new to 64Digits: about me

Posted by Self_titled on Jan. 24, 2007, 8:44 a.m.

Well I'm new to 64Digits (relativly) but not to game development nor Game Maker.

I first started developing games in 1997 using a program called Klick 'n' Play (no code but propostional logic) this help me as I started programming Visual Basic getting a A* in GCSE IT and A grade A' level in Computing.

In 2004 I started Software Engineering BSc degree at Newcastle University, making games in GM all the way. Then I changed my course to Games and Virtual Enviroments.

I'm due to graduate this summer.

Having never really finished a GM game due to lack of interest or i just thought it was a bad concept, I'm not at all known in the GMC.

At present I have a phew games in development the biggest and most important being a MMO game written in Java for my dissertation using a brand new never before implemented architecture.

Another game in development is a horse racing game for a mobile phone, many more games are in development but not important enough to mention.

More of my games present past and never done can be found at my website.

Comments

DesertFox 17 years, 11 months ago

I'm doing a game (engine) in Java too. I'm trying to make it as easily expandable as possible. 1st year RIT student for me.

Castypher 17 years, 11 months ago

You've been hard at work in the gaming area. I'm trying to learn Java, but I can't find any good resources. I hear Java's pretty good for making good 3D games.

Welcome to 64Digits.

Self_titled 17 years, 11 months ago

Thanks dunno if javas is good for 3D having never used java 3D but it can quite fast despite being run by a virtual machine. Easier than C++ no pointers are memory leaks in java :)

first bookmark this http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5.0/docs/api/

it tells you all you need bout the api

if you have any question bout java I may or may not be able to answer them

@DesertFox

cool how are handling the frame limiter?

DesertFox 17 years, 11 months ago

Currently, I'm just using a sleeping thread to make steps take at least X milliseconds, but I'm going to change it to a timer that sets a variable to stop a millisecond sleeping thread, so if it is under the frame limit, it waits, and if it is over, it just goes ahead. Java could use a "wait at least X time" thing. I'm probably missing something about some class that I could use for timing.

System.currentTimeMillis doesn't update often enough to use that as a metronome. Plus its update time can var from system to system.

Do you have any suggestions?

DesertFox 17 years, 11 months ago

When I say timer, I mean Timer of course.

Self_titled 17 years, 11 months ago

i was just wondering cus my engine was only running at 24 fps and i was like crap its so slow until i realise i had it sleeping for 333 milis each step. I need a steady 30fps so my solution was to have a seperate thread calculate how long to have the main thread sleep for each step but its still jerky

Self_titled 17 years, 11 months ago

without any sort of sleep i get 400,000 to 600,000 fps which i think is insane, also you may like to look into bsp trees for collision detection too it reduces the checks a hell of a lot look at this applet i made for research purposes

http://www.students.ncl.ac.uk/c.j.rutter/research/

DesertFox 17 years, 11 months ago

Don't you mean 33.3 millis? 333 millis is 1/3 second XD

Anyway, just do what I'm going to do, at the beginning of every step/frame set the timer to go off in 33.3 millis, and a check variable to true. Then, after you draw the screen, use a while(check variable) sleep(1) - and the timer sets the check variable to false so it exits the loop, or never goes into the loop in the first place.

DesertFox 17 years, 11 months ago

Mama mia thats nice - the bsp collision detection. I'm going to do a little research on that XD

Self_titled 17 years, 11 months ago

opps yer i meant 33.3 i 1000/30 set to a variable which is how long it slept for.

the timer idea is a nice idea i'll look into it thanks