Complete Game Tutorial wanted

www.gametutorials.com has some nice programming tutorials for beginners. I''d also recommend www.cprogramming.com.

I too feel your pain.
But not everybody wants to read about the same stuff.
I'd like to read that kind of tutorial too. But without DLLs please.
I want the code to be portable ...
It couldn't cover DirectX, OpenGl, Allegro AND SDL ...

It would be a bit much to expect somebody to write a complete tutorial and share it for free.
Guess you can't really complain.
If everything you were talking about was in a tutorial, then it would be more of a book.
Guess it is more fun to write about a cool wrapper you wrote than writing about programming basics.

I tried to start a project btw.
A community that works on projects with in depth documentation.
But people didn't exactly jump at it ...

Something like that is what I had in mind:
Breaktris tutorial (work in progress and maybe abandoned)
But because I suck the tutorial would be bad for you.

I am trying to digest a lot of new info every day.
But I'm about to give up. I never understand other people's source code.
I never understand enough of tutorials to come up with my own stuff ( VFS, PAK files ... )
I try, but I waste a lot of time and eventually I end up in a dead end.

But there are many other people who succeed eventually.
Guess they read the right stuff. Guess they buy the right books.
I don't think they just read the one tutorial that explains it all!

Maybe you should look for books worth buying instead.
And maybe start with 2 dimensions ...

---
If nothing works the way it should ... maybe you need a break!?
Get cracking and double-check the switch statements!!
Tolop|Andyart.de

[edited by - Clueless on May 15, 2004 11:31:59 AM]

quote:

---

Original post by Clueless
I never understand enough of tutorials to come up with my own stuff ( VFS, PAK files ... )

---

.pak and .pk3 files are just .zip files with a changed extension. How''s that for encouragement?

I meant creating an own package file format ... like Wad files.
I know there is an article ( Creating a PAK File Format ) about that.
When I read it everything makes sense. I don''t even know where the problem is ...
... guess I can''t organize anything well enough to be a (good)programmer.

You want a book.

Or you have to search for all these parts on the web!


--
You''re Welcome,
Rick Wong
- sitting in his chair doing the most time-consuming thing..

quote:

---

www.gametutorials.com has some nice programming tutorials for beginners. I''d also recommend www.cprogramming.com.

---

Sorry Goldfish, it''s good advice but if you''d read the post properly you would see that he wants a tutorial that steps through all aspects of a game in detail.

What would be best is if someone took a (smallish but feature-filled) game engine and actually did step through each part of it, discussing in detail what everything is for, why it is used, how it is used, etc. I think this is what Dravidian Kayne means but let me just reinforce it.



Stay Clausal,

Red Sodium

For simple starting with dll''s have a look at this.



http://www.flipcode.com/tutorials/tut_dll01.shtml

Thanks red_sodium, you hit the nail dead-center.

And about books....I''ve looked at nearly EVERY book possible to buy, and they all teach you how to program like a guru and skip the steps to get there. Even the books that are for game development, like Paraglyph''s Game Coding Complete, or Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Guru (both of which I have read from cover to cover more than once) don''t even go into any detail about HOW to program a game. They start losing you on chapter 2 or 3 once they start talking about some sophisticated code they got from work, and they don''t even understand how exactly it works.

Tutorials are not things you generally find in books...and that''s what I want, is a tutorial. I want to find someone who has made a game and can step me through the process of cloning that game...even down to the non-programming aspects such as creating digital music and animating 3D models (which I find there is not too many tutorials that actually show how to impliment 3D models into your program very well).

Well I know I''m stabbing in the dark and I''ll most-likely not find a tutorial like this, so I''ll probably have to spend YEARS learning to program (past the years I''ve already spent) instead of having someone actually sit down and map it out for us more visual learners.

Dravidian Kayne~

I''ve heard Programming Role Playing Games with DirectX is pretty good, I havn''t read it myself however. It seems kind of like what you are looking for.

Oh and btw....www.gametutorials.com is probably the BEST tutorials I''ve found so far....and yet they still don''t let me know what I''m doing. GameTutorials is one of the first sites I ever found when I was learning to program. Thanks for the help though.

Dravidian Kayne~

if you cannot under stand any of the game development books you''ve been able to find, it you may be having trouble grasping some of the basic programming concepts, i would recommend going back and at least refreshing yourself on your language first.

once you understand how to use your IDE/compiler (using multiple file workspaces, passing data between files, etc. i would suggest this http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=192483 (A full game tutorial)


___________________
-Nicholas Anton, Owner RaptorTech
-Admin(at)Raptor85.com

Quote:
i would recommend going back and at least refreshing yourself on your language first

I guess that was the plan!? Right? Understanding the language rather than just using it ... ?

Not sure how helpful this link is ... but I think the explanations go a bit deeper than in most other tutorials.
I think it is good in combination with the cplusplus.com stuff.
C++ FAQ LITE

[edited by - Clueless on May 15, 2004 9:56:36 PM]

Short answer: Tutorial

Long answer: No such thing as a professional tutorial. Stock up on some math/physics books. Add a couple of C++ texts, and some programming theory books. Dedicate 2 years into learning theory and its applications and then write your game. There''s no easy way out nor is there instant gratification present here. It''s hard work. Realize that or just find something else to occupy your time. We''ll be happy to help you if you''re serious about sticking through.

Have some imagination and try things. Gather information from as many turorials, articles, books, white papers, etc as you can then see what you can so with what you know. Don''t be afraid to go out on a limb and try something different, worst that can happen is it doesn''t work and then you''ve learned from it. You''re not going to have someone there to hold your hand all the way through development.

Making a game is like trying to write a poem in Italian. First you have to learn the language, right? Focus on that first, because you won''t be able to write anything but gibberish if you don''t. After you''ve learned the language, you''re ready to start studying the art of poetry: structuring words and phrases so that they create something beautiful. Study what methods others used to do this, then try some of it on your own while developing your own unique understanding of it. In the end, the only way you''ll be able to get anything good out is by doing it many times. Everyone goes through the "where the hell are they getting all this from?" stage. Just push forward, make sure you have a good understanding of the coding language, and study others'' code while trying to find your own way of doing it. That''s really all you can do.

On probably a more helpful note, www.32bits.co.uk has some of the best tutorials I''ve ever read. Real simple, the writer is constantly assuming that you don''t know what he''s talking about. Look in the DirectX 9 tutorials, as that''s where he takes you through building up a simple game engine.

If you want a complete resource on how to construct and design a 3D game engine, then I highly suggest 3D Game Engine Design by Eberly. It doesn''t use any code ( nor should it, you should know how to program before you attempt to make a game ), it just goes through design situations and how to do things. Good book I''ve used countless times.

Oh, you need to be pretty ok at maths though to understand that book. Not much more than you need to be to be able to properly make games anyway, so it''s no biggie.

However, if you want more specific details on things ( you mentioned model loading ), then just grab the file format and implement it yourself instead of ripping it from a tutorial. You''ll learn much more that way.

Since you said "YOU STILL DON''T KNOW HOW TO PROGRAM", then I take it you''re expecting to learn how to program by a tutorial on an aspect of game programming..? Why? As I said before, you should be able to program before trying to program a game.

You have to remember that you''re unique, just like everybody else.

quote:

---

Original post by Ceoddyn
I''ve heard Programming Role Playing Games with DirectX is pretty good, I havn''t read it myself however. It seems kind of like what you are looking for.

---

I believe this is what you want, the book steps through making a complete RPG from scratch..first game programming book I bought and it helped me a whole damn lot to get a much better understanding of how a complete game works.


-Luctus
..I''m also moronophobic
[Mail]

Just a clarification, the quote "YOU STILL DON''T KNOW HOW TO PROGRAM" was how I felt after reading those books. To let you all know, I know how to program well and have done C++ console games for years. I''ve recently crossed over to Win32 and I understand it pretty dang well, but no offense to those book writers, but they suck at explaining. Also, I''ve taken MANY math and physics courses and understand fundamentals that half of you haven''t ever heard of. I think more of what I need is a DirectX Bible, or C++ Bible, or something like that, so I can have all the resources at my fingertips.

So to clarify, I''m not an idiot...I have a 192 IQ (as of 2003), but my problem is that I can learn more in a weekend on my own than I can learn in a quarter of college. Taking "time" to learn things isn''t my style. I cram my head with all the info I can as quickly as I can, then use that knowledge to my benefit.

So that explains why I''m interested in a REAL tutorial. I want to actually "see" how it is done, without the use of 3rd party things such as wrappers. I want to know the hard code of how the things work. For example, if you''re a pilot, you fly planes. You know how to fly them how you were shown to fly them. But do you really know what''s going on in the engine? Do you know how many ounces of fuel you''re burning per second? Most pilots don''t. I want to be the pilot that KNOWS everything about my plane, to the last scratch. A pilot can''t simply look up all that info on his own, because it''d take years. But if he asks the pros that made the stuff, he can find out every little detail in a matter of days, maybe hours.

I haven''t looked at the last couple links provided and I hope they help me a little more. Thanks for all your inputs, it''s really appreciated. Once I understand all this stuff fully, maybe I''ll write a 3D Gaming Tutorial for Dummies or something like that. Peace out all.

Dravidian Kayne~

Step 1: Come up with an idea/problem.
Step 2:

function solve_problem(problem big_problem)
{
   problem subproblem[] = determine_subproblems(big_problem)
    for(i=0;i<subproblem.length;i++)
      solve_problem(subproblem[i])
}
  

The problem with the idea of a universal game programming tutorial is that it can't help you if you have no idea what you are trying to do. If you don't know what you are tryiing to accomplish, neither will anyone else. A bottom-up only approach doesn't scale to large projects. Sorry.

For every possible problem you come up with, chances are someone has solved it.

Get some books on software algorithms, programming paradigms, software enginerring, etc. The public library is your friend.



[edited by - igni ferroque on May 16, 2004 6:27:43 PM]