Cartenz: Eazy Games Development

Modding: Add content to your favorite game 17 Oct 09, 06:10:00

It never occoured to me untill last night that I should do a mod for oblivion. I had palyed with the Elder Scrolls Toolset with morrowind, but when it came to oblivion i was more concerned on: Getting the graphics at optimum playability Killing everything But last night i was speaking with a friend who convinced me to expand my modding portfolio. I dont think he ment an oblivion mod but having put that many hours into playing the game, it seems like an obvious choice. Below is a link to the Elder Scrolls Construction Set Wiki, that have lots of useful links and info if your interested in playing with oblivion. (or morrowwind for that matter) http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/Main_Page and here is another site containing some community mods that you might like to post your project to: http://www.tesnexus.com/index.php

Flash and Facebook: AdobeTV interview with Josh Elman 08 Oct 09, 07:10:00

As theis blog is based around a Facebook game I am working on, and the fact that I have been too busy(among other reasons) to blog latley, I have decided to link this vid from adobeTV. It dosnt say much but the main poin I want to illustrate was that flash and actionscript can be used to bridge other technologies--such as mentioned PHP, to Facebook. http://tv.adobe.com/watch/adc-presents/josh-elman-of-facebookcom

Open Source Games: Get involved 17 Aug 09, 12:08:00

People wanting to get started in the games develoment industry might want to first get involved with an open source games project, there are thousands of projects listed on the open source community site sourceforge that you can get involved with, or you could just download there games to play. for some games projects you can get involved with, take a look at this list here on my PROJECT FOSS blog.

University Courses: Perth 15 Aug 09, 06:08:00

Here is a list of a few university courses offered here in Perth that focus on games design and development: Graduate and Post-Grad Master of Games and Simulation Programming (ECU) Undergraduate Games Technology, BSc (Murdoch) Games Software Design and Production, BSc (Murdoch) Bachelor of Computer Science - Major in Games Programming (ECU) TAFE Courses Diploma of Interactive Games Development (Technical Artist) CT58 - Diploma of Interactive Games Development (Games Programmer) 7538 - Diploma of Interactive Games Development again I will continue to add to this list.

Lightwave Stuff: Space 14 Aug 09, 08:08:00

I know I have yet to mention Lightwave, but I found this guys site tonight and it could be useful if your designing a space oriented theme. There is an excelent tutorial on building planets--which is a good place to start with Lightwave, and also some more complicated stuff for those that already have some 3D under there hat.

Game Engines: Short List (UC) 14 Aug 09, 06:08:00

I will add to this as I go along. Here are some games engines, some examples of the games that use them, and a brief description of them: Unreal There are a a few incarnations of this engine, the current one being Unreal Engine 3, it uses DirectX technology and it is the engine on so many popular titles on both the PC and consloes. Source Source is a multi-core, multi-platform engine, that means it can be used to develop for both major consols and also the PC. It is a great engine for modders and first time developers to use, as there is an active community of developers out there. Aurora, Odyessy and Electron The NWN2 toolset is probably the easyies toolset for beginners to jump into and it uses the Electron engine. Being built for RPG games the depth of content you can create is huge. The Electron engine was developed from the original Neverwinter Nights engine, Aurora. not only was the Aurora Engine used as the base for the Electron engine used in the official campaign, but it was adapted into the Odyssey Engine, used for the Star Wars game Knights of the Old Republic. Gamebryo This is one of my current favorites to play, it is used in Oblivion and Fallout 3... Im going to play some games now do some more research!.

Facebook Apps: Introduction 10 Aug 09, 09:08:00

First time game developers might want to utilise the facebook social networking site as a way users can access there game. Using social networks such as facebook give the developer the ability to incorporate other data, such as 'friends' lists, to create mulit-player or team capabilities. I will include more about building for the facebook site, but for now heres a link to a great introductory article by Jeanette Stallons on the adobe site.

Comedy: Penny Arcade 07 Aug 09, 09:08:00

Penny Arcade, for those that have not seen it, is a web comic. The creators have now ended up working on there own games.

Comedy: 7 commandments... 07 Aug 09, 03:08:00

Here is a Cracked.com article that you will enjoy, its from a while back so you may have seen it before.

Training in Games Development 06 Aug 09, 12:08:00

When I went to university, there was no games development course--it was offered the year after I left. Yes, a degree of Games Development, they do exist but they wont nessisarily guarentee a job at Rockstar North. What they do offer is a University Education, which for those that have one know that uni teaches you how to learn, not how to think. What you do with your degree is up to you. So if you already have a BSc or a BA in a field unrelated to games development then seeking a graduate course in games development will probably just be a waste of money. For those i suggest invest in a good book on object-orientated programming for games design. I wont even suggest one, you know where to find them. for those without any tertiary education (IE: no college), then you have the advantage that many professional games developmers didnt have--the oppotunity to study games development at a tertiary level. Even if you dont live near a university offering such a course many schools offer courses online or via other corrospondance. One might be tempted to now state "But I dont have the time to study games development for 4 years", well then you probably dont have the time then to make a game. games take years to make, if your expecting to have a complete projcet from ground up then expect its going to take a good portion of your free time. Games Development courses are not the only way. The games industry employs a range of different people from coders to artists, to accountants to lawyers. so you dont need to have a BA in games development, a Bachelor of Comp Sci will do just fine. What your saying is you need a college degree to work in the games industry? Im not saying that. but having an education puts you ahead of other applicants that dont, and being an industry with high demand--there are going to be a lot of other applicants. sure there are people in the games industry without a formal education, but there are people in every industry that only got there by luck and dont deserve to be there. Im not saying that everyone without qualifications does not deserve to work in the games industry, what Im saying is that the more effort your prepared to put into learning games development then the more deserving your will be to work within games development--and the HR at Rockstar North will recognise this.

Programming Languages - Intro 05 Aug 09, 11:08:00

Computer programming languages are divided into 'compiled' languages and 'on the fly' scripting languages. For beginners working on independant projects or even mods, scripting is often the natural choice. Scripting languages can be less demanding when it comes to correct syntax, and because they dont require compiling they are easyer to create. a popular development toolset, the NWN2 toolset, uses its own scripting lagnguage NWscript. NWscript is a variant of the programming language C, and C had also influenced the development of other languages such as PHP, Java and Perl. C is a versitile language, however learning C is not nessisarily the best language to learn for games development. Firstly it is dated, there are more modern languages that are 'object orientated' that have added functionality for developing games. I dont want to discourage anyone from learning C, but if building a game is your main goal then maybe look at C's younger cousin C++. C++ was developed from C, and is Object-Orientated. I will cover what Object-Orientated is later, but another example of an object-orientated language that is used a lot by independant developes is Java. Java has some great advantages for independent developers, but it had some disadvantages too. The best thing about Java is that its achitecture independant so the same code--or in this case the same game, can run on a variety of different machines, including mobile phones. Infact most phone applications are made with Java. Finaly here I will mention ActionScript. AS (ActionScript), is a simple language designed for non-programmers, more spesificaly: AS is designed for Artists, Animators, Graphic Designers and Web Developers. AS is used with the IDE; Adobe Flash, and has some of the functionalty of more complex languages but has its limitations. Building large scale commercial games in flash is not the way to go--but you can easily build small browser based games with no prior programming knowledge in no time. As mentioned in a pervious post, the choice of language you use is critical to how your end product will perform, so its best to have an idea about what language suits your project. do research on games similar to one you want to make, what language(s) was it built in? this will help you make the right choice for your own project.

Seeking Advice 05 Aug 09, 10:08:00

A big mistake made by first time independent games developers is thay often seek advice from the wrong sources. What you have to use is a bit of common sence, and do thourgh research before contacting other developers. Why did I write developes in italics? Anyone who knows the basics of scripting languages can start building a game, and anyone who can read and follow a tutorial can start modding an existing game. What this means is ANYONE can call themselves a game developer. That is the beauty of being an independent artist; whether its in Music, Film, Litriture or Games Development, anyone with the creative urge to express them self can do so. That being said, you dont just become a famous Hollywood filmmaker, you study film, go to university, make a pile of really bad short films to try and get noticed and eventuality someone may notice your work and get you to work with them on there project. If you want something (this applies to anything), then you have to be prepared to work for it. This is where seeking advice from professionals gets complicated--they got to where they are by hard work, and there not going to cheapen there industry by giving there secrets away to any fly by night script-kiddy. But, there is a flip side to that; they know how hard it is to get started in the games industry so some of them will be more than happy to answer your questions--provided you ask the right questions. Dont ask the same questions that they get asked a million times a day, to be sure your not asking the wrong questions have a look on there site--if they have a FAQ, then read it, and dont ask them any questions that are already on the FAQ. Common sense. Other than the right questions, you need to ask the right people. Asking a washed up dinosaur from the machine code era questions about Lightwave is not going to get you anywhere. And asking a Lightwave designer about your coding problems is not going to result in many solutions either. You should know what questions can be answered by what professionals, and what questions can be answered by the non-profesional community--IE; other indipendant developers like yourselvs. You can also seek advice from professionals outside the games industry, but I will talk about that in detail in another post.

Programing Languages 03 Aug 09, 12:08:00

There are many programing languages out there you can yse to make computer games, but since we are dealing with the basics here we for the most part will be using ActionScript 2.0 There are advantages and disadvantages to using actionscript, but its fairly simple to learn and there is a very useful tool, or IDE (Indipendent Debugging Environment) that we can build a simple game in in a matter of minutes. (yes, it is possible!) that IDE, is called Adobe Flash, and you can download a trial version if you do not have the full software. If you do not want to use actionscript for your game, you can still use this tutorial, however you should understand the differences between the syntax of actionscript and that of your chosen language. other languages you can use to create games could be C++ or Java, as they are also fairly simple to learn and can offer more features, however; neither have the simple IDE that actionscript does, wich is ideal for indipendant developers.

Variables: an Introduction to programming. 28 Jul 09, 05:07:00

Variables are part of the building blocks of any piece of software, and when designing a game you have to think in "variables", if you think of a computer game you have played, if there is a SCORE, then the SCORE is a variable, it is a number that changes over the course of the game. Variables dont just have to be numbers, variables can consist of all sorts of data, but to keep it simple we will stick to thinking as variables as numbers for the most part. examples of other types of data as variables could be a players name, or there health, or other attributes they have. If they have a weapon ready, that ia a variable, and the ammunition of that weapon is another variable. Variables need to be named so the "computer" can tell them apart, you need to assign names to each variable, so its best to keep a consistant format when naming them. once you think of your game in variables, then its a lot easyer to start to put together. I will discuss Variables more later but this is to give you an idea of how you need to think about your game. you can start working out what elements in your game are variables, and give them names, write this in a list then its easyer to program how those variables interact. this list we will call an "array"...

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