Messages

1

Programming / Re: Which language and library to use

« on: July 18, 2014, 06:28:59 AM »

I'm glad that this thread didn't devolve into the typical my-language/your-language argument in which nothing is learned, but instead, we were all able to come together as a community around our shared disgust with Java.  It warms my heart.

By the way, I'd like to hear opinions about C# versus C++ and other languages.  I'm mainly a Python programmer so I think either one would be a big change of pace for me, but I'm interested in both languages as possible new tools.  C# and the whole microsoft stack (visual studio, SQL Server, .NET, ASP, etc.) are used a lot at my work, so I might go for that one.  Is it a better tool for producing packaged software with good performance than Python?  How does the language and its performance compare to C++.  As for C++, I'm thinking it might help me become a better programmer by forcing me to learn more computer-sciency stuff like dealing with memory, threads, data structures, and so forth, but I'm worried about learning a lot of powerful features just to forget them again for lack of need to use them.  How useful is C++ really?

2

Challenges / challenge: replicate pre-Rogue game D&D#1

« on: April 20, 2014, 10:18:55 PM »

D&D #1 was created on a teletype at Clear Creek High School in Houston Texas, connected via an acoustic modem to a PDP 11 type mini-computer. Richard typed the game on a separate terminal onto paper tape spools, then read the tape strips into the terminal connected to the offsite computer, and ran the resulting program. The resulting program would play a simple Dungeons and Dragons like role-playing game. The player had a character that would explore a dungeon in search of treasure while fighting monsters along the way.

No one has seen this game run since the retirement of the teletype in 1979, which is when Richard made the final printout of the game.

I bet somebody on these forums will win this challenge.  The original BASIC code is provided.

https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/?p=39149

3

Design / Re: Bones -- how far can you go with them?

« on: April 16, 2014, 06:58:17 PM »

Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon.  It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.

4

Programming / Re: Multiplayer roguelike implentation through MySQL???

« on: April 09, 2014, 06:26:58 PM »

A good precursor of that, "A game is just a database with a UI." Not to be thought of literally as database software.

I don't know if I buy that quote.  The database implies a model of the "nouns" of the game world, and some of the logical relationships, but doesn't tell the "story" so to speak.  Your game should be more than just a UI.

5

Programming / Re: Multiplayer roguelike implentation through MySQL???

« on: April 07, 2014, 05:00:02 PM »

I attended a presentation at Desert Code Camp on Saturday where the speaker used a great turn of phrase about databases, that the database is "your data at rest".  In the application program, your data is "at work".  The database should be where it's stored when the application has downtime.

6

Early Dev / Rogue State University

« on: April 03, 2014, 12:55:59 AM »

Hi all, I'm coding a new game using pieces from some of my unfinished older projects that weren't all open sourced.  It's going to be a pretty classic roguelike, nothing fancy, so I can use it as a base to build off of.  It will have a "university" theme, where the monsters are college mascots: wildcats, razorbacks, trojans, sun devils, etc, but be totally moddable by editing text info files.

Currently you can see a splash screen, a main menu, create a new game.  World generation just gives you a grassy field full of a few funny plants.  You can move the view around, or press TAB to get a "look/examine" cursor and see what's what.  No "@" sign on the screen yet, because I initially planned to use this code for a fortress simulator.  Nevertheless, I'd be happy to have you try to play it and let me know if it even works on your system.  Let me know what platform you're using, if you do!  And what version of Python.

I built this on Python 3.4.0.  It uses the pyglet library, but that's included in the download so you shouldn't need it on your system.

Source:  https://github.com/joeclark77net/roguestate
To Play:  python roguestate.py

7

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 07:22:17 PM »

Thanks for your help!

8

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 07:07:39 PM »

Bam! That worked.


From the linked thread:

For my installation it occurs only when 'v2i' is used; replacement with 'v2f' is a temporary workaround. For example, the sample files worked once I modified lines 368 & 372 of sprite.py since they were affected by this v2i bug.

I changed those two references and it now works.  I do have an AMD video card.  I will push to github in a few minutes.

9

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 06:32:18 PM »

I still have the same problem.

10

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 06:20:16 PM »

I'm going to downgrade to Python 3.3.5 and see if Python 3.4 is the problem.

11

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 06:06:45 PM »

I mean I just pushed the fix right now.  Tuturto, could you try redownloading and see if it works for you?  If it fails, then I know the problem is my version of pyglet.

By the way, a successful test would mean you see TWO robots in the window.

12

Programming / Re: any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 02, 2014, 06:06:16 PM »

Should work now.  I had some bad import statements that weren't throwing exceptions for me, and I can't figure out why.  Maybe my IDE (PyCharm) was secretly tweaking my PYTHONPATH or something.  Now the references should work.  I also have no idea which copy of pyglet was being loaded, so now it's explicitly running the one in the game's "dependencies" folder, and it should print something to the shell that says so. 

By the way, if you want to see a simpler test that still fails, just run program/sprite_test.py instead of running the whole game.

To Tuturto's comment (which just came in as I hit 'post'), I can see that the conversion from 2 to 3 failed.  I replaced the pyglet library with one from my older game which I had painstakingly converted by hand.  The problem still occurs.  Maybe I should try the pip method instead...

I'm developing and testing on Windows, so I would be curious to see if this works for anybody on a Mac or Linux system.

13

Programming / any working pyglet roguelikes?

« on: April 01, 2014, 08:01:38 PM »

Anyone currently got a working roguelike built on the pyglet library (Python)?  I had one in development that worked fine on my old PC, but doesn't work on my new one.  I'd like to download someone else's game and run it -- to see if the problem is my code, or my computer.

Pyglet sprites simply aren't appearing in the window (or are appearing but they're all-black or all-transparent).  I have tested the code with simpler scripts and can't make it work with any sprite or any image (however, text labels work fine).  The game doesn't know it isn't working.  No error is thrown.  My code FYI: https://github.com/joeclark77net/roguestate

14

Programming / Re: Multiplayer roguelike implentation through MySQL???

« on: April 01, 2014, 01:00:29 AM »

Storing data in MySQL implies constant read/writes to the hard disk of your server, which will eventually become a performance bottleneck.  Better to store the game data in memory and only read/write to the database at server startup and shutdown.  Wish I knew more about how to program something like this!

15

Design / Re: High fantasy word for currency

« on: April 01, 2014, 12:53:42 AM »

For what it's worth, real-world coins before the fiat currency era were not pure silver or gold.  The important part was that a coin was recognizable and had a standard size and metal content.  Mercury dimes were 90% silver, 10% copper.  (I'm surprised it was that close to pure, actually!  Just looked it up.)  So if I were you, I'd drop the idea of "GP,SP,CP" and give your coins names: shekels, doubloons, crowns, shillings, marks, or something made up.

I know that salt was once used as currency in Roman times.  Hence the word "salary".