Baby Steps

Well after being sick I've returned to learning Direct3D and I'm making a pretty good start. I've gotten through the basic Windows programming, it's actually pretty simple stuff once you get into it. So far all I have is a simple window showing a blue background, but in the code it's much more then that. "Under the hood" this simple blue screen is the beginnings of what will soon be a 3D world. Metaphorically you could consider it the drawing board of a game programmer. the screen shot is below, I realize it's pointless but why not.

Woops

Yeah so that it's been a while since I made a post. Sorry about that but I became sick soon after I made those first posts and then I became really busy since the school semester is coming to an end.


I promise to make post more frequently.

Short Stories?

Short Stories? I know, it's an odd thing to have on a blog about games. I've always had an interest in short stories as they don't take a large time commitment and they deliver an awesome story telling experience. Because of the fact that I'm starting to get into game development, and story is a very important element, I thought it would be a good idea to practice my story writing skills by writing short stories on this blog. By no means so I promise writing along the lines of Issac Asimov, or J R.R. Tolkien, but I will write to the best of my abilities. After all, practice makes perfect.

Why Start from Scratch?

I just that thought I would address this question before I get asked it, and also to remind myself when I get stuck or something.

With all the new and easy to use game engines out these like Unity, UDK, and XNA, why would anyone in their right mind want to start a game from scratch? The answer that that question, for me at least, is a little more complex then you would expect. The simple way to explain it would be to say that I just want to prove that I can, and I have a small attention span, but there are quite a few more reasons. The problem with me is that I can never stick to a decision, in an MMO I would never get to the max level because I'm always changing my class, and this part of my personality shows in my game programming. About a year ago I had this great idea to start developing iPhone games so I saved up for a Mac and by the time I finally purchased it my attention was focused on developing Xbox Indie games, by the time I made any progress on an Xbox game, I found the Unity engine. the constant back and forth made it impossible for me to make any real progress on a game.

Now I do realize that this doesn't make any sense at all, if my problem is a short attention span, why would I start a major time consuming project? Well that's where my crazy logic comes in. See, the idea is that if I develop for PC my project will be able to reach more people, not everybody has an Xbox or an iPhone so it wouldn't make too much sense to develop for those, at least in my opinion. Also since DirectX isn't hmm how do I put this... "restricted", I can do whatever I want without having to pay anything or sign some sort of contract telling me what I can and can't do.

I guess that's about it. Sorry for my terrible explanations, I'll probably expand on this later as I'm writing it really tired.

How Are You Learning?

I just thought before I dive deep into anything I would list off the resourced I'm using to learn DirectX and other things that have to do with game development.

The first and main book I'm using is Frank Luna's "Introduction to 3D Game Programming with Direct X 9.0c: A Shader Approach". This book is relatively well known among up-and-coming game developers, while fairly complex as an introductory book it does a good job of explaining the basic and main concepts of DirectX.

The second book I'm using is "Character Animation with Direct3D" by Carl Granberg.to be honest, I haven't had to use this book yet because I just started the basics on DirectX, but I did flip through it and it seems to pick up where the first book left off going into more detail on how to apply DirectX to practical game development. It also explains how to add physics and other things to you game, seems pretty good and I can't wait to get to it.

http://www.directxtutorial.com is also a very good resource, if you have the extra cash I recommend buying the premium tutorials. I've heard that the methods taught by this site aren't very good and are actually a bad practice, but if you find the first book too difficult to understand this is a great site to start because everything is explained as if you're a normal person and not as if its coming from a textbook. I'm in the process of reading through this site right now, as I started with the first book and barely understood a word, after reading this site I can look back at the first book and its 10 times more valuable.

These are just the basics and I hope they help, farewell for now. There are more where these came from.

Game Progress

Okay well, saying that this blog was meant for my current game in progress is almost a lie, almost. Do I have a game in progress? Yes and no. The game itself has had no direct progress made on it, as I am in the process of learning DirectX. This blog was meant to be more of a journal of my journey from knowing nothing about DriectX to finishing a working and playable game. Is the game meant to be a A+ release to steam or something? No it's just meant to be a stepping stone to what I could eventually create. Hopefully this "journal" will help or inspire anyone out there who is wanting to learn how to make games, but doesn't know where to start. Anyway, that's it for now

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog.

Here is will I post post stuff mostly having to do with games, progress on my game, my opinion on current games and the game industry, and it will also just be a place for my random thoughts. I started this mainly because I wanted a place to share my progress, thoughts, and all that on the game I'm currently developing; I'm not one for Facebook so a blog seemed like the perfect solution. I'm also a very opinionated person and have many words to share on subjects like the current state of game reviewing sites and the industry as a whole. I hope you guys enjoy the read.