BlitzPlus - BASIC Development

[zparticle]

Didn't mean to start a screaming matching. I have in one weekend almost completed a game. Mind you it is fairly simple, but then that is exactly the type of games I want to build. I'm sure at some point I'll find something I can't do in Blitz.

hehe I went to www.retro64.com to try out some games, just to leave it again, when I remembered how tedious installers are for small puzzel games you'll just play for a short while. I guess Webstart, Applets and Shockwave has made me lazy  

WebStart is an installer.

There seem to be two disadvantages:

1) File size - the produced executables are pretty huge.

2) Flexibility - seems like all the examples I look at are pretty damn similar looking and feeling. Although this could just be down to the developer...

EDIT: 3) Can't find any support for standards. No XML processing!!!? Web connections would have to be implemented by hand?

EDIT: 4) Can't find any support for database access?

1> MY little game is < 1 meg and needs no JVM.
2> I get the impression these guys are no very worried about making killer demos to include with the compiler.
3> It is a language, libraries can be written, if absolutely needed.
4> I don't see anything here either however a simple ISAM library should suffice for most games and that is easy to write. You don't need a SQL database on the gamers computer in most cases.

I've been playing a lot with DarkBASIC. I've been impressed by it, but frustrated at the same time (I guess it's like that with anything). I haven't tried BlitzBASIC to compare, but you might try it out to see what you think.

Thanks I'll check it out.

TYPE - seems to be structs for Blitz3D.

Kev

Yep same for BlitzPlus, but if you write littel modules with types and functions that act on the types then you basically have classes.

i.e. it's an excellent proposal at first, especially if you "try before you buy" rather than examining/evaluating on spec and/or have no "deep" example use-cases to test it against, but then you soon get more and more frustrated - unless your inventiveness and time are both quite small and you can stay within the tiny playpen without noticing how small it is.

For simple games that don't require complex terrain algorithms, complex AI behaviors or a scene graph its the right tool.

In my case simple is exactly what I want, I'm never going to write a game that is like Doom or Quake. I'm more concerned about Solitare.

I think this is an excellent summation of the problem with those "super weapons" like Blitz.

I think this is backwards, c++ and Java are the super weapons.

This pseudo OO just isn't really fitting in with my over zealous Java tastes.
Kev

I know the feeling, it took me about eight hours to stop trying to think like I do when coding in Java. Once I let go of that I made real progress.

I started programming Basic games when I was 8 years old.  1978.  Retro-chic is one thing, but that's taking it a bit far.

Use the right tool for the right job.

An idiot can write idiotic games with Blitz better than he can write them with any other language. If people want to make a good game they need a good game idea and that is not the programming language that is going to do the miracle.

Right, so why are you arguing against Blitz being used when it fits the particular problem?

Besides there ae other things Blitz doesn't offer. For instance an IDE like Eclipse; a tool for automatic code checking/correction like JML; a package like JUnit to create tests; all the UML tools available for java. This may look like an overhead for a simple game but for a bigger one its a "pain in the ass" saver.

IDE http://www.proteanide.co.uk/index.php?pid=shots

JUnit has nothing to do with Java the language it's just a library, same could be written for Blitz.

As far as UML tools I assume your mean UML tools that perform code generation for Java. Otherwise UML has nothing to do with what language you are working in.

[zingbat]

I don't doubt you can do a game with Blitz very easy. You don't need to convince me of that. I tested some of these easy packages myself and made some simple game prototypes with DarbasicPro, Blender Game Engine and VRML. If your game is simple then Blitz and its framework can be a perfect solution. But i bet you will later want to do something more complex to improve your game and thats why OO is good. Because it lets you build your game incrementaly better than anything else. You may want to forget about Java and try to think in Blitz but i bet that this will just open your mind to come back to learn Java and OO techniques better.

I said i used these easy packages but it would be much better to have some sort of Blitz thing in Java. Then we would have both the advantages of a solid programming environment like Java and the advantages of Blitz for its soft learning curve and the possibility of building game prototypes fast and easy. This would be a nice Javagaming community project.

[princec]

I think you vastly underestimate the ease with which you can write and refactor games code in BASIC. And also the sheer power that Blitz actually gives you to just get on and write games. Look at Best Friends (Retro64). Another Blitz "effort". I mean, how long would it take to write that in Java from scratch?

<edit>BTW it may come to some as a surprise but LWJGL was designed after looking at Blitz... - get my drift?

Cas

Games published by our own members! Check 'em out!

[kevglass]

I was talking to a collegue about writing a Blitz style library based ontop of JME today... the only problem in my eyes is we'd still be dependant on the VM distribution. I realise this doesn't concern some of you but I to me its a fairly big hit. It would still be nice to write Blitz style code in Java

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World world = new World(); Entity player = LoadEntity("alien.md2","alien.skin"); player.setType(MyTypes.CREATURE); world.add(player); Entity level = LoadEntity("testlevel.b3d"); level.setType(MyTypes.TERRAIN); world.add(level) Collisions.defineCollision(MyTypes.CREATURE,MyTypes.TERRAIN,Collisions.STANDARD_SLIDE); while (running) {     // handle key input    World.update();    World.render(); }

Kev

[Bombadil]

From my experience most of the time needed to finish a program isn't the code development itself. It's the uncountable tasks around: design, architecture, interfaces between the program and its outside world feeded by artists, level designers, musicans, (let's say data management), tools (this can be excessive), testing, profiling, tuning, debugging, deployment... to name some important ones.

Naturally, the langage is important, because it shouldn't hinder development but let you shape what's inside your head and on the design paper. That's why I choose Java over C++ any day, for example.

In a large development team there's people for all the different tasks usually, say some handle the data management, some the game logic, some the AI, some the 2d/3d graphics, some the tests, etc. In such teams it's possible that a few developers really program most of their time - but still they would like to choose a rock solid OO language being able to handle many thousands of lines of code from different people.
However, for small teams or one-man teams, the developer usually has to handle all the tasks alone...

That's why Blitzbasic won't help me with my spare time retro game project. Some nice tools [¹] and Java middle-wares would help however. :-)


[¹] Tailor made for my game of course, hehe.

[blahblahblahh]

WebStart is an installer.

I think the point being made was that webstart is an installer that *you don't see* (you click once, then it's done) as opposed to having to click-click-click...-(read text to choose one of eight different options)-...click-click etc

3> It is a language, libraries can be written, if absolutely needed.

That happy statement suggests you've not done much (complex/powerful) library writing before - a language can make it an absolute bitch to write libraries, or at the other extreme make it beautifully simple and stress free.

Even with all it's expressive power, polymorphism, etc, java is only 75% easy 25% hard along that scale from one extreme to the other - I've used languages that had much better support for writing libraries.

I suspect Blitz makes it really hard? We'd have to ask someone who'd tried doing something major to know...

In my case simple is exactly what I want, I'm never going to write a game that is like Doom or Quake. I'm more concerned about Solitare.

Great. Just be careful not to start games small that you hope to make big someday (perhaps on version 3 or similar) when you'll get bit on the ass . (been there, done that, bitter forever more )

JUnit has nothing to do with Java the language it's just a library, same could be written for Blitz.

One would hope so. However, c.f. above comment on library writing - it might turn out to be prohibitively difficult and/or tiresome and fiddly to write / maintain / use depending upon Blitz's language-level support for libraries.

[blahblahblahh]

I was talking to a collegue about writing a Blitz style library based ontop of JME today

It's been mooted before a couple of times, hasn't it, although without much of a strong reception?. Cas has briefly been a cheerleader for it. Is this something the GTG could do particularly well post-JOGL? They've got some experience now of releasing a game-dev support lib, maintaining it, managing the project, etc?

[kevglass]

Actually, looking at JME, it might be pretty easy just to write. Should I ever get the data off my laptop and finish GB, I'll probably consider it my next project

Kev

[princec]

Consider using SPGL and LWJGL as a base for it.
A lot of Blitzness can be achieved with static import.

Cas

[kevglass]

I have to say I was thinking of emulating Blitz3D not Blitz2D.. the problem still lies in the size of the VM tho

Kev

Games published by our own members! Check 'em out!

[princec]

Pretend you don't have that problem and use my micro-VM as a base. With careful fiddling I think another meg could be shaved off the micro-VM bringing it down to 1.5MB.

Cas

[kevglass]

A scarifice worth taking to get the Java language but I'd be worried about licensing restrictions

Kev

[cfmdobbie]

How about keeping a micro-VM as one possible option?

When it comes down to it, the library is entirely deployment-agnostic - it just cares that the Java platform is available to it.  Whether the user wants to distribute a VM, deploy over WebStart, natively compile, or use an embedded VM is their choice - you safely ignore that legality entirely.

[kevglass]

Ah, but with a Micro-VM you don't have the complete "Java Platform" available. Thats why its "micro", lots of stuff has been stripped out and any library must not get dependant on stuff that has been stripped.

Kev

[princec]

It's pretty easy to steer clear of stuff that's stripped out because 75% of the current J2SE is totally irrelevant for games programming. And the rest is AWT, which is the only thing you've really got to look out for.

As Charlie says, don't worry about the licensing - it's not your problem.

Cas

[blahblahblahh]

How about keeping a micro-VM as one possible option?

When it comes down to it, the library is entirely deployment-agnostic - it just cares that the Java platform is available to it.  Whether the user wants to distribute a VM, deploy over WebStart, natively compile, or use an embedded VM is their choice - you safely ignore that legality entirely.

...and then someone can make the fabled oft-wished-for "native webstart installer" that triggers off webstart links on machiens without Java and offers the user the choice "install java? ...or... install mini-java (tiny download) for this game only?".

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