Beggar

[valianjuan]

I'm not sure I understood what you just said. 
Anyway, as an update, I've got the parser running using JDOM.  Now i just have to link the parser with the game... not so easy as my xml is more robust than my engine... well... hopefully by the end of the week.

[Anvilfolk]

I believe what he said, and what I sort of suggested, is that you don't link to the parser directly. A tree isn't really the best way to have all the information about your game. There are more efficient ways of accessing information.

Also, making your engine depend on JDOM primitives might not be a good idea. If some day you want to change JDOM to something else, all you need to do is rewrite the one function that gets all the data from the XML tree, and puts it in the according datastructures, within your classes.

If you have JDOM primitives (nodes, I'm assuming) scattered all over your classes, it'll be a pain.

So, I guess the suggestion is: use JDOM as an interface to get all the hard data out of the XML. Copy that data over to your classes, and dump the JDOM XML tree.

[valianjuan]

Ah! I see what you're saying.

I preloaded everything... meaning I parse the file, translate it to a game class that acts like a database for me.
So, I believe I got it! 

[Slash]

Well, that's not quite what I meant, though that's true too

I mean, when you get to the point of assigning meaningful (and balanced) stats to your items and monsters, you will have a better time if you process the data in a spreadsheet instead of having a flat text file as in XML, as you can apply functions to each entity stats, and get to compare each one stats in-between.

[valianjuan]

That is a good point! 
It would be a great deal easier to do it in a spreadsheet from the client side. Hmmm...
I'll have to ponder on that one a bit.

Here's a question for you though,
If you were write a game where the game files are easily manipulated (as in where monster stats are kept in a spreadsheet or XML) would you give up some of the fun parts of say, maintaining a high score list?  Does it matter and will people get around it regardless?

[corremn]

Highscores wont be compatable with anyone elses but the important part is that the player can see improvement, and judge success by the final result.  I doubt it that most people will modify the data files regularly that much anyway.

[valianjuan]

Finally stable enough to put up an update!     (www.sf.net/projects/beggar)
Check out the xml and cvs inputs (Thanks slash and everyone else)
The next order of business is to allow switching between maps... (coming soon!)

[Slash]

Here's a question for you though,
If you were write a game where the game files are easily manipulated (as in where monster stats are kept in a spreadsheet or XML) would you give up some of the fun parts of say, maintaining a high score list?  Does it matter and will people get around it regardless?

Well, my high score lists are plain text files up to now , I regard trying to protect it as something unneeded

On the other hand, I use encrypted XML for data files

[valianjuan]

  Version 0.5.0!
The xml inputs are working pretty well with my initial tests.  We'll see what comes up after a start trying to flex the parser muscles.  Also added resting blah blah ... etc etc
I think the slime game I made for testing might become a game in it's own right.  Or at least a minigame.

www.sf.net/projects/beggar

[valianjuan]

  Expanded the slime game for fun!  (v. 0.5.1) 
With it came some of the features I've been meaning to put in, but didn't have the motivation until now.

[valianjuan]

Guess I hadn't posted in a while. 
Has anyone here tried the game recently?
Any suggestions?
Thanks!