fearless Member Posts: 91 From: Romania, Tg Mures Registered: 11-26-2005 |
After some thinking I decided to 'evolve' the Visual Script Editor I had been working at for a while into a game builder. Some of you guys here are using game makers (i.e Blitz3D) to make your games and some of you expressed the desire to switch instead to C++. Calin. ------------------ [This message has been edited by fearless (edited November 29, 2006).] |
Jari Member Posts: 1471 From: Helsinki, Finland Registered: 03-11-2005 |
The first thing that comes to mind is that since I like languages like C++ and php the "game maker's" scripting language should be alike. Does your game maker have scripting language? Writing and integrating your own scripts should be simple. I understand if that was not the kind of reply you were looking for - if scripting should be unnesessary with your game maker - but there you have it anyway, for starters. ------------------ [VoHW] (Help needed) [Blog] - Truedisciple (mp3) |
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fearless Member Posts: 91 From: Romania, Tg Mures Registered: 11-26-2005 |
I'm not gonna make my own scripting language, I know it's not hard but I rather stick to the standards. I plan on using Lua for scripting and Ogre for rendering. I have a tool to edit the script. Although it's like putting the cart in front of the horse. The script editor should have come last. ------------------ |
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Lava Member Posts: 1905 From: Registered: 01-26-2005 |
Well, I wouldn't say BlitzBasic is a game maker. Yes most people make games from it, but alot of the tools I use to make my games in Blitz3D were made with BlitzBasic. And addition to that, you cannot create anything in Blitz without knowing some programming (unlike Game Maker 6, which you can create a game without knowing any programming). I'd call it more of a application & game package, rather than a "game maker".But this isn't my purpose why I posted in this thread. I like BlitzBasic because it gives you alot of control to create a game easily, and it's easy to get yourself on a good ground to build your game up. ------------------ |
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fearless Member Posts: 91 From: Romania, Tg Mures Registered: 11-26-2005 |
thanks Lava ------------------ |
dartsman Member Posts: 484 From: Queensland, Australia Registered: 03-16-2006 |
Game makers for one are limited. There is always a limit to what they can and can't do. C++ shouldn't even be compared to them really. C++ is a programming language which allows you to make an application, library or game. Game Makers are a good stepping stone and can be used to flesh out ideas, but you'll always get to a point where you find their limits. ------------------ |
SSquared Member Posts: 654 From: Pacific Northwest Registered: 03-22-2005 |
The only game maker I have used is Game Maker. I actually really enjoyed the short time I used it. I enjoyed the simplicity of it. Dealing with collisions was a snap. The drag and drop nature was easy to pick up. And just filling in a few parameters made it pretty basic to get things started. I guess what I like is how it takes care of most of the work for me. Personally, I don't really care to know all the inner workings of what is going on, so Game Maker was perfect for someone like me. What I didn't like was knowing it has limitations. There was limited 3D support. In general, it seemed best geared towards arcade type of games (platform jumpers, maze games), so it is not all-encompassing. Tough to do AI. Tough to do RTS. Tough to do RPG. The application, on its own, is not really geared to handle those. |
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Jari Member Posts: 1471 From: Helsinki, Finland Registered: 03-11-2005 |
Lua seems pretty good and I am not sure of all the possible ways you can integrate it to your engine but I suppose lua is always statically typed which isn't good for scripting language in my opinion but at least it should allow some level of weak typing but can it convert automatically from string to int? I've used lua in one game's scripting and because of the previously mentioned things it was not good as something like python would be as a scripting language, in my opinion. ------------------ [VoHW] (Help needed) [Blog] - Truedisciple (mp3) [This message has been edited by jari (edited November 30, 2006).] |
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fearless Member Posts: 91 From: Romania, Tg Mures Registered: 11-26-2005 |
Quite frankly at this point I don't know much about Lua. However since WoW, FarCry and other games use it, it can't be too bad. ------------------ |
Ereon Member Posts: 1018 From: Ohio, United States Registered: 04-12-2005 |
I use DarkBASIC. which is like Blitzbasic, except that it focuses entirely on DirectX. The only real problem I have with DB is the fact that it only works in DirectX, and that can severely narrow your audience. The points that most draw me to DarkBASIC are the fact that allot of the repetitive and common tasks that have to be done for a game (loading media, moving 3D objects, rotating, etc) are all handled with one or two commands. With one command you can load an object, and with 3 more lines you can make just about as many copies as you like with a FOR NEXT loop. You could create an entire army in those 4 lines of code. In addition to the simplicity though, there is also a well integrated system that allows you to manually control the deepest facets of the engine. For instance, you can adjust matrixs manually, you can set the view portals and change the properties of the camera. It gives you the basic tools that every game designer, beginner or hardcore, will need, and at the same time offer a variety of options and portals to get your hands as deep as you like if you need to (even to the point of making your own command plug ins in Visual C++). If you're going to make a game builder, my suggestion would be to A) Make is as cross-platform/rendered compatible as possible, B) Give it commands that easily simplify the requisite and common tasks that the designer is likely to use regularly or in large quantities, and C) Give the designer a way to get their hands deep into the core of your engine and manipulate it at as low a level as possible, this will give you clients freedom to carry out ideas and concept that they can't do in other game builders, while at the same time providing the simplicity that your more casual hobbyist may prefer. ------------------ |
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fearless Member Posts: 91 From: Romania, Tg Mures Registered: 11-26-2005 |
quote: Took some time to look into Lua. It is dynamically typed and it can covert ints to strings and vice versa on the fly. I have been coding mainly in C# until now, turns out Lua and C# resemble quite a bit. For everyone interested here's a nice introduction to Lua: Ereon, Ssquared thanks for thorough analisys. ------------------ |
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Jari Member Posts: 1471 From: Helsinki, Finland Registered: 03-11-2005 |
So lua is dynamically typed, thanks for clearing that out! Wow that makes it whole lot better option then. When I used it last time *(years ago in one game) the game used it as statically typed and it was very strict. ------------------ [VoHW] (Help needed) [Blog] - Truedisciple (mp3) |
