3D Game Creation System



The 3D Game Creation System (also known as the 3D GCS or just GCS) is a tool for creating 2.5D and later true 3D games using the Power 3D engine derived from Terminal Terror (1994).

Context
The GCS was used by many independent games and amateur projects as a game creator, largely because it minimized the amount of computer programming knowledge needed to make 3D games in its editing tools. In this sense it competed with modding bigger name commercial first-person shooters such as Doom (1993) or later Duke Nukem 3D (1996) and Quake (1996), but featured the advantage of allowing the production of stand-alone executables without requiring the purchase of the base game and were even allowed to be sold using supplied assets. The ACK3D engine also leaned into this niche around the same time.

The GCS was later competed with and/or supplanted by tools such as FPS Creator/DarkBASIC in 2000, Blitz3D in September 2001, the Retribution Engine in 2003, GameMaker: Studio from Game Maker 6 in 2004 onward, and finally the Platinum Arts Sandbox Free 3D Game Maker and Raycasting Game Maker in 2007. Engines of similar vintage to Power 3D, such as the Wolfenstien 3D, Doom, Build and Quake engines started seeing their source code released in the late 1990s and early 2000s, providing other options for amateur first-person shooter development. Original free and open source engines such as Crystal Space (1997), Genesis3D (1998), OGRE (1999-2000), Blender (2000), Cube (2001), Panda3D (2002), Irrlicht (2003) and jMonkeyEngine (2003) also appeared.

The concept behind the Game Creation System was preceded somewhat by Incentive Software's 3D Construction Kit (1991) and 3D Construction Kit II (1992), both based on their Freespace engine. Arguably the first-person dungeon crawler creators such as The Bard's Tale Construction Set (1991) by Interplay Productions based on The Bard's Tale, and Forgotten Realms: Unlimited Adventures (1993) by Strategic Simulations based on the Gold Box engine, also bear mentioning. Along with the GCS, these initial visions of easy 3D development have proved quite prescient, with modern engines such as Unity, ShiVa, Godot and even the veteran Unreal Engine increasingly emphasising ease of development over advanced features. Part of the massive success of games like Minecraft (2011) are their ability to allow users to easily generate customized 3D spaces.

Version 1.x
Also known as the "classic" version, for MS DOS and released in March 1995.

Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215948/http://www.psky.com/GCS.htm

Version 2.x


Also known as the Win95 GCS Replacement Engine, and released in December 1998 though originally slated for June 1998.

Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215911/http://www.psky.com/Upgrade.htm

Version 3.x
The final fully three dimensional version, released in August 2001 and discontinued in May 2003.

Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030206101739/http://www.pieskysoft.com/prod_gcs.html

3D Game Engine
Main Article: Power 3D

1.x
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215852/http://www.psky.com/

GCS Menu
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215852/http://www.psky.com/GCSMenu.htm

GCS Mega Art Pack
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215852/http://www.psky.com/MegaPack.htm

GCS Industrial Theme Art Pack
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215852/http://www.psky.com/StyxStones.htm

GCS Midi Pack
Also known as the "GCS Midi Music Pack".


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Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524215852/http://www.psky.com/MidiMusic.htm

GCS for Programmers
Also known as "GCS for C Programmers".

Link: http://web.archive.org/web/19980524220018/http://www.psky.com/GCSP.htm

2.x
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030407092743/http://www.pieskysoft.com/order.html

Amazing GCS Texture Package
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030407142048/http://www.pieskysoft.com/prod_amaz.html

GC_NEXTAI


Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030407142535/http://www.pieskysoft.com/prod_gcnai.html

GCS Install
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030407171018/http://www.pieskysoft.com/prod_inst.html

GCS Professional Reference Book
Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20030329045826/http://www.pieskysoft.com/order.html