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planet romero » Gaming » Game Dev / Asset Production » Creating a simple 3D engine...

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Author	Topic: Creating a simple 3D engine...

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: July 1, 2010, 18:16

Y’know, I always snubbed SDL as I was happy with the output of my DirectX programs in the past. But with Vista and Express 2010 fucking me around, I think its time to give it a butchers. At this point I’m thinking of ditching DX anyway.

Speaking of Alpha-blending; I know the maths behind it(wrote a targa composition program years ago), but how would SDL allow me to do it, hardware-access-wise? All I would need is the ability to draw a dot to the screen, but not sure if SDL would grant this simple thing. Was only able to do it years ago in DirectX 7 by locking and accessing the video-memory directly, but they nuked DirectDraw. I think you could display vertices in Direct3D but that was a bit of a shit way to do business as well…

BTW, Express 2010 is doing my head in! Thought about getting Borland Builder but that doesn’t seem to be around any more. Any suggestions for an excellent alternative to the MS Visual Studio? ^_^

Bad Sector

Member
Posts: 33

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: July 1, 2010, 19:41

Personally i use Eclipse everywhere. I have made a bundle of Eclipse Galileo + MinGW + MSYS + SDL for people who want to try it out, but the Eclipse version is old and i’m also sure both MinGW and SDL aren’t the latest versions either. You can download it from here:

http://realm.badsectoracula.com/devbundle/

However i recommend to download Eclipse Helios and the latest versions of MinGW, MSYS and SDL. The URLs are on the site above. It takes a bit of time to install them, but it isn’t hard. You just install MinGW, MSYS, SDL and Eclipse in that order (so the next installation can find the previous).

In SDL you can get access to a surface just like you did in DirectDraw (in fact under some versions of Windows SDL uses DirectDraw – the interface might be removed from latest versions of DirectX but the implementation is still there for compatibility reasons and a lot of programs still uses it): lock the surface (or part of it), get a pointer, modify it, unlock it.

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: July 6, 2010, 18:25

After a lot of teeth gnashing over the last few days, I’m thinking of ditching Direct3D altogether. Instead, I’m going to use Direct2D, which seems pretty good for all things 2D.

One thing that still makes me want to scream at Microsoft is that even after 10 years, they still haven’t provided a function to plot a single pixel to the screen. If an 8-bit computer, with hardly any real power to speak of, can do it in a high level language such as BASIC, then I would expect today’s Monster PCs to do it too! Seriously, would the following function really hurt them?

int PlotPixel(int x, int y, colour value)

…yet somehow they provide Rectangle and Ellipse functions, but not this one simple thing. Rant over.

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: July 7, 2010, 11:42

After a gruelling late night, I finally got Java under my control – with only the Graphics2D import library assisting me. My games knowledge from my C++ days enabled me to hunt down most of the graphics features I needed in a matter of a few hours, and I’m actually taken back by how simple Java is to set up a basic 2D game without the need for additional APIs.

Also, I have a very clean(though not efficient) way of plotting pixels! Hurrah! Only when I try to fill the screen at 1440×900 res does it start to become sluggish, but for a few particles it will do the job quite nicely.

I am officially now a happy bunny!

I don’t want to entirely ditch C++, but I will now take all my games development into Java. Any advanced and demanding rendering I can do with C++ and the Windows API…and maybe even…shock’n'horror…LEARN AND USE OPENGL! ^_^

Right, first task is to convert my C++ Space Invaders demo into Java. Should be a piece of piss!

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: July 27, 2010, 16:45

Due to work on another Uni assignment I’ve been neglecting the Java work.

Going to clean up my classes and then get back on the case. Made a bit of a re-discovery this morning as I chanced upon the Disc that came with my PS2. On it was a copy of YaBasic and using my Razer Arctosa keyboard I actually did some PS2 programming this afternoon!

Going to do some house work and I’ll post up again tonight – as well as looking at Mr Bad’s latest update on his rather sweet Atilia Engine… ^_^

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: August 6, 2010, 22:30

YES! Finally done a Star field particle demo! Feeling really good about my Java skills now, but I’m just wondering how to make a youtube video of it… o_O

Now thinking of slapping together an asteroids-style game with Forgotten Worlds style controls. Also, playing the old Atari Star Wars and ESB arcade games is giving me ideas…

Boone

Member
Posts: 92

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: August 26, 2010, 22:58

Decided that after four years of continuous university study I’m taking a five month break to do some serious Java and Blender work.

I finish my current course in October and will commence the acts of hardcore programming then. I can honestly say I’m looking forward to it!

Bad Sector

Member
Posts: 33

Re: Creating a simple 3D engine...
on: August 27, 2010, 00:26

I wish i had about k in bank so i could stay at home for a year trying to learn new stuff on programming and graphics happy .