New to game development, but not programming...

[D-Bone]

Hi all,

I'm a professional programmer, with an emphasis on C# for the past
three years. The thing is, that I've always been a gamer and am now
interested creating a small game. No, I'm not interested in created
the colossal of all games so I may be worth a small amount of your
time.

A co-worker of mine, who has knowledge in building 3d-models and I
decided to build a small game. I searched around for game
engines/development kits and what not and most things point me to the
realm forge gdk. So I downloaded the source, time stamped July 2005,
updated my Direct X to support managed code, ran the batch file to
create a vs 2003 solution, and compiled the sucker to success.

Not wanting to be a nuisance, I figured I could get something up and
running off of the demos provided. This is where I find myself
confused and in need of experienced direction, so I don't spend hours
re-inventing the wheel.

What I've found is that some of the demos, such as the winter tutorial
have code to render a scene, but when I run the winter tutorial demo
all that happens is a penguin and sled fall to the ground, and then I
can move the camera/character with the normal key set( I see the
snowflakes, iglo, ground, and skyline ). Where I'm sitting at is I'm
wondering is that what I'm supposed to see? How come I don't see a
penguin get shot by a snowball as the code is documenting? Is the
project incomplete? Is there a future release that will be able to
output a complete game?

To sum this up, with the realm forge gdk as it is now, will I be able
to code a simple game such as a character walking around a scene and
performing tasks, or is that all supported in a later release? I am
new and any direction would be greatly appreciated. Once my game is
complete I would be more than happy to submit it as a demo.

Thanks,

D-Bone

[JW Sullivan]

The last I've heard, RealmForge is undergoing a redesign by Xeonx, Najak, and dannomite.  I don't know where that work is taking place as there hasn't been much talk about that work.  Most of the current activity on this list, and in the SVN depot has been on the branch of Axiom that was created to start working on Ogre 1.0.6 compatibility.  Check out the RealmForge page on Tigris for information about how to get that branch.  If you use Axiom directly, then you should know that Axiom is just a graphics engine, and the physics and other code must be pulled form other sources, or written yourself.  I have never used the rest of the RealmForge libraries, so someone who is more familiar with that enging would have to answer questions about its use.

 

If you pull the code currently in the Axiom branch then it should build and run out of the box (assuming you have MDX installed), and most of the demos should work as well.

 

J.W.
 

[najak]

DBone, Hi, JW is right about us working in the background on the next
generation of Realmforge. We're diligently at work, but not ready to
reveal any details yet.

Here's a snapshot of a RealmForge derivative of my own, which *has*
been used to make a game (demo is included in this zip file) and was
also used to make a game by GravitySpec for college credit in one of
his courses.

Here's the link:
www.najak.com/rage/Rage_Aug18_Test.zip

I'm not sure what issues folks are having with Axiom, but I'm sure this
Rage demo doesn't have the issue -- I catch and handle the issues
inside the MDX.InputReader class I believe (it's a plugin dll,
defaulted to with Rage).

You should be able to use Rage to make a small game. The demo game
integrates physics, collision detection, sound fx, music, gui, complex
game controls, in-game pseudo-editor, animated water, splashing,
missiles, and simple AI, and crude scoring system. You can take
control of any avatar by double-clicking it, and use wheel to zoom in
and out. Read the onscreen context-sensitive instructions... they
give you some good guidance about how to play the game.

My availability to support your efforts will only be nominal, so you'll
be mostly on your own.

I'm still neck-deep in another LGPL project called Lu4net designed to
leapfrog log4net, and add some additional utilities which are nice for
app development. The Logging portion is done along with a
configuration tool, and more. I'm in process of inserting Unit Testing
throughout and have achieved 61% code coverage of the base dll so far.

[Serge Lobko-Lobanovsky aka arilou]

Hey najak,

You don't miss a chance to advertise Lu4net, do ya? :))

--
Best regards,
Serge mailto:serge.lo...@gmail.com

[D-Bone]

Thanks everyone, I'll give it a try and see what happens.

[najak]

By the time I get done with it, Lu4Net will *sell* itself.

[Serge Lobko-Lobanovsky aka arilou]

najak,

Hey, you didn't take my message seriously, did you? :)

Wednesday, February 8, 2006, 3:55:28 PM, you wrote:

> By the time I get done with it, Lu4Net will *sell* itself.

--

[najak]

No, I knew you were kidding me about it. I will be pushing Lu4Net out
to my acquaintences for a while, as a sort of field test/beta before I
try to attract users at large. My response was just a joke too -- but
also serious. :) That's my motto for development -- if my product
doesn't speak for itself and *sell* itself, then I've messed up. It
must stand-alone, without excuse or handholding, or I'm not happy with
it. Wish me luck; I'll need some.

[Serge Lobko-Lobanovsky aka arilou]

najak,

good luck! can you share some thoughts with me? what are you trying to
achieve with a LGPL product, make some exposure for your company ?

you can e-mail me at serge.lo...@gmail.com if you don't want this
discussion to be public.

--

[najak]

Lu4Net contains content from the LGPL RAGE project with some thing
taken from RealmForge, and a few other free projects on the
CodeProject. My goal for Lu4Net is to serve both the game industry as
well as for standard forms-base business apps. It has become the
location where I implement logic common between the two industries.
Lu4Net is currently split into 3 dll's:

Lu4Net.dll (Logging system, Platform detection, Timers, Data
Modeling)
Lu4Net.App.dll (Configuration, DataBinding, Tasking, ThreadMgr, and
generic Form support)
Lu4Net.App.UI.WinForms.dll (plugin to provide System.Windows.Forms
support - plugs into Lu4Net.App).

The Lu4Net.dll can be adopted by itself, if all you are trying to use
is the Logging system. Lu4Net.App.dll is useful for those who'd like
to have a free base application platform to build on, and
Lu4Net.App.UI.WinForms is useful if you also plan to use WinForms for
your GUI (this plugin faciliates proactive/flexible/easy data binding
for WinForms, and remedies about a dozen defects that currently exist
with Winform raw data binding).

I'm working on V0.91 now. The goal of this release is to make
Lu4Net.dll ready for prime time. Then the goals for v1.0 will be to
make the other DLL's production ready.

Because Lu4net targets both games and business apps, my intent is to
apply it to both of my worlds - work and play.