This is a hobby-level project, or rather a father-son level project. My son wants to make a game, and since I'm really bad at a lot of things kids ask from their dads, I figure I have to make some sort of effort here... The rest of the story is in the docs - I have two main questions/requests, - Any general suggestions, game-play or other? - Any ideas for a light-weight graphics engine to use? I need something that will play well on really cruddy hardware but still if at all possible be able to use 3d acceleration when present. Best suggestion I have so far is probably using the Q2 source. Anyway... this is how I write stuff. Any feedback welcome. Cruyk design. - Olof [edited by - Teodric on November 24, 2002 6:35:21 PM]

I think the best question here would be:
How much do you know/how experienced a coder are you?

-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
-The Navidson Record! The best film you''ll never see!

Oh - 10 years professional developer - not in games though. Games experience only as a hobbyist though (but I own a net yaroze, I was in the BeOS developer program and I tried the very first windows Game SDK and have messed about with every DX version since that I think). I'm not afraid of anything ;-)

Well, ok I'm not touching assembly :-)
- Olof

[edited by - Teodric on November 24, 2002 6:59:24 PM]

This is one of the most useful links for the new comers here!

Thanks but... Well it''s an excellent newbie page but I fail to find any help there... My copy of Code Complete fell apart years ago.

This isn''t a "help me learn to program games plz!" post. I''d enjoy reading feedback from anyone who feels like actually reading the document and I want to hear about graphics engines out there (preferably from people who actually use them).

If this is just something for your son to play with. Non-commercially, I''d say the Quake2 engine might be your best bet. Modding it out of a more modern engine is also a possibility. In any case, my feelings about such a project are ambiguous at best. And I don''t know why, exactly.

-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
-The Navidson Record! The best film you''ll never see!

quote: Original post by Teodric
My copy of Code Complete fell apart years ago.

Mine too - and I''ve only read it twice. They weren''t very solidly bound, were they?


God puts an apple tree in the middle of the Garden of Eden and says, do what you like guys, oh, but don''t eat the apple. Surprise surprise, they eat it and he leaps out from behind a bush shouting "Gotcha." It wouldn''t have made any difference if they hadn''t eaten it... because if you''re dealing with somebody who has the sort of mentality which likes leaving hats on the pavement with bricks under them you know perfectly well they won''t give up. They''ll get you in the end. -- Douglas Adams

quote: Run_The_Shadows
If this is just something for your son to play with. Non-commercially, I''d say the Quake2 engine might be your best bet.

Well, I''d be happier with something that didn''t exclude commercial paths, but it''s a minor consideration to start with. I do have the idea of perhaps using the same solution for ideas more of my own, but that really complicates things.

quote: Arild Fines
They weren''t very solidly bound, were they?

LOL no! "The awesome power of Direct3D/DirectX" was worse though - but in that case I didn''t really mind :-)

If you do want to go commercial with this, you may want to look into the TRIBES2 engine, which licenses for $100(USD), compared to a possibly much more expensive one, like any of the Quakes.

-Ryan "Run_The_Shadows"
-Run_The_Shadows@excite.com
-The Navidson Record! The best film you''ll never see!

If perhaps you want to be able to let other people play your creations (I bet your son''s friends will be interested), maybe make a modification for Half-Life? It''d be simpler to distribute than a Q2 distribution.