In GSP110 we used GameMaker 8.0 Pro to design some simple games. Get the demo here! Now as I start chewing my way thru Sam's Teach Yourself C++, I see the logic behind this "crawl before you run your butt off" method. GameMaker is actually a preloaded object programming system. You can download numerous resources, be they bitmaps, jpegs even music files, and use them to create games that can actually be kind of fun to play.
The program teaches you to keep your design in mind, teaches you how to link sprites, objects, events and place them in rooms. While a simple level editor, it's interesting to see how the tool box works.
Kid Risk told me most Game Engineers start out working on Tools. So I'm now working on games that use as many events as I can come up with and still keep the interface manageable and on a learning curve that isn't too radical.
Finals next week for first session, going into both classes with high 90th percentiles. March 1st, Logic and Design CIS115 and getting a req bonehead class Computer Applications with lab out of the way.
Over the next week, I'm going to build a simple Dungeon crawler shooter.
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Going out on a limb here, but I hope that C++ is not the language of choice for game development. It's convoluted, messy, and not the best OO language by a long shot.
ReplyDeleteDepending on the target platform, Objective-C (Apple), C# (.Net), C/Assembler (high-performance required), or even a compiled Java (using gcj, Black Tower or other tools) would be better.
If I'm wrong here and the game development (outside of Apple - your only choice should be Objective-C) community uses C++, then you should spend a lot of time learning Object Oriented design/best practices. You should do so anyways, but in C++ you'll easily shoot your toe/foot/leg off...
Nope, learning C++ to knock some rust off the synapses
ReplyDeleteThen learn Java or Objective-C (or C# if you buy a Visual Studio.Net license.) C++ will never again have mindshare - it is the COBOL of the Object-Oriented world.
ReplyDeleteI have C# and Java courses this fall and next spring
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