Sep 13 2015, 3:29 pm
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Kaiochao
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What does "programming from scratch" mean?
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Kaiochao wrote:
What does "programming from scratch" mean? I'm assuming programming from a blank canvas. | |
You mean, opening Dream Maker and hitting "New Environment..."?
Is that something people don't actually do? | |
Just like when a writer opens a fresh notepad (or whatever) and wants to just write a miraculous story, it doesn't work. Writers block aka creators block happens a lot to some people and a blank slate makes it even more difficult.
It is the same as someone learning to draw by looking off of another that they like, or looking at a scene they want to draw from IRL. "from scratch" means from nothing, yeah. The things I can make from scratch are graphic templates for websites. I can start at nothing and come up with something beautiful (At least to me), like Pondera's Website. When I look at an empty dm file I don't know what to do... :(. I can modify existing code well enough, though. I just need something to work with when it comes to DM and I'm sure there are some others out there like me. Not everyone is a programmer, not everyone is a graphics person, etc. @FKI &@ Ter -- if you two want to team up on me and be byond bullies, that is fine. I will just completely ignore you from now on (and if you continue to harass me I will ban you from my projects). | |
I don't really know how to respond to that. I've hit that thousands of times. I haven't seen any rip sources. The closest I've come to really working in an existing source is when I was asked to fix a lag issue in Eternia once.
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AREProductions said:
... He probably focused on the excerpts he did because that was the meat of your post. You made it seem like those of us who can program are some type of genius when that's not the case, you're just not willing enough due to the mental barriers known as excuses. Being left- or right-brained does not dictate what you can do in life, it influences how you process information. Whether you enjoy visual learning or reading tutorials (like myself), that plays no part in the end result given the effort is put in. You're saying not everyone is a "programmer" or a "graphics person" but that's only because people marginalize themselves. You can be and do whatever you want, but in order to do that you have to start doing it instead of thinking about why you can't. "If you can talk, you can sing; if you can walk, you can dance." Deviant Coder said: Other genres can be easily created to fill byond page that are not RPG as well, but it gotta click with byond players too. It just cannot be any concept or style put into play, it gotta actually be playable, addictive, and/or interesting. The thing with the above bolded statement, is that appeasing Byond's small crowd shouldn't be your focus. If the Byond community enjoys your game, that's great, but ultimately you should be expanding your reach outside of Byond, that's how you'll build a successful game. While I share much of Toddab's opinion, I'm sure we're all aware there is no magic formula that will "fix fan games", and so I will continue to observe. | |
tf happened to my posts DX!!
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Ghost of ET wrote:
tf happened to my posts DX!! They're on page 1, unless you had some others you wrote? or were writing? Not sure, but I do agree with FKI that there's no magical fix for all of this. The truth of the matter is we can discuss it all we want, but only time, and taking action will change things. So on that note, I'll likely be more of a silent watcher now as I return to focusing on one of my neither fan game nor RPG projects that'll hopefully help the process along ever so slightly. | |
Fan games will never be anything worth a damn unless they stop using resource art and the trash art that floats around byond... I personally don't play games if my arts better than the game I'm playing.
Zane, zete, vixi, bteks, soundz and who ever does the art for doohls game are the only art that lives up to my standards. visuals are everything to me fun gameplay is a bonus but I can spend all day looking at good eyecandy art. | |
Southv2 wrote:
Zane, zete, vixi, bteks, soundz and who ever does the art for doohls game are the only art that lives up to my standards. visuals are everything to me fun gameplay is a bonus but I can spend all day looking at good eyecandy art. Logic like this is why the console industry survives. | |
Lugia319 wrote:
Southv2 wrote: I agree. | |
On the note of RPGs being the default, that's exactly one of the problems I'm talking about. People just flatly don't appreciate the amount of work that really goes into making an RPG shine. Even the simplest ones can be extremely daunting. Look at NEStalgia for example. In relation to other, mainstream RPGs, it's incredibly simple, but the amount of work it's taken to get it where it is today has been enormous.
RPGs are the default, but the default option doesn't necessarily mean the best option. If you don't know how to program a sidescroller or something, great news! There are literally dozens of us here on the forums who can help you learn! We won't hold your hand, but we'll always give you enough information to set you in the right direction. People have to just stop being so afraid to ask for help. | |
Not all original games have to start from scratch, either. Frameworks exist to be a starting point for games. Libraries exist to be used when necessary.
For example, Forum_account has a couple tutorials specific to his Sidescroller library: A tutorial to make a racing platforming game (includes videos): http://files.byondhome.com/Forumaccount/tutorial/index.html A set of challenges for practice with the Sidescroller library: http://files.byondhome.com/Forumaccount/ sidescroller-challenges.html Even if you're not particularly interested in making a platformer, doing some exercises like that can be really useful. You'll learn how to use the Sidescroller library, but more importantly, you'll learn the actual concepts involved that can be used elsewhere. | |
I like what you had to say, but it's actually striking the right areas to make me come out of the shadows again for a moment since it focuses a lot on what I said.
I didn't mean to say people SHOULD do RPGs because they're the default by any means, and certainly all the gravity toward RPGs is not generating a lot of GOOD ones, but what may or may not of been taken from what I said is it being the default makes people naturally think of and gravitate toward them. Because it is the default right out of the box, it appears to be easier to the naive and/or inexperienced, and it's already right in front of them. They see so many, they think it's the successful way to go, or their mind jumps on it first. Heck, they may even just love RPGs, and not see something else to make them consider otherwise. It's all about what the new users, programmers, and such are exposed to. Learning materials is another factor. Many prefer more visual options, or more hand fed options, or just plain want to get by on their own or with friends rather than developer help. Some languages cater to that, but ultimately this generation is more acustom to listening, videos, and other less reading and studying intensive stuff. Also, this is hobbyist teens mostly, so they're not going to think toward dedication like we are nearly as easily usually. So... TL;DR the default being RPG's makes them appear easier to make to the untrained eyes, and just puts them in mind first before other genres. So changing that is what I meant by getting in peoples heads. Also, remember its often young teen hobbyist getting into the BYOND scene, so they usually go with whatever they feel is easiest, and aren't often dedicated enough to figure things out and seek our help in developer help like we may think they should. | |
&@ Kats -- The reason my sidescroller is on the backburner is because it is futuristic and I cannot do the advanced laser mechanics and other advanced geometry that would be involved in my design. I haven't messed with the project since 2008 because I have been busy with Pondera.
I have been meaning to check out a new sidescroller framework and try again, though. Just didn't want to take my focus off of my main project. | |
Sorry I didn't jump in this earlier but,
Kats this post makes you look so hypocritical. I could remember times and posts/comments you've harshly criticized other anime games and bashing them too. Not to say we all can't change but meh, it seems awkward hearing any of this from you. But to jump into to topic, I don't look at it as "hate" towards fan-games, I've always thought people were waiting for that "nuke-anime" game to destroy all the other current bad-fan games and I was too. Honestly, we've been warped around games with sources like: Finale, Encore, GOA, Shinobi Story, Zeta, NNG, etc. for YEARS! At the end of the day, the direction in which Fan Games go on byond is up to us, no one else. | |
AERProductions wrote:
A bunch of really meaningless excuses. You are what you have done. If you suck at math, it's because you haven't had the math exposure that you need to grasp the concept. If you aren't a computer guy, it's because you haven't spent time with computers. If you are a car guy, you have spent time with cars. Nobody walks into a computer repair shop and says: "Hey, I'm interested in computers, so I'll just start making repairs because my natural interests make me an expert." If you aren't interested in doing it, don't begrudge those who spent the time to get good at it and spent the time doing it. Natural ability only gets you so far. The rest of it is drive and determination. You would get treated absolutely no better anywhere else on the internet. BYOND is the only community that seems to indulge people like you who seem to think it's mean to tell people that if you want to play the piano, you actually have to spend time learning how to play the piano. Nobody drops out of the womb into a concert hall and performs Beethoven. Speaking of Beethoven, you know what that guy did to make his masterpieces? He went deaf. Instead of complaining about the hand that life dealt him, he sawed the fucking legs off of his piano so he could feel the music he was playing. He struggled against a serious disability, through alcoholism and poverty, through obscurity and through ridicule to become one of the true masters of his craft. Anybody that's taken the time to master ANY skill, no matter what that skill is, should be insulted by what you are implying, and would rightly call you out for your entitlement complex. People use different parts of their brain. The brain is an organ that makes associative connections based on repeated stimulus. You do something, you get better at doing that thing because you make new memories. It's that simple. Sure, some people start out better at certain things than other people, but that's largely due to their pre-existing exposure and fundamentals from other areas of their experience. Quit making excuses for your lack of interest in doing the work. I don't have time to commit to learning programming at that advanced level You've been here for 10+ years. They say it takes roughly 10,000 hours to master a skill. If you had spent 20 hours a week trying to work out how to program for the last ten years, you'd be a master already. If you'd spent ten, you'd be more than competent. 20 hours a week is nothing. You had time. You wasted it making excuses for yourself. and the absolute truth is not everyone has the same capabilities Beethoven was deaf. Bastard is one of the best musicians of all time. Van Gogh was batshit insane, still managed to make world-changing art. Stephen Hawking had ALS, has managed to completely change the face of modern particle physics. Sure, you aren't gonna be a giant, but at least you can stop throwing a pity-party and learn a goddamn skill. If you had read my post you would of understood that I shared this but clearly you just want to get the "gotcha" comment and don't care about the meaning of my post at all. ...Or maybe I fervently disagree with the asinine attitude you have about what I've spent a very long time doing. If this were about me, I'd want to upvote your idea about how I'm special because I can learn something that you can't, but that's not at all the case. Anybody can learn what I've learned. If they put the time in. Oh, and if you want to fall back to the "I'm an artist bit." Then don't talk about how we talk to prospective programmers. You aren't our target audience and your opinion on that means nothing. And as for the left-brain, right-brain thing, explain how I taught myself to program, and how to art. Quit trying to put people in these little boxes because you can't handle the fact that you suck at something. There's nothing wrong with sucking at something. That's an excellent place to start. What is important, though, is being honest with yourself and asking whether or not the thing you want is really worth putting the effort in to get. If you aren't willing to honestly put the work in, you best face yourself and decide it's not for you and move on. Otherwise, you are wasting the time you could be spending developing the skill you do want. | |
Simple screen shot. Was able to recover my source files with AER's help. =D
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I would put money that most of us here have had a problem with fan games before. I've done my fair share of fan game bashing, but it was undeserved at the time and the reasons I gave were lackluster at best. I'm trying to clarify why I've always felt fan games were pits of sorrow.
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