Woot, glad to have you back! I can't wait to see what you give us this year=-)

Thank you. ^_^

Houdini is a procedural approach to content creation that involves building node networks that define a “recipe” to create detailed game art that can be applied over and over. You can wrap up these networks to create custom “smart” assets that are built by artists for artists. And with recent technological advancements, these assets can be loaded into game editors such as Unity or Unreal Engine or even custom game editors using a simple API.

Hmm... That's a rather interesting and impressive piece of software.

However, if I understand correctly (and I'll admit that I'm pretty tired at the moment, and so may be missing points), Houdini doesn't work with Blender, requires a separate piece of software--the "Houdini Engine"--to load the produced assets into an engine, and as to game engines, currently only has plugins for Unity or Unreal Engine 4 (although one can apparently use the API to produce plugins of one's own). :/

(These limitations are understandable, I daresay; it just leaves Houdini not terribly useful to someone like myself, who uses other tools than those supported--in my case being Blender and Panda3D.)

Hey guys, I'm stoked to be involved in this contest! Let me know if you want a temporary Houdini Indie license to use before and during the contest, sooner is better.

However, if I understand correctly (and I'll admit that I'm pretty tired at the moment, and so may be missing points), Houdini doesn't work with Blender, requires a separate piece of software--the "Houdini Engine"--to load the produced assets into an engine, and as to game engines, currently only has plugins for Unity or Unreal Engine 4 (although one can apparently use the API to produce plugins of one's own). :/

Thanks for bringing up these questions. Houdini doesn't have a plugin for Blender (yet) but you can definitely export FBX or OBJ from Houdini and import it into Blender. You can use Houdini just like any other 3D software and create assets to put into your game engine. To clarify, Houdini Engine comes with Houdini Indie and is basically just a bridge that lets Houdini talk to Unity, Unreal, Maya, Max, or C4D. This method allows you to have the procedural control of Houdini within the other software tools.

If you're interested in learning Houdini we have tutorials on our site here, and we've sponsored free tutorials on Gametutor here.

Good luck with the contest, I'm looking forward to playing the games you make!

Thanks for bringing up these questions. Houdini doesn't have a plugin for Blender (yet) but you can definitely export FBX or OBJ from Houdini and import it into Blender. You can use Houdini just like any other 3D software and create assets to put into your game engine. To clarify, Houdini Engine comes with Houdini Indie and is basically just a bridge that lets Houdini talk to Unity, Unreal, Maya, Max, or C4D. This method allows you to have the procedural control of Houdini within the other software tools.

Aah, I see--thank you for the clarification!

If I now understand correctly then, I could theoretically generate a procedural model in Houdini Indie, export it to a .obj file, import this into Blender, and then export to Panda3D format (for which I already have an appropriate plugin). Well, this is tempting then, and I'll give it some thought! (It's a little difficult to be confident of how useful it will be for this short contest when I have no real idea of what I'll be making--a disadvantage of the theme being released only at the start of the competition, I fear.)

Hi everyone ! What will you use to make your game during the competition ?

On my side, I will use this :

Engine : My own engine made with SDL or Stencyl. It will depend of what kind of game I will made.

Language: C++ if I use my engine.

Graphic: Paint.net, tileStudio

Sound: SFXR, audacity

Music: FL Studio, Musagi or ejay depending of what kind of game I will made.

For myself, I intend to use the following:

Engine: Panda3D

(This will likely include some reusable components of my own (such as my saving-and-loading module, and my menu-handling framework), and may very well include the reuse of less-discrete chunks torn from old projects.)

Language: Python

Visual Artwork: Blender and GIMP, perhaps with a few other tools if called for.

Sound: Audacity

Music: Royalty-free music, most likely from http://soundimage.org/

Engine : Unity 5

Language: C#

Graphic: Photoshop

Sound: Audacity

Music: royalty free music from the internet

I'm in. Sign me up

Team: DifferentName

Member: DifferentName

Website: differentname.com

Engine: GameMaker Studio

Language: GameMaker Language?

Graphic: I tend to use Adobe Flash. I love how it does vector graphics.

Sound: BFXR?

Music: Maybe

Welcome to the forums / contest! Glad to have you.

I also have a question. In the original post it says that participants will also be judged on their participation. Does this mean that a development journal is something that's expected or will the usual update post in this thread suffice?

Last year, some users created a single thread in the forums, and posted updates during the contest into those threads. Journals are also a good alternative - GameDev.net has free journals you can create very easily.

Regardless, screenshots and updates on your progress a couple times a day are fantastic.

Some users used twitter, which is harder to track, so make sure you post your twitter feed - and I'd still recommend a thread or journal (one or the other). My unofficial opinion is this: the point is to encourage more participation with each other during the contest, to make it more enjoyable, so commenting in other people's threads and on their journal posts, and responding to other people's comments in your thread/journal is important also.

That very much added to the experience for me as a competitor last year: receiving and giving feedback.

I think what I'm supposed to do as a judge is ignore all the participation during the contest so as to not bias myself, and play all the games with a blind eye unaware of their development process (the teams are participating with each other, not the judges ), but Slicer will have to clarify that for me.

I think what I'm supposed to do as a judge is ignore all the participation during the contest so as to not bias myself, and play all the games with a blind eye unaware of their development process (the teams are participating with each other, not the judges ), but Slicer will have to clarify that for me.

Last year some judges followed and responded to participation threads/journals, some didn't. I don't see an issue with it if you want to and have the time.

I didn't do much of that last year (time constraints), and as a result a couple of the games were rather unplayable, without explanations which had been posted to those thread/journals... So, your mileage may vary.