Game Development

Hi there, I have a question.

hi

It's probably very stupid, but I curretnly can;t realy think of a good solution

I want to check multiple things with if-statements

and if they all fail, i want to do something elsel

Noob Here: What's the best beginning programming language for games and what are some good learning resources for it?

5:10 PM

@jmalais Lua, google: LOVE and Lua

but an
If(){}
if(){}
if()
else{}

doesn't seem to work,
I assume thats because the else executes every time the last if-statement fails, right?
How to achieve what I am aiming for?

@jmalais I'd say Unity

@user1103457 conjunctions

conjunction = and

disjunction = or

if (a and b) <- fails if either a or b is false

if (a or b) <- fails if a and b are false

I don't think that's what he's looking for

yeah i am familiar with conjunctions and disjunctions

but

well

5:12 PM

then I don't see where the issue is

if (kbc.IsKeyDown(Keys.Up)) { player.Jump(); }
if (kbc.IsKeyDown(Keys.Right)) { player.RunRight(); }
if (kbc.IsKeyDown(Keys.Left)) { player.RunLeft(); }
if (kbc.IsKeyDown(Keys.Space)) { player.Attack(); }
else { player.Idle(); }

I might do:
if(conditionA){ ... }
if(conditionB){ ... }
if(conditionC){ ... }
if(!conditionA && !conditionB && !conditionC){ ... }

taht's the specific piece of code

but i want to be able to jump and runRIght at the same time

but if none of the conditions is met, i want to execute the idle method

yeah

if (MovementKeyIsDown) { SeeWhatMovementKeysAreDown(); } else { IsIdle = true; }

well okay haha. I did think of that... but i Hoped there would be a more.... elegant way of coding it ;)

5:14 PM

this is elegant

Alternatively, you could make an `idle` variable:
bool isIdle = true;
if(conditionA){ isIdle = false; ... }
...
if(isIdle){ ... }

yeah

@user1103457 chaining 2580295208 ifs is ugly

and so not fabulous

@JohnMcDonald Yeah I think I played a similar game in high school that just used playing cards to identify roles. We called it "Mafia"

Well... I'm assuming you can be jumping and running right at the same time, right?

You had members of hte Mafia, the town watch, and the townspeople

5:15 PM

John's solution looks even better

yeah that's why I'm not using else ifs

yeah

yeah i kinda like johns suggestion too :)

go for it, I'd do so too

because I thaught of bogdans solution too, but it felt kind of redudant to check the same things twice

5:16 PM

@ToddersLegrande Cool. Sounds very much like Werewolf

okay thanks!

@user1103457 you don't check the same thing twice

you only check for the keys once and then store all pressed movement keys in a separate structure

but John's solution outperforms mine anyway

that being said you MIGHT want to use a separate structure anyway

something like IsPressed[Keys.UP] <---- dictionary

to avoid calling IsKeyDown for each entity

that updates the logic

I'm pretty sure the IsKeyDown uses a dictionary too

yes, but adds the overhead of the call

XNA right?

5:19 PM

yeah XNA indeed

meh, the overhead will be minimal, if it's not optimized out

I am not saying much since i am trying to understand how to use the dictionary like bogdan is suggesting

whoah there's a lot of people today here

So Bogdan, You suggested this:
if (MovementKeyIsDown) { SeeWhatMovementKeysAreDown(); } else { IsIdle = true; }

Could you explain how i would define MoevementKeyIsDown?

see if any of the movement keys are down (dunno, store them in some sort of list or w/e)

5:21 PM

Pretty sure he's planning to use: GetPressedKeys

then go through the list and update according to each key

or the array, as John pointed out

@BogdanMarginean Is this the website? I'm blocked at work so I can't access it. love2d.org

yeah that's the one :)

I honestly don't think you'll notice any difference unless you are checking thousands of keys per frame

be sure to follow the tutorials

5:23 PM

@William'MindWorX'Mariager Huh! Yeah! What is it good for?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

@JohnMcDonald I agree, you should use John's method

yeah okay.... though that really feels like you are checking double, to me

:D

@user1103457 IsKeyDown() does a double check too

first of all, you're doing your own check

and then the method does the dictionary (or whatever keys are stored in) check too

5:25 PM

hmm i see your point...

don't think much about it, use John's solution

even mathematicians will find it fabulous

with its false supposition and stuff

yeah I am just trying to understand all views to learn from it ;)

So then LUA vs Unity (JS or C#) for a beginning programmer? I'm coming from web development though I've never wrote any Javascript before, only some PHP.

but thanks a lot!

@jmalais I find Unity's way of pushing a 3D world in your face a bit daunting for beginners

Lua and LOVE provide a cleaner way than XNA to show you how to draw a few sprites

if you understand basic programming, you'll be able to write a simple game like pacman in Lua in no time

5:28 PM

Alright, so maybe LUA and Love for a few game builds, then try out Unity for the 3D aspect? Also, what sort of time commitments would a small scale game like Pacman require for the average beginning programmer?

all it can find

you won't be able to do much if you start working thinking you'll have to stop in 2 hours

find a day when you're completely free and study the process in detail :D

Cool maybe this weekend when my finals are over...Is there any good learning publications or resources I can check out besides the engine's website?

Q: Good Tutorial For Lua and LÖVE

let me see

well there's my blog but the whole Love and Lua series isn't finished yet

trying to find others

8

I want to make a very simple 2D game, and have been reading a lot of good things about LÖVE, so I want to try it out. However I can't seem to find any good tutorials. The ones on the LÖVE page are rather unstructured, and the other one I found by Mathew Casperson is not very useful. Does anyone k...

and here's the link in case you want to come back to LOVE after pacman: vanillacodesnips.wordpress.com

I'll be done with it by then (most likely)

Would you recommend a different text editor rather than Dreamweaver for programming?

I would never use Lua for anything but simple scripting.

5:33 PM

@jmalais I use gedit

Not that I have any valid reasons why not. I just never really liked Lua much. :P

there's also "Code Writer" on Windows 8, I really like it

it's Metro-only though

nova-fusion.com/2011/06/14/…

have fun :D

Thanks!

@William'MindWorX'Mariager LOVE deserves more love :P

LÖVE is a good example why people shouldn't use unicode chars they don't understand. :P

Considering how you pronounce it now. :P

5:38 PM

bah, who cares about that

LewwwwwV is awesome

@William'MindWorX'Mariager how should we pronounce it?

@BogdanMarginean something like that really?

Yes. :P

something like that yeah

google says it's a swedish word, and should be pronounced something like lowvne

luv <3

5:44 PM

@William'MindWorX'Mariager I've just remember also there is "Ōban Star-Racers"

Louvre

5:56 PM

Touche

Douche

Ooh! Che!

Hooray!

Anyone here have experience with audio/music for games?

I have successfully played background music and sound effects in my XNA dabblings

If making a game, would it be better to create your own music (regardless of experience) in house, or hire someone outside

house? why not progressive trance?

:C stahp

Depends on how capable you the people in house can make it and if you have budget for in house employee vs outside contractor

5:58 PM

In house as in "in house" as in "made in 'murrica" actually no but "made in here"

Alright, thanks.

In house is generally "at our company"

Knowing someone who makes music is always nice

:)

hey, mebbe I should ask that on gamedev

Hmm.....and you can both answer it :D

It's like a private treehouse thing except not really

Does it guarantee me 200 reputation points worth of up votes / accepted answers? That would be cool :P

mebbe 3

answer on my other top question

I had no way of knowing it would be that popular

6:02 PM

But in all seriousness... I'm trying to figure out how how well it fits the QA format

I'm not good at such decisions

Q: What should I do to get music into my game?

0

If making a game of my own, what should or what can I do to get audio in game? I understand that just going on the internet, and finding random tracks and putting in my game may raise a whole load of legal issues, but is there any "good" way to get audio in the game? Basically, if making a game,...

music project-management

Project management

related to game "development", no?

Alright. I'm on it

Someone's got to put audio in (unless Chaplin came back from the dead to produce a game)

"Mime"sweeper

hahahaa bad forced jokes here on my end

hahahaha

Q: Has piracy ever resulted in a developer getting shut down?

33

Has piracy EVER resulted in a developer getting shut down? That is, has piracy ever been so detrimental that it brought about the downfall of a game studio? If I were to release a game, should I be extremely wary of pirates and plan accordingly, or is it safe to assume that it won't damage me wha...

project-management piracy drm

Answer here if you'd like, it's pretty damned popular I might say.

6:06 PM

Hmm

6:31 PM

@Retrosaur Here's hoping my answer makes sense xD

7:15 PM

man I love Win8's start menu

<3

now if there only was a way to stop showing US holidays in my calendar...

answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-ecoms/…

@BogdanMarginean maybe that will help you

I'm wondering why there's no option for it in the Metro interface

thanks!

f) Click Apply
g) Restart the computer

g) Restart the computer

so I guess I'll find out tomorrow if it worked :D

:)

w00t, 30 degrees C today

it's still April ffs

should have gotten 30 in July

A: Is Udyr stronger in top lane or the jungle?

7:31 PM

-9

Tho tyo tyo tyo tyo tyo tyo tyo tyo tyo

lol wut

Answer by ToddersLegrande: "Neither. Play SC2."

Code Assassin

He's right you know :D

TYO TYO TYO TYO!

TYO?

TYO!

TYO TYO!

7:36 PM

facepalm

...

@ToddersLegrande TYO!

TYO

@Almo TYO TYO

@ToddersLegrande @BogdanMarginean TYO

7:41 PM

This is happening, isn't it?

The whole world has lost its mind and I'm the only one left.

@ToddersLegrande TYO? TYO TYO!

@ToddersLegrande TYO.

I just recalled an EVE-related dream I've had maybe twice... but I have no idea how many months ago.

weird!

►

TYO TYO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

7:47 PM

@BogdanMarginean TYO, TYO...

it looks pretty cool

Winner

+1 for coconuts. — UnderscoreZero 10 mins ago

8:08 PM

45 points until 1000 rep!

And then I'll be recognized as kind of knows what he's talking about! :P

woohoo :D

8:25 PM

Hey is anyone here familiar with Raycasting in Unity?

Negative, Captain.

dam

well thanks for the honesty

*damn

trying to make a third person camera that will interpolate itself in front of objects it would normally collide with

problem is when I raycast I get the point of collision (outside point on a wall) and not the inside

heya guis

@BenjaminDangerJohnson well to be honest I was just speaking for myself. Someone else might be :)

ooh ben, try quill18creates on youtube

8:28 PM

Didn't mean to speak for the whole group!

he does unity tutorials and things

@Almo @BogdanMarginean Hey guis, whazzup?

But if I understand correctly.....


               x <--------Point of Collision
    --------------------------------------
               Wall
    --------------------------------------
               ^
               |
               |
               |
            Raycast

L2ASCII guys. Jeeze

?

Well I've got a generally good understanding of raycasting, but it just checks for the first collision with a collider, the entry collision if you will, and not the exit collision

Oh so I've got it backwards

8:32 PM

I suppose I could just move the viewport into the objects position, effectively putting it in the center of the object so it doesn't render, but I'd like to just get it at the exit position

@BenjaminDangerJohnson try quill18creates if yo want to

           x <-------- Desired Point of Collision
--------------------------------------
           Wall
--------------------------------------
           x <--------Point of Collision
           ^
           |
           |
           |
        Raycast

see u guis later, type @PythonInProgress if you need me.

@PythonI I'll take a peek at it, but I was hoping someone might know off the top of their head

kk, i dont sorry

8:33 PM

no worries, thanks for the tip, tutorials never hurt

unless they are in Javascript

I would star that if it was on one line :P

star what?

wars?

No worries, thanks for the tip, tutorials never hurt. Unless they are in Javascript...

ah very good

yes, sadly JavaScript is a plague upon computer science

second only to the obscenely useless scripting languages invented at college campuses

lol

8:47 PM

@PythonInProgress hiya

@ToddersLegrande ++ ascii art!

wow, I just realized there is a super simple solution to my issue, just raycast backwards -.-

Instead of from the camera to camera target, I just need to cast from the target to the camera

I feel dumb now

9:12 PM

Javascript is awesome

well, the good parts are awesome

@Jimmy you know that book isn't very thick :P

it's condensed awesome

SICP is a very small book too

lol

Also, believe it or not, there is SICP Rule 34. The internet is terribly weird

Indeed it is Jimmy. Indeed it is.

9:27 PM

can't believe how bloated Freelancer.com's interface actually is :(

I find it almost unusable

Maybe they should look to hire someone to rewrite it

I could suggest a site where they could find someone

which one is that :P

lol

am I missing something?

?

9:31 PM

nvm

I assumed you understood the joke hence ":P"

nope, I didn't lol

And now you do?

not in the least

lol

oDesk

9:32 PM

ooooooh

At least thats my guess

The nice thing about that setup is that any answer is funny

makes sense now

But its especially funny because Bogdan keeps complaining about oDesk

like, "Freelancer.com could find someone to fix their website on oDesk" or "Freelancer.com could find someone to fix their website on Freelancer.com"

9:33 PM

Ah

Hmm

Maybe that wasn't the joke lol

I think the joke is in the setup

it's one of those that is worse if you give out the punchline

well I'm complaining about anything really :P

Good call. It never occurred to me, even though its obvious, what Freelancer.com was

Now I'm the embarrassed one who overlooked the joke :P

Don't worry, according my ex'es I have the worst humorous execution on the planet

I thought it was amazing until it turns out I didn't get it lol

9:40 PM

@Jimmy That's pretty funny

#complisult

:<

I never know if I'm supposed to read that as an alged frowny face or just angry eyes/brows

heh, anyway. I think you're pretty funny @Jimmy. At least in here

Or maybe a goofy duck

9:43 PM

Pretty sure it's an epic frown

yes, an epic frown

I've been told that complisults are outlined in the book: "The Game" which is all about how to pick up chicks

Pretty weird, but: "Some of the recommended techniques are sinister. One involves discreetly undermining a woman's self-esteem by paying her a backhanded compliment in the hope that she will hang around to seek your approval. This manoeuvre has its own name: 'the Neg'"

Guys who believe in negging are like girls who believe in playing hard to get.

I don't understand either but I'm sure the strategy works on some people

Eg: "I think your hair would look better up (or down)"

or: "I like your look, lot's of girls have beauty but you seem like you have character."

weird

TIL I learned I've been accidentally negging girls

oops

9:53 PM

hahah, nice