Prototyping in C++

I have been playing around with the 2dBoy Framework which uses C++ and SDL. I have been prototyping a new FIFO system to handle different requests that come from the enemies so everyone gets a chance to move, fire, etc. I am currently working on the movement code so each enemy can fly a unique route. Hopefully, I'll have a new version of Old Skool up on Game Jolt soon.

Old Skool Shmup is on GameJolt

Check it out here

Thanks to the Flixel forums for helping me realize that after creating an object I need to add it to the FlxG.state so it will show up and run its animations. I still need to add sound effects and keep increasing the difficulty each time a level is cleared. The aliens probably need a few more patterns too.

Old Skool Shmup lives!!!

Old Skool Shmup is finally working in silverlight. I have one version of alien with two attack modes implemented. The aliens on the left hand of the screen attack to the right and the aliens on the right hand side attack to the left. I spent quite some time hacking together code to pick which alien to go into attack mode. I eventually scrapped it and am currently using FlxArray::GetRandom() to pick the next attacker. I am currently working on implementing explosions which for some reason aren't showing up yet. I suspect I am doing something wrong with the Flixel animation code but at this point have no clue.

Visual Studio 2010 Silverlight quirk?

I have been messing around with Visual Studio 2010 RC and I noticed that if I create a new Silverlight project and add a button or a text box that nothing is displayed when I run my program. If I upgraded an existing Visual Studio 2008 Silverlight project to Visual Studio 2010 everything displayed normally. What is going on? I found that looking at the MainPage.xaml the 2008 Silverlight project had two lines that the 2010 Silverlight project did not. I added those two lines to the 2010 Silverlight and it started working. These are the lines I added:


xmlns:navigation="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Controls;assembly=System.Windows.Controls.Navigation"
xmlns:uriMapper="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Navigation;assembly=System.Windows.Controls.Navigation"

I also added a reference to System.Windows.Controls.Navigation.

Any comments? Anyone else seen this problem?

Flixel Rocks

I have been playing around with FlashDevelop and Flixel, trying to learn a little about Flash development when I found this Flixel is a great middleware product that handles a lot of the game for you. I have my shmup space ship flying around and the menus, and credits done already. If your developing games for Flash, Silverlight, or the Iphone give Flixel a
look .

Creating a game in Silverlight

Lately, I've been learning about Silverlight. It seems like a good fit with my skill set, I'm already familar with Visual Studio, C# , and .NET. So I thought I'd try to convert my shmup from Gamemaker to Silverlight. Stay tuned for all the gory details.

Destructoid article

Just read a great article on Destructoid about why 8bit games?here

Visual Studio STL problems

I found an interesting read about Visual Studio STL problems, here . It looks like Electronic Arts also had a problem with STL, here .

Updated Game

Still working on my first game, added sounds and another level. Check it out here .

First Prototype

I finally finished my first prototype with GameMaker! I made an Old Skool Shump. It was a lot of fun. Check it out here.

I have been reading a lot of blogs recently about Game design, my favorite so far is this one: How Much Work Does It Take To Become A Great Game Developer? I figure at the rate I'm going only 8 more years to become a competent game developer.

Game Maker Impressions

I have been evaluating Game Maker for the past week or so. My impressions so far are favorable, Game Maker seems like an affordable, easy to use game platform. I have been following Derek Yu’s tutorial Game Maker For Beginners: Part I which is a pretty good introduction. I wholeheartedly recommend http://www.tigsource.com/ as a great site for aspiring game developers.

During my explorations I came across Jonathan Biddle’s Explodemon prototype created using Game Maker. See it here for an example of what can be done with Game Maker. Jonathan Biddle’s work is awesome, I highly recommend checking out his site: http://www.onebitbeyond.com/

Welcome

This is where I'll be talking about the path I'm taking as I learn to make games. I am a professional software programmer but I have never programmed graphics before. I suck as an artist so I want to stick to characters that are easy to draw. I am not musically inclined so I'll be sticking to simple sounds and effects. I want to explore what tools are out there to help create games. I also want to learn more about the business side of game making so I'll be talking about that too.