Version 1.5 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes two huge new features, a graphical shader editor and a voxel terrain system. The shader editor, shown in the left image below, allows artists to create detailed custom shaders without the need for any programming. The engine automatically translates the graph-like stucture of each shader into the low-level code needed to run on each platform. The voxel terrain system gives artists the power to create intricate landforms with intuitive tools for sculpting and painting terrain. The arch shown in the right image below is an example of what can be done in seconds without the restrictions of traditional height-based terrain systems.

More details about the shader editor and voxel terrain system can be found on the C4 Engine wiki at the following locations:

Using the Shader Editor

Editing Terrain

Release notes and downloads for version 1.5 are available from the developer page.

The 808-page book The Beginner's Guide to the C4 Engine has been released and is now available for electronic download in the Terathon Marketplace. Written by four members of the C4 Engine community, the guide contains 21 chapters of valuable material for both beginners and experienced C4 users.

For details, see the listing in the Terathon Marketplace.

Terathon Software has added a new component to its website called the Terathon Marketplace where products designed for use with the C4 Engine can be bought and sold by the community. The types of products to be offered in the marketplace include 3D models, music tracks, texture collections, training videos, books, and any other kinds of resources that would be valuable to a C4 Engine user. Community members who wish to sell their work in the marketplace can submit their products and earn a generous royalty on each sale.

Go to the Terathon Marketplace.

Congratulations to James Brady for winning first prize in the C4 Engine scripting contest. James implemented a fully functional video poker machine using only the built-in scripting features of C4. His script is shown in the image to the right and weighs in at a hefty 218 methods. The script is divided into sections that perform tasks such as dealing the cards and determining what hand (pair, straight, flush, etc.) the player has received. When the player finally loses his last dime to the machine, he's met with a rather hostile escort out of the building.

Second prize in the contest goes to Chris Boyce, who designed a script to light up the correct bars in a two-digit LED counter. And third prize goes to David Vasquez for a large number of scripting functions implemented in his Material Showroom project.

The next contest will be for the best custom shader and will begin at the time that version 1.5 of the C4 Engine is released. Prize values can be expected to increase.

The C4 Engine Contest Series officially began today with the opening of the first competition in a monthly sequence of contests extending to the end of the year. The first contest challenges participants to create the most interesting script using the C4 Engine's graphical scripting language. The deadline for entries is October 10, 2008, and the competition is open to everyone regardless of whether they are licensed users of C4.

For details, see the official contest page.

TML Studios has released their C4-based train simulator World of Subways Vol. 1, published by Aerosoft. Called “THE PATH: New York Underground”, the first volume puts players on trains running along the route connecting New Jersey to New York City. The simulator combines a realistic subway experience with both underground and above-ground scenery like that shown in the screenshot to the right. For more screenshots from the game, see the images page.

World of Subways official website

Purchase at Aerosoft

Version 1.4.10 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a new cross-platform voice chat feature that lets players talk to each other over the internet in real time. Voice chat works even in games where the players are using a mixture of PC, Mac, and Playstation 3 client machines.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 149 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a completely new graphical scripting system that supports conditional execution, loops, and variables. The new script editor is shown in the screenshot to the right. There are also several other new features in this release such as support for Xbox 360 controllers under Windows, a new and improved texture format, extensible streaming audio, and generalized multi-zone visibility functionality.

Technical information about the graphical scripting language can be found on its wiki page.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 148 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes new post-processing effects for glow and bloom, several World Editor enhancements, and an expanded plugin system.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 147 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes the new content that was shown at the Game Developers Conference.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 146 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a large number of new features, including path editing tools, distortion post-processing effects like heat haze, and enhanced surface marking capabilities. With this release, the C4 Engine also runs on the Intel GMA X3000 series of graphics processors.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Terathon Software is excited to be an exhibitor at the Game Developers Conference in 2008. The event will be held at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, and the expo runs from Wednesday, February 20 to Friday, February 22. Terathon will be demonstrating its C4 Engine technology at booth #5749 in the north exhibit hall.

Build 145 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains a new GUI rendering system that allows custom skins to be created. The screenshot to the right shows the default skin that ships with the engine. This release also contains several new optimizations for scene rendering and resource management.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 144 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains a completely redesigned Resource Manager with support for pack files.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

The University of Kempten (Fachhochschule Kempten) in Germany has acquired an educational license for the C4 Engine, extending the list of universities now using C4 as a tool for teaching games-related engineering design. Combined with the usage of the book Mathematics for 3D Game Programming and Computer Graphics as a textbook, the work of C4's creator Eric Lengyel influences the education of students at a large number of universities worldwide.

Build 143 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains new text handling capabilities, dynamically-expandable referenced worlds, and several new miscellaneous features.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 142 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains several new miscellaneous engine features, new level-of-detail capabilities, World Editor improvements, and demo game additions.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 141 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains several new World Editor features and some improvements to existing features.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

McMaster University, in Ontario, Canada, has acquired an educational site license for the C4 Engine. Students in the Software Engineering and Game Design Program who are participating in the honors-only Capstone design course have voted to use the C4 Engine in their studies, and Terathon is happy to provide a solid technological foundation for their projects.

Build 140 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains the much anticipated rewrite of the internal geometry building code. This opens the door for more rapid implementation of many new features currently on the C4 roadmap. In this build, many new capabilities have already been added to the World Editor, and the Collada Importer has received several enhancements. There are also quite a few miscellaneous updates throughout the engine, as detailed in the release notes.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 139 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. Build 138 contains new scripting capabilities, editor enhancements, and many small requested features. Build 139 includes a workaround for a crash being reported under ATI drivers.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Georgia Institute of Technology has acquired an educational site license for the C4 Engine. Students in the Computer Science and Computational Media degree programs will be using the engine in the Video Game Design and Programming class (CS 4455) during the next school year to aid in the teaching of game architecture, design, and implementation.

Corporate giant Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) has recently acquired a company-wide site license for the C4 Engine. Initially, the engine is being used at the Radical Innovation Technology Center at Lockheed's King of Prussia, Pennsylvania location to develop applications characterized as “serious games”. This license adds a new dimension to the C4 Engine market by expanding its utilization beyond entertainment and education.

Build 137 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains a completely new Sound Manager with a large number of new features. Also included in this release are the much anticipated multi-node Get Info dialog in the World Editor and several weapon upgrades in the demo game.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Eric Lengyel will be demonstrating the Collada import capabilities of the C4 Engine at the Siggraph 2007 conference in San Diego on Wednesday, August 8. The Collada Birds-of-a-feather (BOF) event will feature the C4 Engine in Conference Room 2 of the San Diego Convention Center between 2:00 and 3:45 PM.

Build 136 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release addresses some input problems that appeared on the Mac after installing the latest security updates. There are also minor updates to several engine components.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 135 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes new anti-aliasing support, several new World Editor features, and a spiffy new gun to play with—the proton cannon (pictured right).

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 134 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This is a minor update that includes several miscellaneous improvements.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 133 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes several world editor upgrades and new particle system capabilities.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 132 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release is the first part of a major two-part upgrade to the built-in world editor, shown in the image to the right. Build 132 also includes a new enemy character, new features for rendering remote camera images in interaction panels, and a major speed boost for ATI hardware.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Eric Lengyel will be giving a short lecture about mathematical projection matrix tricks at the 2007 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. These techniques are implemented in the C4 Engine and handle things such as projected depth offset for surface markings and zero-cost oblique near-plane frustum clipping for mirrors and portals.

See lecture description on official site.

Build 131 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes many improvements to the built-in Collada support and some miscellaneous tweaks.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 130 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a powerful new animation blending system and several miscellaneous improvements.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 129 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a lot of miscellaneous enhancements such as horizon mapping, new particle capabilities, better normal vector calculation, improved multiplayer APIs, and batch texture importing. The foundation of a new animation blending system is also in place, and this will be completed for the next release.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 128 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes a fully functional multiplayer game and new world designed specifically for multiplayer deathmatch games (shown in the screenshot to the right). The multiplayer game makes use of many new features in build 128 such as jump pads, protection shields, splash damage, power-ups, and mid-air propulsion.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 127 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release includes many small enhancements such as a new beam effect, expanded Collada support, and scripting improvements. Some large additions to the multiplayer systems were also made in this build, and work on a fully functional deathmatch game continues for the build 128 release.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 126 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release, which is known by the codename “Cannon”, includes several much-anticipated features such as support for multiple submaterials per geometry and new environmental interaction functionality. The Cannon build also includes a new editor for creating interactive in-game interface panels, shown in the image to the right.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Eric Lengyel will be demonstrating the Collada import capabilities of the C4 Engine at the Siggraph 2006 conference in Boston on Wednesday, August 2. The Collada Birds-of-a-feather (BOF) event will feature the C4 Engine in room 206A of the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center between 6:00 and 8:00 PM.

Build 125 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains new entity placement tools in the World Editor, updated Collada 1.4 support, and several miscellaneous improvements.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 124 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This release contains full support for version 1.4 of the Collada format, improves full-scene motion blur, adds some new lighting features, and includes some major shadowing optimizations.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Build 123 of the C4 Engine is now available to licensed developers. This is a minor update to the Blade series.

Release notes and downloads are available from the developer page.

Robert W. Lindeman, Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), recently integrated support for a tactile virtual reality suit named the “TactaVest” into the C4 Engine. A documentary featuring the TactaVest aired on the Discovery Channel show Daily Planet in Canada on May 26. Full story