SOME HELPFUL ADVICE FOR THE 360 DEV.

Peter D. has published some tips that will help you avoid the "memory wall" you may find when developing games for the XBox 360.

From Microsoft's forums: "I mentioned in a previous thread, that developers need to be careful when creating their games as the 360 has only 512mb of ram available. I noticed recently that as more people start to use the XNA launcher, they are running into this memory wall.

So here are my top tips to help avoid the wall ..."

Want to know more, follow this link.

TUTORIAL: XNA COLLISION DETECTION FOR 3D MODELS (PARTS 2 & 3)

Sharky's has published parts 2 and 3 of his formerly 2-part tutorial series called "XNA Collision Detection for 3D models".


For those of you who didn't read part 1, please go and check it now!

Also there's some sample code you can download and read through the code.

Enjoy!

ARTICLE: "GATES TAKES ON SONY AND NINTENDO"

GameIndustry.biz has published an article that summarizes Bill Gates' comments -interviewed by Dean Takahashi of the San Jose Mercury News, regarding how good the different strategies of the major console makers are doing so far, in his opinion of course.

As an indie, and from now on I will only refer to the 'game development' side of the story, I agree that the XBOX360 will do great since MS has decided to make the "development transition" easy for us: XNA.

I mean, the easier they make it for developers, the more developer's attention -and projects- they'll get, and ultimately, the more games will be created and released for their console.

If -in addition- "easy" includes "cheapper", the better.

Please do not misunderstand me, I'm not saying with this that console makers should make less restrictive the quality assurance policies and controls for commercial games. All I am saying is don't forget "indies", thus, help us produce for your consoles by providing better and affordable tools and frameworks, reducing the cost of game development (including time and effort as a "cost").

XNA GSE goes in that way, the right way imho ... ;)

INFINITY: A SPACE-BASED MMOG

What an excellent way to publish my first post of this new year 2007 by talking about this amazing game that is being created: "Infinity". The guys behind this new production have posted great videos and images that really do a great job of showing off what the game is about.

Also, the "Journal of Ysaneya" is very interesting to follow -for us, developers- since it comments on the status of the game, the coding challenges they face to fix bugs, improve the gameplay, implement new features, etc.

Pay a visit to Infity's site, read the journal and don't forget to download the combat prototype and join the battle between the read & blue teams.

Cheers!

NVIDIA GEFORCE 8800 LAUNCH EVENT VIDEO

Published on GameTrailers.com, the video shows a few but still impressive images of what the new card has to offer to gamers and why not, developers.

If the computer-hardware industry continues to grow like this, and users eventually buy this powerhouses, techinques like static lightmapping may become an antique.

Coming next: XNA - Part 2 ...

MY FIRST GRAPHIC AD: REALM CRAFTER

Wow! I'm excited ... I have witnessed the appearance of a graphic ad in my blog: "Realm Crafter - Make Your Own MMORPG". Sometimes it shows up at the top-left corner of the side bar.

It's very difficult to get those kind of ads even if you set "Only graphic ads". Believe me ...

This blog is going up in the world ... ;)

Anyway, Realm Crafter is a framework that helps you create a Masive-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG). Until this year-end (December 31st, 2006) you can buy the current version for only $65 and get the upcoming version 2 for free.

If you want to know more about this promotion visit RC's site as well as check out the public portions of its forums to see some screenshots and read some news related to version 2.

Later.

DECEMBER 2006 DIRECTX SDK

Microsoft has released the latest SDK for DirectX.

Among what's new in the release you will find the official launch of DirectX 10.

I'm downloading it right now ...

XNA GSE V1.0 RELEASED!!!

As you may already known -given the large amount of blogs' news pointing out the same- XNA GSE v1.0 is out. Check the official words from the XNA Team itself.

One question though, any news regarding the release of TorqueX? We are still on December 11th ...

XBOX 360: BEYOND THE BOX

GameTrailers.com has also published a video with interviews to XBox360 product's managers who explain the new strategy on peripherals available for it: wireless technology.

I'm really a lazybones today, so this is it for one day!

WE ARE ALMOST THERE!

Yeap! December is comming ... sales, presents, christmas, XBOX360, PS3, Wii, XNA, TorqueX, Visual3D.Net ... phewww! Everything accelerates as we approach the year-end.

For us, "indies", it is a very important month as we are waiting for the final release of XNA GSE and with it, the parallel releases of TorqueX and Visual3D.Net.

Developers post questions over and over in every forum asking for CTPs, betas, demos, screenshots and such, as if they were children traveling in a car with their parents and continuously asking them: "Are we there yet?".

Patience. Even if they need some extra time to finish the products it will benefit us in the end: more stability, less bugs, more fun.

In the meantime, check "HeroEngine", it seems quite interesting. Unfortunately, neither demos nor prices are available in the site so I cannot comment about it (I don't know about the engine itself but the tools seem to be .NET-based). If someone has more information about this framework please drop me some lines.

Cheers!

A COUPLE OF INTERESTING ARTICLES

Checking my RSS subscriptions I have found two interesting articles:

1. Securing High-Score Games: an article of the latest "Casual Games Quarterly" publication (by the IGDA) which talks about the different ways to set up online secure high-score tables, and
2. Indies Will Lead The Way In Next-Gen Development: an article published by GamesIndustry.biz where it is pointed out that small teams will spread innovation.

Ah, yeah: don't forget to pay a visit to AniBoom's site and try to find my "crappy" 3d-animation. Remember that I said I had created it with v2.5 of a very well-known 3D-animation package. What are you waiting for? Just go and start searching for it ... it will amaze you ... ;)

Well, that's all for today.

USER-CREATED GAMES, XNA GSE & INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY

There is an interesting article that discusses the topic of intelectual property rights of games created and shared by community users of XNA Game Studio Express.

Also, you will find another article regarding user-created content and the PS3 (Shhht! Apparently this is a secret).

NEW VIDEO SHOWING XNA

The XNA Team has released a new video featuring games created with XNA.

In the video you will find games developed by members of the XNA community like Blobbit Dash, Sharky's Air Legends, and Particle Wars. Also, you will get a sneak preview of upcoming starter kits like "Pocket Jongg" and the superb "XNA Racer".

Enjoy!

BRING IT ON!!!

As announced, beta 2 version of XNA is out so for those of us who want to use C# to program videogames these will be interesting times.

Also, I have received an email message by GarageGame's postmaster announcing the closed beta program for TorqueX and at almost the same time RightRiot has confirmed that Visual3D.Net is coming towards the public beta release this month.

On the console fields, I have read an article published by Gamasutra where it is commented that Sony will be take more into account "indies" for game development for PS3 since, among other reasons, they deem XBox360 as its main direct competitor, mostly in the US market.

Thus, as said, everything is set for interesting times which will likely mean "opportunity".

The fun is about to start: many tests, assessment and decisions shall be done to choose the right framework but in the end, I guess we -"indie" developers- will be the winners.

MANAGED DIRECTX 2.0 NO MORE

Some of you may know that Microsoft had announced that the beta version of MDX 2.0 would expired on the first days of October 2006. As promised, it did. What is more, the beta has been removed from the latest SDK release.

Consequences? Either you go back to MDX 1.1 or move forward to XNA-supportive implementation.

Even though it has been clarified that XNA is not officially supported in the above-mentioned SDK, if you use and or ever used MDX 2.0, I believe that moving your programs to XNA is the right path to go -unless of course you cannot wait for its final release, given the features XNA currently offers as well as the upcoming ones.

So go ahead! Support XNA and please avoid the temptation of modifying the date in your system's clock to September 2006 ... ;)

GAME ENGINES AND OTHERS: PART 3 OF 3

At last! The final part of the series ...

Where were we? ... On part 1 I had introduced some general concepts about game engines and other components and on part 2 I had presented some examples for each category. Well, now is time to reduce the spectrum to .NET world.

There may be a lot of well-known components that I'll forget to mention (as wll as new additions made to the market and upcoming ones), so I recommend you for the n-th time to pay a visit to "DevMaster.net" and check the "3D Engines Database" section.

Not too many components were built for .NET using C# from scratch, but I can remember two of them which did: Purple# and Haddd.

Purple# was one of the first engines to appear that were written using C# 1.1 and if I remember well -please correct me if I'm wrong- it'd be ported to version 2.0 of .NET. However, things have been quiet for a while since no news have been posted and the forum's activity has almost stopped. Also, last time I checked the "Downloads" section had no files to download (?).

Tip: you can always use the rate of new posts, both for news and forum's threads, as a proxy of the activity related to the component's site. I mean, whether a component is still updated or under development, whether it has been abandoned by the developers and or its users, etc.

Haddd was one the most (relatively) recent ones to appear and was pretty much impressive. Open source, its rendering process was designed for the use of shaders (mostly, model 2 ones), a physics middleware was successfully plugged in and some AI implementations were interesting. Unfortunately, Haddd project was suddenly stopped. Fear not! Fortunately, the source code for the latest review was distributed free to the community and now there's a new successor: Jadengine.

What about components ported to .NET and or targeted for .NET but built upon non-NET components? "Err ... what? Please rephrase ..."

I remember AXIOM3D. This engine was built upon OGRE and let me tell you it was quite good on the offered features and open source. One of the things I liked most about it was the BSP implementation.

Then it came Realmforge GDK. Built upon AXIOM3D -but from a different team, this component was meant to ease your game-creation experience by providing a handy GUI which one could use to set and edit your worlds properties and such.

Both components were discontinued. Fear not ..... again! Visual3D.Net is on its way.

But, what is it? Well, to sum up, the next phase of evolution that results from the cumulative experiences of the developers of Realmforge3D (the original developer of AXIOM3D joined the project a few months ago). Correct me if I'm wrong but it has been built from scratch using C# and MDX so it's not AXIOM nor OGRE dependant anymore.

For what it can be seen in the screenshots and read in the forums, Visual3D.net promises to be a very useful framework when released with support to .NET Framework v2.0 and XNA Framework. A Community Technology Preview ("CTP") of Visual3D.net is comming this October so if you're interested don't forget to visit its site and sign up to get the latest news about the CTP.

Its nemesis? Or at least, for what I understand, TorqueX ... Garagegames' future product which is a combination of its newest product ("Torque Game Builder") and some features of other products (like "Torque Game Engine" and "Torque Shader Engine") all ported to XNA Framework. This also promises to be very useful so as to reduce coding time.

Some videos have been released to the public showing TorqueX's features and a public beta has been announced (even though no release date has been confirmed yet), so again if you're interested, go and sign up to receive the newsletter on the product.

As already said, Visual3D.net and TorqueX will both support XNA framework, so this match is going to be interesting ...

"Wait! You have mentioned XNA for the third time now ... but what is XNA?"

According to XNA's FAQ it "is not acronymed". XNA Framework is a collection of classes and tools that can be used for the production of DirectX-enabled programs with VisualStudio 2005 that can be run in both, PC and XBox 360 platforms. One of its most important features is the content pipeline it offers (a handy way of "incrementally" deal with your assets for the game, like meshes, music and sounds).

Think of it like the successor of Managed DirectX 2.0, given that it has been recently announced that no further development shall be provided for MDX 2.0. Sooooo, when you choose a component for your project bear this information in mind in order to avoid ugly surprises.

"Ok, but what is XNA Game Studio Express?". XNA GSE is the ... you know what? Just read it here (I promise I'll post my comments about it in future posts but currently you can find some source code for it I've already posted in this blog).

I cannot bring the series to a proper end without mentioning some other components that supports .NET technologies through the provision of wrappers which are worth checking:

• 3Impact,
  
• Irrlitch,
  
• SDL.NET, and
  
• Truevision3D.

I could include "3DState" to that list since it has been around for a long time now, but last time I checked there were no news nor forum page. The website was revamped with some flash components but it seems that there is no sign of further activity (?).

Remember MAC developers to check "Unity3D": based on its features, users' comments, demos and examples, this framework seems to have nothing to envy to PC-platform's ones. And yes, for those of us who may consider buying a MAC, Unity3D can produce cross-platform executables.

To sum up, as you can guess for what you have read in the whole series of posts, there are a lot of engines, middleware and frameworks which will help you produce videogames from square one (as well as, in some cases, other multimedia applications). Thus, the whole process of selecting the one/s for your project demands a high amount of man/hour efforts so as not to fail by making a wrong choice. Therefore, before starting a project make sure you spend some time to develop a systematic method to evaluate the component candidates efficiently in order to seek and get optimal results.

Well folks, I hope you have enjoyed reading "Game Engines And Others" as well as found it useful.

'till next time. See ya!

GAME ENGINES AND OTHERS: PART 2 OF 3

Monday you said? Yeah, right ... lazybones ...

Whatever ... On part 1 I had introduced some general concepts about game engines and other components, right? Well, today's post will concentrate on giving a few examples of some of the "helpers" that you may find in the industry, or at least, among "indies".

To do so, I'll will use the same categories of part 1, so If you don't remember the definitions and concepts, or you didn't read part 1 at all, you'd better go and read it first before we continue.

Ok, assuming you did. We shall continue ...

Ahhh, by the way, what you will see is how I see it, ... it's my blog, right? ... so feel free to re-arrange things up in your own list if you think that some component belongs to a different category.

(1.a) General-purpose engines.

If you had paid a visit to Devmaster.net as I suggested, you would have noticed the growing number of engines available in the market, like "Irrlicht", "3Impact", "C4 engine" and "Truevision 3D".

C# developers: although most of them are C++ original, some of them like "Irrlitch" provide a wrapper for .NET technology.

(1.b) Game-type-specific engines.

Our first classic match of the night: "Unreal Engines vs. Quake Engines". That is to say, "Epic Games vs. Id Software".

And lately, a new generation of engines that continue Quake III's legacy: "Doom III engine".

(1.c) Game-bound engines.

Well, to tell you the truth, you can include here any engine created for the sole purpose of developing one game and or sequels for that "title". In fact, the line between the previous category gets thinner when the engines starts to be modified in order to develop new "different" titles.

2. Game Frameworks.

From fully WYSIWYG frameworks like "GameMaker" and "Multimedia Fusion" -which you can get interesting results with, to full 3D-powerhouses like "A6 - GameStudio", "Quest3D" and "Torque Game Engine" -which let you target very ambitious projects, there are a whole range of frameworks to choose.

MAC developers: check out the cross-platform "Unity3D" engine.

C# developers: a new battle is coming: "TorqueX vs. Visual3D.Net". Buy your tickets ...

3. Game-Oriented Languages.

New GO languages are now entering the field but one of the classic battles of latest years is "Blitzbasic vs. Darkbasic".

Choose the contenders you prefer for each side, like Blitz3D vs. DB Pro, and enjoy the match.

OOP developers: both "line of products" above are non-OOP.

(4.a) Game-Oriented Middleware: Rendering.

I could mention too many components here like "Renderware" and "Gamebryo", but I will refer to OGRE (which stands for "Open Source Graphics Engine").

Contrary to what many of you may think, OGRE is not a game engine ... read the "Graphics" part of the "G" abbreviation ... ok, time to run away before the mob reaches me ...

Really. You can build your own engine by using its outstanding multiplatform-rendering capabilities, and you will likely find those who did, but OGRE only provides a set of C++ classes which will make your development life easier for rendering processes.

C# developers: yes, there's an OGRE.NET out there.

(4.b) Game-Oriented Middleware: Physics.

"Bring it on!". That's what companies that develop physics-prone components are saying one each other.

Havok, Newton, ODE, PhysX, Tokamak ... These guys have been around for so long now, and the battle still goes on.

Different type of licensing, different technologies, different features, different logic structure, different support, different approaches to the one domain they have in common: physics' mechanics.

C# developers: be aware that currently most of those companies neither offer nor support wrappers for .NET technology. You may find third-party wrappers, but no guarantees as usual ...

(4.c) Game-Oriented Middleware: Scripting.

Some AAA games have their own scripting language, like "Unreal Script". But there are general-purpose scripting languages that you can use, like "LUA" and "Phyton" (both well accepted in the industry).

Also, there are relatively new entries but yet powerful options, like "Gamemonkey Script".

And finally, I must mention one of the mostly used languages for internet-targeted games: "Actionscript" (built-in language for Adobe's Flash).

A tip for C# developers: with a bit of self-effort you can also use C# as your scripting language.

(4.d) Game-Oriented Middleware: AI.

Ok, you can either use scripting languages to modify the behavior of your game's "bots" or hard code your own implementations but there are some intereting components you may consider to use, like: "AI.Implant", "Renderware AI", "PathEngine", and "Memetic".

C# developers: see the tip in (4.c) above.

(4.e) Game-Oriented Middleware: Networking.

Last but not least, multiplayer stuff. Err ... getting a community of gamers together to play your game.

If you think that the other "areas" were tough, don't forget this one. Believe me. Point-to-point communication, client-server models, world updates, anticipation of each connected player's movements, etc. This requires a lot of patience and experience. Thus, not many games provide this feature.

Luckily, here come some components to the rescue, like Quazal's line of products, "Replica Net" and "Plane Shift".


Now, some final thoughts ... you may have heared about some of the above-mentioned "helpers" or even used them, but the fact is that in order to produce a game from scratch to completion you have to choose the right ones, that is, the ones that comply with all of the requirements for your project: budget, scope, technology, features, comfort, support, ... just to to mention a few.

But one thing is getting to know a bunch of components in order to pick the right one for you and your crew and other very different thing is to "wander" around them in a sort of "never-ending" testing, because you are either waiting for that long-awaited "saviour" component, you have played around so much that you don't know where the North is anymore, or you can't just make up your mind.

One of the huge mistakes that many "indies" usually make -I included- is playing around with some third-party components at the same time for a long time. You may say, "what's wrong with that? One should get to know a component before buying it, right?" I'll tell you what, the problem is that when you use, not one or two, but more components at the same time for a long time you face the risk of not getting to know none of them with the due depth of detail that you need in order to properly deal with your project.

In other words, don't play around with the components as if you were carring on the project it-self in a paralell manner through all of those components, like saying "the one that reaches the finish-line first wins the race" (if you compete with your-self in this one there will be no winner).

Just perform a set of small and accurate tests on the functionality that you need for your game in a sort of check-list verification: "Engine 1 ... checked, Communications ... checked, ... ". And then, having analyzed the pros and cons of the candidates, select one, get to know it deeply and start your project.

And please, don't look back until you finish it or otherwise you'll be only creating abbandonware, potentially speaking.

Just remember, there may exist no perfect components in absolute terms but relatively speaking, there is one (set of) perfect component(s) for your project if you manage to choose smartly. Or was it for soul-mates?

Anyway, part 2 is now finished. See you all next time ...

[... we will only focus on .NET based components]

DO THE MATH

In one of my previous posts, I had included some links to interesting sites where figures on sales were published and discussed. Remember those?

Now, do you want to know more about what "indies" should and souldn't expect? Well, if your answer is "yes", an I'll bet your answer is "yes", just read Jeff Tunnell's article.

Browsing the web I happened to find this site which is really interesting and instructive. Ok, enough talking ... just go, read the article and do the math.

See ya ...

GAME ENGINES AND OTHERS: PART 1 OF 3

There goes the weekend. I hope you have enjoyed it. Now it's time to get back to reality ... Mondays = kill-joy ... For some.

Remember last Friday's post? I had commented something about game engines, right? Ok, this is the first part of a small series of posts regarding game engines and other components like: game frameworks, game-oriented languages and game-oriented middleware.

As soon as you try to join the game industry you will run over a bunch of software components which may help you build a videogame from scratch, to some extent. Are all of these components a "game engine"? Quick response: "No". Why not? To answer that, let's first take some due notes of the following concepts:

1. Game Engine: a software component that provides the core functionality that will help you implement "the whole" programming areas of the videogame.
   
2. Game Framework: a suit of robust software and tools that offers a set of rapid and standard solutions to common program requirements and problems, all related to videogames.
3. Game-Oriented Language: a language specifically built to let you program videogames with ease -or at least, (a bit) easier/faster than by using "general-purpose" languages.
   
4. Game-Oriented Middleware: a software component that provides the core functionality that will help you implement only "a part" of the whole programming chain of the videogame.
   

The purpose of all of the above-mentioned type of "helpers" is to simplify the development and programming of videogames and, in general, to provide some sort of "re-usability".

By doing so, they usually bring at least one implementation layer between your final game and "low-level" libraries (like "DirectX" or "OpenAL"); generally speaking, "low-level" libraries provide access to computer/console hardware through a set of basic functions: take for instance "Application Programming Interfaces" (API) like "Direct3D" or "OpenGL", which can be considered as software abstractions of the "Graphic Processing Unit" of videocards (GPU), thus letting you handle and build "rendering systems".

Please, bear in mind that those 4 concepts are just one general and simple way of categorize the software components that you may find out there. Meaning, you could bring more categories to the field, rename or re-arrange the provided ones, but the important thing is that you realize that when you start to move down "the logic tree" trying to narrow general/base concepts, specificity may be found, and in turn, new categories may appear.

For instance, "Middleware" could sound too misleading for some since the word it-self wouldn't necessarily imply that it deals with just a part of the game-programming chain (contrary to "the whole"), but it'd imply that it brings at least one layer between your game and a low-level API (thus, some could deem "1" and "2" above as more general middleware).

Again, it's up to you to build your basic list of categories and place each component within them either with a great amount of certainty (for "obvious" choices) or "at a rough guess" (for "not-that-obvious" ones).

1. Game Engines.

If you remember one of my previous posts, when you want to program a video-game you will have to deal with lots of main logic areas: Rendering Pipeline, AI, Physics, Scripting, etc.

Game engines come at a hand to such purposes. They bring programmer-friendly solutions, methods, and techniques which will let you face the task of implementing each logic area according to the program requirements of your videogame.

In other words, a game engine will provide you with the proper software components so that you can program the core aspects of your game in a rapid and reliable way. This doesn't mean that you will press some button and, say, the physics of your video-game will be "auto-magically" programmed for you. Following the physics' example, it means that you'll have a group of pre-built functions that will help you set the proper physics' behaviors for your video-game, but how you assemble the puzzle is your Company's task, you team's task or your task.

What kind of game engines can be found? Well, basically there are 3 type of engines: (a) general-purpose engines, (b) game-type-specific engines, and (c) game-bound engines.

(a) General-purpose engine: offers a set of functions so that you can develop and program any type of video-game.

(b) Game-type-specific engine: offers a set of features so that you can develop and program a certain type of video-game. For instance, a "First-Person-Shooter" game (FPS).

(c) Game-bound engine: created for a particular "title" -or series. Its use is normally considered as "one-time" even though sequels of the game may appear, which use a modified version of the base engine.

Most of the (currently available) game engines were developed to be use with C++ language, which is the standard language for game development (alias, the language used by 99% of each and every "Pro"). They are usually deployed as a set of "dynamic-link libraries" (DLLs), or add-ons to the most-used IDEs (like Visual C++, Dev-C++, etc.), so that they can be easily referenced, integrated and used in your game's implementation.

Sometimes, it's curious and instructive to see how these engines have evolved during years. One may think that it all starts with a general-purpose engine and then everything moves in a top-down direction. Makes sense. However, one may go wrong sometimes ...

For instance, GarageGames' "Torque Game Engine" was originally designed for the game "Tribes 2". After that, the engine went public so that developers could use it to build "Tribe-like" videogames for a minimum price which varied as a function of the kind of licenses offered.

Since then, the engine has been modified in such manner that today is one of the most used multi-purpose cross-platform game engines among "indies". What is more, it can be considered a game framework since it offers a whole set of tools that help developers leverage the production pipeline.

Therefore, GarageGames' TGE moved along the whole range of types of engines, starting from "(c)" and upto "(a)".

2. Game Frameworks.

"A suit of robust software and tools that offers a set of rapid and standard solutions to common program requirements and problems, all related to video-games". Meaning?

Game frameworks usually go beyond than game engines do, in the sense that they not only provide the libraries you need to carry on programming tasks with ease but also bring a set of tools into play which help you develop parts of your game in a graphical manner.

By the use of "Graphical User Interfaces" (GUI), the developer enjoys a more controlled experience over areas of programming and design, generally resulting in a more comfortable interaction with game APIs. Although it cannot be always assured that desired results are reached thorough the only use of GUIs, some frameworks also offer the possibility of either using scripts to do a fine tunning of the final output and/or extend the game logic, or accessing the final source code before compilation.

Some years ago these frameworks only consisted of either an add-on to existing languages (the game engine) plus a game-level editor to create new levels for your game. Now-a-days, they have evolved to more complete systems formed by several tools which offer more features so as to produce more accurate results with less lines of source code manually inputted by developers.

Levels construction, pre-calculation of lights and shadows, creation and visualization of meshes and animations, setting of game characters and their respective behaviors, general rules for the game (like collisions and physics), integration of cut-scenes, shaders, music and sound, ... these are just a few elements in the list of features offered by top-most game frameworks.

3. Game-Oriented Languages.

What is the difference between a general-purpose language and a game-oriented one? Simple. With the former you can usually program any kind of software -limitations may appear depending on the language. Take C# for instance, with it you can implement from graphically-appealing applications to console command-type programs. With the latter, only video-game related software can be produced -some exceptions do exist, where multimedia applications can also be created.

Does this mean that I can only use game-oriented languages to create a videogame? No, you can also use general-purpose languages -like C++, C#, Visual Basic and Delphi- by plugging in add-ons, class libraries, game engines and or game-oriented middleware, where available.

Why using then a game-oriented language? That is a matter of assessment, resources and preference. These kind of languages offer their own syntax, commands and structure. Not all of them follow the Object-Oriented Programming Paradigm (OOP) and some of them sometimes consist of a wrapper of a base API (like DirectX) with some moddifications and additions to ease the user experience.

What is the difference with "scripting"? A script is interpretated at runtime. Game-oriented languages usually provide a compiler that converts the source code into machine code at compilation time. Also, many of these languages provide an "Integrated Devleopment Environment (IDE) which consists at least of an official source-code editor.

Should I choose an OOP-tailored language? Again, that is a matter of preference. Some may still find some comfort on using non-OOP languages, but believe me, once you start to understand OOP and appreciate the advantages of OOP languages, you'll use OOP and you won't want to turn back the page again.

4. Game-Oriented Middleware.

Contrary to the criteria that leads a component to be considered as a "Game Engine", this kind of middleware specializes in a certain "logic area of incumbence" of the game-programming chain. For instance, AI.

There is a new growing wave of enterprises that specialize in the production of middleware components that one can "hook" onto their game projects. One of the main advantages of this components is the strong set of features they provide plus a high grade of reliability. One of the "cons" is simple, the more number of components you use in your game project, the more difficult will be for you to assemble the puzzle and follow the evolution of each component. Moreover, performance hit should be monitor closely since using a great number of external components does not necessarily mean that performance will increase, a priori.

The main areas covered by game-oriented middleware are rendering, physics and artificial intelligence. But new specific solutions to general problems are appearing from time to time.

Again, like "game engines" do, game-oriented middleware is generally targeted to C++ market. Some wrappers may exist for other languages/technologies, though, generally provided by third-party enthusiasts. Therefore, if used in a project, these wrappers should be always used with caution, having analized the whole spectrum of options.

Ok, I have read carefully the 4 points mentioned above, but what should I consider so as to choose the proper game components for my game project? Good question: it will be covered in next posts, but here is a short list: price, licenses (royalties, terms and conditions, etc.), support, bugs, average period between updates, performance, features, target platforms, type of deployment/integration, type of files supported (for images, meshes, animations, etc.) and so on.

"I've read your interesting post but I cannot wait for the next 'part' of the series, so where can I find more information about game engines and such?". Impatient, uh!? Ok, you can then pay a visit to "DevMaster.Net" site, where you will find a very extensive and detailed database of engines -most of them ranked by users.

Soooo ... with these words we are reaching the end of this first part about game engines and others. I'm not sure so far but I guess this will turn out to be a three-part series. ETA for "Part 2"? Maybe next Monday ... but as usually said "it will be released when it is done" ... ;)

[We will continue to discuss game engines on later posts, focusing on some of the existing/upcoming engines for .NET]

THERE AIN'T NO TIMES LIKE THE OLD TIMES

Today I was thinking of posting some comments about some of the engines out there, but then I said "naaa! It's Friday. Let's take it easy and leave that for Monday".

So, what's for today? Doing some search for new posts in a couple forums I found some references to "old" games and I couldn't help remembering the old machines, old games, old sweet days. Snif! Snif! So let's go retro ...

Going back to the mid 80's I remember receiving my first computer ever: a ZX Spectrum Plus ... aahhh! My first love. Responsible for my passion on videogames. Titles like "Pssst", "Atic-Atac" and "Game Over" come very fast to my mind. Those were the days when you had to wait like 5 minutes or so until the game loaded into memory (48k ... wow!) while you prayed not to receive that nasty error message that appeared when the cassette player emmitted a wrong sound. Remember that? I bet you do. Then without loosing your hope, you used to rewind the tape, press "play" so that everything started again.

Then I switched to a "Commodore 128D" with a 5 1/4 drive. A whole new world for me. Just the fact of not having to use a tape was terriffic for me. Games like "Dig Dug" and "Bruce Lee" helped me tolerate those boring afternoons after high school when there was no one to call, no football matches, not even homework.

Then came an "Amiga 2000" (without hardrive I regret -too expensive back in those days) but again with an unknown hardware for me: a 3 1/2 floppy drive (I know what you're thinking: "what a challenge!"). This was a big change regarding visual quality: the graphics, colors, the cut-scenes. And also regarding sounds and music: my favorite? "Shadow of the Beast" (that guitar track that played when the game was over was really enjoyable). Games like "Prince of Persia" (with those impressive movements of the main character), "Lotus Espirit Turbo Challenge" and "The Blues Brothers" (a very funny platform game) caught my attention for hours and hours.

Finally, I bought my first PC computer: a notebook "Presario 1080". After that I realized something "I love notebooks". I have to admit that desktops are in general more powerful and you can get a better desktop for the same price or less than a notebook (especially if you buy the part separately and assemble the machine by your-self), but notebooks are quite more handy. With time I started to value more "handiness and comfort" than "hardware power" (yeah, I know, to some extent, since it has a direct relation to your needs as well as your purchasing power). We all know PC games but the first I played was "Pod" (since it came with my notebook), then "Primal Rage", "Alone in the Dark", the "FIFA" and "Star Wars" series (Rebel Assault, Tie Fighter, etc.), among others.

Now-a-days, I've got a 64-bit-processor desktop with the power to run smoothly each and every newest PC game in the market (like one of my favorites "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time") but I still enjoy playing classic retro games, every now and then.

Well, that's all guys. Have a nice weekend!

[By the way, which are/were your favorites "retro" games?]