Battlezone Forums

Has anyone here ever used, experimented with, or designed a game with DarkBASIC Pro? If so, do post info about it here.

I suggest looking at non-proprietary languages.

Nielk1 wrote:I suggest looking at non-proprietary languages.

Well yes, but the beauty of DarkBASIC is that you get a s**tload of goodies like animations, models, textures, and effects absolutely royalty-free. C++ is for soulless nerds and is too hard to learn.

How about C# and XNA?

C++ is quite similar to C# from what I can gather, and C# is nice and easy to learn.

AHadley wrote:C++ is quite similar to C# from what I can gather, and C# is nice and easy to learn.

Only at the most basic level. Java is similar in that regard as well. C# and Java are the best if you don't want to deal with memory management.

Java is coffee, not a programming language. C++ is the best from my experience, but it is HORRIBLE, handles objects poorly, and doesn't have good garbage collection.

forgottengames wrote:Java is coffee, not a programming language. C++ is the best from my experience, but it is HORRIBLE, handles objects poorly, and doesn't have good garbage collection.

No, Java is a programming language. Javascript is a scripting language, and Coffeescript is compiled Javascript.

C++ is the best from my experience, but it is HORRIBLE, handles objects poorly, and doesn't have good garbage collection.

Please learn one memorable quote from alt.sysadmin.recovery : "They all suck, some worse than others".. Everything has its downsides. If you're willing to admit the faults, you're less likely to be a clueless fanboy.

C++ has garbage collection as good as the programmer: RAII. Learn that pattern. Programming games is about managing resources - textures, models, sounds, animations, etc. That's why C/C++ (and derived) are the dominant languages for professional game development. C was designed to be the unix OS kernel's language. C/C++ manage resources great, given a good programmer. Games are running their own mini-OS under the hood, managing resources.

-- GSH

Nielk1 wrote:

forgottengames wrote:Java is coffee, not a programming language. C++ is the best from my experience, but it is HORRIBLE, handles objects poorly, and doesn't have good garbage collection.

No, Java is a programming language. Javascript is a scripting language, and Coffeescript is compiled Javascript.

My point exactly, Nielk1. If I wanted JAVA I would drink it.
But seriously, what other game development apps can offer you as many goodies as DBPro?

There's a ton of free resources available online. Sure, they may not be packaged as nearly as your preferred solution, but they do exist, and are usable in any modern language given some elbow grease.

In terms of making games, my advice is this: start small. If you've never written a game before, your first game should be pong. Or breakout. Then, make Tetris. It'll take you far longer to get your first game(s) up and running than you estimate. You'll probably take two or three times longer than you estimate to make Tetris. Seriously. But, writing some quick, throwaway, bits of code, you'll learn. And, when you make your next game, you can take the pieces that didn't stink from your last game, and build up the next.

Too many beginners aim for a moon shot, trying to copy World of Warcraft (or even Final Fantasy 1-6) as their first game. Those games were built by professional developers, having made several games before, and it still took many man-years to complete. Paid man-years, not stuff done in your basement between chores. Those that can complete and release a moon shot in their first attempt are one in a billion. (Translation: roughly 7 exist in the whole world. You're not that special.) NASA didn't go for the moon on their first launch. They had 21 manned launches (7 Mercury, 10 Gemini, 4 Apollo) before Apollo 11 landed on the moon. You should aim to make 4-5 smaller games to learn from before you go big.

And note: I didn't say anything about what language(s) your smaller games are in. Programming is like writing or drawing - any aspiring writer has about 10,000 bad words in them; artists have 500-1000 bad drawings in them before anything good comes out. You just need to get the bad stuff out of your system before you can produce quality work. Others call it the 10,000 hour rule -- need to work at something for 10,000 hours to produce good stuff. Get started.

-- GSH

This is a java game:

FYI.

I prefer C++ or C# personally, but I can do Java pretty well.

Java is a very capable language. It seems clunky at first, but it can do things that would surprise you.

Looks like a fun game, Nielk1. What's it called? May I play it?

That's Spiral Knights. It's an f2p on Steam.