BlitzMax Game Framework V1.03 out!
Community Forums/Showcase/BlitzMax Game Framework V1.03 out!
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| Hi all, I'm proud to release V1.03 of the Grey Alien BlitzMax Game Framework which was used to make: Holiday Bonus ( http://www.greyaliengames.com/holidaybonus.php ) The Wonderful Wizard of Oz ( http://www.greyaliengames.com/oz.php ) Sudoku Maya Gold ( http://www.greyaliengames.com/sudokumaya.php ) These professional games have sold thousands of copies on the major portals and you can own the framework that was used to make them for only £29.95. Make those new year's resolutions come true and make some games now! The framework is tried and tested, and already in use by many hobbyists and professionals (well over 60 customers!). Give the mini-game demo a whirl today and find out why it's so popular: *DEMO* www.greyaliengames.com/downloadtrack.php?id=11 (5.86Mb) Also try out these demos: Speed Run (a vertical scroller) www.greyaliengames.com/downloadtrack.php?id=12 (2.42Mb) Make Me Happy (a multi-directional scroller) www.greyaliengames.com/downloadtrack.php?id=13 (2.75Mb) Find out more about the framework here: *FAQ* http://www.greyaliengames.com/framework/faq.html Watch a video here (Note: any jerkiness is 100% due to video capture (and my inability to use it), not the framework.) *VIDEO* www.greyaliengames.com/aotmg/aotmg.wmv (1.1Mb) *NEW* Full function listing of commoncode.bmx http://www.greyaliengames.com/framework/commoncode.html *NEW* Full type listing of commontypes.bmx http://www.greyaliengames.com/framework/commontypes.html This version has many improvements. Some of the larger ones include: - Now compiles with BlitzMax 1.24 - Now compiles on Macs (note: some features are Windows only) - More examples! - Screens now Fade In - TCrossFade type - TParticle supports multiple animation phases! - Sprites and Buttons have fancy glow support (see Holiday Bonus) - Two new demo games! Speed Run and Make Me Happy. - Plus tons more stuff! Why do you need it? Well do you... - want the fun of making games without boring research, technical problems and tons of interface code? - want your game to run on a wide range of PCs using an ultra smooth timing routine? - want your game to have the same functionality as professional commercial games? - want to plug your code straight into an OOP environment with tons of ready-made Types? Then get the Grey Alien BlizMax Game Framework!  How To Play AOTMG ----------------- Just move left and right and shoot the UFOs with Z, that's it for now... Keys ---- Press <Esc> to exit the game. Press <F> to toggle full screen/windowed mode. Press <V> to toggle VSync on/off. Press <G> to toggle DirectX/OpenGL. Press <D> to bring up the debug display Whilst in debug mode, press <J> to jump level. Whilst in debug mode, press <R> to restart level. Whilst in debug mode, press <T> to toggle fast (full speed). Whilst in debug mode, press <L> to toggle slow motion. Whilst in debug mode, press <I> to toggle Flip modes. Whilst in debug mode, press <A> to toggle anti-lag fix. Whilst in debug mode, press <N> to toggle No Timing. Press <P> to pause the game. Press <Q> to quit the game. Press <S> to toggle sound on/off. Press <M> to toggle music on/off. Press <-> and <=> to adjust sound volume. Press <F12> to take a screenshot. Press <Ctrl+X> to exit the game instantly. Summary of features (in no particular order): Smooth Fixed Rate Logic timing. Dynamically change between Full-Screen and Windowed Mode. Dynamically change between DirectX and OpenGL. Windowed mode has working minimise and close buttons. Game and music pauses whenever focus is lost. Full icon support (.exe and title bar). Ini file to save user settings. Extensive debug suite. Take screenshots with F12. Integrated mouse pointer. Sound and music functions. Sprite type. Comprehensive Particle engine. Button type. Menu type. Font and Label types. Animation type for handling multi-phase animations. Splash screen. Loading screen. Title screen. Fully working options screen. Fully working Player Profile Manager dialog. Dialog type extended to DialogOK, DialogYesNo and DialogTextInput. Load, save and enter High Scores. Other example screens such as Level Complete, Game Complete, Game Over, and Credits. Select Level Map which zooms and scrolls. Example types such as Player (with shield, lives, target, and level), Bullet, Alien etc. Fast fade out or in. Also crossfade! Manage multiple game screens easily. Event-based input instead of PolledInput. Top-level general error handling including auto-resetting the ini file upon crash. Auto-selects best graphics mode and errors properly if none present. BlitzMax fixes and workarounds. And more! (For a full list of features, please see the FAQ.) ********************************************************* The Game Framework (Windows only) is a collection of files that you can use to make a professional quality game. It also comes with an example mini-game called Attack of the Mutant Greys. You can buy it for £29.95, €43.50 or $54.95 (please ask for prices in other currencies). This gives you a royalty free licence to use the code for freeware and commercial projects. You will receive FREE updates as and when they become available. To buy it, please go here: http://www.greyaliengames.com/contact.php and use the appropriate Paypal donate button (this is my preferred method). Or use Share-it! https://secure.shareit.com/shareit/checkout.html?PRODUCT[300072102]=1 If you are based in the U.K. and want to pay by cheque or postal order, please email me (my email address is in my blitz profile and on my website). ********************************************************* Thanks to everyone who has helped with this and thanks to all my loyal customers. Don't delay, try it today! |
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| *** Please note: I'm going away to do an Aikido course on Friday for 3 days (back Sunday night), so if you buy it, or have any questions, I won't be able to reply until late Sunday night or Monday morning. Thanks for you patience. |
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| Sounds good as always Jake. Looking forward to seeing the new version in my inbox. :) |
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| I've received it half hour ago and I am looking forward to playing with it tonight. Glow effect is excellent btw. Great work and service, Jake. Thank you. Barney |
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| Avon. You should have it by now. Let me know if not. Two zip files were sent (unless you are on my list for .rars). Barnabius: Thanks as always for your support. |
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| I didn't get mine. I've recently done away with some email addy's ( I had too many ) so the framework may have gone to one of those. The email addy I use now for all my purchases is "purchase (at) kamikazekrow (dot) com" If possible could you send the framework to that address Grey? |
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| I'm having trouble sending emails so I'll just say that I ordered earlier this week and I got your first couple of emails and also this new version. Thanks a lot! Sören |
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| Amon, yeah I'll do later when my youngest son is not hassling me to play fizzball. (Did it) Sören: Glad to hear it, great! |
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| Got it. :) If you could update the 'Getting Started' doc that would be cool also. :) What I would be interested in is a blank Project. What I mean is a bare bones demo, no AOTMG graphics etc, that shows how to start the framwork without having to modify everything. Any chance of getting something like that setup? Also, do you have any plans to setup a private forum for registered peeps to post in? |
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| I agree with Amon. I'd love to have a basic skeleton of the framework, if possible. |
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| I'll third that, a skeleton would be great! |
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| Spam! |
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| I didn't get mine yet, looking forward to it. |
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| Avon. You should have it by now. Let me know if not. Not arrived yet. I sent an e-mail to you about 12 hours ago, but am posting here in case you didn't get it. |
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| I sent the ££ via Paypal, look forward to getting it when you return from your course! |
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| Not arrived to me! :(( |
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| Gray is not around as he mentioned above *** Please note: I'm going away to do an Aikido course on Friday for 3 days (back Sunday night), so if you buy it, or have any questions, I won't be able to reply until late Sunday night or Monday morning. Thanks for you patience. |
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| GregBUG: Don't panic, in the post above Grey says he's away for the weekend, see: *** Please note: I'm going away to do an Aikido course on Friday for 3 days (back Sunday night), so if you buy it, or have any questions, I won't be able to reply until late Sunday night or Monday morning. Thanks for you patience. |
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| Amon: Made something like that a while back for a customer, good idea. It's on the to do list. As for forums, good idea BUT I'm afraid I don't have thte time/resources to set one up at the moment, mind you if anyone else wants to...I'll check it out. Chroma: ? Blitzplotter: Still not got it? Please email me with a current email address. Avon: Looking into it. Basically I sent the email en-mass as some people have got it and others not, so it must be something at your end...Did you get the first email saying I was about to send the update? the 2nd/3rd emails containted the framework (part a and b) GregBUG and to the other new customers. Sorry I was away for three days, I tried to let you know at the top of the post. I will process your orders immediately. Many thanks I hope that you enjoy using it a lot. Thanks to others for pointing out my post about going away. |
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| Hmm, small problemo... Tried to compile the sample game and it fails, with "SystemParametersInfo' not found". I'm using a Mac (and yes I realise that some of the framework is Windows only) so I'm expecting a few teething troubles. Any pointers? |
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| Got round it by commenting out the call in the commoncode.bmx file. Next problem though, on execution the app is complaining it has no 3d drivers. Obviously as I'm on a Mac I've changed the driver type in the AOTMG.ini file but that's not made any difference. I'll go have a noodle and report back if I figure it out. |
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| RiK: Hi, sorry for the problems, V1.02 compiled on a Mac but it seems 1.03 doesn't. However, a really cool Mac customer has sent me some fixes so I'm emailed you the Mac safe version now. |
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| Thanks, Just got it, still got the "no 3D driver" issue though. Found it. Your driver init in commontypes.bmx checks the ini file and then sets the driver accordingly, but all that code is inside a ?Win32 directive, so is the line which sets DriverOK=1. The ?MaxOS bit only selects an OpenGl driver but doesn't set the DriverOK=1 and hence the error trap immediately after that fails... If I force DriverOK to 1 it runs.. (partially, currently checking out the next one. ) |
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| Hi Rik, I thought the version I emailed you had then DriverOK = 1 issue fixed (it does, I just checked). Plus it should have any other issues you are finding fixed, check it out :-) |
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| Oops, looks like a PICNIC* error there... Yup it's working ok now thanks. Great stuff, very impressed so far. * Problem in Chair, Not in Computer. |
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| RiK. Glad you've got it working, hope you enjoyed your picnic ;-) |
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| Got it grey, thanks. Haven't had much time to view forums of late.. |
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| i've mine too. Thanks Grey. |
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| Just had a chance to look closely at speed run, varying a spaceship's speed dependent upon which colours it goes over is an interesting piece of coding. Thanks Grey {;-> |
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| Yeah it's actually based on a mini-game I wrote on the Amiga over 10 years ago (before wipeout). I may add some more to it soon. |
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| Grey, what are you thinking for the timeframe for 1.04 (I'm considering playing with a Mac.) |
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| Well I'm on a mission to complete 1.04 (Mac verison) by the end of Feb so I can start my next game in March. That's the aim anyway. It may be sooner than that but I can't make any promices. |
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| Ooh, I'll look forward to that then.... |
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| well I'm gonna be posting quite a few questiosn on the forum no doubt. |
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| I'm gonna bug you again for the barebones template. I need a template with the bare minimum. or a quick tutorial on how to start from scratch. :) |
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| yeah sorry Amon, I just had some other vital stuff. The thing is have you looked at ExampleTitleScreen? That's pretty much a barebones template, just take out the data loading and delete the contents of the load/start/draw methods and there you go. That's what I'm gonna do anyway. I'll let you know when it's ready. |
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| Apple Framework? Hmm... Looks like one of the office Mac's will change residence soon. :-) Barney |
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| Yeah I gotta get a cheap Mac first! |
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| Hi everyone, I've just emailed you all an empty template project as requested by Amon. Hope you got it OK. |
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| I didn't get it, Grey. |
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| i got it, ty jake |
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| Amon Amon why do you never get my emails? I even sent this one from another address. I'll try again now...:-) (sent to address in your profile) |
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| I didn't get it. |
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| I'm afraid I did not get it, too. :( So, if you can resend when you find time, please. Barney |
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| weird. OK I'll send from my other email account now. Please let me know. This is really annoying me (not you, my ISP) wonder if I should get a different SMTP server... |
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| nope me either.. IPete2. |
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| I'm going to try to get an app which sends out emails one at a time as my ISP seems to send back an error if I send out to more than 20 at a time. Any recommendations? |
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| Mail received, Jake. Thank you. Barney |
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| Got it, Thanks :) |
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| hip hip horray ;-) |
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| Easiest thing would be a simple mailing list that you create on your mailbox. Assuming that you aren't using a free mailer which most likely does not allow that :) (alternatively: Becky 2 is quite interesting in such stuff. Its my mail program for 5 years now :) ) |
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| I don't think Outlook Express has a function like that... |
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| Me neither too... |
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| RiK. Sending now to the address in your profile. |
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| I didn't get the first, but I did get the second. |
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| I got mail {:-) |
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| Just so everyone knows, I'm on Holiday from Sat 24th FEb to Sat 3rd March (1 week) so they'll be no framework support and I'll deal with any sales on my return. Thanks! |
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| Just wanted to say that if anyone tried to buy it through Paypal recently and found that the Donate button was automatically adding on £1.50 P&P, that this is a stupid Paypal error that I'm trying to resolve right now. So don't be put off, try again soon and if the P&P still isn't gone then reduce your main payment by £1.50. Sorry for the inconvenience. |
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| Having bought the framework recently, i've got to say that i'm very impressed, and have been quite pleased with my purchase. The functionality and workarounds that are added have saved me many hours of boring work and research. Even better than the new additions is the structure with which these features are implemented, as well as the 'Screen' system in general. With everything being OO, adding or changing types and behaviors is simple, but you are not at all limited or restricted in what you add or how you do it. I can honestly say that building a project on top of what is provided is both rapid and actually quite enjoyable. The only facet which could use improvement is the documentation, which doesn't feature a full breakdown of the added types & functions, and their fields and methods. With a short while of tinkering and reading through the source, though, it's not tough at all to get a grip on things. My suggestions is to keep commoncode.bmx and commontypes.bmx open, and use these as your main point of reference. After all, what better guide is there than the code itself? Case in point, I found myself wanting an additional button type for my project; a 'Text Button' that would display a text label on top of a button in a chosen font, eliminating the need for button graphics for all the buttons I would eventually need (quite a lot). All I had to do was extend the TButton class, add a single custom method and override the Draw method, and my new TextButton was ready to use. Given that the Menu functionality and logic was already implemented, I was up and running with my new feature in less than an hour. (Note: Look for this function in a future release of the framework! GreyAlien was nice enough to roll the new type into the full build, hope some of the other users will find this useful!) In summary, this product is well worth its price if only for the time it has saved in implementing similar features. Add to this the tremendous freedom and flexibility it offers due to the fully OO structure, and i'd be *extremely* hard pressed to go back to vanilla BMax. I'd give it a 9/10, with the documentation being the only thing lacking. A must-buy for anyone interested with building from a solid base. |
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| One of my customers, Nolan Carroll, has very kindly written a basic tutorial called "Creating a Basic Setup" and plans to follow it with some more tutorials soon. Thanks Nolan, keep up the good work! Also, on the news front, I'm working on a game for Big Fish Games at the moment. It's due for release in June sometime and naturally after that I'll send out a framework update. The next update will include full Mac support and Windows Vista support too. |
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| Since Grey is busy, if anyone is having trouble with getting the framework to work on the Mac, please let me know. I would be happy to help. I've forwarded the changes I had to make(very few actually) to Grey Alien, so they should hopefully be in the next build. I haven't tried this on an Intel Mac, so I don't know if there are any other changes needed on that platform. |
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| Yeah Keith has been very helpful. The last release compiled on Mac but the mouse didn't work properly but Keith has sorted that out, but I haven't release that version yet. I have an Intel Mac so I'll be able to test the framework on that soon, it's what I bought it for after all! |
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| Just noticed something on the Mac last night with the Framework. The issue is not specific to Grey's framework, it seems to be a blitzmax thing(or a Mac thing), but I thought I'd bring it up here. On the PC side, I had changed my path to my graphics files from the Frameworks default of \data\graphics to \media. Instead of rewriting parts of Greys code to allow me to pull from whatever directory I wanted, I simply would call my images by doing ..\..\media\<image>.png. This would make the resulting load of the image into data\graphics\..\..\media\<image>.png. On the PC this would work fine, even though my installer never created the data\graphics folder. However, on the Mac, if those folders are not created by your install program(even though they are empty), the game will crash and say it can't find the files. So I've temporarily patched my installer on the Mac to put those folders in, though they remain empty, and everything loads fine. Eventually I'll just replace the Framework code with my own path instead of circumventing it. Hope that was helpful for someone. |
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| Interesting. Keith, you weren't using backslashes on the Mac were you or doesn't it matter? |
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| It shouldn't matter as all the file system commands call FixPath, a function which changes all the "\" to "/" regardless of platform. |
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| wow I never knew that. cool. |
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| Just ordered my copy looking forward to spamming the world with my puzzels :) |
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| Hi Grey, I am about to take the plunge and start merging my project (currently in v102) with the v103 framework, yep I know you released v103 3 months ago but have been busy...... I was wondering whether or not v104 might be released soon, if so I'll hold off merging till 104 comes out. (;-) The sparkles coming of the mouse pointer makes the merge worthwhile in itself...... |
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| sparkles are in V1.03. 1.04 probably not due out until my current game is finished mid June, but there'll be a number of improvements plus fixes. I guess if enough people demand it, I could do an interim release...Hmm, just checked the logs and the only real bug was with scaling particles. There's a few other minor enhancements but nothing major. 1.04 should include vista compatibility and Mac also. Probably worth combining with V1.03 for now. I never break any code written with old versions, so you'll be OK. |
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| Just Wondering if you are thinking of implementing any pathing methods for Sprites Im Working on a few methods at the moment Using [[x,y,s],[x,y,s],[x,y,s],[x,y,s],[x,y,s]...,[l]] Where x,y are vector points s = speed*delta mod l= looping on/off/pingpong My main reason im building on this is on your angle move forward for sprites it would be a great benefit to have a destination option or range options |
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| Haven't got any major plans but if I was to write a shooter I'd probably have to do it. My particle engine has "phase" system where each particle can go off and do several phases. Rather than specifying the destination coords you just specify the x and y speeds and the duration of the phase. The end result is the same though. If you make any cool methods then I could always add them to the framework. |
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| Cheers Grey, I'll start merging with 103 then..... |
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| Just fixed the donate button so it doesn't charge £1.50 P&P like it has for a month or so, bloody Paypal! Their P&P profile applies to website payment buttons AND donations. Who wants to charge P&P for Donations, that's so dumb? So anyway if you were put off by the P&P charge, please come back and try again! I've also put the paypal comments box back in as that disappeared a while back by accident. You can enter "Framework" or something in here if you like. |
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| Just added a cool feature to the particle engine. Basically, the particles already support "phases" but now you can specify your own function to be called when a phase ends and the particle gets passed to the function as a param. This means you can do stuff like when a bonus particle hits a scoreboard you can push up the score. It's pretty neat. |
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| Just added TParticleGenerator and TParticleGeneratorList. Pretty darn useful. |
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| Is there a TMergeCode on the way ? (;-) |
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| fraid not haha. Nor as we'd said before TMakeRPGGame or BringMeACuppa() ;-) |
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| Almost got my TMakeMatch3 Working and only going for £299.99 + 85% of all sales you make :) |
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| re: TMakeMatch3. These days I'm not sure a customer would make the money back. And 85% you shark you! |
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 @Grey Finding your Framework most excellent realy dynamic one of the most flexible mods ive managed to get my hand on anyways early screeny of PuzelGull my Make a Game in 28 Day Challange |
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| Grey- I am planning to purchase your Framework eventually because it looks like there is a lot of useful functions in there, even for those of us not making match-3 games! :) I know you've been working on perfecting the Mac version, but I implore you to also follow up with ensuring your framework is Linux compatible as well. I think we are going to see the Linux consumer base grow with Dell offering Ubuntu as a OS choice, and any serious developer needs to consider support for all three platforms if they want to maximize their sales. |
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| Duckstab[o]: Excellent, glad to see a game taking shape, and thanks for the kind words! :-) Tachyon: Cool. Yes Linux support is on my list of things to look into after Mac and Vista (but I can't guarantee I'll do it). The only thing I was thinking was that do Linux users actually pay for games or do they only get free stuff like their OS? i.e. is it really a valid market? Mac users cerainly pay and Mac games can account for 30% of sales. |
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| do Linux users actually pay for games Sure they do! While it may be an open-source OS with many free games and apps available, there are also a surprising number of commercial games for that platform, some of which are AAA quality titles. It's a market I am not planning to ignore, especially because it's not nearly as saturated as the Windows game market is. Hmm, I wonder just how many sales a quality match-3 game could be made on the Linux platform... |
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| I've posted a thread here and on Indiegamer about it to find out more information. |
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| My framework is one year old, yay! I'm giving away a FREE copy to one of the next 3 people who buy it. See this thread for more info: http://www.blitzbasic.com/Community/posts.php?topic=69279 Also I've posted some news about forthcoming features in my blog: http://greyaliengames.com/blog/forthcoming-features/ |
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| Congratz Grey, managed to merger with 103 last night, 95 percent done... |
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| What, specifically is Windows only at the moment ? |
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| Basically I'm not saying it's Mac or Linux compatible because I haven't personally tested on those OSs. But one of my customers helped me to get in compiling on the Mac and V1.03 compiles on the Mac. V1.04 will have been fully tested by me. Also another customer has got it working on Linux and I'm going to try to find out what they did so I can integrate it into my framework. Some features of the framework rely on Windows API calls and thus they won't work on the Mac, they are ignored in fact because I've put ?win32 ? round them. They are not major features at all, just stuff to do with setting the icon and pausing when minimised etc, just API about windowed mode. There's no problem with full-screen mode. So basically to cover my arse I'm selling it as a Windows framework with the added bonus that you'll probably get it working on the Mac fine. Would you like a specific list of the Windows only things? |
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| If you can, that would be useful |
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| OK here goes: - Include an icon with the exe - Detect if app was suspended whilst loading - Display Desktop Hz - Display Full-Screen Hz - Centre Window on Desktop - Add a minimise icon to Window - Add a maximise icon to Window - AppResume detection via Windows API in rare case when Blitz doesn't report it - Detect if window has been moved and reset timing variables - Reading mouse coords relative to desktop in order to allow mouse cursor to slide out of the window instead of get stuck at the edge - Set an icon on the window - Force window to minimise - VWait (DirectX only) - CreateMutex (for detecting if 2 versions of app are running) - Set Process Priority - Get Environment Variable - Set Desktop Wallpaper A lot of those things I've already made links to relevent posts so I can write the Mac code when I do my "proper" conversion. As you can see there is nothing critical in the list, it's just a few bonus items that you may or may not use. If you didn't have my framework you'd still need to figure out how to those things and hundreds more on your own. Those functions account for maybe 1% of my code, basically nothing. |
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| Thanks for posting that, Grey. Clearly some of those features would be greatly appreciated on the Mac and Linux platform, particularly those items related to the GUI (icons, buttons, desktop-related functions). I think if you keep developing this framework and ensure as much cross compatibility as possible, you could have an overall package that would be considered a "must have" add-on for all BlitzMax users. |
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| Tachyon: Yeah that would be cool. Certainly I aim to support that stuff for Mac first quite soon. |
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| Hey, Grey. Have you ever considered making a deal with BRL Including a full or lite version of Framework into BMax distribution could do wonders for both parties... Just a thought... Barney |
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| Yeah I think Indiepath suggested that, well not a bundle but at least some promotion. But I never got round to it. There's another thing to consider. At the moment the support emails are fine, I can handle them, but imagine EVERYONE with BMax was emailing me :-O. I don't really want to tie myself down to that despite the money I'd get from sales because I really want to be making games (which also have the potential for more money). That might seem crazy that I'd want to limit the number of sales but it's true. Unless I could find a way to outsource the support to a 3rd party, perhaps an existing framework customer or two and maybe I could handle the really hard ones... |
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| ...I really want to be making games... Spoken like a true programmer. Nuff' said. :-) Barney |
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| hmzz, it seems this thigy is quite populair. maybe i should try it as well :-) but i was wondering, can anyone tell me what makes this different than the SpriteCandy thigy of X-Pressive (http://www.x-pressive.com/SpriteCandy/index.html) ? That seems more powerfull.. but is it? |
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| SpriteCandy is a Sprite System for B3D while BlitzMax Game Framework provides Game Framework modules for BlitzMax. Difficult to say which is more 'powerful' as they provide different things. If you're looking for a B3D Sprite System then SpriteCandy is the right choice (or NSprite2). If you're looking for a BlitzMax Game FrameWork then BlitzMax Game Framework is a good choice. If you're looking for a BlitzMax Sprite System then SSWift Sprite System is a good choice. <edit> I apologise to others who have similar products available which I haven't mentioned. |
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| right, i forgot about that this was for BlitzMax only... :-P |
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| thanks TonyG for some reason I missed this thread for a whole day, gasp! Yeah LeeMing it's BMax only. Do you have BMax? It's very good. My framework has a sprite and particle system build in. |
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Just upgraded the debug stats: Now shows: - Sound Driver (and you can toggle it with H) - Windows Memory Used/Total/Load % - OS Version (Mac OSX or various Windows version) - Music (On/Off) - Sound (On/Off) All pretty useful stuff (at least to me ;-)) Wouldn't mind finding out how to display video RAM but it's not so easy... |
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| looking good grey, is there any chance you might incorporate a TBreakOutGame_Type in v1.04 ? I would be willing to pay an 'upgrade' fee, seeing as I've had your product > 1 year if you included some source code along the breakout mentality. I did have an initial stab at producing a TBreakout type myself within your framework, but opted for developing something in line with Assari's tutorial - purely due to the requirements I'd for my breakout game and a lack of understanding..... I am using your Game Framework for the primary application within my product and it works like a charm. I noticed on another thread that someone has been advised to incorporate a 'loading bar' - your framework has this functionality already. {;-) Good luck with trying to display video RAM. Regards, BP. |
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| yeah I have a loading bar :-) I'd like to make a breakout game too. Made one on the Amiga in assembly. Anyway, I don't really ahve any spare time for extra projects right now (full-time on my game) but in the future I'll bear it in mind certainly! |
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| Hi Grey Alien, I would like to ask you if it is possible to you explain a little more how works your system with swifft sprite system. I'm almost decided to buy both... Is there any known problem? Thanks! |
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| Hi Pinete. A while ago sswift made a physics demo with his sprite system and I wrapped it with my framework and it worked fine. In fact I have a guide on how to do it which comes with the framework. If you don't want the physics then the sprite system would be even easier to plug in. You could even see how you get on without out it. My framework has a TSprite type and also a particle engine and they can be used to do all sorts of crazy stuff! |
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| I assume that this is being released in multiplatform mode, being made in BMax? Was this exclusive to any platform, as far as Windows, OSX, Linux, etc..., or was it going to be released on all three at some point? I mean, the Windows version's fine, seems to work in Vista, but as far as anything else, wonder how Feisty Fawn would do with a game like this. |
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| Hi again! I've tested the game example and I've seen that it doesn't support Alt+TAB!!! When I press Alt+tab to back to game it's just quits! Is this normal? maybe just in the demo version? As I said to you previously, I'm very close to be convinced to buy, but I need to know if your framework supports stuff like: a) Alt + Tab b) full screen <-> window mode c) CTRL + Alt + Supr and come back d) stuff like this... could you please tell me something about this? Thanks in advance! |
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| (X360)WedgeBob: At the moment I'm saying it's Windows only because I've personally tested on that no problems. A couple of my customers have tested it on the Mac and say it' fine (they sent me some tweaks to the code). There are a couple of minor features that won't work on the Mac because they use Win32 library calls, but nothing major. Another customer has apparently got it working on Linux, but this is something that I'm not planning to support in the immediate future. My next version V1.04 will have full Mac support because I've got a MacBook Pro and I'll be making it run on that. Pinete: a) Alt + Tab has always been supported, I'm surprised it doesn't work on your PC. I just downloaded the above demo, went into the gamescreen did alt+tab to desktop, then alt+tabbed back in fine. My PC is Windows XP, Radeon 9800XT. In fact when I released Holiday Bonus, Oberon Media ran it through their extensive QA on a number of machines, and it included that test and more, and it passed. So I am confused. However, since that demo was made I think BMax have upgraded their DX module so, it if you were to do a syncmods and recompile the AOTMG demo it would work. I hope so... b)Yeah this totally works, simply press F to toggle modes (or go to the options screen). c) CTRL + Alt + Supr? Do you mean Ctrl+Alt+Del? This should work, again it was tested by me and Oberon. Does it work for you? d) Basically, as it's a professional framework, I spent a long time investigating all that stuff and making sure that it worked so I'm interested to hear if you have any problems with it. Next up is full proper Vista support. It will work on Vista but it's not currently saving to the "correct" file locations which I'm sorting out for V1.04. I've just added support for different sound drivers and got a bug in the OpenAL driver fixed by BRL which is good :-) |
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| Hi Grey, just a small suggestion, are you considering a method of mixing simple strings with graphical templates/images within 1.04 ? It'd be a nice touch to generate menu options simply by changing the options string, or the play game string.... all the best with your latest production, Regards, BP. |
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| BP: I have on my to do list the ability to specify a string as the label for buttons. Is that sort of what you mean? I won't be doing it for V1.04 though as I don't need it for the current game because all the buttons are done in graphics only. |
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| Hi Grey, After taking a first look at the framework, I've a simple question... There exist a document that contains all the types and its methods as a kind of list? Is very umconfortable to have the .bmx always open and go up and down to look for a method or to check something... you know.. So it could be a really good idea (I guess fantastic), to have a document like this, where explain shortly what does each function/method/type and where the user can have the complete list of methods & functions to check whatever he wants. All the best, |
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| No doc at the moment I'm afraid. Is very umconfortable to have the .bmx always open and go up and down to look for a method or to check something This is what I do, except I use the side panel in the MaxIDE that lists all the types and then I expand any that I am wanting to look at the methods on. I may change the entire list of Types to Alphabetical order for V1.04This document you'd like, would you be printing it or do you mean say an HTML document which has each type and then the methods as sub points for each type? In other languages you can use "forward Declarations" to declare types and methods and functions at the top of a file as a kind of index and then have the bulk of the code future down, but you can't do this in BMax. |
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| yep thats sort of what I meant. thanks. |
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| Hi Grey, regarding the document, I guess the correct way to have it is in html format or .DOC, in example. Just a wish! ;) I've thought starting to do it but I've a important lack of knowledge still about your framework and maybe the correct way would be some 'framework' expert could do it. Just an idea. Right now I'm starting to have a little more control over your framework, but to be honest, to deal with it since the begining is very difficult to me in terms of lack of docs and examples as I said. I miss to have more information about some functions / methods, to have them ordered in a document to access quickly and find a complete description of each one. The framework is a huge project and the users need to be more assisted to learn. Right now I feel the learning curve is maybe very agressive to be accesible for standard users or Blitz3D users without a deeper knowledge of OOP. But just my opinion!. The framework is great, no doubt. A great purchase. :) Just a question not related to this... Is your framework Windows Vista compatible?? (Excuse me if this question has been done before) Best Regards! |
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| Pinete: I really want to make that doc. Maybe I'll do a bit each day until it's done. There is a getting started guide, did you read that? There's also a Creating a Basic Setup doc (and the author of that is making more). The technical FAQ may have some things that help. Also there are several source files that may help: ExampleTitleScreen.bmx and also the Make Me Happy and SpeedRun demos. These are more simple than the big AOTMG demo. There's even a template project which may help. Vista, it will run but doesn't save in the right places. So I'm making it do that for V1.04 (the next version). |
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| Pinete: I've started some new docs. Here is a full function listing (with brief explanations) of every function in common code. Please note that some of these functions only exist in V1.04 which has not been released yet: http://www.greyaliengames.com/framework/commoncode.html To be honest, I think the framework is worth the money for these functions alone, let alone all the types in CommonTypes.bmx which I'll be documenting next. If I was starting from scratch and had to research, write and test all these functions, it would take weeks - so the £29.95 price tag makes total sense from a time=money point of view. |
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| Hi Grey! That list is exactly I was referring to! Great!!! :) Absolutely agree with you about the price. Your framework is a gift for 29.95. Really cheap and complete. Since I purchased it I've always thought is an incredible investment. :) It can saves you tons of time and money. No doubts. When do you expect launch next version? do you have a aprox date? Best regards! P.D. Thanks for the list!! ;) |
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| Pinete: Thanks for the kind words! Those things make me really happy :-) I'm going to make a list of all my Types today so keep an eye out for it. I was planning to release V1.04 when I finish my current game but that may be in August! So I may try to release it before then...I want to make a special framework webpage (with proper paypal buttons that fill out the price) and links to all the demos etc. I may do that and release V1.04 (if I can find the time!) |
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| OK here is a full listing of all the types in CommonTypes with a brief explanation of each. (fields and methods aren't listed yet). http://www.greyaliengames.com/framework/commontypes.html Also I've spent about 5 hours alpha ordering the functions in commoncode and commontypes as well as adding the brief descriptions as comments to the source, and tidying up all existing comments a bit. Man, I remember slaving through each of those types, some of them took ages like the TPlayerManager but are vital for making a professional game. If anyone is interested in having a prerelease of V1.04 then please let me know :-) |
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| /me sticks a hand up |
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| emailing... |
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| /me too.... |
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| done. This thread is getting too long. Anyway, I'm away on Saturday and Sunday (until the evening) so I can't process any framework sales until Sunday night, just so you all know. I can process them tonight though :-) |
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| Grey, nice to hear the 1.04 is coming, I also want to preview it, |
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| I would appreciate a preview of 1.04 as well if the offer is still available. Thanks! |
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| eni: sent! Enjoy. Yoko, I did send yours a week ago right? Anyway I'll send another copy with Jitter correction now. |
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| Hi Grey, Just downloaded and tested the game example and found that on my PC Alt+TAB also causes the prog to quit when I try returning to it from the desktop. Also, directory "profiles" is not present in the zip file (or is not auto-created when the prog is first run - so the game exits after displaying an error msg on the loading screen) and had to be created manually... |
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| Chalky. Thanks for the info! On my PC, and lots of others, Alt+Tab works fine. This is most odd. Have you tried any other full-screen BMax games to see what happens in comparison? I just downloaded the demo and the .zip file DOES containt a profiles folder, which is created when I use Winzip to extract the zip (yes the game doesn't auto create it, but I'll make it do that also from now on). How strange that profiles isn't made on your PC! Perhaps it's because it's empty? In fact I've just added a dummy text file in the folder and reuploaded the .zip so I wonder if you can download and test again, that would be a great help for me thanks! That version of AOTMG (V0.43) was made in January before some BMax updates including DirectX tweaks so I may upload a temporary version of V0.44 and wonder if you would be kind enough to test Alt+Tab again? thx... |
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| Hmmm. I use TugZip and seem to remember someone else saying that it refuses to unpack empty directories. This is most likely why that happened then. I have just downloaded the new zip containing the dummy file, and directory 'profiles' was extracted/created successfully. My own fullscreen BMax creations ALT-TAB to/from the desktop without problems. As soon as you have 0.44 up let me know and I'll happily give it a try. |
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| Chalky: OK glad we got the profiles thing sorted. Here's a version of the demo compiled in the latest BMax, please see if Alt+Tab works, thanks! http://www.greyaliengames.com/aotmg/aotmg044.zip |
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| Hiya Grey, downloaded and tested it - you'll be pleased to know that Alt-Tab works fine in this version... :o) |
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| YAY! Nothing changed in the code, it must have been a BMax thing. But that old version did work on my PC and many others, weird. Thanks for testing and making me worry then stop worrying ;-) All you gotta do now is buy the framework :-O |
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| I experienced the same problem and it got solved when I selected the OpenGL driver... regards! |
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| aha, so as I suspected it must have been fixed when BRL redid the DX module. |
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| Hi again Grey, just a little question.. How could I select from code the screen I want to start? Imagine I want to start seeing the credits... :) Thanks in advance! |
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| Hi Penete: In AOTMG.bmx LoadData() change this line: Game.LoadingScreen.Destination = TitleScreen 'Important. It has to go somewhere! To point at whatever screen you want like CreditsScreen. However, in AOTMG you'll get an error when you exit the options screen because of the funny route you took into the game. I sometimes point the game directly to GameScreen (when I'm making changes to the gamescreen), but in order to do that you need to add the following lines to CommonTypes.bmx, TLoadingScreen.Logic(). Put them inside the "If DoFade Then" block. 'Load the profile stored in the ini file variable Game.CurrentProfile = TProfile.Create(Game.ProfileName) Game.CurrentProfile.Load() 'Start the game properly GameScreen.GameStart() |
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| I'm going to be releaseing V1.04 soon (it's available to buy now). I'll be sending it to all my customers shortly, then making a new website for the framework, then a new thread here. So keep your eyes peeled... |
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| Got mine Grey - Thanks. Looks like it's received a fair amount of work since 1.03. |
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| sure has, 5 months' worth I'll post a new thread about it soon. Also planning to make a special website for it. V1.05 will have Vista and Mac support, but won't be out until late August. |
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| Did you send out 1.04, cause I did not get it!! |
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| brilliant I'm glad you posted. Of all the emails that I sent yours is the only one that totally failed. Please email me with an email address that works and I'll send it to you straight away. |
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| I will mail when I get home. Maybe your mail got caught in ny antispam program, if yes I dont know why, i'll have to check it. |
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| I've been sending to the email in your profile. They all bounce back. I'll send another quick test now. |
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