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game programming

8 replies on 1 page. Most recent reply: Aug 28, 2003 9:53 AM by Leandro Oliveira

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Rivky Fried

Posts: 2
Nickname: ricky123
Registered: Aug, 2003

game programming

Posted: Aug 27, 2003 5:48 AM

I am in an educational field, and want to learn to do game programming to create educational software. I took a course in C - so the concepts of procedural programming are not foregin to me. I have NO idea what it takes to make animation and movement.
I went down to a computer school yesterday to discuss this matter - but i got mixed responses. One person that I spoke to encouraged me a lot whereas the other warned me that if I would want my program to be interactive, and receive responses from the student, it would take a very sophisticated level of programming. The tuition there was VERY high and wasn't even sure if i'd get the knowledge I'd need. One of the people at the school mentioned that java would be the language I'd need to use (together with flash, photoshop,and dreamweaver applications etc.).Can anyone advise me???

MANY THANKS!

David

Posts: 150
Nickname: archangel
Registered: Jul, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 27, 2003 7:15 AM

* They're both kinda right.
* Writing games is a non-trivial task.
* Java is Object-Oriented, not Procedural.
* Games can be written in both Java and in C.

What kind of games were you planning on producing and how did you plan on distributing them i.e. do you want them to run in a website or not?

Rivky Fried

Posts: 2
Nickname: ricky123
Registered: Aug, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 27, 2003 8:33 PM

Thanks for taking the time to respond. I think i would rather have the games not run on the web. I was hoping to have the games run off of cd roms. Would running it on the web make it easier or harder programmatically?

The basic form of my games.....hmmmm...i don't know exactly...but i was thinking along the lines of having animated screens with questions which the child would have to answer. The child would need to respond by clicking at the appropriate spot. Just off the top of my head....suppose the goal of the game would be to teach the child to rhyme. The screen might show a picture of mickey mouse saying the word bat.....The game would then prompt the child with "What rhymes with bat?" Is it cat boat or bike? The child would either have to click on the word bat or in the ideal scenario, the program would pick up the child's oral response (i.e. voice recognition)....If the child's response would be correct, mickey mouse would scream out "yippy...you got it right." How complicated would something like thar be?

David

Posts: 150
Nickname: archangel
Registered: Jul, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 1:03 AM

> Thanks for taking the time to respond. I think i would rather have the games not run on the web. I was hoping to have the games run off of cd roms. Would running it on the web make it easier or harder programmatically?

Nope - probably actually a little bit more problematic.

> The basic form of my games.....hmmmm...i don't know exactly...but i was thinking along the lines of having animated screens with questions which the child would have to answer. The child would need to respond by clicking at the appropriate spot. Just off the top of my head....suppose the goal of the game would be to teach the child to rhyme. The screen might show a picture of mickey mouse saying the word bat.....The game would then prompt the child with "What rhymes with bat?" Is it cat boat or bike? The child would either have to click on the word bat or in the ideal scenario, the program would pick up the child's oral response (i.e. voice recognition)....If the child's response would be correct, mickey mouse would scream out "yippy...you got it right." How complicated would something like thar be?

Not too bad. I'm probably going to get stoned for saying this, but I'm going to say it anyway...

I think that Visual Basic (note - NOT VB.NET) might be a better bet for you. It's not properly object-oriented, so it'll fit in better with the procedural stuff you've done already. Also, doing graphical things is really easy and would probably offer a smoother learning curve rather than Swing.

You can do what you're saying in Java - I just think that it'd take you more time to learn.

If the cost of buying Visual Basic is too high, you could always use the Personal edition of Delphi (it's free!).

Ok...I've said my piece...let the stoning begin...

Senthoorkumaran Punniamoorthy

Posts: 335
Nickname: senthoor
Registered: Mar, 2002

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 4:29 AM

Since you also menthioned Delphi :-) you escaped stoning from me this time... he he he

Senthoorkumaran Punniamoorthy

Posts: 335
Nickname: senthoor
Registered: Mar, 2002

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 4:38 AM

But I too agree with you that Rapid Application (RAD) Development Tool is a better choice in this case.

Specially when you say kid games definitely I hope they are not going to run on Linux or Solaris :-) unless the kid is someone who is going to medical school at the age of 12 :-) (a news item from MSN)

kiranvasu

Posts: 1
Nickname: kiranvasu
Registered: Feb, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 6:51 AM

A cheaper alternative to this would be to create a browser based game which you can distribute in a cd as well. This would require you to use HTML, JavaScript, Flash. JavaScript will be very easy for you to learn given your procedural programming background. Endless resources available over the net to learn HTML and JavaScript.

Good Luck

David

Posts: 150
Nickname: archangel
Registered: Jul, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 7:40 AM

Good point.

Leandro Oliveira

Posts: 21
Nickname: lao
Registered: Aug, 2003

Re: game programming

Posted: Aug 28, 2003 9:53 AM

I think the best way to make what you want is to use a multimedia authoring tool, like Macromedia Director. Using java, vb, c, or anything like that is a waste of time.

From macromedia's site:
"With Director MX, you can create interactive content that integrates long video streams, photo-quality images, audio, animation, 3D models, text and Macromedia Flash content. Create accessible content for people with disabilities. Then deploy on CD, DVD, kiosks, or the web."

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