How to make a game.

[Eye]

I would like to say this is my first post, I was browsing through the website and stumpled upon this thread.

Anyway, I am glad to see something on this supject. It is not easy that is for sure. I can see where the time frame for learning programming would take a long time if you are learning it yourself. I am currently a computer Science major and in my third year and hope to one day make it in the video game industry. So far I have learned c/c++, java, and assembly in 2 years. I am now taking a course on openGL. The closest thing to a graphical game that i have done was a battleship and tic tac toe game in java. I have also done some little text based games in c++.

I would just like to point out that if i tried learning this all on my own. i can say it would have easily taken twice as long to learn what i did in 2 at a university, but I would have saved a hell of a lot of money

[mebhas]

well, so much about the rantings and whinings and the like about designing, modelling and programming. the first thing, i think, is the need of a storyline. what good is a game where u just go around shooting people without any specific purpose. at least get a goal or an idea of what the game should be doing.

well, so much so, has anybody even given the slightest of thought to develop the enemy ai, or are u all trying to get the easy way out by making the game nultiplayer only? developing ai is not the easy thing. in fact it is harder than learning programming... starting from basic as lockdown mentioned.

i have been programming since 1991, 12 years already. my programming path...

gw basic
qbasic
pascal
turbo c
visual basic 5
delphi
gnu c++
visual basic 6
visual c++
visual basic .net

i still find it confusing. some times, it gets real frustrating and i format my hard disk. then i get to reinstall again and find most of the backups were never made.(i guess, thats why i never get to post any wips )

so anyways ppl, before you get into game programming, be ready to work hard and get ready to work real hard. then think about the creativity u have.

fianlly, financial backup always helps

[shauryashaurya]

hey you guys forgot math!!!!

every single line of code that you need to write, every breath you take, every s*** you do MUST MUST MUST reek of math.
well if thats an exageration, then ask the guys who made 3dsm.

right from realtime shading and animation to basic drawing, graphics programming is an altogether a HUGE challenge in itself. Add to it algorithmics and data structure programming. Then comes thorough knowledge of graphics engines like DirectX and OpenGL (I also heard a rumor abt. microsoft coming up with a "Farenhiet" which combines both ogl and dx).
I am not even half way there, I just hope this forum helps.

[nendo]

i don't think thats the way to make games. it's a way but i'm sure there are other ways. i know someone thats easly makeing a game and all he knows is vb and he realy aint that good at it

[scott99]

well, why not do what i do, just hire someone that already knows all that

J/K

actually me and my bro are doing internet based games, but we are trying to learn enough to step to the next level so its not just internet based

so ill let my bro know that we need to go to Basics from where we are at....
[cant you tell we are far behind] ROFL


anyway, will be fun in about 10 years *sigh*

[nendo]

yeh. that sounds like a web based rpg game. like anaroch.

[hanzo]

lots of good info here!!..

[EMR]

Hi, everyone
This is my first post, and I have to say I'm very happy to find such good lines and such wise words in this thread. Since I'm still a student, I think I can't really add anything but a few questions about the whole gaming thing:
You all have been talking about making videogames, and making people enjoy with games (I think we all agree that's the point of videogames), but why hasn't anybody mentioned "the old 2D gaming"? I know we're in a 3D post, and that's OK... I think this is a bigger affair than just not mentioning
Why can't I see in the market 2D videogames like there used to be in the 90s?
What has become of gamers? why they have forgotten graphic adventures? Hey!, LucasArts hasn't always been doing Star Wars... I can still remember Day of the Tentacle, and Sam & Max, and Monkey Island, and lots of good games which had apparently been forgotten. And not only LucasArts', how about Sierra and its Space Quest, Larry,...?
And beyond the graphic adventures are the interests of those who I call "gamers". Those who play videogames have changed in this last decade so strongly... Maybe thinking now seems boring, and 2D graphics now seems little attractive and impresive... I don't know. But I can't think about making a good plot for my videogames without these questions in my head... I hope someone can help me with these

[Guilherme]

well well well.
Ok people. I know 3d game programing is not for everybody but, lockdown2000 do you realy belive we need more or lass 20 years for learn 10 languages? Do you?
ok I'm 16 and for 4 years I am interested for programming, I belive it is realy good for express our imagination, so as everyone that begins without know anything, I found a book into a library that sad, "C programing", ok What do I think, "Cool, it's possible program a hard drive", good, or god, LOL, I beggined reading this and I found onto 3rd or 4th page what C is realy, I thot "Good, C it is not a hard drive name, it is to a programming language, cool", as you are thinking I wrote the book from the first untill the last page. But there was a big problem. I DIDN'T HAVE A COMPUTER, you ask, How to know a programing language as C without a computer, the answer is too easyer, for me it was realy impossible, but, i din't stop programing, I both a computer and I beggined creating scripts for mIRC, cool it isn't? at the same time and just because mIRC language is too easy, I study C/C++, now with a PC.
I red somethings about Visual Basic, Java and JavaScript. I studed HTML and Flash. For now I'm at the first year of programing cours, as you can say, I'm learning now PASCAL, blody crap language, , but I never stoped trying to do things in C.
Cool is know that I know (+/-) the basicone ingen of C, but I never red anything about graphics. Does anyone have some PDF's or HTML's or DOC's files to sand me? Ok you say, searsh on GOOGLE, I realy did it.
but one more thing lockdown2000 how do I import a model for Pascal or C??????????

Belive my next language to know will be Pithon. What do you think so about it???

[olympus]

thanks for this informative thread 'lockdown2000'

given everybody else's programming history, i am curious, am i the only person that started with visual basic .net?

[Jason-Lavoie]

HA HA HA my first programming expereince was with QBASIC, he heh e then to VBASIC, leanred ALOT from that!

[Sathe]

Now i may know NOTHING about how to make a game but a few of my friends in year 10 came up with the maddness redeamer game in just a couple of months using flash, and im pretty sure they havent been learning how to use 20-30 languages for the past 10 years, but anyway i have learnt alot from your post so thanks, but i cant imagine it can take THAT long to become a proffesional.

[Arius]

hehe, i've been away from this forum for ages. Glad too see this thread is still going. The last time i posted in this thread i was using a stand-alone "game engine" called blitz3d. I've since moved onto the Truevision3d SDK, which is more ofa library. you have too write your own game code e.t.c which makes it far more flexible. As for the old "You have too develop" in c++. I still think this is a very stupid comment. I would however like too add that being able to code in c++ is a great advantage. It is NOT the be all and end all. I think the vast majrity of people who have posted in this thread have essentially blown that statement out of the water. I know a lot of coders currently writing games. The general consensus is that c++ is far too complex for games development, especially in large teams. It is the BEST for games development imo, but it is not an ideal evnironment for it. I'm using delphi, which as far as im concerned is a far better lanaguage than c++. This is of course purely an opinion. Regardless, the sdk i am using, the next version of it, will be completely written in c++. So the backbone too my game will be c++. If you are intended too start from scratch using pure directx api and you are a solo developer. Then really, it doesn't matter what language your using, because you'll probably fail

[oneth]

What kind of game programming are we talking?

If the subject is about making a game for having fun, then that is the correct way. But if you want to become a *true* game programmer/maker, you surely have to take another path.

Pre-build engines, or 'game makers' aren't a good choice. First, they do limit your game, you cannot make 'everything you want'. Second You should learn how to develop a little engine by yourself cos it will help you a lot to understand how it works. It won't take more than a few months if you alredy know how to program in c/c++ and have a good OpenGL/directX reference (NeHe tutorials are a good start point).

When you have your engine, you should start thinking how you will code your game. Most game developers use a 'self' script language to code levels, ia, and every other aspect of the game.

UnrealEngine uses UnrealScript as scripting language. Blizzard games, like Starcraft, uses a script language to define every ia strategies.

Now you have to code a few levels, maybe only one, in your scripting language.

At same time, design your models, maps, weapons, sounds...

Build all togheter and your have a little game.

Making a real game only takes more and more people to work on it. Don't try to make a DoomIV alone But, as said, try to make a little game, following all the steps: coding, modelling, sound, etc.


What I use:

- Programming: C or C++. Java is good too. Visual Basic NO, think on the good games: starcraft, quake, unreal, half-life... anyone coded with VB? No...

- API/SDK: most actual games uses directX as main API/SDK. I prefer OpenGL + OpenAL + other non propietary libs. But you should test all if you have time. Profesionals do test every new version that comes out.

With this you can start the game. Later youl'll need artist: 2D, 3D, sound. but... eh! i'm the programmer, you all are the artists

Hope this helps.

NOTE: sorry for my bad english Spanish user

[Arius]

No, i disagree. In order to develop games in a professional manner you do NOT need to write your own engine. Infact it would be stupid to do so. Look at the majority of games on the market. Most use third party engines. Not all obvioisly, but most. This is because it is quicker than writing your own. You have too write your own games engine. But not your own graphics engine. Why would you want too reinvent the wheel?. Why write octree's, lightmap support, file type support, dynamic lighting, billboarding, particles, vertex/pixel shaders and lots more, then on top of all that you would have to write a game engine on top of it. This is idiotic when a lot of graphics libraries do this for you. An you can just concentrate on writing game code, like ai, file i/o and custom classes.

I will agree that knowing some directx/opengl is an advantage. Otherwise you might get lost when using d3dvectors an so forth. But expecting hobbyists or small teams to write an entire engine for a game is foolhardy. The project would never be finished. As stated before i'm using a graphics library. NOT a game engine. Game engines like dark basic and blitz3d are not flexible enough for serious development. But expecting people, or a small dev team, too write an entire engine for a commercial quality game from scratch is, in my opinion, stupid.

On a side note:

Anybody who knows me well knows i loathe vb. However, i have seen a LOT of vb D3D apps and games written in vb that are complex and that have 600+ fps. Vb is poor for math's and is not imo "ideal" for 3d development. But it can be done if the coder is good enough.