Cookbook  »  Articles And Sources

Articles And Sources Collection of links to various sites.

External Resources

External resources on general topics such as 3D math, physics libraries, Animation, Artificial Intelligence, Games, Network, Shaders, Sound, Terrain, Texture, etc.

OGRE

• OGRE Website - home to it all
• OGRE project page at SourceForge
• OGRE Forums - the OGRE community.
• OGRE Readme - provides links to OGRE tutorials, manual, API reference, etc.
• Axiom 3D Engine - OGRE's C# cousin for .NET
• RealmForge GDK and Axiom Forums - The forums for Axiom and the game engine and run-time toolset involved with its development
• RealmForge GDK and Axiom Wiki - The new wiki for both Axiom and the RealmForge GDK, much of which may be applicable to OGRE programmers

Other Languages

The main OGRE site and this Wiki are English only for simplicity, but there are several translation sites around the web:

• German OGRE Forums A Blog and German User Forum about OGRE
• French OGRE Forums A new French Forum about OGRE
• GameMakers.gr Greek translation of many of the OGRE tutorials
• Games Creators Network The page about OGRE of this french community.
• pl.wikibooks.org/wiki/OGRE
• Futurn A french community helping games creators by providing a lot of documents (including Ogre3D translations and new documents).

Recommended Reading

• Recommended reading

External Tutorials

• Xadeck Tutorial 1 - Displaying and manipulating a scene
• Xadeck Tutorial 2 - Using Ogre's facilities for debugging
• Xadeck Tutorial 3 - Assembling a nice scene
• Xadeck Tutorial 4 - Rendering your own stuff

3D Math

• Martin Baker's All-Inclusive Learning Site For 3D Math, Graphics, Physics, Computational Geometry, And More. Includes topics on learning how to program games.
• A Simple Quaternion-based Camera
• Matrix and Quaternion FAQ: lots of info on matrix transformations & quaternion rotations.

Animation

• Walk Cycle

Artificial Intelligence

AI Links repositories

• Generation5 - Articles
• GameDev.net — AI
• AI on the Web
• AngelCode.com - reference database
• Game Research and Technology
• IGDA - AI SIG
• The Game AI Page
• Game AI Programming at AiGameDev.com
• aboutAI.net
• aboutAI.net
• Generation5 - Competition
• Game AI Newsletter at AiGameDev.com
• AI Center - Site Map
• gameAI_news (unmaintained)

SDKs

• FEAR :: Foundations for Genuine Game AI
• MetaAgent, A Steering Behavior Template Library - Compiling Meta Agent
• OpenSteer
• OpenAI
• OpenSkyNet

General and Specific Architecture Articles

General Architectures

• Half-life AI (MUST READ)
• AI Horizon: Essays on Artificial Intelligence, from the Basics to the Advanced
• AI Halo
• Gamasutra - Features - Handling Complexity in the Halo 2 AI
• Gamasutra -"Decision-based Gameplay Design"
• Complete Game AI: Volume I
• Item Management Systems

PathFinding

• Huge Theorical exhaustive Book on pathfinding
• Terrain analysis on age of empire (MUST READ)
• AI terrain
• Amit's A* Pages
• An optimal pathfinder for vehicles in real-world digital terrain maps
• Smart Moves: Intelligent Path Finding
• Toward More Realistic Pathfinding
• All FPS pathing problems in a presentation
• 3d path Into Ogre Implementation
• C++ Group Pathfinding Basic Library and Test Tool
• ASTAR pathfinding algorithm in Ogre - Nice example with source

Group AI

• Boids (Flocks, Herds, and Schools: a Distributed Behavioral Model)
• Coordinated Unit Movement - Introduction
• Implementing Coordinated Movement

Tactic

• Game AI and Tactical AI

Steering

• List : steering Behaviors For Autonomous Characters
• Steering Behaviors For Autonomous Characters
• The Code Project - MetaAgent, a Steering Behavior Template Library - Libraries & Projects

Rule-Based System (RBS)

• Rule-Based AI
• Rule-Based Systems and Identification Trees

Neural Networks (NN)

• tensor (small NN)
• tensor neurals net
• Untrained Neural Net Class
• NN sample

Fuzzy logic (FL)

• aiGuru.com
• bayesian systems... somewhere on generation 5 site.
• Hybrid Fuzzy A* - Using Fuzzy Logic with A* Path finding (handy for fast vehicles that also need to steer)

Finite State Machine (FSM)

• FSM small
• Visual Finite State Machine AI Systems
• State-Driven Game Agent Design

Decision Tree (DT)

• generation5 - Binary Decision Tree implementation in C++

Emotion

• generation5 - VPI: Virtual Personality Interaction

Lag

• Defeating Lag With Cubic Splines Or AI path moves Cells

Expert Systems

• Expert Systems

Learning Systems

• AI character learning

Blogs

• Sinbad
• Carmack
• Brian Hook
• Gaffer
• Gamegirl
• Gamedev
• Cliff Bleszinski
• About(Code) (pt_BR)

C++ / STL

Introduction / Help

• C++ slides Optimisations, Templates and good use of heritage and polymorphisms (MUST READ)
• Thinking in C++ (One of the best introductory books and it is free!)
• STL basics
• Reference Card
• Cpp reference
• C++ FAQ LITE (Mirror here)
• C++ Containers Cheat Sheet
• C++ Iterators & Algorithms Cheat Sheet
• Unicode: A nice introductory-level article on the topic.

User Misconception of C++/STL

• STL common errors
• VC2005 products Chief Guru of the Week Problems and Answer on C++/STL

Performance

• A must-read C++ optimisations with benchmark for all optimizations listed(MUST READ)
• Common performances mistakes(MUST READ)
• Common performances mistakes II (MUST READ)
• C++ Optimization Strategies and Techniques(MUST READ)

Design patterns

• Dozens of 1-page examples in C++Before-and-After refactoring examples(MUST READ)

Games

Game Developer Sites

• game programmer wiki
• gamenuX - Brazilian Linux Game Programming Community

Hardware

Ati (papers, tools, source) (MUST READ)
Nvidia (papers, tools, source) (MUST READ)

Game/3D Conferences

Siggraph Conference

• siggraph
• all siggraph papers

Game developers Conference

• gdc
• nvdia slides and demos
• Ati papers

MainStream

• Gamasutra(MUST REGISTER)
• Gamedev
• Game Developer Magazine
• International Game Developers Association
• Devmaster
• Gamedevnews

Game Design Patterns

• gamepatterns
• The Case For Game Design Patterns
• gamedesign wiki

Game Development

• Unit testing and game development
• Game Engine 101 - a decent primer

Publisher-Developer relation

• Business and Legal Primer for Game Development, by S. Gregory Boyd, Brian Green [ISBN 1-58450-492-7]
• Negotiating Development Contracts: From International Game Developers Association.
• Game Law: Contracts 101: Article at gamasutra.com.
• Sample Business Contracts: From onecle.com
• Who owns the source?: Horror story about what happens without contract (with useful advices).
• Advocacy: Advocacy on THE open-source ressource site.
• Open Source and the Gaming Industry: Article at GameDev.net.
• The Business of Game Development: Frequently Asked Questions.
• Game Law: Game Law on GameDev.

Network

Articles

• How to handle Networks + Physic
• Design and Implementation of Networked Games
• Network Programming in Age of Empires and Beyond
• NetCode q3Arena
• Unreal NetCode
• Introduction to Multiplayer Game Programming
• Dead reckoning
• Gamasutra - Designing Secure, Flexible, and High Performance Game Network Architectures
• NAT and game servers
• Simple NAT punch-through
• NAT and Peer-to-Peer Networking
• Why internet sucks
• Defeating Lag with Cubic Splines
• GameSurge on netCode
  • Editorial,
  • Rebuttal
  • Interview
• Using Groupings for Networked Gaming
• Closing the Loop on Scalable Network Gaming Backend Services
• It's the Latency, Stupid
• Latency and the Quest for Interactivity
• Fixed step networked Physics

SDKs

• enet
• Hawk Software - HawkNL (Hawk Network Library)
• RakNet

Physics

Articles

• Simulation Theory Links
• Verlet Integration Source + code
• How to handle Timestep, Integration, Networks sync, etc.
• Canonical Game Loop
• Moving Beyond Ragdolls + demo.
• Very Clean and Easy Flash 2d Physic Tutorial
• Outsourcing Reality: Integrating a Commercial Physics Engine
• Green Eyed Monster's MyCarTutorial: - An example application with source code that demonstrates some car physics with ODE.
• ODE Composite Objects - ODE page on building composite objects.

SDKs

• NxOgre
• OgreOde and ...
• OPAL - high level features
• Open Dynamics Engine
• Newton
• JigLib - rigid body physics engine
• PhysX
• meqon
• havok
• Physic Processor Unit (hardware)
• Bullet Physics Library - ZLIB license, Blender integration, Collada support, physics-on-GPU

Shaders

• frustum Dx and GL source code shaders
• humus Dx and GL source code shaders
• Delphi shaders demo, but shaders are language independent
• shaders competition source
• shaders competition source
• Shadertech.com

Sound

• Thief paper on sound and AI.
• OpenAL - 3D Audio

Terrain

• All on terrains
• Terrain rendering : basics
• All about rendering landscape
• Hierarchical Image Caching for Accelerated Walkthroughs of Complex Environments
• Terrain Texture Generator (Link broken!)
• shadow caster (Link broken!)
• Landscaper/ (Link broken!)
• A Real-Time Procedural Universe
• Visibility.txt
• grid raycast
• libnoise example: Complex planetary surface
• planetrendering

Texture

• Photoshop Plug-ins
• Texture Atlas Tools - A collection of tools for creating texture atlases
• Windows Texture Viewer - Simple DDS viewing, especially for files with alpha channel
• DDS Thumbnail Viewer - Shows thumbnails of dss files in Windows Explorer
• http://www.cgtextures.com - Nice free textures
• http://www.crazybump.com - Make nice bump / normal / specular textures (from plain textures)

Vegetation

Articles

• Image-Based Rendering of Vegetation in Real-Time
• Lighting Flat Objects (tree impostors)

SDKs

• SpeedTree

Visibility

• Harmless Algorithms :
  • I - Fine Occlusion Culling Algorithms
  • II - Scene Traversal Algorithms
  • III - Design Patterns And 3D Gaming
  • IV - A Hybrid Approach to Visibility
• Portals and Mirrors
• Hierarchical Techniques for Visibility Computations
• Half-life realt-time visibility
• Virtuals occluders
• Unified Occlusion Culling: Portals, Visibility Umbra, and HZB

Debugging

• Introduction to Debugging

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