As someone who didn't budge from AS2 til about last year, it takes a fuckin' lot to convince me to download and try to make a game in new software.

At 2/15/13 01:40 PM, TomFulp wrote: I'd like to try a monthly challenge where each month we present a different development tool that people can make a game with. So everyone who is interested can make a game with that tool. You can get it sponsored, or just run ads, or whatever... But you've learned the tool that month.

I like this idea, it gives developers an incentive to test out the different tools that are out there and gives (much needed, I'm sure) exposure to the authors of those tools. As long as the tool for each jam is announced beforehand so we have a chance to dig through the documentation/examples a bit first, I'd certainly be willing to try it out.

We could also pop a 48 hour game jam between each one, just to open the field to everything.

So I guess my question is - do you guys want to try doing a 48 hour game jam before something like this kicks off, or should I just get moving with launching a Construct 2 Challenge?

I like classic jams and the freedom they allow, so yeah, my vote's for "popping a 48 hour game jam between each one". I'd like to keep the mid-March jam a classic jam too, I'm excited to get back to jammin'.

As for the date, what works for everyone else? MGSHero, what works for you, if not the sixteenth? The open weekends for me within the next couple of months are:

March 9
March 16
April 6
April 20

At 2/15/13 01:40 PM, TomFulp wrote: I'd like to try a monthly challenge where each month we present a different development tool that people can make a game with. So everyone who is interested can make a game with that tool. You can get it sponsored, or just run ads, or whatever... But you've learned the tool that month.

This sounds pretty damn cool. It would give me an opportunity to do some videos and post them on my poor little YT channel :P

on a more serious note, it would give everyone a chance to look at new things (since that's a big part of programming - try not to get too comfortable with anything because everything changes very quickly) - hopefully we can get some fresh blood involved in development.

So I guess my question is - do you guys want to try doing a 48 hour game jam before something like this kicks off, or should I just get moving with launching a Construct 2 Challenge?

to be honest, i'm just looking for something to prove to myself that I haven't been using all my free time unwisely. A game jam is great for that, but if you have something better then I say go for it.

At 2/15/13 06:26 PM, Archawn wrote: As for the date, what works for everyone else? MGSHero, what works for you, if not the sixteenth? The open weekends for me within the next couple of months are:

March 9
April 20

The 5th is the final competition for my ME design class, lots of sponsors show up and watch our bots do stuff. It might extend over to the 6th as well, so that weekend's out.

I agree with 4ur. I would prefer a classic game jam first. (Plus, I suck at HTML, so HTML5 would be even worse for me.)

If anyone is curious, here is my breakdown of HTML5 libs after having looked at various different ones. Please correct me if I made any mistakes.

CreateJS / EaselJS: Awesome for flash devs. Similar display object and stage concepts. Renders to the HTML5 canvas. Can be slow if you aren't careful. Probably start here if you are proficient in AS2 or AS3.

Game Closure: Aimed at Android and iOS development. I haven't checked it out in much detail yet, but the license is a deal breaker for me. They make you show their splash screen at the start of your game. No exceptions.

LimeJS: My favorite. Actually uses DOM manipulation and sets CSS on the fly rather than using Canvas. Uses google closure to make your code pristine. Write your build scripts in python.

ImpactJS: The Flixel / Game Maker of HTML5. Performs well. This is probably best if you are more of a visual developer. It comes with a level editor, and debugging tools. Costs 100$. No demo. :[

Unity: Unity doesn't build true HTML5 games, but you can write games in Javascript, so I think it deserves a mention.

This reminds me, isn't this more like "The Game Dev 'Reg' Lounge" now ?

At 2/15/13 02:42 PM, 4urentertainment wrote: Also I'd much rather see a classic game jam first. To bring back everyone together again.

I'd love to try out some tools I am not familiar with, especially something HTML5, and a jam would be the perfect way to do that, but I would have to agree with 4urentertainment. I'd like to see a classic jam to get back in the spirit of things ;)

For the last several weeks I have been mentoring a local robotics team, and was thinking back to when I started to learn how to program. I knew nothing about code, much like a few of the students on the team. It feels so strange when you say "write an if statement", and it causes mass confusion, since it is such a simple thing for someone who already knows the logic behind programming.

I think it would be fun to start from scratch learning a new language/program. Although, I almost wish I could hit a reset button and start from scratch, to feel that full sense of discovery once again.

At 2/16/13 01:05 PM, PrettyMuchBryce wrote: This reminds me, isn't this more like "The Game Dev 'Reg' Lounge" now ?

I'm sure there are a lot of devs who will never go to the flash forum and see this thread.

This would be a good time to make my small game ideas, since I probably won't stick with the tool for too long (unless it's AMAAAAZING), and I need to stop coding RPGs badly.

At 2/16/13 01:05 PM, PrettyMuchBryce wrote: This reminds me, isn't this more like "The Game Dev 'Reg' Lounge" now ?

Basically. Ever since Animation became its own forum the Flash forum in general has become more game-dev oriented.

At 2/16/13 02:31 PM, Mattster wrote: For the last several weeks I have been mentoring a local robotics team,

FIRST is a blast. May I ask what team you're mentoring? Maybe I'll see you down at the Championship event this year, haha. Or maybe not, our robot's not looking so good and it doesn't look like we'll be getting any time to program the competition bot before bag day.

and was thinking back to when I started to learn how to program. I knew nothing about code, much like a few of the students on the team. It feels so strange when you say "write an if statement", and it causes mass confusion, since it is such a simple thing for someone who already knows the logic behind programming.

I started our fall season with a dozen or so new programmers, and by the time I was done trying to show them around NetBeans there were only three or four left. The ones that stuck around are fantastic, though.

I'm still trying to find an approach to teaching people to code without scaring them away. The learning curve's daunting.

At 2/16/13 08:38 PM, Archawn wrote: I'm still trying to find an approach to teaching people to code without scaring them away. The learning curve's daunting.

If you find a way, you should mention it to our MATLAB class's teachers. Quite a few people fail the class and have to retake it. Most copy the hw from someone else. Some switch majors. What's hilarious is when someone takes an hour to copy the hw (not sure where that's spent) while it takes me 10 mins to do the whole thing :)

At 2/16/13 08:38 PM, Archawn wrote: FIRST is a blast. May I ask what team you're mentoring? Maybe I'll see you down at the Championship event this year, haha. Or maybe not, our robot's not looking so good and it doesn't look like we'll be getting any time to program the competition bot before bag day.

I'm mentoring Team 4814, it's a rookie team formed at the University which is an incubator group for all local highschools. All extra-curricular activities around here have been cancelled due to a teacher strike. We've got 2 schools in with us this year, who we hope will become independent next year (and we'll take in 2 more). We're basically trying to suck all the highschools in London into joining FIRST.

I think we've got a pretty good chance at getting Rookie All-star, so you never know. I was on Team 3739 in highschool and was at the 2010 championships (via Rookie All-star), it truly is an amazing and inspirational experience.

I started our fall season with a dozen or so new programmers, and by the time I was done trying to show them around NetBeans there were only three or four left. The ones that stuck around are fantastic, though.

I'm still trying to find an approach to teaching people to code without scaring them away. The learning curve's daunting.

Oh my god, yeah, people get scared and run away. I've been lucky to have some students who stay interested and at least try. For a few days the programming team (size: 2) didn't show up, so I was told to appoint 2 of the electrical people to learn how to code... It was... interesting.

What team are you with?

i have been using unity lately its actually pretty cool

been making a multiplayer thingy

At 2/16/13 10:19 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: been making a multiplayer thingy

been playing a little of it as you may have seen. It's actually really addicting.
my only complaint is the way the x-ray works. It's a tad confusing at first, and I nearly ran myself into lava with it several times.

At 2/16/13 10:40 PM, egg82 wrote:

At 2/16/13 10:19 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: been making a multiplayer thingy

been playing a little of it as you may have seen. It's actually really addicting.
my only complaint is the way the x-ray works. It's a tad confusing at first, and I nearly ran myself into lava with it several times.

im gonna fix that eventually (i need to do some raycasts to find out what z-plane I can cull out objects at)

At 2/16/13 10:43 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: im gonna fix that eventually (i need to do some raycasts to find out what z-plane I can cull out objects at)

i've actually been juggling the idea of a simple multiplayer worms-like game with a terrarian movement/world mechanic for a while now, just to get something out there. My submissions have been dead for quite some time.
Guess you beat me to the punch, in some ways :P

At 2/16/13 10:19 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: i have been using unity lately its actually pretty cool

been making a multiplayer thingy

I'm impressed Tyler. This has a lot of potential.

At 2/16/13 09:11 PM, Mattster wrote: I think we've got a pretty good chance at getting Rookie All-star, so you never know. I was on Team 3739 in highschool and was at the 2010 championships (via Rookie All-star), it truly is an amazing and inspirational experience.

Yeah, it is. I've been there twice now, both last year and the year before. I was lucky enough to be the human player last year, and being a part of the action down on the field is like nothing I've ever experienced before.

Good luck to you and your team!

Oh my god, yeah, people get scared and run away. I've been lucky to have some students who stay interested and at least try. For a few days the programming team (size: 2) didn't show up, so I was told to appoint 2 of the electrical people to learn how to code... It was... interesting.

What team are you with?

I'm an Adambot, on Team 245, out of Michigan.

At 2/17/13 12:03 AM, Archawn wrote: I'm an Adambot, on Team 245, out of Michigan.

I'm gonna play Find the Archawn.

At 2/17/13 12:34 AM, MSGhero wrote:

At 2/17/13 12:03 AM, Archawn wrote: I'm an Adambot, on Team 245, out of Michigan.

I'm gonna play Find the Archawn.

Oh, man, please, most of the pictures on that website of me are terrible.

At 2/17/13 10:22 AM, Archawn wrote: Oh, man, please, most of the pictures on that website of me are terrible.

That wasn't nearly as subtle as I had hoped for.

At 2/17/13 10:29 AM, Archawn wrote:

At 2/17/13 10:22 AM, Archawn wrote: Oh, man, please, most of the pictures on that website of me are terrible.

That wasn't nearly as subtle as I had hoped for.

It was more subtle in my forum feed :)

When I saw the brony, I lapsed and thought I found MintPaw...

At 2/17/13 10:57 AM, MSGhero wrote:

At 2/17/13 10:29 AM, Archawn wrote:

At 2/17/13 10:22 AM, Archawn wrote: Oh, man, please, most of the pictures on that website of me are terrible.

That wasn't nearly as subtle as I had hoped for.

It was more subtle in my forum feed :)

When I saw the brony, I lapsed and thought I found MintPaw...

I found you

I'm doing my first multiplayer thingy in Unity aswel, but cos I'm only one guy, testing this multiplayer game is kind of fucking impossible.
Fly around with the mouse, left-click to shoot, right-click to eject (and steal other jets if there's more than one player flying around)

Setting up a room where multiple players could jump in was astonishingly easy! Getting it to run well is more accurate to how I expected: really hard.

At 2/17/13 12:27 PM, I-smel wrote: I'm doing my first multiplayer thingy in Unity aswel, but cos I'm only one guy, testing this multiplayer game is kind of fucking impossible.

the "player name" thing forcing you to have one character is really annoying D:

other than that, I don't see much problem with it other than the semi-confusing buttons. Can't really say for sure, though, because there wasn't anyone else on.

How are you guys doing Multiplayer in Unity ? Does it come built in with some sort of socket server ?

I had to input a player name on Glaeil's, which I thought was weird. It usually generates "Guest<number>".

I'm using Photon, because it's free and I don't have to set up a server. Glaeil's probably using something else. I'm building a good prototype with this, then hopefully getting someone who knows how to make videogames in to take over.

oooooooohhh
do want :D

this brief interruption brought to you by: egg's "shiny things" radar
and now back to your regularly scheduled program.

On the topic of tutoring people.

I've had friends ask me to teach them programming (mostly after they realize you can make money making games), and I've realized I actually love to teach. I used to wonder how teachers can be happy with their lives, basically doing the same thing every year and never really going anywhere, but even when I was saying the same explanations and repeating the same introductions, there's a sense of satisfaction when you teach someone and they end up doing something with what they learned.

And yeah, it was interesting seeing things that are extremely intuitive that you wouldn't think twice about apparently being not easy to understand at first.

Something I do is that I tell them, that the only way to change the value of a variable, is by doing "variable = value", there's absolutely no other way to change the value of a variable. Then I ask them to figure out a way to increment a variable by 1.

And it's really interesting seeing them think, and trying to get them to figure it out on their own. The thought process is something like, "When your brain wants to increment a variable by 1, it takes the value, adds 1 to it, and returns it. So if I tell you increment 'counter' by 1, you're going to check the value held in counter, and add 1 to it, then make counter equal that value". And I wait for them to translate that into code of "variable = variable + 1".

And it's such a beautiful "Aha!" moment when it clicks.

At 2/17/13 03:48 PM, 4urentertainment wrote: And it's such a beautiful "Aha!" moment when it clicks.

I tried helping a group of friends understand for loops within for loops. It didn't work.

In my Java class, for programmers not engineers, everyone seemed to know how everything worked, but not how to use it. We used this online forum where people can ask and answer questions, with the teachers and TAs overseeing it all. Every day, there were about 20 posts (and 20 emails) asking how to do something, like swap the indices of 2 array elements. The TAs eventually just emailed those few lines to everyone. Our final homework was to make a basic game over two weeks (class died when it was announced, I was like "I'll start next week...end"), and the forum exploded with posts. Basically what we see in this forum.

I'd like to tutor, but I have way too much stuff to do now. I tutored at my high school (tutoring for middle school kids) over two summers, and it was awesome. I went through that program when I was younger, and I scored the all time highest on the how-much-have-you-learned test. A kid I tutored broke my score. I definitely would have been beyond lost in math if I didn't go through that program, so I know how much of a difference it makes.

At 2/17/13 03:48 PM, 4urentertainment wrote: I've realized I actually love to teach.

I too have realized that I like to teach, but would never want to be a teacher or prof of any sort. I can handle people who want to learn, but start to lose that enjoyment of helping people learn when they aren't committed or they just can't seem to learn it. In my opinion, it seems to takes a certain mindset to be able to program, and not everyone has that. Sure someone can learn a language, but can they really program?

That moment when you give someone the pseudocode of a problem and they manage to translate that into actual code is so fantastic.