Quote: "To put it simply, my first question is this: Can AppGameKit Classic be used easily to create a King's Quest style game. Is changing from room to room or scene to scene straightforward and how is graphics performance. Today there are 140hz 200hz and etc monitors. Will the engine correctly adapt for really smooth animation and gameplay with it's sprite rendering."
AGK will not add Interpolated Frames to Image Animation (i.e. Sprites)., but a basic Animation concept is that Humans will interpret (visually) as low as 7.5 Frames (Images) as a "Fluid" Motion.
This is Hand-Drawn Cartoons were able to get away with creating shows for TV on such a condensed time-frame... because they're drawing more simplified versions and as few images as possible to convey the "Action" on-screen.
Seriously, if you have a Video Player that supports Frame-by-Frame Controls; load up an old Animated TV Show and you'll see most actually have very little in the way of total frames to comprise a complete shot.
I mean other methods are to use Static Frames and only move important elements... say like a Mouth and Eyes for when characters are Talking to each other.
Very similar techniques were used in old Sierra Adventure Games as well., both to cut down on Development time, but also to conserve Storage Space... Animation is Space Intensive.
Now why is this important to keep in mind? Well because the same ends up true even with more Frames Per Second... we can essentially use the 7.5 FPS as our "Benchmark" as it were for a Minimum when we're upscaling to Higher Refresh Rates... so let's say we have 30 FPS Animation., but we want to run at at 120Hz; well then we simply write the Animation Engine in a way that it hold each Frame of Animation for (RefreshRate / IntendedFPS).
Thus we'd still get the intended 30FPS Playback regardless of Display Refresh.
There is another (albeit more processing time intensive, and best to do it as a Pixel Shader) called Frame Interpolation... in essence this is another technique somewhat borrowed from VHS or CRT Displays; where-in 2 Frames would be Composited Together over a number of Frames; with which way they'd blend be based upon a percentage of the frames between.
So again we use our 30FPS Animation to 120Hz., this is 4 Frames = 1 Frame., but we can interpolate these to be 100:0 > 66:33 > 33:66 > 0:100 and thus those two frames in-between if we were to look at them as Static Frames would look out-of-focus and bad; but IF we look at them in motion, well your brain takes over and essentially adds the additional frames.
Mind a Simple LERP Mix will have noticeable ghosting., to reduce this you can use a Motion Vector approach; which would blend only the pixel elements that change; thus you get the ghosting on just the motion pixels... it's how a lot of Modern Smart TVs handle what they call Motion Prediction to give the illusion of a Higher Framerate for TV Shows and Movies; and it actually works exceptionally well unless someone chose to use the "Shaky Cam" technique that was popular during the Mid-2000s to add "Realism" or "Documentary" feel to something.
Personally I'd say it's better figuring out what Framerate you want to use; and force a Refresh of 30 / 60 / etc.
Remember Pre-Canned Animation (akin to TV Shows, Film, or Adventure Games) is actually FINE to have Lower Refresh Rates while still having a Smooth Appearance... because what causes it to FEEL bad in most games is actually the Input Latency between when you press a button on a Controller and when the Action actually happens.
In Action Games, you want this to be as Low as possible; where-as Adventure games you're more giving a "Suggestion" rather than directly controlling things; so input latency is less of a "thing" and so there is a dissonance between Image and Controls that plays to your favour.
For example Ori at 120Hz is just beautiful due to nearly no input latency., makes the game just feel so fluid and responsible; and more beautiful... but Deponia feels just as good at 30 (with 15 FPS Animation) because it's Point-and-Click.
Quote: "The second question: This is simple. The Nintendo 64 had Mario 64. Can there be a complete remake of that game in AppGameKit Classic. Is it a simple yes/no answer or are there some exceptions to the rule."
You could produce a near 1:1 remake of Mario 64., of course certain techniques such-as Triangular Filtering is a bit of a pain to do in Shaders; and Bilinear Filter (which AppGameKit uses by Default) isn't quite the same.
So, yes.
The thing is should you start to get more Modern / Complex... eh., well that's where you might run into difficulties.
On top of this the Audio System and Controller Support is far from ideal; keep in mind AppGameKit was designed more primarily for Mobile Smart Devices... and not even Modern ones but 1st to 3rd Gen type Devices (not that it runs very well on them).
Quote: "If you answer these questions clearly for me, it can give me a better idea on how much effort can be put into that type of projects. After that, I know that AppGameKit can be used to make royalty free games, so it's just a question as to wether or not a commercial project would be worth it in the long run. Keep in mind I'm not a professional developer, but I'm trying to get into the mindset of such."
I would use AppGameKit for Pet / Hobby / Prototype Projects... something where you're trying to get down the general idea, or you're not too bothered about adding "Professional Polish"
It's great for small projects., small ideas., and just general tinkering.
I mean it's a bit like say learning to Play the Guitar... you might get a budget £50 Guitar off of Amazon., which is fine for plucking away on you own; but if you want to actually play in a Bar or such; let alone have ambitions of actually doing Music Professionally at some point; well you'd end up getting a more expensive and BETTER Guitar once you have that confidence and skill.
AGK is essentially that starter Guitar.
And I'm not saying this to be mean., it's not like AppGameKit couldn't be a much more professional grade product for producing more professional work; being a proper alternative to established Industry Middleware.
AGK has two key issues holding it back... the AppGameKit Script (being a BASIC-like Scripting Engine), which is EXCEPTIONALLY Slow and the fact that TGC can't seem to decide if they want the built-in Functionality to be an API (thus giving you the complete freedom to create an Engine from the ground up, like what Dark BASIC Professional had; which was essentially DirectX 9.0c for BASIC) or if they want it to be an Engine akin to Unity 3D where things are taken care of for you.
Well that, and they've an inconsistency when it come to Feature Support... and their updates seem far more focused on helping people monetise their Mobile Apps than ACTUALLY fix or address underlying issues.
It's a shame., as a Modern Dark BASIC would be the ultimate "Go-To" Tool for Independent Developers looking for more Developer (rather than Designer) approach to Game Development without needing to learn a more complex language like C++ and various APIs to create their own Engine.
Dark BASIC Professional was somewhat ideal as a Rapid Application Development Tool... BASIC as a Language is relative easy to understand and learn., while DirectX 9.0c was a Comprehensive API for Game Development; and converted into something a bit more Streamlined and BASIC Friendly; well it's what made Dark BASIC Professional one of THE most popular Indie Development Tools of it's time.
Then TheGameCreators abandoned it in favour of silly WYSIWYG Development tools like FPS Creator and Game Guru that saw very little success; likely because if you wanted to make an FPS., there was Source or Unreal Engine that were simply more comprehensive and just as straight forward; but with better base assets, graphics, optimisation and features.
And by the time GameGuru was made., well Unity 3D had become more or less what it is today (as opposed to what it started as., which was a Macintosh exclusive development tool inspired by DBP... that's not a joke either, search back through the forum; the original Developer WAS a Member on here and was showcasing Unity 3D during it's early development) ... again it was just BETTER and still is.
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Personally I'd suggest using AppGameKit for Prototyping Ideas., then building them out on C++ with a Custom Engine.
It's great for prototyping and seeing if an idea will work... what need to get tweaked... scrapped... etc. before then committing the time and effort with a more bespoke approach.
