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Hey guys. I used to program with DarkBASIC like 5 months ago. I am now a C# programmer in DirectX. Should I stay with vanilla DirectX? Or should I try out GDK .NET? I also noticed that DirectX is free and a commercial license for GDK .NET is $200.

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UltraG, you don't necessarily need to purchase the Commercial license straight away. You do have the option to upgrade from the freeware license when you have a product to sell.

As for deciding whether you think DarkGDK.NET is right for you, I would get opinions from all of the users on this forum, and then decide for yourself. The benefits of using DarkGDK.NET with both Visual Basic and C#... is that it's very easy to use. Easier to use than diving straight into the DirectX interface libraries.

I will point out though, that with DarkGDK.NET, you need to install a runtime component onto an end user system before DGDK.NET developed applications will run. The toolkit comes with an installer that can be run silently if needed, incase you decide to create your own installer, but you'd also need to do the same with the .NET framework installer as well.

Other than the above minor issue, the benefits outweight the drawbacks. It's easy to setup projects. The toolkit comes with several sample projects demonstrating different aspects of the engine. The documentation isn't great though (partly my fault), but I'm working on it.

Paul.

Thank you. Maybe I'll get DarkGDK regular instead so that other people can use my games if I get it. I'll wait for more opinions, though.

If you're still using Managed DirectX, you probably should know it is dead by now, replaced by XNA.

Well, I've tried XNA, and although I'm a "MS FanBoy", I can say for sure that even though MS states it is easy to use, it is not as straight forward as DGDK.NET.

Maybe you should take a look at all our posts on this forum as there are a lot of DGDK.NET code almost everywhere. It's better than DBPro

Thiago

PS: I've been wondering "Where's Niels to tell DGDK.NET is GREAT and by using DarkEngine DGDK.NET gets even better"

Well, let's compare XNA to DGDK.NET now.

XNA has xbox 360 input while DG doesn't.

XNA has more model usage than DG.

XNA has barely any tutorials, while DGDK has alot.

XNA is not much like DirectX, while DGDK remains true to it's DirectX roots.

Xna is free.

DG is like DarkBasic Pro which I've used before.

It's a tie. I'll have to choose myself unless one of you thinks otherwise.

UltraG

You should go for DGDK.NET because thats really programming. The things you maybe have made in C# can also be used in DGDK.NET.

I dont know about XNA but I was choosing DGDK.NET and Im very happy about it...



And thanks to kBessa for the FREE plugin DarkEngine... hehe

Well, I like XNA because it's free, and it's basicly just the next version of Managed DirectX. I think I'll go with that.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by that statement. First of all, it's impossible to form an opinion on a product if you haven't actually used it. Flexibility is a derogatory term at best because DGDK.NET is extremely flexible, and efficient. You can't compare XNA to DGDK.NET for several reasons:

1. XNA is not a 3D games engine like DGDK.NET. It is a standardised interface for setting up communication between the various hardware components of the system such as the GPU, sound card, network play and controllers. Even with XNA, you are still completely responsible for the design and logic associated with handling these devices in their basic form. True, XNA has extra functionality in their to help game developers achieve results quickly, but it is still just an interface layer to DirectX.

2. DGDK.NET is a derived product of both DarkBASIC Professional, and DGDK (C++), and both of these tools provide game programming functionality on several levels, and remove the complexities of creating low level objects that you are to expect from interface hierachies like DirectX and XNA. It's not a fare comparison in my opinion, since DGDK.NET provides alot of the ground work for you.

3. This is a very important distinction. XNA is a managed interop layer to the DirectX interface, and because it's managed, the performance may be very slightly less than calling DirectX functions directly, but you still are just calling DirectX functions. DGDK.NET is a complete engine that sits between DirectX and you, the developer. There still is an interop layer to call the COM functions exposed by DGDK.NET, but bar the interop layer between a .NET application and DGDK.NET, the rest is fully unmanaged and fully native code.

4. The runtime component of DGDK.NET is just four mb... 4! It only requires a onetime installation, and it's fully configurable to be silent so that it can be called from an application's setup routine. With XNA, you would still need to install both the .NET framework and DirectX runtimes which would occupy almost 80mb of install. So to say that DGDK.NET isn't as flexible as XNA, is just wrong.

5. You will get unlimited support on this forum for DGDK.NET. Almost every person that has posted on this forum, has quoted positive feedback and recommendations for DGDK.NET and it's ease of use with both the Express and Professional .NET development tools. You will be hard pushed to find anything that comes close to the simplicity of creating and running an application within minutes of installing the toolkit... and that's a fact!

So... my response is, reconsider, because you won't be disappointed.

Paul.

I think I might get both. But, beware, I am not a beginner to game programming in DarkBASIC. Dark GDK isn't much different in many ways. It's basicly the same things, except Dark GDK is much faster, loads faster, commands look different, you get it. I feel like making my own game engine anyways. I need the experience in order to become a good proffesional game programmer. Sure, some of the good games are not made in their own game engine, but they had to know how the engine works and how to code it in order to modify it. I also have tried XNA before, and I think it is pretty good. I have followed tutorials and stuff and already am 3/4 through a flight sim creation tutorial. Plus, XNA just makes me feel like I actually accomplished something, while DarkBASIC just made me feel as if I had just made something not too special. And I bet with DarkGDK it won't be different. Don't take me harshly, I just chose not to go with Dark GDK because I already have experience with Managed DirectX and XNA. So, I might as well go from these forums now, because I don't do the kind of stuff that the people in this forum do.

Ok, I understand, but most computer's already have both of those installed, so what could go wrong? I'll get Dark GDK probably now, as it has advantages that the XNA doesn't have.