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• Good starting platform for a teenage games programmer

  - by gkrogers

  My son (15) has decided that he wants to pursue a career as a games programmer. I've said that he should get started now with a simple game. He has no programming experience yet, but I am a programmer (business apps, not games) so I can teach him programming, but what would be a good platform for him to start on? Initially I'm looking for something that can provide quick results, to keep his enthusiasm up. What would you suggest?

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• UDK : UTWeap_RocketLauncher gift CreateInventory: Any idea why this does not work properly?

  - by John Sloan

  I am giving the player an instanced class of UTWeap_RocketLauncher in an instance of UTGame. PlayerPawn.CreateInventory(class'FobikRocketLauncher',false); // Does not work PlayerPawn.CreateInventory(class'FobikLinkGun',false); // Works Even if I give the original class (eg. UTWeap_RocketLauncher) it does not actually show up. However if I do a "GiveWeapons" cheat, I get it just fine. It also works if I had code it into the map. - But UTWeap_LinkGun works fine either way. Any ideas? It shows the default ammo amount, and the icon on the HUD.

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• Creating shooting arrow class [on hold]

  - by I.Hristov

  OK I am trying to write an XNA game with one controllable by the player entity, while the rest are bots (enemy and friendly) wondering around and... shooting each other from range. Now the shooting I suppose should be done with a separate class Arrow (for example). The resulting object would be the arrow appearing on screen moving from shooting entity to target entity. When target is reached arrow is no longer active, probably removed from the list. I plan to make a class with fields: Vector2 shootingEntity; Vector2 targetEntity; float arrowSpeed; float arrowAttackSpeed; int damageDone; bool isActive; Then when enemy entities get closer than a int rangeToShoot (which each entity will have as a field/prop) I plan to make a list of arrows emerging from each entity and going to the closest opposite one. I wonder if that logic will enable me later to make possible many entities to be able to shoot independently at different enemy entities at the same time. I know the question is broad but it would be wise to ask if the foundations of the idea are correct.

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• How can state changes be batched while adhering to opaque-front-to-back/alpha-blended-back-to-front?

  - by Sion Sheevok

  This is a question I've never been able to find the answer to. Batching objects with similar states is a major performance gain when rendering many objects. However, I've been learned various rules when drawing objects in the game world. Draw all opaque objects, front-to-back. Draw all alpha-blended objects, back-to-front. Some of the major parameters to batch by, as I understand it, are textures, vertex buffers, and index buffers. It seems that, as long as you are adhering to the above two rules, there's little to be done in regards to batching. I see one possibility to batch, while still adhering to the above two rules. Opaque objects can still be drawn out of depth-order, because drawing them front-to-back is merely a fillrate optimization, meanwhile state changes may very well be far more expensive than the overdraw of drawing out of depth-order. However, non-opaque objects, those that require alpha-blending at least, must be drawn back-to-front in order to avoid rendering artifacts. Is the loss of the fillrate optimization for opaques worth the state batching optimization?

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• How can I improve the "smoothness" of a 2D side-scrolling iPhone game?

  - by MrDatabase

  I'm working on a relatively simple 2D side-scrolling iPhone game. The controls are tilt-based. I use OpenGL ES 1.1 for the graphics. The game state is updated at a rate of 30 Hz... And the drawing is updated at a rate of 30 fps (via NSTimer). The smoothness of the drawing is ok... But not quite as smooth as a game like iFighter. What can I do to improve the smoothness of the game? Here are the potential issues I've briefly considered: I'm varying the opacity of up to 15 "small" (20x20 pixels) textures at a time... Apparently varying the opacity in this manner can degrade drawing performance I'm rendering at only 30 fps (via NSTimer)... Perhaps 2D games like iFighter are rendered at a higher frame rate? Perhaps the game state could be updated at a faster rate? Note the acceleration vales are updated at 100 Hz... So I could potentially update part of the game state at 100 hz All of my textures are PNG24... Perhaps PNG8 would help (due to smaller size etc)

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• What is involved with writing a lobby server?

  - by Kira

  So I'm writing a Chess matchmaking system based on a Lobby view with gaming rooms, general chat etc. So far I have a working prototype but I have big doubts regarding some things I did with the server. Writing a gaming lobby server is a new programming experience to me and so I don't have a clear nor precise programming model for it. I also couldn't find a paper that describes how it should work. I ordered "Java Network Programming 3rd edition" from Amazon and still waiting for shipment, hopefully I'll find some useful examples/information in this book. Meanwhile, I'd like to gather your opinions and see how you would handle some things so I can learn how to write a server correctly. Here are a few questions off the top of my head: (may be more will come) First, let's define what a server does. It's primary functionality is to hold TCP connections with clients, listen to the events they generate and dispatch them to the other players. But is there more to it than that? Should I use one thread per client? If so, 300 clients = 300 threads. Isn't that too much? What hardware is needed to support that? And how much bandwidth does a lobby consume then approx? What kind of data structure should be used to hold the clients' sockets? How do you protect it from concurrent modification (eg. a player enters or exists the lobby) when iterating through it to dispatch an event without hurting throughput? Is ConcurrentHashMap the correct answer here, or are there some techniques I should know? When a user enters the lobby, what mechanism would you use to transfer the state of the lobby to him? And while this is happening, where do the other events bubble up? Screenshot : http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/695/sansrewyh.png/

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• How do I create a big multiplayer world in UDK?

  - by Dorpe

  I want to create a big multiplayer world in UDK and I'm having a few difficulties. I created the biggest terrain possible but then any terrain related action I do takes forever. However, I've seen videos of people make same size terrain and working without a problem. My pc is strong enough, so maybe someone can tell me what I'm doing wrong. I want to make it even bigger then the biggest terrain size, so I was thinking of doing level streaming but then I read that streaming is working server side which means if I have a player on every terrain all terrains will still be loaded and I want to save as much memory possible so it will work well online. Thanks for any help you can give.

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• How effects found in "Autodesk Fluid FX" are implemented using OpenGL ES?

  - by afds

  How this kind of effects are technically implemented using OpenGL ES? Are they performing simulation on GPU (using Shaders) or CPU while using some smart vertex positioning and texturing? Why it appears so fast (in terms of performance)? You might check the video of that app here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4KOk6QP6kQ edit Here is the presentation for the app: http://www.futuregameon.com/FGO2010_JosStam.pdf

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• Dealing with numerous, simultaneous sounds in unity

  - by luxchar

  I've written a custom class that creates a fixed number of audio sources. When a new sound is played, it goes through the class, which creates a queue of sounds that will be played during that frame. The sounds that are closer to the camera are given preference. If new sounds arrive in the next frame, I have a complex set of rules that determines how to replace the old ones. Ideally, "big" or "important" sounds should not be replaced by small ones. Sound replacement is necessary since the game can be fast-paced at times, and should try to play new sounds by replacing old ones. Otherwise, there can be "silent" moments when an old sound is about to stop playing and isn't replaced right away by a new sound. The drawback of replacing old sounds right away is that there is a harsh transition from the old sound clip to the new one. But I wonder if I could just remove that management logic altogether, and create audio sources on the fly for new sounds. I could give "important" sounds more priority (closer to 0 in the corresponding property) as opposed to less important ones, and let Unity take care of culling out sound effects that exceed the channel limit. The only drawback is that it requires many heap allocations. I wonder what strategy people use here?

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• Modular building technique with angles? (A roof)

  - by Mungoid

  Ive been spending a bit of time lately studying the modular buildings of many games and reading/viewing several tutorials about it as well, but almost every example I see uses a plain square building that does not have any angled roof or similar. In all my applications (CS6, Blender/Max, UDK) I adhere to the same grid spacing and I get pretty good results, but trying to make modular angled pieces is confusing me as I'm not sure the best way to approach it. Below is some shots of my template sheet and workflow I have been doing. Should I do the roof separately or is it possible for me to keep it in the same texture sheet? The main issue is below. I have made a couple modular roof pieces but when i try to use them, i end up needing to model multiple other parts to fill gaps based on what roof shape i want. I then model those 'filler' pieces and now i have that much less space left in my texture sheet and those pieces are usually not that reusable for anything else. This is where im not sure how to proceed. If anyone has any links to documents or papers talking about this or advice, I would greatly appreciate it! =-) My main roof pieces with the gaps My power of 2 texture sheet, with 16x16 grid squares. The texture sheet loaded into blender on a 16x16 plane and starting to separate and extrude.

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• Failing Screen Resize Method

  - by StrongJoshua

  So I want my game to draw to a specific "optimal" size and then be stretched to fit screens that are a different size. I'm using LibGDX and figured that I could just draw everything to a FrameBuffer and then resize that buffer to the appropriate size when drawing it to the actual display. However, my method does not work, it just results in a black screen with the top right quarter of the screen white.Intermediary is the FBO, interMatrix is a Matrix4 object, and camera is an OrthographicCamera. @Override public void render() { // update actors currentStage.act(); //render to intermediary buffer batch.setProjectionMatrix(interMatrix); intermediary.begin(); batch.begin(); currentStage.draw(); batch.flush(); intermediary.end(); //resize to actual width and height Sprite s = new Sprite(intermediary.getColorBufferTexture()); s.flip(true, false); batch.setProjectionMatrix(camera.combined); batch.draw(s.getTexture(), 0, 0, width, height); batch.end(); } These are the constructors for the above mentioned objects (GAME_WIDTH and HEIGHT are the "optimal" settings, width and height are the actual sizes, which are the same when running on desktop). intermediary = new FrameBuffer(Format.RGBA8888, GAME_WIDTH, GAME_HEIGHT, false); interMatrix = new Matrix4(); camera = new OrthographicCamera(width, height); interMatrix.setToOrtho2D(0, 0, GAME_WIDTH, GAME_HEIGHT); Is there a better way of doing this or can is this a viable option and how do I fix what I have?

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• My Sprite comes out the screen

  - by IlNero

  If i an action moves the sprite,how can i keep the CCSprite on the screen???? this is my code: [enemy runAction:[CCSequence actions:[CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:2.0 position:ccp(-winSize.width*0.4, 0)], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(winSize.width*0.2, -winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(winSize.width*0.2, -winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(winSize.width*0.2, -winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(winSize.width*0.2, -winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(winSize.width*0.2, -winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.3,winSize.width*0.3), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.3, -winSize.height*0.3))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.2,winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.3,winSize.width*0.3), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.3, -winSize.height*0.3))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.2,winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.3,winSize.width*0.3), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.3, -winSize.height*0.3))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:randomValueBetween(1.0, 0.3) position:ccp(randomValueBetween(-winSize.width*0.2,winSize.width*0.2), randomValueBetween(winSize.height*0.2, -winSize.height*0.2))], [CCDelayTime actionWithDuration:0.5], [CCMoveBy actionWithDuration:2.0 position:ccp(-winSize.width*1.5, 0)], [CCCallFuncN actionWithTarget:self selector:@selector(invisNode:)], nil]]; but whit this code the sprite sometimes comes out the screen, i need the sprite moves randomly in the screen without comes out..

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• How to offset particles from point of origin

  - by Sun

  Hi I'm having troubles off setting particles from a point of origin. I want my particles to spread out after a certain radius from a the point of origin. For example, this is what I have right now: All particles emitted from a point of origin. What I want is this: Particles are offset from the point of origin by some amount, i.e after the circle. What is the best way to achieve this? At the moment, I have the point of origin, the position of each particle and its rotation angle. Sorry for the poor illustrations. Edit: I was mistaken, when a particle is created, I have only the point of origin. When the particle is created I am able to calculate the rotation of the particle in the update method after it has moved to a new location using atan2() method. This is how I create/manage particles: Created new particle at enemy ship death location, for every new particle which is added to the list, call Update and Draw to update its position, calculate new angle and draw it.

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• Will we see a trend of "3d" games coming up in the near future?

  - by Vish

  I've noticed that the trend of movies is diving into the world of movies with 3-dimensional camera.For me it provoked a thought as if it was the same feeling people got when they saw a colour movie for the first time, like in the transition from black and white to colour it is a whole new experience. For the first time we are experiencing the Z(depth) factor and I really mean when I said "experiencing". So my question is or maybe if not a question, but Is there a possibility of a genre of 3d camera games upcoming?

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• Procedural Planets, Heightmaps and Textures

  - by henryprescott

  I am currently working on an OpenGL procedural planet generator. I hope to use it for a space RPG, that will not allow players to go down to the surface of a planet so I have ignored anything ROAM related. At the momement I am drawing a cube with VBOs and mapping onto a sphere. I am familiar with most fractal heightmap generating techniques and have already implemented my own version of midpoint displacement(not that useful in this case I know). My question is, what is the best way to procedurally generate the heightmap. I have looked at libnoise which allows me to make tilable heightmaps/textures, but as far as I can see I would need to generate a net like this. Leaving the tiling obvious. Could anyone advise me on the best route to take? Any input would be much appreciated. Thanks, Henry.

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• XNA WP7 Texture memory and ContentManager

  - by jlongstreet

  I'm trying to get my WP7 XNA game's memory under control and under the 90MB limit for submission. One target I identified was UI textures, especially fullscreen ones, that would never get unloaded. So I moved UI texture loads to their own ContentManager so I can unload them. However, this doesn't seem to affect the value of Microsoft.Phone.Info.DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("ApplicationCurrentMemoryUsage"), so it doesn't look like the memory is actually being released. Example: splash screens. In Game.LoadContent(): Application.Instance.SetContentManager("UI"); // set the current content manager for (int i = 0; i < mSplashTextures.Length; ++i) { // load the splash textures mSplashTextures[i] = Application.Instance.Content.Load<Texture2D>(msSplashTextureNames[i]); } // set the content manager back to the global one Application.Instance.SetContentManager("Global"); When the initial load is done and the title screen starts, I do: Application.Instance.GetContentManager("UI").Unload(); The three textures take about 6.5 MB of memory. Before unloading the UI ContentManager, I see that ApplicationCurrentMemoryUsage is at 34.29 MB. After unloading the ContentManager (and doing a full GC.Collect()), it's still at 34.29 MB. But after that, I load another fullscreen texture (for the title screen background) and memory usage still doesn't change. Could it be keeping the memory for these textures allocated and reusing it? edit: very simple test: protected override void LoadContent() { // Create a new SpriteBatch, which can be used to draw textures. spriteBatch = new SpriteBatch(GraphicsDevice); PrintMemUsage("Before texture load: "); // TODO: use this.Content to load your game content here red = this.Content.Load<Texture2D>("Untitled"); PrintMemUsage("After texture load: "); } private void PrintMemUsage(string tag) { Debug.WriteLine(tag + Microsoft.Phone.Info.DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("ApplicationCurrentMemoryUsage")); } protected override void Update(GameTime gameTime) { // Allows the game to exit if (GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).Buttons.Back == ButtonState.Pressed) this.Exit(); // TODO: Add your update logic here if (count++ == 100) { GC.Collect(); GC.WaitForPendingFinalizers(); PrintMemUsage("Before CM unload: "); this.Content.Dispose(); GC.Collect(); GC.WaitForPendingFinalizers(); PrintMemUsage("After CM unload: "); red = null; spriteBatch.Dispose(); GC.Collect(); GC.WaitForPendingFinalizers(); PrintMemUsage("After SpriteBatch Dispose(): "); } base.Update(gameTime); } protected override void Draw(GameTime gameTime) { GraphicsDevice.Clear(Color.CornflowerBlue); // TODO: Add your drawing code here if (red != null) { spriteBatch.Begin(); spriteBatch.Draw(red, new Vector2(0,0), Color.White); spriteBatch.End(); } base.Draw(gameTime); } This prints something like (it changes every time): Before texture load: 7532544 After texture load: 10727424 Before CM unload: 9875456 After CM unload: 9953280 After SpriteBatch Dispose(): 9953280

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• Platformer Collision Error [closed]

  - by Connor

  I am currently working on a relatively simple platform game that has an odd bug.You start the game by falling onto the ground (you spawn a few blocks above the ground), but when you land your feet get stuck INSIDE the world and you can't move until you jump. Here's what I mean: The player's feet are a few pixels below the ground level. However, this problem only occurs in 3 places throughout the map and only in those 3 select places. I'm assuming that the problem lies within my collision detection code but I'm not entirely sure, as I don't get an error when it happens. public boolean isCollidingWithBlock(Point pt1, Point pt2) { //Checks x for(int x = (int) (this.x / Tile.tileSize); x < (int) (this.x / Tile.tileSize + 4); x++) { //Checks y for(int y = (int) (this.y / Tile.tileSize); y < (int) (this.y / Tile.tileSize + 4); y++) { if(x >= 0 && y >= 0 && x < Component.dungeon.block.length && y < Component.dungeon.block[0].length) { //If the block is not air if(Component.dungeon.block[x][y].id != Tile.air) { //If the player is in contact with point one or two on the block if(Component.dungeon.block[x][y].contains(pt1) || Component.dungeon.block[x][y].contains(pt2)) { //Checks for specific blocks if(Component.dungeon.block[x][y].id == Tile.portalBlock) { Component.isLevelDone = true; } if(Component.dungeon.block[x][y].id == Tile.spike) { Health.health -= 1; Component.isJumping = true; if(Health.health == 0) { Component.isDead = true; } } return true; } } } } } return false; } What I'm asking is how I would fix the problem. I've looked over my code for quite a while and I'm not sure what's wrong with it. Also, if there's a more efficient way to do my collision checking then please let me know! I hope that is enough information, if it's not just tell me what you need and I'll be sure to add it. Thank you! [EDIT] Jump code: if(!isJumping && !isCollidingWithBlock(new Point((int) x + 2, (int) (y + height)), new Point((int) (x + width + 2), (int) (y + height)))) { y += fallSpeed; //sY is the screen's Y. The game is a side-scroller Component.sY += fallSpeed; } else { if(Component.isJumping) { isJumping = true; } } if(isJumping) { if(!isCollidingWithBlock(new Point((int) x + 2, (int) y), new Point((int) (x + width + 2), (int) y))) { if(jumpCount >= jumpHeight) { isJumping = false; jumpCount = 0; } else { y -= jumpSpeed; Component.sY -= jumpSpeed; jumpCount += 1; } } else { isJumping = false; jumpCount = 0; } }

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• Synchronise graphics and logic code

  - by Skeith

  I have a procedural approach to the game loop that runs various classes. it looks like this: continue any in progress animations check for used input apply AI move things resolve events such as collisions draw it all to screen I have seen a lot of posts about how drawing should be running separately as fast as it can, possibly in another thread. My problem is that if the drawing runs as fast as it, can what happens if it tried to draw while I'm still applying the AI or resolving a collision? It could draw the wrong thing on screen. This seems to be a well established idea so there must be an explanation to this problem as I just cant get my head around it. The only solution I have is to update the screen so fast that any errors like that get refreshed before we see them but that sounds hacky. So how does this work / how would you implement it so that they are in sync but running at different speeds?

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• StringBuffer behavior in LWJGL

  - by Michael Oberlin

  Okay, I've been programming in Java for about ten years, but am entirely new to LWJGL. I have a specific problem whilst attempting to create a text console. I have built a class meant to abstract input polling to it, which (in theory) captures key presses from the Keyboard object and appends them to a StringBuilder/StringBuffer, then retrieves the completed string after receiving the ENTER key. The problem is, after I trigger the String return (currently with ESCAPE), and attempt to print it to System.out, I consistently get a blank line. I can get an appropriate string length, and I can even sample a single character out of it and get complete accuracy, but it never prints the actual string. I could swear that LWJGL slipped some kind of thread-safety trick in while I wasn't looking. Here's my code: static volatile StringBuffer command = new StringBuffer(); @Override public void chain(InputPoller poller) { this.chain = poller; } @Override public synchronized void poll() { //basic testing for modifier keys, to be used later on boolean shift = false, alt = false, control = false, superkey = false; if(Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_LSHIFT) || Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_RSHIFT)) shift = true; if(Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_LMENU) || Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_RMENU)) alt = true; if(Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_LCONTROL) || Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_RCONTROL)) control = true; if(Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_LMETA) || Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_RMETA)) superkey = true; while(Keyboard.next()) if(Keyboard.getEventKeyState()) { command.append(Keyboard.getEventCharacter()); } if (Framework.isConsoleEnabled() && Keyboard.isKeyDown(Keyboard.KEY_ESCAPE)) { System.out.println("Escape down"); System.out.println(command.length() + " characters polled"); //works System.out.println(command.toString().length()); //works System.out.println(command.toString().charAt(4)); //works System.out.println(command.toString().toCharArray()); //blank line! System.out.println(command.toString()); //blank line! Framework.disableConsole(); } //TODO: Add command construction and console management after that } } Maybe the answer's obvious and I'm just feeling tired, but I need to walk away from this for a while. If anyone sees the issue, please let me know. This machine is running the latest release of Java 7 on Ubuntu 12.04, Mate desktop environment. Many thanks.

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• infer half vector length in BRDF

  - by cician

  it's my first question on stack. Is it possible to infer length of the half angle vector for specular lighting from N·L and N·V without the whole view and light vectors? I may be completely off-track, but I have this gut feeling it's possible... Why? I'm working on a skin shader and I'm already doing one texture lookup with N·L+N·E and one texture lookup for specular with N·H+N·V. The latter one can be transformed into N·L+N·E lookup if only I had the half vector length. Doing so could simplify the shader a bit and move some operations into the pre-computed lookup texture. It would make a huge difference since I'm trying to squeeze as much functionality as possible to a single pass mobile version so instruction count matters. Thanks.

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• Creating a steady rhythm for music-based game in XNA

  - by A-Type

  I'm looking to develop a game for Windows Phone to explore an idea I had which involves the user building notes into a sequencer while playing a puzzle game. The issue I'm running into is that, while my implementation is very close to being on-beat, there is the occasional pause between beats which makes the whole thing sound sloppy. I'm just not sure how to get around this inside XNA's infrastructure. Currently I'm running this code in the Update method of my GameBoard: public void Update(GameTime gameTime) { onBeat = IsOnBeat(gameTime); [...] if (onBeat) BeatUpdate(); } private bool IsOnBeat(GameTime gameTime) { beatTime += gameTime.ElapsedGameTime.TotalSeconds; if (Math.Abs(beatTime - beatLength) < 0.0166666) { beatTime -= beatLength; return true; } return false; } private void BeatUpdate() { cursor.BeatUpdate(); board.CursorPass((int)cursor.CursorPosition % Board.GRID_WIDTH); } Update checks to see if the time is on beat, and if it is, it calls the BeatUpdate method which moves the cursor over the board (sequencer). The cursor reports its X position to the board, which then plays any notes which are in that position on the sequencer. Notes are SoundEffectInstances, preloaded and ready to play. Oh, and TargetElapsedTime is set to 166666, or 60FPS target. Obviously totaling up the time and then subtracting isn't the most accurate way to go but I can't figure out a way to work within XNA's system in order to overcome this issue. This current system is just horribly unstable. Beats lag and fire too early and it's obvious. I thought about perhaps some sort of threaded solution but I'm not familiar enough with multithreading to figure out how that would work. Any ideas?

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• How do I reconstruct depth in deferred rendering using an orthographic projection?

  - by Jeremie

  I've been trying to get my world space position of my pixel but I4m missing something. I'm using a orthographic view for a 2.5d game. My depth is linear and this is my code. float3 lightPos = lightPosition; float2 texCoord = PostProjToScreen(PSIn.lightPosition)+halfPixel; float depth = tex2D(depthMap, texCoord); float4 position; position.x = texCoord.x *2-1; position.y = (1-texCoord.y)*2-1; position.z = depth.r; position.w = 1; position = mul(position, inViewProjection); //position.xyz/=position.w; // I comment it but even without it it doesn't work float4 normal = (tex2D(normalMap, texCoord)-.5f) * 2; normal = normalize(normal); float3 lightDirection = normalize(lightPos-position); float att = saturate(1.0f - length(lightDirection) /attenuation); float lightning = saturate (dot(normal, lightDirection)); lightning*= brightness; return float4(lightColor* lightning*att, 1); I'm using a sphere but it's not working the way I want. I reproject the texture properly onto the sphere but the light coordinates in the pixel shader seems to be stuck at zero even if when I move the light volume update properly.

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• Generating random tunnels

  - by IVlad

  What methods could we use to generate a random tunnel, similar to the one in this classic helicopter game? Other than that it should be smooth and allow you to navigate through it, while looking as natural as possible (not too symmetric but not overly distorted either), it should also: Most importantly - be infinite and allow me to control its thickness in time - make it narrower or wider as I see fit, when I see fit; Ideally, it should be possible to efficiently generate it with smooth curves, not rectangles as in the above game; I should be able to know in advance what its bounds are, so I can detect collisions and generate powerups inside the tunnel; Any other properties that let you have more control over it or offer optimization possibilities are welcome. Note: I'm not asking for which is best or what that game uses, which could spark extended discussion and would be subjective, I'm just asking for some methods that others know about or have used before or even think they might work. That is all, I can take it from there. Also asked on stackoverflow, where someone suggested I should ask here too. I think it fits in both places, since it's as much an algorithm question as it is a gamedev question, IMO.

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• When dealing with a static game board, what are some methods to make it more interesting?

  - by Ólafur Waage

  Let's say you have a game board that you look at. It does not move but there is some action going on. For example Chess, Checkers, Solitaire. The game I'm working on is not one of these but it's a good reference. What are some methods you can apply to the game or the design that increases the appeal of the game to the user? Of course you can make it prettier but what are some other methods you can use? For example: Visual cues, game design changes, user interface arrangement, etc.

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• How do I optimize searching for the nearest point?

  - by Rootosaurus

  For a little project of mine I'm trying to implement a space colonization algorithm in order to grow trees. The current implementation of this algorithm works fine. But I have to optimize the whole thing in order to make it generate faster. I work with 1 to 300K of random attraction points to generate one tree, and it takes a lot of time to compute and compare distances between attraction points and tree node in order to keep only the closest treenode for an attraction point. So I was wondering if some solutions exist (I know they must exist) in order to avoid the time loss looping on each tree node for each attraction point to find the closest... and so on until the tree is finished.

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