing (lookin at EA killing several great series by releasing crap sequels, which kill the series, but not releaseing the license, so the series could be picked up by fans or studieos that would like to see a proper continuation).

[Skaruts]

Sure there has to be something for dealing with outright fraud, but it seems like licensing as it stands is mostly not about that and goes way overboard.

[Petike the Taffer]

That's a cool idea, thanks for doing that.

 

This piece needs updating though:

 

The Crucible project was declared dead about a year ago and the missions were put up for adoption or returned to their original authors. It is no longer in development, and definitely shouldn't be characterized as "the main campaign for the future of TDM".

 

Gotcha. That said, should I keep it as the "past effort at an official campaign" ?

 

Sorry to hear it's not being continued. I was still under the impression that it's a slow-burning project.

[Springheel]

Gotcha. That said, should I keep it as the "past effort at an official campaign" ?

 

Well, technically it was never really an "official campaign". And calling it that now might create the impression that the entire development team failed to achieve a project it was working on, which isn't really desirable (or accurate).