ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta

SDL Development
21

Well, more like pygame… pygame’s the main SDL binding for python.
It’s also what people new to game development should use instead of
game maker :wink: kidding

grats on your port!On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 12:42 PM, Pierre Phaneuf wrote:

On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 7:39 PM, Mason Wheeler wrote:

For the record, JEDI-SDL is not “a port of SDL to Object Pascal.” No such port exists, and it would be more trouble than it’s worth to try to create one. JEDI-SDL it’s a collection of Object Pascal headers that allow OP compilers to interface with the SDL libraries. It uses the “real” SDL DLLs written in C, the exact same ones you use in your C/C++ development, and except in a few very specific cases, it doesn’t introduce any new code. It just enables people to use this wonderful collection of C libraries from a language other than C.

It’s something like PySDL, that kind of stuff.

22

Well, more like pygame… pygame’s the main SDL binding for python.
It’s also what people new to game development should use instead of
game maker :wink: kidding

grats on your port!

Depends on how serious you are. I wouldn’t recommend either Game Maker
or Python, or anything but a full-featured, compiled-to-native-code language,
(such as C or Object Pascal), to a newcomer who wants to build a serious
game. As a friend of mine put it, “Python loves you and wants you to be
happy.” And that’s great if you already know what you’re doing. But if not, you
need to learn the fundamentals so you’ll understand what’s going on. If you start
off with something that insulates you from the workings of the system, you’re
just “programming by coincidence,” and then when (not if, when) something
goes very badly wrong, you won’t know why, or how to fix it, or where to even
start looking for the answer to those two questions.

Having said that, if you’re working on a trivial game, or if you’re an experienced
coder who knows how everything works already, feel free to use whatever “loves
you and wants you to be happy” system you want to. But that’s a lousy place
to start learning serious coding.

“Let’s start at the very beginning, / a very good place to start.”

  • The Sound of Music>----- Original Message ----

From: Ren? Dudfield
Subject: Re: [SDL] ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta…

23

agreed! people should learn assembly && C && python(or other
modern scripting languages) && (GLSL,HLSL) && level editors &&
sound programs && graphics programs && etc… for creating
games.

More people complete games with easier tools though. I’ve seen heaps
of people start with C++ and never get past creating an engine, but
I’ve seen heaps of people start with simpler things and complete basic
games.

cu,On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 9:26 AM, Mason Wheeler wrote:

----- Original Message ----

From: Ren? Dudfield <@Rene_Dudfield>
Subject: Re: [SDL] ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta…

Well, more like pygame… pygame’s the main SDL binding for python.
It’s also what people new to game development should use instead of
game maker :wink: kidding

grats on your port!

Depends on how serious you are. I wouldn’t recommend either Game Maker
or Python, or anything but a full-featured, compiled-to-native-code language,
(such as C or Object Pascal), to a newcomer who wants to build a serious
game. As a friend of mine put it, “Python loves you and wants you to be
happy.” And that’s great if you already know what you’re doing. But if not, you
need to learn the fundamentals so you’ll understand what’s going on. If you start
off with something that insulates you from the workings of the system, you’re
just “programming by coincidence,” and then when (not if, when) something
goes very badly wrong, you won’t know why, or how to fix it, or where to even
start looking for the answer to those two questions.

Having said that, if you’re working on a trivial game, or if you’re an experienced
coder who knows how everything works already, feel free to use whatever “loves
you and wants you to be happy” system you want to. But that’s a lousy place
to start learning serious coding.

“Let’s start at the very beginning, / a very good place to start.”

  • The Sound of Music

SDL mailing list
SDL at lists.libsdl.org
http://lists.libsdl.org/listinfo.cgi/sdl-libsdl.org

24

agreed! people should learn assembly && C && python(or other
modern scripting languages) && (GLSL,HLSL) && level editors &&
sound programs && graphics programs && etc… for creating
games.

More people complete games with easier tools though. I’ve seen heaps
of people start with C++ and never get past creating an engine, but
I’ve seen heaps of people start with simpler things and complete basic
games.

Exactly. Basic games can be done on basic tools, as long as you stay within
the nice little basic box they define for you. But to write a serious game, you
need to build your own box, and that means writing your own engine. And
trying to take any shortcuts when doing that is asking for trouble when
something gets broken.

I’ve spent the last year and a half working on a project similar to Game Maker.
I built an engine that worked great, right up until I added one feature too many,
using threading techniques I didn’t understand well enough. It b0rked the
entire engine and left it unusable. Now I’m rebuilding it from the ground up with
a more stable framework and taking the time to understand all my components.

To accomplish all that, it took Delphi (native-code language), Asphyre (Delphi
multimedia framework, similar to the SDL video system), SDL_Mixer
(Asphyre’s sound-handling sucks), RemObjects PascalScript (scripting
language), a good strong dose of Photoshop, and a handful of optimizations
in inline assembly. And I’m currently working on building the level editor and
moving everything over from Asphyre to a pure SDL framework, and I’m
planning on implementing some of the trickier visual effects in GLSL. Your
list of what it really takes is quite accurate.>----- Original Message ----

From: Ren? Dudfield
Subject: Re: [SDL] ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta…

25

And that’s great if you already know what you’re doing. But if not, you
need to learn the fundamentals so you’ll understand what’s going on. If you start
off with something that insulates you from the workings of the system, you’re
just “programming by coincidence,” and then when (not if, when) something
goes very badly wrong, you won’t know why, or how to fix it, or where to even
start looking for the answer to those two questions.

I’m playing Battlefield 2142 at the moment, and it seems that using a
low-level language/platform does NOT necessarily ensure that you know
what you’re doing. The most damning is probably their input system
based on something like SDL_GetKeyState, even for input boxes. Result:
they lose keys on a frighteningly regular basis. Really annoying when
you’re changing kit and spawning, only to find out you’ve got the
sniper kit instead of the engineer kit with tanks coming at you…On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 5:26 PM, Mason Wheeler wrote:

–

26

I’m playing Battlefield 2142 at the moment, and it seems that using a
low-level language/platform does NOT necessarily ensure that you know
what you’re doing. The most damning is probably their input system
based on something like SDL_GetKeyState, even for input boxes. Result:
they lose keys on a frighteningly regular basis. Really annoying when
you’re changing kit and spawning, only to find out you’ve got the
sniper kit instead of the engineer kit with tanks coming at you…

Yeah, I’ve heard about that one. It gets particularly bad if you try to type
something while in the middle of some heavy visual effect that drops your
framerate, right? And yes, proper language choice doesn’t automatically
mean you know the fundamentals. But it means you can learn them, which
you can’t do if the language insulates you from what’s really going on.>----- Original Message ----

From: Pierre Phaneuf
Subject: Re: [SDL] ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta…

27

I loved GM but it’s like you said exactly. I used it even earlier than 03 but in a bbs system change (They called it that) my time in changed. Most of my time those years I used it I wasted in my opinion. I guess some of that leaked through in my post here. Sorry.

http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=410483&st=0#entry2974791

---- Mason Wheeler wrote:=============

----- Original Message ----

From: Ren? Dudfield
Subject: Re: [SDL] ANN : Game Maker 7.x for MacOS X enters private beta…

Well, more like pygame… pygame’s the main SDL binding for python.
It’s also what people new to game development should use instead of
game maker :wink: kidding

grats on your port!

Depends on how serious you are. I wouldn’t recommend either Game Maker
or Python, or anything but a full-featured, compiled-to-native-code language,
(such as C or Object Pascal), to a newcomer who wants to build a serious
game. As a friend of mine put it, “Python loves you and wants you to be
happy.” And that’s great if you already know what you’re doing. But if not, you
need to learn the fundamentals so you’ll understand what’s going on. If you start
off with something that insulates you from the workings of the system, you’re
just “programming by coincidence,” and then when (not if, when) something
goes very badly wrong, you won’t know why, or how to fix it, or where to even
start looking for the answer to those two questions.

Having said that, if you’re working on a trivial game, or if you’re an experienced
coder who knows how everything works already, feel free to use whatever “loves
you and wants you to be happy” system you want to. But that’s a lousy place
to start learning serious coding.

“Let’s start at the very beginning, / a very good place to start.”

  • The Sound of Music

SDL mailing list
SDL at lists.libsdl.org
http://lists.libsdl.org/listinfo.cgi/sdl-libsdl.org

28

Yeah, I’ve heard about that one. It gets particularly bad if you try to type
something while in the middle of some heavy visual effect that drops your
framerate, right?

Exactly.

And yes, proper language choice doesn’t automatically
mean you know the fundamentals. But it means you can learn them, which
you can’t do if the language insulates you from what’s really going on.

This particular problem (and most of the things that annoy me with
BF2142) would probably be exactly the same with pygame or some other
wrapper like that. That said, it’s the kind of thing I would
personally put in a game engine (“ok, this is a text field, use events
rather than key state”), but such thing can be done well or badly
either in C or in Python.

I think the real thing is to use a low-level library to know what’s
going on. Your code can be Python, Perl or C, it doesn’t really
matter, what matters is that you’re using a low level enough API. A
simple Python wrapper around SDL would be fine, but maybe pygame has
higher-level constructs, I don’t know.

And I suspect a “Game Maker” style IDE would probably be worst. :wink:

But sometimes you don’t really want to learn everything, you just want
to make a fun little game, that can be the ticket. I remember having
tons of fun in the olden days with things like Adventure Construction
Set and Pinball Construction Set, yet I knew I couldn’t just go and
call myself a game developer after playing with those. It’s like the
difference between using Legos and being a proper engineer, but
there’s plenty of fun to be had with Legos! ;-)On Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 8:06 PM, Mason Wheeler wrote:

–