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Geek Culture / What is your story?

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Cybermind
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Location: Denmark
Posted: 15th May 2016 11:31
I just love AGK2 I started with DarkBASIC, then went on to DarkBASIC Professional (which I still use as I do not want to convert all of my tools made in DBPro), and now, finally I am using AGK2 for the games themselves.

I have always loved digital games since early childhood. I played a lot, but then some day, I found out just exactly that blue screen on the C64 was for, not just loading games, it was a programming prompt. I started learning programming on my C64, never got any good at it back then, but I got a taste for making games. It has been my dream to make games ever since. As an adult, I made a decision, to go all in on learning to program and develop games.

In the beginning, I wanted to make big games like Morrowind, but slowly, I realised that I knew too little about game development and programming, so my games slowly got smaller and smaller scopes and my programming experience grew. Now, I can finally make real games. My first release is getting closer to release than anything else I ever made. I am so happy that I ended up with AGK2 for several reasons. I can use BASIC which is easy, I can convert important stuff to C++, I can release one source code on many platforms easily. Now even Raspberry Pi is supported which is great, I can now run a small, power efficient test server and I can even release my game on Raspberry Pi, at some point It would be great with PS and Xbox support as well, at some point I am living my dream

What is your story?
13/0
BatVink
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Posted: 15th May 2016 12:42
Back in 2003 I wanted to make a specific project, which I still haven't made yet I had prototyped it in VB and needed the visuals of a real gaming environment.
I saw DB and Blitz compared in a PC magazine (remember those paper-based things you used to buy from a place known as a newsagent?)
I liked the syntax of DB more so went with it, and glad I did.
By 2005 I had won a couple of small prizes in the competitions, and applied for the post of tutorial writer for the newsletter.
When Rich Davey left, I became the newsletter editor...for 8 years!
Over the years I upgraded to DBPro and then AppGameKit and AGK2. Along the way I won lots of competition prizes (blackberry tablet, Intel Ultrabook, 27" touchscreen Table PC, $1,000 (twice), 3D camera).
Now, I'm still writing lots of little bits here and there. They are mainly aligned with my original project that I never did, writing games for local fundraising events.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur
TutCity is being rebuilt
budokaiman
FPSC Tool Maker
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Playing: Hard to get
Posted: 15th May 2016 14:09
How exactly did you get a thread with no name?
"Giraffe is soft, Gorilla is hard." - Phaelax
TheComet
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Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.
Posted: 15th May 2016 14:15 Edited at: 15th May 2016 14:17
This trick still works:



[b][/b]

[EDIT] No it doesn't.
"Jeb Bush is a big fat mistake" -- Donald Trump
https://vt.tumblr.com/tumblr_o2rvwdLLSF1rmjly4.mp4
Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 16th May 2016 19:30
Alllllll those years ago, I encountered a demo disk with a copy of Klik N Play and I was so enamoured with it that I convinced my parents to buy me the full version, I must have been 10 or 11. I maybe various bits and pieces with my wonderful child-like imagination. Eventually I replaced it with The Games Factory. I lamented that I couldn't do anything 3D and my ideas were in the 3rd dimension, this might have been when I was 13, I tried the demo of Clickteam's Jamagic, which was neat, but I didn't understand the programming language that well...barely at all really and it was just a demo and there was no way a 13 year old would be able to afford it. After a bit of finding, I encountered Dark Basic (classic version) and started coding with that and I didn't make anything spectacular, but it was all a learning process. I ended up joining the forums not that long before I upgraded to Dark Basic Pro and applied all my noobiness and delusion of grandeur to these forums and have yet to come back to you with a completed game.

At some point in my late teens, I started to try and branch out, try other more advanced languages or try something different and tried a number of things, Torque, TrueVision, Irrlicht, Ogre and later on, Unity3D - initially with its demo before it had a free version and then more fully when a free version was available. Unity3D was the one I got on the most with, but used Dark Basic Pro to prototype ideas. In my usual wisdom, I have not finished anything in Unity either. But at least I got a fully working playable demo of something in Dark Basic Pro, not very well polished mind you...or at all.

University happened, unemployment, wanted to get a job and put effort into that. Found a permanent job, hated it (still doing it) and then decided, instead of getting stuck in a dead end job, I'd try and get skills and qualifications doing something I enjoying and found web development was bigger thing in my area and have since been trying my hand at that. Initially I was "yay ASP.NET" because of my C# knowledge and the number of ASP.NET jobs around, but also found PHP and Ruby On Rails to be fairly common too. Did my research, ASP.NET seems to be where I want to be, PHP to me is turn off for some reason, but Ruby On Rails I learned and found to be a job to work with. At the moment I am in that mind of pledging full focus on ASP.NET or RubyOnRails, I know C# a lot better than I know Ruby, but I am more familiar with Rails that I am with ASP. At the moment, I think Ruby On Rails is winning, because it is just so wonderful to work with and so easy to set up on other OS's and I am not confining myself to Windows either. Ruby is also nice in that I can use a tool called rvm, which I find useful when I have different projects using different versions of Ruby. And getting a single project set up and configured on different systems (and OS's) is so much less of a headache than it is when using something like Visual Studio for ASP.NET.

And that is where I am. Still not got a job doing it and I don't get a lot of spare time for coding, but I am persevering...oh and I am working on a top secret game project, I had an idea and inspiration for, once it's less secret and in a better state, I'll make it less secret. It is using Unity3D, though, my dear fellows.
The Slayer
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Posted: 16th May 2016 22:10 Edited at: 16th May 2016 22:11
Quote: "oh and I am working on a top secret game project"

Well now, it's no longer a secret anymore.
Good to know it'll be in Unity, though!

My story is...either long or short. Which one do you wanna hear ?

Jokes aside, it all began 25 (or more) years ago, when i had my first PC, a Commodore 64 with cartridge! Ooooooooooh, i loved that machine! Still brings back good memories. Had keyboard, floppydisk, and cartridge, and plugged to a regular old TV.
At first i was just playing games, but with the help of the cartridge, i was able to see the binairy and hex code of games, aswell as the basic code of some games. And, it inspired me and got myself hooked on game creation. I made some small bits of code, a couple of 'games', and also some sort of 'paint program'.
Later, i had my first real PC, using Windows 95. Bought a 'Klik N Play' CD at a local store, and was even more inspired to make my own game that would become super popular .
At a young age, i found out i was pretty good at painting, drawing, and making music, so it was the normal step for me to go digital and use my skills to make games.

Since then, i have tried a fair amount of different engines: DBPro, Leadwerks, Cryengine, Unity, Unreal, Torque3D, FPSC, Irrlicht, and more. During those years, i also found out that good tools/programs gave better/quicker results. I had a job (still have), and it allowed me to buy a whole arsenal of cheap/expensive programs to make my life as an artist/game developer easier (and more fun, because let's be honest...a new tool to play with is quite exciting, isn't it?

So, now i have programs like ZBrush, 3DCoat, Lightwave 3D, Substance Designer/Painter, Vue 2015, Paintshop Photo Pro X7, FL Studio 12, UU3D Pro, iClone Pro, Blender, Shadermap 3, and a few more.

Currently still working on my game 'Seventh Crystal Of Theia' in Unity 5 Pro, and still loving game creation!
Quote: \"Close those quotes before they start to spread!...too late! Aaaaaagh!!!
Kevin Picone
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Posted: 17th May 2016 16:53
Learnt 8bit 6502 back in 1982, went 16/32bit 68000 in 1988 and have been lamenting the stupidity in processor design ever since.







PlayBASIC To HTML5/WEB - Convert PlayBASIC To Machine Code
TheComet
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Location: I`m under ur bridge eating ur goatz.
Posted: 18th May 2016 00:18 Edited at: 18th May 2016 00:28
Young Comet sucked at history class, so dad said: "Comet. I will give you this cool CD-ROM I found if you score sufficiently in your next history exam."

Young Comet studied and he scored well. It was, in fact, the best score Comet had scored - and ever will have scored - in a history exam. Ever. (A mere C- for you Americans.)

As promised, he was rewarded the mystical "DarkBASIC" CD-ROM. At the time he had 2356 viruses installed on his computer and asked for help on TGC. He received none.

From this day forth, Comet's life spun out of control. Sunlight was no longer required. Sleep was no longer required. Food was no longer required. With nothing but determination, DBC running on a 800x600 CRT screen and the energy of the universe, Comet embarked on a journey deep into the source code of "Iced.dba". He didn't understand one goddamn thing, but it was cool.

Comet made a bunch of god-awful games. He eventually proceeded onwards to DarkBASIC Professional. The power was limitless, it seemed! Even more absolutely attrocious "games" were shat out at Comet's fingertips.

Then it happened. The Posting Competition began. A harmless thread, one might have thought at the time. But it soon proved itself to be the mother of all time wasters. Not even /dev/null could compete with the amount of data that was devoured by this thread. Keystrokes that should have been spent writing code were more and more consumed by The Posting Competition. "Just. One. More. Post." Comet cried in agony, helpless to the powers that be, glued to his now upgraded 1280x1024 LCD screen with one finger holding down the "F5" button.

I've not written a single game for more than 2 years now, but I have since acquired a very deep understanding of C, C++ and python, and I've tinkered in the source code of some well known C++ game engines, Urho3D being my favourite so far. Oh, and I've become quite good at blender too.

These days I mostly hang out on discord (if anyone wants to add me or join our programming group, please say so!) and I work on C++ applications.
"Jeb Bush is a big fat mistake" -- Donald Trump
https://vt.tumblr.com/tumblr_o2rvwdLLSF1rmjly4.mp4
The Slayer
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Posted: 18th May 2016 05:01
LOL, that is seriously a very cool story, Comet! Thumbs up!
Quote: \"Close those quotes before they start to spread!...too late! Aaaaaagh!!!
Dark Java Dude 64
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Posted: 18th May 2016 18:27
Ah, fun thread! Back in 2009 or so (I was a mere 11 year old little chap), I took on an interest in computers. I began to wonder how they worked and such. My dad had long been a programmer (wrote software than ran on a very large energy company's billing system servers), and I believe he gave me some insights on how the whole programming thing worked. He gave me an instructional Java booklet he once used, and I remember piecing together strange bits of code (which never would have run ) on pieces of paper. I eventually wanted to try it out for real, and came across what had shortly before been know as "Kids Programming Language" or KPL. The language had only just recently changed its name to Phrogram. It was an object oriented language designed for easy GUI programming (sort of in the same niche as DBPro) and I got quite into it. I became a very prominent member on their forum, as well. Interestingly enough, that forum dropped to near no activity by the time I left.

Alongside all of this, for a long time I had been interested in becoming a pilot. As a result, I commonly flew planes on Microsoft Flight Simulator X -- when I learned that I could make something like that by programming, I decided I wanted to create my own flight simulator. Phrogram had some serious limitations however, and I began looking for another programming language. I came across many, but I was hooked when I saw TGC's instructional website for using DBPro. When the site claimed that
Quote: "print "Hello, world!"
wait key"
was enough to create something that ran, I had to check if it was real. I downloaded the DBPro compiler, and the rest was history.

As of a few years ago, I sort of lost interest in programming. To this day, I still write the occasional program if I want to check out how some algorithm would work, but other than that, my arsenal of completed software is small.

Lol, I just found my old YouTube channel. 12 year old me at work. Capture the Ball is probably my favorite. The Virtual PC was pretty fun. Marbsticle Course (which never came anywhere even close to completion) was done with DBPro, the others with Phrogram.
"You're fat. Don't sugar coat it or you'll eat that too" - Dr. Phil
Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 18th May 2016 22:44 Edited at: 18th May 2016 22:44
12 year old you. Hmm, I don't have the liberty of showing stuff I had from when I was 12, because I didn't share any of it, given my dial up connection and everybody else was in the space age of broadband.

However, I will look through old threads and look at a hopeful 14 year old Seppuku. *scrolls* Oh no, I was one of those "here I made a screenshot of a menu" people.

However, I will link http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y173/seppuku05/screenyakai.jpg.

I am cringing as I go through old threads. I am surprised people didn't find me annoying, either that or they did and we just too polite.
Van B
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Posted: 19th May 2016 12:51
When I started out, magazines would print program listings and we'd type these in, hell I don't think I could even read or write properly yet. So programming in ingrained into my DNA and has and will always fascinate me. From the speccy to the C64, to the ST, then there was a black period in history when there really wasn't a great deal of options for PC development, I took to drinking and social life instead. But, then some clever folk made DB Classic... turns out I could be making 3D games for the PC in BASIC. Now some 10 years and a dozen or so projects later I'm using mostly AppGameKit, still use DBPro for stuff, and even dabble in retro games, in fact my last 2 finished games were for the Speccy.
CJB
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Posted: 19th May 2016 13:57
A cool thread this! Nice to get some background history on my fellow forum knights!

My story is way too long to fit, but here's a short version:

Got a VIC20 at 4 years old. Started coding at 6 or 7 (copying those lines of code from computer mags and learning how to make my own games). I was hooked from the start. Other kids in primary school were typing in their name on the BBC Micro (we shared one that was wheeled around the classrooms on a trolly), and I was writing racing car games, trying to teach the other kids binary so they could help me convert my hand-drawn graphics into data statments.

Progressed to the C64, Amiga (AMOS was Awesome!), PC (many, MANY upgrades), etc.. Even had a Dec 10/10 Mini Computer (with the RSTS operating system) in my bedroom for a while before my mum demanded I got rid of it (it was about the size of two washing machines and made the windows rattle when powered up! Boy do I regret losing that!)! Borland Turbo C filled the programming void for me during that black period. Learned how to get the most out of the good old VGA chip and Adlib sound card before technology started taking over.

Did my City & Guilds in computer literacy at the age of 12, went on to study computer science at college (National Diploma) and then Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence at the School of Cognitive Sciences near Brighton. Have been a programmer for various companies in the 20 odd years since, using a huge variety of technologies and languages. Have been Director of a small selection of niche businesses. Picked up a wife and three kids along the way, and now find myself developing front and backend software for insurance products.

Throughout all the real-world 'Life' stuff, writing cool games and apps has always been my dream, but has never made it far beyond fanatical hobbyist stage. I think when I publish something that brings enough in to pay food and shelter (just £30k p/a would do!), I'll make the switch to doing it full-time and start living the dream!





V2 T1 (Mostly)
Phone Tap!
Uzmadesign
Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 19th May 2016 23:13
Quote: "Well now, it's no longer a secret anymore.
Good to know it'll be in Unity, though!
"


Damn! Well, I guess now I'll have to share a teaser screenshot?

http://i.imgur.com/jh6LiFF.png
The Slayer
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Posted: 20th May 2016 05:49
Quote: "Damn! Well, I guess now I'll have to share a teaser screenshot?

http://i.imgur.com/jh6LiFF.png"

Woooooooooooooaaaaah! That's impressive! Nice work!

At least your secret is now in the open. You no longer have to be scared anymore at night.
Quote: \"Close those quotes before they start to spread!...too late! Aaaaaagh!!!
Chris Tate
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Posted: 23rd May 2016 15:44
Quote: "Alllllll those years ago, I encountered a demo disk with a copy of Klik N Play"


Sort of the same here, after a few commodore 64 and QBasic experiments, I used the Games Factory (pretty much the newer version of Klik N Play), then Multimedia Fusion, then Flash, then DBPRO, then C# / VB.NET, then DBPRO again, now DBPRO and C# / VB.NET.

I have AppGameKit installed for some apps I want to create in the near future.

Quote: "Damn! Well, I guess now I'll have to share a teaser screenshot?"

Thanks for that spoiler Seppuku Arts, the hype train has been derailed. Still looking forward to it.

Quote: "Comet made a bunch of god-awful games"

In your opinion, I think what you did are quite good compared to some of the stuff I see being sold on Steam.

Quote: "Learnt 8bit 6502 back in 1982"

A year before I was born.
Phaelax
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Posted: 29th May 2016 17:49
Quote: "Learnt 8bit 6502 back in 1982,"

We get it Kevin, you're older than betty white!


I started making games using SEUCK on the Amiga500 in the very early 90s. Mid 90s I got into QBasic. In highschool, I learned Pascal and C++ and I loved pascal (at the time). I ended up being an unofficial teachers assistance for the class because if he didn't know the answer to something, I usually would. When I was 16 I discovered DarkBasic, yes the first one. Years before TGC existed. I was a member of RGT then LLRGT and finally whatever we called it after LLRGT (if it even went that far). Eventually, I found this community in '03 and 13 years later I'm still here. So I really have been a follower since the very beginning of DB. Somewhere in those years I went to college and studied java and did some JSP development on the corporate side of things. Today, programming is more of a past time hobby that I don't do much anymore. My new hobbies have turned to woodworking and landscaping.

Why I got interested in DB in the first place because in middle school I came up with a great game idea, Bar Fight! Pascal didn't appear to have the capabilities to make such a game back then. I've made all sorts of little projects over the years, an SQL database program like the one that came with Macs (I forget the name of it). An AIM chat client which I used until AOL shut down their TOC protocol servers. I always intended to go back and rewrite the library to handle OSCAR but never got around to it. I started an iTunes clone in Java (and even DBP!) but scrapped it a year or so later after Apple released the Windows version. Wrote my own Java IDE and did all my Java homework with it for the last half of my semester.

"I like offending people, because I think people who get offended should be offended." - Linus Torvalds
Cybermind
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Posted: 30th May 2016 20:55
I see a few used Klik & Play I found Klik & Play in a second hand store back in the late 90's. I was thrilled, I could finally make some games. They all ended up as just small prototypes. I got The Games Factory after that. After some time I could see it did not suit my needs, lucky as I was, my cousin had talked about some DarkBASIC he had found, but lived a bit far apart but I found a copy of DarkBASIC in cheap sales crate at a store, I got it, and I started to really try and learn how to program Now I am actually pretty far in some projects, using AGK2 and DBPRO
13/0
Cybermind
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Posted: 28th Jun 2016 09:06
It was fun reading about others journey in programming Thank you for sharing!
13/0
Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 28th Jun 2016 14:15
Commodore 64? I've never even seen one, the earliest games I ever saw were rise of the triad and wolfenstein and my favourite game for the sega was Sun Set Riders, which I never owned I just played it at my friend George's house.

Cybermind
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Posted: 29th Jun 2016 10:08
The C64 was my first computer. Before that I had an Atari 2600, a console developed in the 70's, it came on the market around '76 as far as I recall. I bought mine around '89 or '90. Not an early adaptor I could hardly afford anything back then, it was my parents who bought the C64.

Rise of the Triad and Wolfenstein were great games for their time. I think Rise of the Triad was actually build on an improved engine from Wolfenstein.

Here in Europe the Sega Genesis is the Sega Megadrive. Great machine! I liked it. My cousin had one, him and his sister played a loooooot of Sonic
13/0
BatVink
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Posted: 29th Jun 2016 11:31
My first computer. Look how happy it made people.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur
TutCity is being rebuilt
Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 29th Jun 2016 12:27
I started programming at the age of 16 when I received a copy of DarkBASIC for my birthday. It opened up a different and strange new world, where my ideas could be changed over into games.

I still remember the first game I attempted to develop was a huge 3D platformer. I never got past the design stage, I think one day soon I will actually make it.

Anyway, I upgraded to DBP in 2010ish, and made some nice level editors and did some other cool stuff in it. After a few more years I tried at my hand at Unity and rather enjoyed it, so I left DBP behind. This was around the time that AppGameKit 1 was around and wasn't nearly as good as AGK2 is.

Once AGK2 was released I purchased it and began having fun doing everything from scratch again. There's something about programming it all that makes it way more rewarding. However, I discovered the Godot engine and started using that for my bigger projects, as it helps speed up development time significantly. The scripting language is pretty nice as well.

There is still a place in my heart for AppGameKit though, and I frequently open it just to code a little something in it. It's still my goal to create a full game with it eventually!
Slowly compiling code, one byte at a time.
Follow meh blague for more zany thoughts and possibly offensive programming!
Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 29th Jun 2016 13:47


One of the first games I ever played at the age of 10 or 11??? The Legend of Robin Hood, my mother was the only one who could complete it.
Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 29th Jun 2016 15:04






Excalibur 2555 A.D. my favourite game of all time, which I'd still play today if I hadn't of taken my PS1 to pieces convinced there were magical creatures living inside it, but you know kids are weird and insane so whatever...
The Slayer
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Posted: 30th Jun 2016 15:25
Quote: "Commodore 64? I've never even seen one"

That's a shame! I fell in love when i saw the pixelated pixels of Gianna Sisters on the TV screen that was plugged onto my C-64.
Quote: \"Close those quotes before they start to spread!...too late! Aaaaaagh!!!
Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 30th Jun 2016 19:53 Edited at: 30th Jun 2016 19:54
The Slayer wrote: "That's a shame! I fell in love when i saw the pixelated pixels of Gianna Sisters on the TV screen that was plugged onto my C-64."




Yer they do look adorable but Willow is the best side scroller of all time!

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXdUD1G1FFw [/video]
The Zoq2
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Posted: 30th Jun 2016 23:51
Really interesting thread, I guess i'll share my own story too.

In fourth or fifth grade, we had a thing where you spent a day with someone at work. My dad knew some people working at a company called cyb aero who makes autonomus helicopters and asked if I could "work" there for a day. I did, and the task I got was to create a 3d model of their helicopter for an RC flight simulator which they wanted to put it in. I really enjoyed it and when I got home, I went looking for some 3d modelling software. First I tried google sketchup but it felt weird, it didn't work the same way as what I had used at cyb aero and eventually I found a program called anim8or. For a year or so, I had fun making models and small animated videos in anim8or but eventually I wanted to use my models for something other than videos. I asked my parents who are both programmers to make a game with my models in it but naturally they were busy. Eventually found a program called FPS creator which looked nice, so I downloaded the free version of it and started playing around. At some point, probably for my birthday I got the full version of FPS creator and started learning more about it. I used it for 1 or two years until I started wanting to do more with my games, at first I tried learning the weird scripting language of FPSC but it felt limiting. At the time, I had tried a few mods for FPS creator which I knew were written in dark basic so I figgured I would try and learn programming in dark basic.

This wasn't the first time I tried learning programming, but this time, I found a thread in the newcommers section called "Beginners guide to DBPro" which was written by Nickydude. Unlike previous tutorials I had found, this didn't just explain what to write, but why to write it and the basic concepts of programming. I made some terrible demos in dark basic before TGC announced AGK. When it came out, I brought it instantly and started making some games in it. I made a few terrible games in AppGameKit which are still on the google play store and I even "won" an ultrabook in a competition for making a game about being stranded on an island. However, while I was working on this island survival game, I encountered a few bugs in the AppGameKit language and I was starting to get annoyed by other things about it as well. But I had read about Tier 2 of agk which allows you to write games in C++ using the AppGameKit libraries. At this point, I was studying a computer focused thing in school and I was interested in working with programming at some point. I figgured I would need to learn another language at some point anyway so I downloaded visual studio and got started learning C++. It was a tedious process but I eventually got the hang of it and I think I ended up making one or two games using C++ and agk. One of those games was a school project where me and two friends decided to make a platformer, me and a friend were going to do the programming and another friend was going to make the graphics. I ended up doing most of the programming and once again, I started getting tired of AGKs limitations. One of the main limitations being it not running on linux (at the time).

At this point, I was about to graduate from the equivalent of high school and I applied to study computer science at the university. I started looking into doing other things than games, like some image recognition on a raspberry pi which taught me a bit of python. I was accepted into uni and I just finished my second year. I will most likely end up working with programming or computer hardware, and it's all thanks to me finding FPS creator all those years ago.
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Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 00:17 Edited at: 7th Jul 2016 07:25
The Zoq2 wrote: "
Really interesting thread, I guess i'll share my own story too.

In fourth or fifth grade, we had a thing where you spent a day with someone at work. My dad knew some people working at a company called cyb aero who makes autonomus helicopters and asked if I could "work" there for a day. I did, and the task I got was to create a 3d model of their helicopter for an RC flight simulator which they wanted to put it in. I really enjoyed it and when I got home, I went looking for some 3d modelling software. First I tried google sketchup but it felt weird, it didn't work the same way as what I had used at cyb aero and eventually I found a program called anim8or. For a year or so, I had fun making models and small animated videos in anim8or but eventually I wanted to use my models for something other than videos. I asked my parents who are both programmers to make a game with my models in it but naturally they were busy. Eventually found a program called FPS creator which looked nice, so I downloaded the free version of it and started playing around. At some point, probably for my birthday I got the full version of FPS creator and started learning more about it. I used it for 1 or two years until I started wanting to do more with my games, at first I tried learning the weird scripting language of FPSC but it felt limiting. At the time, I had tried a few mods for FPS creator which I knew were written in dark basic so I figgured I would try and learn programming in dark basic.

This wasn't the first time I tried learning programming, but this time, I found a thread in the newcommers section called "Beginners guide to DBPro" which was written by Nickydude. Unlike previous tutorials I had found, this didn't just explain what to write, but why to write it and the basic concepts of programming. I made some terrible demos in dark basic before TGC announced AGK. When it came out, I brought it instantly and started making some games in it. I made a few terrible games in AppGameKit which are still on the google play store and I even "won" an ultrabook in a competition for making a game about being stranded on an island. However, while I was working on this island survival game, I encountered a few bugs in the AppGameKit language and I was starting to get annoyed by other things about it as well. But I had read about Tier 2 of agk which allows you to write games in C++ using the AppGameKit libraries. At this point, I was studying a computer focused thing in school and I was interested in working with programming at some point. I figgured I would need to learn another language at some point anyway so I downloaded visual studio and got started learning C++. It was a tedious process but I eventually got the hang of it and I think I ended up making one or two games using C++ and agk. One of those games was a school project where me and two friends decided to make a platformer, me and a friend were going to do the programming and another friend was going to make the graphics. I ended up doing most of the programming and once again, I started getting tired of AGKs limitations. One of the main limitations being it not running on linux (at the time).

At this point, I was about to graduate from the equivalent of high school and I applied to study computer science at the university. I started looking into doing other things than games, like some image recognition on a raspberry pi which taught me a bit of python. I was accepted into uni and I just finished my second year. I will most likely end up working with programming or computer hardware, and it's all thanks to me finding FPS creator all those years ago."


First Person Shooter Creator is for [EDIT], why would you want anything other than DBC or DBPro?

In any case if we're all sharing life stories I programmed in Dark Basic for over 15 years man and boy, my greatest achievement was having david spade walk towards you firing a scorpion machine gun and the objective was to stab him which took me four years...



See his face just screams violence!

My first game in DBC was about racing hobbits and at the finish line was Gandalf, the game was called 'Hobbit Hop', at the age of 14 I was too dumb to figure out how sprites worked so I just textured some cubes and animated them by retexturing them and your opponent moved randomly along the y axis.



yer my hobbits kind of looked like that but cooler, my vision of Tolkien's work was far superior in comparison to Peter Packman's saturated clap trap.
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Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 1st Jul 2016 02:54 Edited at: 1st Jul 2016 02:58
Quote: "
First Person Shooter Creator is for girls and transgender people like WickedX, why would you want anything other than DBC or DBPro? "


Oh great, you're CryOfPain, aren't you?

The 15 years line is what clued me in, and also your needless sentence I quoted above.

TGC really don't moderate anymore, do they? Ridiculous.

EDIT: As a moderator on another forum, this is seriously starting to annoy me.

I remember when the mods would get on users for almost-but-not-quite breaking rules and netiquette, and now I have seen so many things from users lately that no only blatantly break the rules and are offensive, but are certainly only designed to get on peoples' nerves.

Not only that, but if my assumption is correct and Scanner Darkly is indeed the recently banned CryOfPain, HOW have they not noticed? Surely the IP's add up, or are you telling me you didn't do an IP ban and just a general ban, and if so... WHY?!?! You just WANT offensive posters to be able to come back but with different names? You like asking for trouble?

Does TGC really want to have a reputation on this forum of no longer giving a darn on the quality of the posts on the forum?
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Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 04:15
egghead wrote: "You like asking for trouble?
"


Jesus dude I posted my entire FPS on this forum today and all you're interested in is bans and etiquette, I was also Davros but forgot my password, as well as a whole slew of other users over the years I've been programming DB for 15 years I remember a time before this forum existed and I was one of the first people to use it, so you can stick that in your pipe.
Release the Krakus
Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 1st Jul 2016 04:31 Edited at: 1st Jul 2016 04:37
No, no, my issue isn't with you exactly there, Scanner Darkly/cryofpain/Davros, though I don't much care for your lack of etiquette and name-calling.
You could be a bit less offensive and not call other users gay or transgender just because you find a product they like inferior. That's the kind of behavior that, five years ago or so, would have gotten a user immediately and permanently banned. And the mods and TGC in general are just letting it slide by and getting out of hand.

Like I said, as a moderator on another forum, it grinds my gears when I see someone clearly breaking the rules time and time again, and can't do anything about it at all. You know why? Because TGC has had these new forums for over a year and STILL don't have a report function. Mods all but ignore the Geek Culture board, and emailing them doesn't illicit a response in a timely fashion.

In all honesty, you really do seem like a good guy, and I certainly wouldn't ban you if I had the power, unless I had already issued you several warnings. For example, calling another user gay/transgender for no real reason. Just please be mindful of other people when posting here.

And for Apollo's sake TGC, PUT THAT REPORT FUNCTIONALITY BACK IN. I'm not saying that because of anything in this thread really, I just mean in general. A very basic requirement for a forum and a year later it still hasn't materialized.

EDIT: It may seem like I'm really picking on TGC here, but let me tell you why.

I was once a hugely loyal and frequent user of TGC products in the mid '00s, when they were releasing new and exciting updates almost on a monthly basis, similar to what they're doing with AppGameKit now.

As a frequent user of products, I bought more products over time. I have only purchased two things, but in the almost 9 years I have been here, I am still a paying customer. As a paying customer, it's just irritating to see a product I once loved become so mismanaged. I am talking specifically about the forums, although I feel they could have done much better with DBP as well towards the end. AGk2 is still nowhere near what DBP was, in terms of plugins and such.

Anyway, to make my final point - I was a paying customer, and as a paying customer it shocks me that TGC not only severely screwed up the forums when making the new software, but now a year later STILL DOESN'T CARE ENOUGH TO IMPLEMENT BASIC FEATURES, or ask for more moderators. My word's no good if it's not backed by funds, I guess? Do you want me to buy AppGameKit again?
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Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 13:42
yoda wrote: " I don't much care for your lack of etiquette and name-calling.
You could be a bit less offensive and not call other users gay or transgender just because you find a product they like inferior."


It was only a little joke dude, I really don't give a damn what orientation, colour, creed or persuasion people are so long as they're cool or at the very least collect warhammer or lego, the real issue here is I'm stupid and AppGameKit, C++ and other stuff scares me, like when I was a child I went to computer camp and everybody bullied me because I was no good at basic and they called me crustacean because we were playing this game where you had to play like duck, duck, goose, make up a hand gesture to represent an animal, say the animal's name and then chase your opponent around the circle... Kids are cruel, all the good animals and hand gestures were taken! And I thought that a crustacean was like a mollusc that lived on a beach but actually it's more like a prawn.

yoda wrote: "Anyway, to make my final point - I was a paying customer, and as a paying customer it shocks me that TGC not only severely screwed up the forums when making the new software, but now a year later STILL DOESN'T CARE ENOUGH TO IMPLEMENT BASIC FEATURES, or ask for more moderators. My word's no good if it's not backed by funds, I guess? Do you want me to buy AppGameKit again?"


Man that AppGameKit stuff looks well difficult, why not be more dynamic and program in DBPro? check out my first person shooter in the link below:

Please post on this Yoda
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Van B
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 15:15
We don't have the function to compare IP addresses now, and frankly I don't think we need it, nor do we need more mods. What we need is activity, not more hands to deal with the tiny fraction of users who might post something you don't like. Mods don't pay too much attention to geek culture because it is geek culture, in the past we'd have to deal with political posts, rants, offensive material, and even the odd imploding mod... nowadays with forum traffic the way it is, we ban spambots mostly, it's rare that we have to take actual action, and taking more action wouldn't help the forum any. Why should moderators take a heavy hand, when it's typically long time users who are the most salty.

Scanner Darkly, please avoid terms that other users may find offensive or that might bring your mental health into question. We have infinite tolerance for enthusiasm, but absolutely no tolerance for trolls.
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Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 1st Jul 2016 15:46 Edited at: 1st Jul 2016 15:54
Really? Did you ever stop to think that maybe this board isn't gaining new users is because of the fact that people are getting away with name-calling and offensive and trollish posts? No one, especially new users, wants to come on and see that. Your response comes off to me as though you are excusing no longer implementing the AUP to a full extent, because of a "lack of activity".

So, in other words, moderators don't care enough about this board to actually patrol it anymore, so you'll let anything go? Only stop something when you actually feel bothered to open a thread which captures your interest and happen to see it?

What even prompted cryofpain to get banned in the first place, and why haven't you done anything about Scanner Darkly? Clearly he is circumventing the ban, has even admitted to it, and nothing has been done?

Sloppy. This community is now a No Man's Land. I can't believe TGC has actually let it come to this.

And still no further comments on implementing a report functionality?

And you guys really wonder why users are disappearing.

EDIT: The reason long-time users such as myself are getting "salty" is because of the infuriating lack of communication between us and TGC officials, or mods.

We come to you with real problems, either with users or forum software, and instead of receiving any help or proper response, we are given excuses and told that we are salty.

Not only is that infuriating, but it is the worst thing to do if you want to help bring TGCs community back together.

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Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 16:12
Yoda wrote: "bring TGCs community back together."


How am I supposed to not be offensive and a troll if people won't be my friend and post things about my first person shooter? It took allot of effort and I'm disgruntled by being ignored!

VAN B wrote: "Scanner Darkly, please avoid terms that other users may find offensive or that might bring your mental health into question. We have infinite tolerance for enthusiasm, but absolutely no tolerance for trolls."


To be perfectly honest with you there's a distinctly ugly atmosphere about this place that never happened in the past! and it's certainly not coming from my side of the fence, people are secretive and annoying I spent two days trying to figure out how to get the programming language connected to the compiler and only one person gave me the answer after 18 hours of constantly asking, wickedX just lead me round in circles?
Do that thing you do and pay us for it!
Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 1st Jul 2016 16:16
Well, I just posted on the AppGameKit group on FB to finally get some sort of response.

Daniel Foreman wrote: "I've just had a quick look at the forum, there's posts going up every day so it's not inactive. I can't comment on the mod situation, except that prior to leaving TGC (as a freelance contractor) there were some dramatic paradigm shifts going on. One of the biggest of which is Steam. I know the moderators at the time were spending as much time moderating discussions on the Steam forums. If you find activity level low you may find what you need from the Discussion buttons in the steam client. I don't really use them myself because like you i've spent that last many years investing in the TGC forums. But now that their only who products are basically AGK2, and Game-guru with a bunch of DLC content Steam is basically the new platform for consuming TGC content."


So, from what I gather he says, TGC shifted their focus from the forums without properly announcing it to the forum members.

Still, I can't believe what has gone on here. A simple feature request on my part has been ignored for almost a year. I have been told I am salty, and have been offered no real response to any of my questions or suggestions. Instead I get a response from VanB that's less than helpful, and a somewhat actual response from Daniel Foreman but had to post on the AppGameKit group to actually get it.

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Van B
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 16:25
Sorry, but when did you come to a moderator with this problem? - I didn't get a message or an email, I checked this thread and found your bitching comments about lack of communication and blah blah blah... we've all heard it a hundred times from a hundred users with a hundred problems that only they seem to have.

Moderators do not work for TGC, have no real say in the functions we have, and can't be held accountable for the lack of a feature! - I visit these forum several times a day, I frequent all but the FPSC boards - you seem to think moderators should be proactive forum police somehow, swinging ban hammers and features that we don't have to keep the place free from immature jokes. All we can do is ban or slap, and we do not like to intervene when another moderator is already taking action, we have respect for other mods and their actions.

And here I am, salty as ever, arguing with the forum president as if it even matters... you imply that we simply don't care about the forum and complain about lack of communication - well you've posted a few kilobytes that maybe 4 people will actually read, and I can guarantee that TGC won't read them, they have more pressing matters than that 1 user who re-joined and indirectly called someone a gay. The forum is not frequented by young people nowadays, which was the reason for such a strict AUP - Apollo users need to be more resilient in Geek Culture... hell people should just avoid it in general. GameGuru has its own forum, AppGameKit has the Steam forum - we are not expecting a huge turnaround in new users, and new users tend to be focussed on the AppGameKit section. We could make the forum more strict and business-like for new users by doing just 1 thing, delete the Geek Culture section completely. Seriously, it's supposed to be 'largely unmoderated' but even nowadays it takes half our time and is the only place where anyone ever bitches about TGC or moderators, what purpose does it serve apart from a general toilet for people who should have better things to do.
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Yodaman Jer
User Banned
Posted: 1st Jul 2016 16:37
Your answer is to mock me, tell me I am bitching, and continue to offer no real responses or solutions.

9 years was a pretty good run for me, but I realize now that since no TGC officials seem to care about this forum, then neither should I, especially when I am called salty and told I am bitching, for attempting to bring large issues to the attention of the moderators and staff of TGC forums.

Pathetic. I don't know what I expected, I guess. Goodbye.
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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 1st Jul 2016 23:15 Edited at: 2nd Jul 2016 02:20
Quote: "To be perfectly honest with you there's a distinctly ugly atmosphere about this place that never happened in the past! and it's certainly not coming from my side of the fence, people are secretive and annoying I spent two days trying to figure out how to get the programming language connected to the compiler and only one person gave me the answer after 18 hours of constantly asking, wickedX just lead me round in circles?"


Sometimes it can take 18 hours to get the answer you want. You need to find somebody who knows the answer or somebody who can troubleshoot to help you find the answer. We aren't the all seeing eye and not all of us necessarily use the same TGC tools. Heck, I've gone on forums and never even gotten an answer or anybody try and help me and I have to sit there and work it out myself and Google intensely.

However, there is behaviour that is acceptable on this forum and behaviour that is unacceptable. We have members from all walks of life, all ages, all cultures. As a result, how we moderate takes that into consideration. It's why I don't talk here like I do with my friends, if I spoke to people here like I spoke to my friends, I'd have been banned a long time ago. I have a terribly offensive sense of humour, but I know where and when to use it. This forum is not one of those places.

I won't ban you outright, I'll give you the opportunity to get it right, but if you do continue down the path of trollish behaviour, then it will inevitably be a ban. There are plenty of other forums out there that would accommodate said behaviour. These ones do not. If you can live with it, stay and we'll all play nice If you can't, then probably not the right place for you.

As for my opinion on the number of mods. I am generally browsing Geek Culture daily, I haven't seen much misbehaviour until Cry of Pain has shown up. Cry of Pain was banned, if this duplicate doesn't behave, then he will likely end up banned too. However, anybody does see something I don't, I am happy for them to message me.


[edit]
My second opinion on this is, it's taken a troll to have people fall out. If said person is genuinely a troll, should we be fighting over them? My general philosophy is not to give trolling victories.
Scanner Darkly
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Posted: 2nd Jul 2016 16:34
Seppuku Arts wrote: "trollish behaviour"


"Troll" is a particularly subjective word, fact is I've posted code and received no feedback on it apart from "Trollish" behaviour from Modz, my best friend is very experienced with internet security and if I paid him enough you could have to find yourself a new server or just disappear entirely, if I worked alone you could get pinged into the stone age, what can I say brute force is all I know...

You're lucky I don't find the tedious moderation annoying enough to actually lash out about it, I think you know in your heart of hearts that I should run this forum, be forum president and let people run wild, the wilder the better, turn it into a more intellectual goregrish of DarkBasic programming.

Push me and find out what I'm capable of, play fair and don't annoy me and we can all be friends.
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BatVink
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Posted: 2nd Jul 2016 16:59
TGC are working to re-introduce the Report button very soon, specifically as a response to the latest request here. You are being listened to, just bear in mind that there are lots of things to deliver in many areas of the TGC ecosphere.
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Dark Java Dude 64
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Posted: 2nd Jul 2016 19:17
Quote: "TGC are working to re-introduce the Report button very soon, specifically as a response to the latest request here. You are being listened to"
Fantastic! Would it be possible to keep the button situated on the right side of the post? It appears a tad unsightly where it currently sits. Other than that, perfect!
The Next
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Posted: 2nd Jul 2016 19:32
I have added the button back as you can see, there are improvements required but it should improve the ability of users to communicate issues to us.
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