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Published February 20, 2007
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So I haven't put anything in this journal for a long time, 'cause nothing exciting has been happening with me (unless you call playing Baldur's Gate for the billionth time exciting).

But now, I'm working (again) on a game engine. Woo.

But this time it's different for the following reasons:

  • I am not planning this at all, I will just refactor as necessary.

  • I am making content as I need it, not all at once (big sticking point).

  • I am using C# and XNA.

  • I am better at programming.



So I'm going to have fun doing this without too much forward planning, and seeing how playable it is.

Anyway, the first thing I started on were the gameplay classes, because they're more fun to make than graphical classes.

So the most important game play class is the entity (I started spelling game play as two words because Firefox's spell check is yelling at me) because it represents something that can be interacted with.

Every entity has two parts: its sprite, and its other stuff. I couldn't figure out a name for the other stuff so I called it "EntityReference".

Here's what I'm talking about:
using System;using System.Collections.Generic;using System.Text;using System.IO;using FromNothing.Utility;namespace FromNothing.Gameplay{    class EffectValue    {        string idName; //must be unique        string visibleName; //what the player sees        double Magnitude; //how strong it is        long Duration; //how long (in milliseconds) it will last    }        //this class specifies all the information about an entity that I might want to save.    //Any thing in the game world that can be interacted with is an entity.    class EntityReference    {        //This MUST be unique, it is used to identify an object        string idName;        //This does not have to be unique, it is what the player sees.        string visibleName;        //This refers to the type of object that this actor represents. EntityTypes might        //be "door", "tank", whatever        string entityType;        //Every actor has various attributes and statistics associated with it.        //This dictionary maps an attribute name with its value. Examples of attributes        //would be "strength", "dexterity", and "hitpoints", or in the case of a door,        //"thickness", and "picklock difficulty".        public SortedDictionary<string, Variable> attributes;        //Attributes are variables that are always present and relate directly to gameplay.        //They never go away. LocalVars, on the other hand, have distinct lifespans. These        //might be used to track plot points involving an actor.        public SortedDictionary<string, Variable> localVars;        //Effects are temporary ailments that are capable of effecting all entities, not        //just ones with specific storyline purposes. They are usually very temporary.        //Examples of effects include "poison", "lung shot", or "on fire".        public SortedDictionary<string, EffectValue> effects;        //Actions Performable are luachunks that spell out what happens when a character        //performs a certain action on this entity.        public SortedDictionary<string, string> actionsPerformable;        //if the variable does not exist, it is created.        public void SetAttribute(string name, Variable value);        public void SetLocalVar(string name, Variable value);        public void SetEffect(string name, EffectValue value);        public void SetActionPerformable(string name, string luaChunk);        //there is no kill attribute because attributes live until the character is removed        public void KillLocalVar(string name);        public void KillEffect(string name);        public void KillActionPerformable(string name);        /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////        public Variable GetAttributeValue(string name) { return state.attributes[name]; }        public Variable GetLocalVarValue(string name) { return state.localVars[name]; }        public EffectValue GetEffectValue(string name) { return state.effects[name]; }         /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////        public void Serialize(Serializer serializer);        /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////    }    class Entity    {        public EntityReference reference;        public Sprite sprite;        Entity()         {            reference = new EntityReference();            sprite = new Sprite();        }            }}


Anyway, if you see anything that sucks, let me know. I'm going to be a game developer some day, and if you don't help me now, karma dictates that you will be maintaining my code some day.
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Comments

Scet
I could be totally wrong about this, but won't all your SortedDictionaries be null? I usually initialize things right where they're declared unless they reference other objects in the class, I even initialize value types even though there's no real point, just to match the references.

Also there's no point in function prototypes in C#. Unlike C++, the order functions/variables are declared doesn't matter at all. Plus why not just merge EntityReference and Entity?
February 20, 2007 07:57 PM
Gaiiden
Good luck, writing an engine is rough. I tried it, and in some ways succeeded. Everyone will tell you it's not worth it, and that's true from most commercial standpoints, but where you're at now you could stand to gain more from the experience. Plus there are always cases where needing your own engine is critical. A friend of mine just finished an engine that's less than 400KB so he could make a 3D web game
February 21, 2007 01:28 AM
Drakkcon
Quote:Original post by Scet
I could be totally wrong about this, but won't all your SortedDictionaries be null? I usually initialize things right where they're declared unless they reference other objects in the class, I even initialize value types even though there's no real point, just to match the references.

Also there's no point in function prototypes in C#. Unlike C++, the order functions/variables are declared doesn't matter at all. Plus why not just merge EntityReference and Entity?


You're right, I was just sort of prototyping though, not wanting to write out the function definitions. That's not to say I don't forget to initialize stuff all the time in C# =)

Quote:
Good luck, writing an engine is rough. I tried it, and in some ways succeeded. Everyone will tell you it's not worth it, and that's true from most commercial standpoints, but where you're at now you could stand to gain more from the experience. Plus there are always cases where needing your own engine is critical. A friend of mine just finished an engine that's less than 400KB so he could make a 3D web game


Thanks!
February 21, 2007 07:35 AM
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