I'm casually thinking about attempting to make my own dizzy game. I'm just wondering how many of you thought "no way can I do that" after reading some of what you have to do before you made your first game?. Is it as complicated as it looks? I know there are tutorials out there to help, but will they help someone with *no* programming knowledge at all?
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So my advice would be view those tutorials Jamie kindly did, they worked for me to learn & go from there...
I’m casually thinking about attempting to make my own dizzy game. I’m just wondering how many of you thought “no way can I do that” after reading some of what you have to do before you made your first game?. Is it as complicated as it looks? I know there are tutorials out there to help, but will they help someone with *no* programming knowledge at all?
[/quote]Hi Boo, I thought exactly that, no way can I make a game and no way could I until Jamie (Delta) did the tutorials. If you want to attempt making one I highly recommend you view these. I was always impressed by these guys who could & made the fan games.
Although I had one or two disagreements (or maybe better put differance of opinion) regarding some of the comments made by Jamie in reference to the comp there was no way without his tutorials could I ever of attempted to create a Dizzy game in the first place and now ive just completed my second soon to be released. Not only that he was extremely helpful as are a few of the others that can assist with coding queries if your able to get to grips with it somewhat.So my advice would be view those tutorials Jamie kindly did, they worked for me to learn & go from there...
basically i made the tutorials because I know how daunting it is to even think about making your own game. They are made assuming that the person watching has no prior knowledge of DizzyAGE at all, and should enable you to write a game with some basic (but essential) interactions.
What you have to remember is that we all started somewhere! there are also manuals that give you a basic idea of how to do stuff too.
good luck, and have fun! :smile:
What you have to remember is that we all started somewhere! there are also manuals that give you a basic idea of how to do stuff too.
good luck, and have fun! :smile:
Well other then members help i useed the books for get the foundations (as there was not videos then) and still have been refer to them now.. alwyas forget things, check bits of code or new stuff.
The tutorials are a great place to start but after that i think its easier and qucker to just laod up the book and follow that, than haveing pause a video or keep playing bits back,
(i've never wached the videos so i dunno what they're like)
The only thing is you need Patience to learn, I've been playing around with Dizzy age for about 3 years and im still learning (but im also a bit thick so you'll probably pick it up much faster)
The tutorials are a great place to start but after that i think its easier and qucker to just laod up the book and follow that, than haveing pause a video or keep playing bits back,
(i've never wached the videos so i dunno what they're like)
The only thing is you need Patience to learn, I've been playing around with Dizzy age for about 3 years and im still learning (but im also a bit thick so you'll probably pick it up much faster)
thanks everyone for the input....feel a tiny bit more confident to do it now...when I can find the time to sit down and read it all properly :smile:
If I can make a game, you definitely can. My basic understanding of the coding is copy and pasting the bits that I've miraculously got to work. I learnt from Jamie's tutorials as well. I say learnt but, as I said earlier, I just copied the bits of code that he typed. So yeah, video tutorials and the manuals. Good luck, buddy!
I've come up against my first problem (yes, so soon lol). When I try run the bat file for the sample "hello world" program, it flashes up then disappears straight away. Is it supposed to do that?
The console program that comes with the gs9 book is designed to help you learn more about programming in GS9 by running your small examples. It has not much to do with DizzyAGE games except that gs9 is the language used by the DizzyAGE scripts.
Beside the default commands from gs9, the dizzyage engine adds new specific commands that work only in dizzyage games (not in the console).
The gs9 console should wait for a key press after it runs the code. But if that doesn't happen for you, run it from a console... ah confusing? Press the windows start button, select run, type cmd, change directory to where the gs9 console and your program are and run console.exe program.txt (or the .bat file).
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Putting this aside, maybe going directly into the scripting book is not the best approach for everyone. Even if the GS9 book is written for totally beginners I think most of the dizzyage developers started with the DizzyAGE book or with the editor book. Or even with the video tutorials. And they read the gs9 book for more details on the scripting part.
There isn't a particular order to go through these materials, so feel free to explore whatever comes easier to you.
Alex
Beside the default commands from gs9, the dizzyage engine adds new specific commands that work only in dizzyage games (not in the console).
The gs9 console should wait for a key press after it runs the code. But if that doesn't happen for you, run it from a console... ah confusing? Press the windows start button, select run, type cmd, change directory to where the gs9 console and your program are and run console.exe program.txt (or the .bat file).
-------------
Putting this aside, maybe going directly into the scripting book is not the best approach for everyone. Even if the GS9 book is written for totally beginners I think most of the dizzyage developers started with the DizzyAGE book or with the editor book. Or even with the video tutorials. And they read the gs9 book for more details on the scripting part.
There isn't a particular order to go through these materials, so feel free to explore whatever comes easier to you.
Alex
I think I got that :smile:
I've made a 3 room map with one puzzle, I'm going to try code that. And if I'm successful with that I'll try something on a slightly bigger scale and attempt an actual game.
I've made a 3 room map with one puzzle, I'm going to try code that. And if I'm successful with that I'll try something on a slightly bigger scale and attempt an actual game.
Good stuff, sounds positive..good luck..
Hi Boo
I know what it's like having made my first game a few months ago as a complete novice. If you're anything like me the tutorials are like learning a foreign language, but do persist cos although there is loads of frustration in trying to make things work, the sense of achievement when you get something to work is unbelievable. Read the tutorials till you're blue in the face. Watch Jamie's videos over and over again. Crack open Mushroom Pie and pull the map apart to check all the 'action blocks' and try to match them to the coding. Plus think of the engine as being stupid and you have to tell it exactly what to do and in what order.
And if it's any help here are some basic tips that I found very useful.
Check your spelling. It's so easy to put a lowercase character instead of an uppercase character in some of the basic functions such as ObjGet, ObjFind, ObjSet etc as the engine won't recognise it during the game, but will ignore it during the initial loading check.
Never put an semi-colon at the end of a func line or at the end of an 'if' or an 'else' statement.
Always use ObjGet(ObjFind ... to check the status etc of an object and ObjSet(ObjFind ... to alter the status etc of something. Obvious, but took me ages to properly figure out.
When using an 'if' statement in an ActionObject sequence end each 'section' with 'return;' before starting the next 'if' line. Not vital, but unless the coding is spot on the engine will sometimes just continue with the next part of the sequence. Also, always use curly brackets after the 'if' statement to contain the commands.
Always use 'else' when starting a new section of a UseObject sequence, and again use the curly brackets after an 'if' statement.
And of course enclose the whole 'func' within curly brackets.
If it helps, try unpacking Daisy Goes Solo and look at the game script file. For the early parts I tried to include as much detail as I could to explain what I was trying to do.
Hope this is useful - now to put my own query on the site.
Grandad
I know what it's like having made my first game a few months ago as a complete novice. If you're anything like me the tutorials are like learning a foreign language, but do persist cos although there is loads of frustration in trying to make things work, the sense of achievement when you get something to work is unbelievable. Read the tutorials till you're blue in the face. Watch Jamie's videos over and over again. Crack open Mushroom Pie and pull the map apart to check all the 'action blocks' and try to match them to the coding. Plus think of the engine as being stupid and you have to tell it exactly what to do and in what order.
And if it's any help here are some basic tips that I found very useful.
Check your spelling. It's so easy to put a lowercase character instead of an uppercase character in some of the basic functions such as ObjGet, ObjFind, ObjSet etc as the engine won't recognise it during the game, but will ignore it during the initial loading check.
Never put an semi-colon at the end of a func line or at the end of an 'if' or an 'else' statement.
Always use ObjGet(ObjFind ... to check the status etc of an object and ObjSet(ObjFind ... to alter the status etc of something. Obvious, but took me ages to properly figure out.
When using an 'if' statement in an ActionObject sequence end each 'section' with 'return;' before starting the next 'if' line. Not vital, but unless the coding is spot on the engine will sometimes just continue with the next part of the sequence. Also, always use curly brackets after the 'if' statement to contain the commands.
Always use 'else' when starting a new section of a UseObject sequence, and again use the curly brackets after an 'if' statement.
And of course enclose the whole 'func' within curly brackets.
If it helps, try unpacking Daisy Goes Solo and look at the game script file. For the early parts I tried to include as much detail as I could to explain what I was trying to do.
Hope this is useful - now to put my own query on the site.
Grandad