Game Development

William 'MindWorX' Mariager

00:04

Weeee

John McDonald

00:56

@thedaian, that was quick

thedaian

i am quick

like ninja

John McDonald

No kidding

thedaian

also i've seen the steampunk portal device pictures. it's awesome, and yes, I do want one.

John McDonald

(fyi, I'm referring to a very recent G+ post I made about this: batman-n-bananas.deviantart.com/art/…)

I mean, who doesn't, right?

thedaian

Indeed.

Also, If Doom was done today: youtube.com/watch?v=C4yIxUOWrtw

2

John McDonald

01:03

LOL!

ClassicThunder

01:30

@thedaian Steampunk is the best punk.

thedaian

Provided it's not just gluing some gears on it: youtube.com/watch?v=TFCuE5rHbPA

3

ClassicThunder

Best youtube video I've seen all week.

stephelton

06:09

Candidate for the longest answer? gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/26080/…

William 'MindWorX' Mariager

06:28

A good candidate too. :P

Trevor Powell

09:07

I just installed Ubuntu.

(in a VM)

It's very fancy.

I had forgotten how much I dislike gnome-terminal.

Chorche

09:30

Hi all

I started learning c++

Trevor Powell

howdy

Chorche

can anyone drop a link to a good tutorial using openGL in c++

:D

some really simple tutorial

a triangle tutorial

i don't even know what kind of project should i create in codeblocks, if i want to develope a game

Console project?

Gajet

13:09

@Chorche they say this tutorial is good:

arcsynthesis.org/gltut/index.html

but I didn't try that myself.

Aidan Mueller

15:08

When would I use linear algebra?

Byte56

15:51

Hey, only 15 more votes and I can unlock the unclaimed Reversal badge ;p

Aidan Mueller

16:15

what? unclaimed reversal?

this room is pretty empty

John McDonald

This is actually pretty busy for a weekend

As for when you'd use linear algebra: I have only really done 2D programming, but things like cross and dot products are useful, as well as matrix transformations

Aidan Mueller

16:33

well math makes me run so I have to do

well some math

John McDonald

ic

yeah, you can get by in 2D programming without linear algebra (I did for years), but there is no avoiding it with 3D programming

I knew linear algebra, but I never applied it in my games until recently

Aidan Mueller

WHERE can I learn linear algebra? (I want to move to 3D eventually)

John McDonald

I went to university for Computer Science, and it was a required 1st year class

I didn't move on to take Linear 2 or 3 or 4

Aidan Mueller

well, I mean something like a site or a book (if a book is the only way)

John McDonald

yeah... I'm not the person to ask, although I'm sure someone else will have an answer for you

Aidan Mueller

16:42

wait, what about this: blog.wolfire.com/2009/07/…

John McDonald

that looks pretty brief, but it looks like a good place to start

Byte56

There's 4 parts to that

It's reasonable

John McDonald

Well... there are parts: 2, 3, and 4

yup

Aidan Mueller

yeah I guess so. I was learning about sin, cos, tan, atan, atan2, etc at a different place but it had problems and I had trouble understanding it.

John McDonald

I guess I never really thought about vectors being bundled in with Linear Algebra, but thinking of it now, of course they are

Byte56

16:47

Sounds like you want trig too

John McDonald

So yeah, linear algebra is almost unavoidable in 2D as well as 3D

Byte56

It sure makes things easier

Aidan Mueller

well I guess I will have to read that then.

John McDonald

If you're just getting started with gamedev, I'd highly recommend starting 2D

Byte56

Agreed

Aidan Mueller

16:49

I already made a simple game

2d

John McDonald

3D is significantly harder and requires a lot more math

I don't even know where to begin with 3D actually, or when someone should begin

What about you @Byte56?

Byte56

That extra dimension sure does add a lot more than just one dimension

Where to begin?

Aidan Mueller

I almost forgot, do I use sin or cos for the z?

the page I read was only for 2d

which was one of it's problems

Byte56

Depends what you're trying to do

@JohnMcDonald You mean where to being? Or when?

Aidan Mueller

For calculating it's next position

John McDonald

16:53

@Byte56 Both

I've never actually touched 3D games before

Aidan Mueller

oh dear

Byte56

Well I didn't do it the "right" way, so it's hard to say. If there even is a right way

John McDonald

and I've been programming games for well over 10 years as a hobby

Byte56

I did a few 2D games, then went full on into a very large 3D project with my current project

Aidan Mueller

and I've been interested since I was about 5 but I had no clue how they were made

John McDonald

16:55

hah, you reminded me, I did actually try to make a mod for Half-Life. So I guess that's 3D

Byte56

That counts

John McDonald

Then I went right back to 2D

Aidan Mueller

I've modded for mc (sorta) before.

Byte56

I think I'll be doing 3D for my next game

Someday when I finish my current

Long from now probably :)

John McDonald

:p yeah

Byte56

16:57

Er I mean 2D for my next game

John McDonald

Oh, ok

Byte56

As for starting in 3D... I guess modding or adding onto existing code would be good

Use an engine for sure

John McDonald

Oh yeah

Aidan Mueller

I finished my 2d fighting game in about a total of one day but it was very simple. seeing as you both have experience, how long does the average game take (I know that can't really be answered but I mean on average)

Byte56

Don't do it the way I did. From scratch making your own engine :/

Well, I've been working on mine in my spare time for nearly a year now :)

Had I used an engine or existing code I would have been a lot further along

Aidan Mueller

17:00

spare time, I have plenty of that.

John McDonald

hah, I've been working on mine (hobby project only) with a good bit of social life thrown in, for almost 3 years now

So... it really depends on the scope of the game you pick

Byte56

That's the pace for non-full time type games

John McDonald

You always think that your ideas are simple, always. But guess what? They're not, think simpler

Aidan Mueller

well, how much time if you were working solid. what would the total time have been so far

Byte56

Maybe 2-4 months of 40 hours a week

But, I write something, then find a different way to do it, backtrack and so on

It's my first large scale game after all

So there's plenty of learning

Aidan Mueller

17:04

how would you say it took for v0.1 or the first playable version took?

Byte56

Can't say. I'm not there yet :/

I've been building the engine longer than the game

Aidan Mueller

one sec

Byte56

so if you start with an engine you'll be much better off.

John McDonald

It's been so long, it's tough to say how many hours I've put in. I have 23k lines of code that I wrote for this project, @thedaian has something like 15k for IsoTower, others have somewhere in the range of 18-30k. Maybe that helps judge?

Byte56

Ah, I'll count mine...

Eclipse have a built in for that, or do I need a plugin?

Aidan Mueller

17:06

is that including lines that just have } on it?

John McDonald

My very first playable game did only take me 2 weeks for the first version, an other month for the second version, and an other month or two for the third. And by then, the code was a horrible horrible train wreck that I abandoned the project altogether.

That includes everything:
Comment Lines: 4138 (18%)
Blank Lines: 3896 (17%)
Code Lines: 14994 (65%)
Code w/ Comment: 109 (0%)
Total Files: 171
Total Lines: 23028

Aidan Mueller

but it was experience.

John McDonald

Yup, it was a fun experience, and not a single one of my projects since then has been nearly as small

Also, those numbers (I think) include all testing code

Aidan Mueller

umm...is that built in? in eclipse where do you go to do that?

John McDonald

a mandatory part of the project

I use C#, and I wrote a line counter a long while back

Aidan Mueller

17:10

oh

Byte56

I'm looking around, I'll let you know about elcipse

Aidan Mueller

what? it says my OWN post was probably not read. it put that line above it.

John McDonald

yeah... don't trust the line

Damir

@AidanMueller stackoverflow.com/questions/1043666/…

Aidan Mueller

so it's not built in

ok

hey what happens I delete system3..........

Byte56

17:12

Ah nice, thanks

Total lines is 25.3k

Aidan Mueller

wow

how long does it take to write 1000 about?

Byte56

That's pretty hard to say

Aidan Mueller

oh

Byte56

It depends on what you're writing and how clever you're being :)

John McDonald

From my personal experience, you'd be hard-pressed to get above 10-15k without having written a few smaller projects first

Aidan Mueller

17:20

so it mainly is on wpm and what your writing?

what if I'm on a dvorak

Byte56

It doesn't really boil down to that. It wouldn't make sense to think of it like that

John McDonald

Your wpm doesn't factor in

imo

Byte56

I don't usually write code as fast as I can type.

John McDonald

Programming is all about thinking

Byte56

I wish I could, but I don't think that fast

Aidan Mueller

17:22

I've noticed that too. but i'm a slow typer <----not a word

John McDonald

typist?

Byte56

Someone more experienced than me, or me now, could have written my current code base in considerably less time and likely smaller/cleaner

Aidan Mueller

yeah I know but I dind't feel like it

if only typer was a word

Byte56

So you on spring break now Aidan?

Aidan Mueller

nope

saturday

Byte56

17:24

I mean next week is no school right?

Aidan Mueller

umm...spring break is over

Byte56

Oh, ok

It's just starting for kids around here

Oregon

Aidan Mueller

you in canada?

oh

oregon

Byte56

I was going to say, pick something you think you might be able to do in a week

Aidan Mueller

what about a day

or two

or seven

Byte56

17:26

Yep

Aidan Mueller

:D

Byte56

Then add on to it

John McDonald

Holy crap, someone is actually planning to make a small game!

Aidan Mueller

well I could fix the code for my fighting game

Byte56

That's a good start

Aidan Mueller

17:27

@JohnMcDonald not planning, already did

John McDonald

Well, sounded like you were thinking of making an other in a day, or two days, or seven

My first real game was a clone of Combat

Just the air portion

And at the time, I couldn't remember what the game was called, so the project will forever be know as "That Atari Game"

Gajet

@john do you know how I can get access to steamworks API to create an indie game?

John McDonald

Umm... you talking about getting a license from Valve to sell an indie game?

Gajet

nope

John McDonald

Or are you talking about making a free mod based on the source engine?

Gajet

17:36

I'm talking about their client/server communication library.

plus usage of their servers.

John McDonald

for a non-source game. Ok.

Gajet

yep

actually it doesn't matter if it's source or not.

John McDonald

umm. my understanding is that they don't provide that information until you're almost ready to implement that

Gajet

I only need a code to get a dynamically created object and render it!

John McDonald

You've seen this, right: steampowered.com/steamworks/gettingstarted.php

or here: partner.steamgames.com

Cool

Aidan Mueller

17:41

FF froze

John McDonald

Actually, I didn't think they provided this much detail until you were basically ready to ship

:/ yeah... you get the front page overview without having a mostly complete game to demo

Aidan Mueller

it's silent

in here

John McDonald

it's the weekend

We've been silent for like 20 hours one time

Aidan Mueller

oh

Gajet

@JohnMcDonald yep, already saw those.

John McDonald

17:51

:/ yeah

Gajet

but the game I'm trying to create is heavily based on multiplayer feature.

John McDonald

Multiplayer is done yourself. Valve doesn't have a hand in that, other than maybe the matchmaking

Gajet

so without being able to compete against another player it just looses it's whole gameplay.

John McDonald

I can hook you up with my matchmaking service if you'd like?

Gajet

that's not the point

John McDonald

17:53

Or just use IPs for now

If you look, they don't provide multiplayer code for you: steampowered.com/steamworks/gameservices.php

Gajet

I'm also looking for a dedicated server.

John McDonald

They don't do that. You do

A dedicated server is basically just an exe that only runs the server (no graphics output)

Gajet

if they do the match making and also all the server/client communications, I need nothing else

John McDonald

They don't do the client/server communications

Aidan Mueller

sfml?

you could use that

Gajet

17:55

@JohnMcDonald they have to, then what is steam doing in there?

found the link,

Aidan Mueller

I've never used it but it works with c++ D Python .NET C

Gajet

they do peer to peer networking

partner.steamgames.com/documentation/api

they also do so many other things

John McDonald

That's just a fancy way to say that they can set up matches

Peer to Peer is no different than Client-Server, except where both people are Clients

Gajet

clients can act as servers.

John McDonald

You're still responsible for sending all of the data over the wire

Gajet

17:58

no problem. I'm just looking for something to deliver them fast and reliable!

John McDonald

Well... all that P2P package is going to do, is let you ask Steam for user "John McDonald"s IP address so that you can connect with him

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