Reality Factory

i pretty much scrounged what i could from the internet, read one book on c++ (c++ weekend crash course, it wasnt very good compared to bruce eckel's book), and learned by doing for about 5 - 6 years, moving from language to language until i settled on c-script (a6's scripting language). finding that too restrictive eventually, i moved on to c++. i now would not want to go back to c-script, and because of c++'s flexibility actually find c++ easier for most things, odd as that may sound.

pretty much just read the book, write simple test programs, and get comfortable with the language. after about halfway through the book, when you have a comfortable grasp on c++'s basic syntax, you may start to write a very simple 3d application using an easy-to-use engine such as Irrlicht. after that, and after completing the book, you can move on to OpenGL or Direct3D if you want, but its more and more common to simply use an existing engine.

it is a process that can't be rushed - i dont know how long it takes to get into the programming mindset, since i was 8 or 9 when i began "programming", if you could call it that; it could take a month, it could take a year, before code even begins to make sense. i just dont know, since i dont remember it occuring with me, and i wish i could helkp more with that aspect of it.

I picked up on Visual Basic quick and I think the same will happen with C++. I understand a bit of C++ from my attempt to learn a while back, I think the hard part of learning this will be decifering the RF or tools source to help out. It probably wont be a matter of identifiying and inderstanding the commands used, but understanding all the variables and librairies that are referanced. I have looked at the RF souce and there are dozens of files being referanced. I know I cant understand the full impact of a line of code until I know what is being run when that librairy or variable is referanced. I am just hoping that by the time I am done reading that e-book and doing some tutorials that I can read and possibly write code for RF. Maybe in the future I will be able to help with these things. Lets hope so.

rf's source may be a bit complicated to understand at first, or at least until you've conquered the book.

i'm beginning serious development on rf2 again after a break while i fought a cold, travelled, etc.

thanks Andy Download the books by Bruce Eckel, I got more out of book one then I did with 5 other diy c++ books.

Hope your health holds up till you finish rf2

Will the first download be long, can you give a date (down to the min )

and when can we have screen shot............................

Gods speed to your programming fingers........

ardentcrest wrote:thanks Andy Download the books by Bruce Eckel, I got more out of book one then I did with 5 other diy c++ books.

your welcome, he really is amazing, downloading and reading his books free is a great marketing ploy, it makes me want to send him the money for the book and an extra tip for his amazing teaching skills... other authors couldnt do it because they arent as good...

ardentcrest wrote:Hope your health holds up till you finish rf2

oh, beyond a cold, i should be fine. lots of travelling though.

ardentcrest wrote:Will the first download be long, can you give a date (down to the min )

*gruff id voice* it'll be done when it's done. */gruff id voice* but seriously, giving a date is pr suicide, i'll either get it done way too quickly, or (much more likely) i'll miss that date and several more, and people will begin calling rf2 vaporware.

again, unless you mean download of media. in which case, i'll have one as soon as the appropriate code is done and i've found a good artist to produce content.

ardentcrest wrote:and when can we have screen shot............................

as soon as someone finds me a good artist to produce content. unless you want to stare at screenshots of c++ ide's showing rf2's code, or screenshots of programmer's art in-engine which would make people think rf2 is a cantidate for making the next lego star wars game.

ardentcrest wrote:Gods speed to your programming fingers........

thanks!

Ok. No date.

Ok No screen shot.

Can we have pa pic of you working on rf2 to keep us going

sure... showing main code that will likely be scrapped before long...

ardentcrest wrote: Can we have pa pic of you working on rf2 to keep us going

not your comp screen.

A pic of you. or a act file of you at you comp.

By the way its 12 40 am here in ireland, what the time in the good old US of A.

oh. bah, my desk is a mess, maybe some other time. picture a guy sitting in a nice grey office chair at a futuristic black metal and tempered glass desk staring at a boring white monitor, typing on a cheap keybopard, using a nice mouse, drinking tea, with an island fruit candle burning off to my side and a gamecube and tv at the ready for stress-relieving metroid sessions.

right now it's 5:52PM.

whats kind of interesting about rf2 is it's resiliance. for instance, i can delete realityfactory.ini, and itll happily default to values hardcoded into it.

yep and, because of irrlicht, if a file would not be found then it would not crsash the whole world, am i right?

AndyCR wrote:

ardentcrest wrote:and when can we have screen shot............................

as soon as someone finds me a good artist to produce content. unless you want to stare at screenshots of c++ ide's showing rf2's code, or screenshots of programmer's art in-engine which would make people think rf2 is a cantidate for making the next lego star wars game.

What kind of art are you looking for?
a) Textures
b) Character Models
c) Object Models
d) Levels
e) All of the above
f) Answer not given

mainly textures, object models, and levels (in model format). textures should be 512x512 or 1024x1024, and should have normal/height maps accompanying them. object models should be decently high poly, up to 2,000 for things such as chairs, pillars, etc. (you can go a bit higher).

the level, beyond the basic shell, should be gutted. ie, make the level, then take, sa, one of the pillars and put it into a new model file, save as pillar.x, do the same with everything but the walls, cieling, and floor. you should include a picture or text file explaining where everything goes, or simply the original level without the chopping-up.

you can pick any theme you wish.

irrlicht gives alot of flexibility, my theory with rf2 is if a resource is not found, it should continue without it unless its critical like the player model but should inform the user somehow so they can fix it.

i apolagize to so shamelessly ask for artwork from the community, but if you saw my programmer's art instead of real art...

i thank anyone who wants to do this in advance. if nobody does, i suppose i can find textures on the net and rig up a mesh.

EDIT: in addition, we have two options in terms of screenshots: show what the engine is capable of, or show whats actually implimented in rf2 already. if you want the latter, itll be screenshots of the menu for awhile, which im willing to show.

i might want to wait for the level editor format to be done before i give any 3d screenshots, its just a pain to do it without those classes in place.

slight complication, irrlicht has very little in terms of 2d graphics capability compared to it's 3d graphics capability, and as such it provides no way to cut a section from an image and store that as a texture, like the menu buttons use. looks like i'm going to have to lock the image and manipulate it manually. wonderful. should work once i get it though, just produces extra code, and i hate extra code... then again, maybe i'm being a -bit- too picky with the rf2 source

i can barely pull myself away from the rf2 source code... i suppose it's good for progress, but hey, i need to eat

slight complication, irrlicht has very little in terms of 2d graphics capability compared to it's 3d graphics capability, and as such it provides no way to cut a section from an image and store that as a texture, like the menu buttons use. looks like i'm going to have to lock the image and manipulate it manually.

I would just set up an orthogonal projection and use quads for button graphics etc. You will just have to set the correct uv coordinates, no need for image manipulations...

that's an interesting idea, i never thought of that before... thanks for the idea!