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Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? #465254
04/14/17 15:05
04/14/17 15:05
Joined: Apr 2017
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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Suikerbier  Offline OP
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I was wondering about upgrading A8 commercial to pro, but it seems that the editors and engine aren't getting much attention anymore. Has it been discontinued? I don't want to start a rant or dispute later on. Tried sending mail to sales, but nobody really answering only a page where you can buy and then have to figure it out.

Last updates to the engine where last year. And the forum looks kind of empty. Am I asking for the obvious avoiding buying the license to Pro?

I have other software for 2D games and liked some of the 3d features in A8 although very simple compared to other engines around.

So, yea or nay?

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465258
04/14/17 15:55
04/14/17 15:55
Joined: Oct 2007
Posts: 5,210
Ä°stanbul, Turkey
Quad Online
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Quad  Online
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Joined: Oct 2007
Posts: 5,210
Ä°stanbul, Turkey
Nay, try to win one from the contests instead.


3333333333
Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Quad] #465260
04/14/17 17:04
04/14/17 17:04
Joined: Apr 2017
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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That's just it. I rolled in the acknex engine after fiddling with other low grade 3d engines after abandoning Div GameStudio (many had there hopes up), then I say Gamestudio and all the features looked awesome, but really would like to make hobby projects and prototypes with it.

Then the world editor and model editor were to be updated and lite-c came around. I already bought my first A5 Pro license from another user who wanted to level up to another engine. The we got A6 and A7 and finally A8 all those versions I bought the commercial license/upgrade without hesitation. Not just because it has great dev team back in the day with Doug and couple others. But also because I wanted to support the future development of the engine.

Now after me growing up during these glory days of engine I never had the funds as hobbyist programmer to get using the other functions in pro. Not for commercial release, but at least to see what I can accomplish with it and if its worth to upgrade.

That said. Most of my Gamestudio friends have ditched GameStudio because of the weird things going on and The Who Zorro, OP/Atari thing leading up to Litec. Not that I havent welcome Litec.

Without going further with this semi-rant. I don't want to puke on the engine, I wan to know if it has a future, even as a photo-type engine, but with the pro features including such as packing resources. Which is important, because not every modeler is wanting me to put his work in a "simple" prototype and get his artwork ripped.

Is there some other site where it is allowed to go deeper into this issue without bashing on the product delivered so far. I can create reasonable games with the engine, but it has more potential and its not getting full potential because its blocked to commercial users.

Suikerbier

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465261
04/14/17 17:19
04/14/17 17:19
Joined: Apr 2017
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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I don't want to win a license to the professional engine by circumventing missing features in the engine just to make the photo-type look better during demo. I'm interested in the features and future implementations in the engine, not to mention extensive beta testing. Which is pretty much hidden from the average teams.

What I'd like to know is whether or not JCL and his team sold everything related to the products covering the GameStudio software. If this is true the company that did bought it might have released 1 update in 2016 but its not sufficient.

Game companies that really have everything in place, but the suitable engine will see some big features first and get mislead. Because what I have learned using the engine was writing al lot of C++ code and plugins to get things working the way they should.

Lot of people said GameStudio is dead what you see is what you get. Minor update, but for those that have created real games with teams and put money it in are left to fend for themselves. Yeah write another plugin. We're here to make games.

My advice to Contic/OP group/Atari is to do a big firesafe if you're not planning on upgrading the software you put out for purchase, though it isn't ready for releasing games that have been "produced" with the tools applied and engine capabilities.

That said, The engine is cool, yes you can prototype and do all sort of experiments inside it. but it isn't a finished product and has many bugs and problems that have not been solved for some kind of reason.

You should not have people shell out money for product that is not all there.

Continec did this is in the past, changing name is not excuus for doing it again.

Change the pricing or remove the entire thing and start over.

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465262
04/14/17 17:57
04/14/17 17:57
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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Suikerbier  Offline OP
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Originally Posted By: Suikerbier
I don't want to win a license to the professional engine by circumventing missing features in the engine just to make the photo-type look better during demo. I'm interested in the features and future implementations in the engine, not to mention extensive beta testing. Which is pretty much hidden from the average teams.

What I'd like to know is whether or not JCL and his team sold everything related to the products covering the GameStudio software. If this is true the company that did bought it might have released 1 update in 2016 but its not sufficient.

Game companies that really have everything in place, but the suitable engine will see some big features first and get mislead. Because what I have learned using the engine was writing al lot of C++ code and plugins to get things working the way they should.

Lot of people said GameStudio is dead what you see is what you get. Minor update, but for those that have created real games with teams and put money it in are left to fend for themselves. Yeah write another plugin. We're here to make games.

My advice to Contic/OP group/Atari is to do a big firesafe if you're not planning on upgrading the software you put out for purchase, though it isn't ready for releasing games that have been "produced" with the tools applied and engine capabilities.

That said, The engine is cool, yes you can prototype and do all sort of experiments inside it. but it isn't a finished product and has many bugs and problems that have not been solved for some kind of reason.

You should not have people shell out money for product that is not all there.

Continec did this is in the past, changing name is not excuus for doing it again.

Change the pricing or remove the entire thing and start over.


Is there any possibly that the A8 engine will be upgrade for people who were here for a long time supporting the dream and some of us still believe in it. I know you can setup to Unity and believe me im already there, but it doesn't allow rapid prototyping as you can do in A8. Sure it looks like crap, but its just a prototype.

Conitec, oP Group, JCL can you give long time users advice if they should support the engine and buy pro in order to get the features implemented again and bugs addressed? Or is this what we have after all those time and need to appreciate and extend it with C++ and plugins?

I love this engine and I would just buy it for nostalgia reasons if it ever gets abandoned.

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465263
04/14/17 18:05
04/14/17 18:05
Joined: Apr 2017
Posts: 15
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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Suikerbier  Offline OP
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Gamestudio/A8 Pro Upgrade from A8 Commercial Gamestudio Upgrades
Unit Price: USD 749.00
Total: USD 749.00
Info plus 21% sales tax/VAT to USD 749.00: USD 157.29. <---insance
USD 906.29
Delivery: Download <--- as it should be
Option: Backup Media [Info]
File Size: Full version: 80.1 MB
Download Time: Full version
56k: ~187 min.
DSL/Cable (1/8/16Mbit): ~11 / ~1 / <1 min.

I bet we can make a better deal on Bitcoin

Last edited by Suikerbier; 04/14/17 18:07.
Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Quad] #465264
04/14/17 18:09
04/14/17 18:09
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 118
Deutschland
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Ezzett Offline
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Ezzett  Offline
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Deutschland
The developers will still release maintenance updates if necessary. But if Microsoft kills the DirectX 9 compatibility of Windows in a future update we would be out of luck, I guess. grin


oP group gets paid to develop Zorro, so they are focusing 98% of their time doing that. That's understandable. But if you pay them 200000 € to develop a new WED over the next 12 months, than I think they will do it.

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465265
04/14/17 18:13
04/14/17 18:13
Joined: Apr 2017
Posts: 15
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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Suikerbier  Offline OP
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Note: In the past I bought A5 Professional from another hobbyist that went to another engine. And those whoever worked with A5 Pro know the problems arising from that. I still have this copy another not longer allowed to use it after upgrading to A8 commercial.

Still I would like to experiment with the features professional edition had and if it will benefit some prototype looking better. Then sure if its worth it in producing and the development team still working ons serious bug and new implementations of features.

We didn't even get the marry christmas from JCL another one of my Heros.

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Ezzett] #465266
04/14/17 18:27
04/14/17 18:27
Joined: Apr 2017
Posts: 15
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Suikerbier Offline OP
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Suikerbier  Offline OP
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Yeah you're totally right on that. But I think there will be still a big market for retro games be it 2D/Isometric/Sidecrollers and 3D games with retro graphics for the coming decades. 3D is cool but got hobbyist without team and funds its almost impossible to breakdown to actually getting some games sold.

There there is the next problem. I personally only run Apple products at home for rendering and video/audio. Sure I have Windows running, but GameStudio isn't ready for new platforms.

I don't run Window 8 or higher. regardless of the good news about Win10. But friends trying demos working fine on XP/Pro/W2K/don't produce results on higher platforms n Windows without causing problems or even reboots.

So for now GameStudio/A8Comm/A8Ptp don't seem compatible with the new Windows release and the battle about who dunnit can start blaming.

Re: Still worth it to buy A8 Professional? [Re: Suikerbier] #465267
04/14/17 18:28
04/14/17 18:28
Joined: Aug 2003
Posts: 118
Deutschland
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Ezzett Offline
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Ezzett  Offline
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Deutschland
I think the main problem with Gamestudios development is really the money they are making with it. Gamestudio was most popular about 2005-2007. Even at this time Conitec decided that it was to much hassle to support the engine further and so they gave it back to oP Group to maintain the engine. If there was enough money from Gamestudio customers, they wouldn't have done this.

In one issue of AUM, maybe AUM 100, there was an interview with JCL, where he was asked what the biggest mistake in Gamestudio development was. He said,the biggest mistake was to focus only on game creation and not developing a tool to create all kinds of software easily. The truth is, the big money isn't made with games but with business software.

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