Developing

[LockdownX]

How hard is it to develope games for the Jaguar and Panther(developers box,
real console never released)? I want to learn programming, so to program
the Jag, what kind should I learn? BASIC or C or C++ or C+++?

LockdownX

[Gary T. DuVall]

In article <mHfF2.222$0l4...@news.rdc1.tn.home.com>,

"LockdownX" <gkim...@home.com> wrote:
> How hard is it to develope games for the Jaguar and Panther(developers box,
> real console never released)?

The Panther was never fully developed into a console - only a few prototypes
exist and they supposedly aren't even operational. There was a guy floating
around the NGs sometime back who has one of the prototypes, giving out his
URL to his webpage where he had a lot of Panther information (which I can't
remember the URL to), saying his doesn't work. It was scrapped in favor of
the Jaguar's development instead. Jeff Minter supposedly worked on the
Panther to an extent, and Cybermorph was rumoured to have been first
developed as a game for the Panther, then got moved over to the Jaguar.

> I want to learn programming, so to program
> the Jag, what kind should I learn?

Based on the accounts I've seen, it's rather hard to program. This is of
course just from things I pick up on JI2 and the newsgroups, so take it with
a grain of salt.

> BASIC or C or C++ or C+++?

Uhm, I think BASIC isn't even used in developing the Jaguar. Learn C and
Assembly, although you really should try reading the 'Jaguar Underground'
documentation and the developer docs so you can see what you're getting
yourself into.

And if you do decide to tinker with the Jaguar development system (You'll
need either a modified Jaguar + PC or a $500 development kit), DONT LET
ANYONE KNOW. People these days have been going crazy lately over 'newcomers'
telling people how they're going to program for the Jaguar, then fessing up
saying they actually don't know how to program, but will learn this way
instead.

Carl Forhan, 4-Play, Krunch Force, OMC Games, and Bastian are the only guys I
know that program the Jaguar actively right now with experience. Might want to
ask them your questions to see if it's worth the trouble to try programming.

Just know it's not going to be ANYTHING like BASIC. ;) Hope this helps!

> LockdownX

Gary T. DuVall
Sanctuary Internet Design Group
http://www.sidg.net

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[Andrew Seed]

Most games for the Jaguar were written in assembler, the occasional game got
written in C ( Doom) with the critical code being written in assembler ( for
speed). If you want to learn in general then I would recommend C or C++ as
the major of today's games are written in these languages. Also by
programming in a high level language then cross platform development is a
lot easier.
Fortunately Atari choose the 68000 for the Jag which made it immediately
accessible ( for the Amiga and ST communities) and the Tom and Jerry chips
GPU and DSP respectively) are not that bad to program for.

All the bset 8-)

Andrew Seed

LockdownX wrote in message ...

>How hard is it to develope games for the Jaguar and Panther(developers box,

>real console never released)? I want to learn programming, so to program
>the Jag, what kind should I learn? BASIC or C or C++ or C+++?
>
>LockdownX
>
>

[Vidar "Hawk" Olavesen]

How about assembler ? That would be your best bet for speed, but of course
it's more work!

LockdownX <gkim...@home.com> wrote in article
<mHfF2.222$0l4...@news.rdc1.tn.home.com>...