Programming a simple game... how?

esuhl

I've got a great idea for a simple, educational computer game that I'd like to create.

I'm under no illusions that it'll be my ticket to millions of pounds (or even a sparkling penny) -- I just want to create a demo for my niece and nephew to play. Just for fun, I'd like to eventually make it available (probably free) for others to play.

It would be a simple grid-based game (think half Pac-Man, half Minesweeper); nothing fancy. A fixed background, a character that moves on a grid; that's it, as far as graphics are concerned.

I'm not sure whether it would work on a smartphone... The screen is too small for little fingers and young kids don't have phones. But it would work on a tablet or PC.

About 20 years ago, I would write programs in various languages (Pascal, BASIC, VB, etc.)... and since then I've written some pretty complex Visual Basic and VBA code. I'm sure I won't have any problems converting my idea into pseudo-code.

But I'm very out-of-touch with modern programming and getting my head round the crazy IDEs and "object models" just to type a simple old-skool program is a real headache...

So... What programming language would you guys recommend? Where should I start in making my idea a reality? Android or PC? Both? What language? What IDE? Help!

Sooler

Try this ...

Java - Snapcode
http://www.reportmill.com/snap/

SnapCode Interactive Exercises
http://reportmill.wordpress.com/2014/10/24/snapcode-interactive-exercises/

Teach Sparky to Fetch
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gQ3wbQ1oKQ

System

Hi

Slightly askew here.

http://www.raspberrypi.org/learning/getting-started-with-minecraft-pi/

http://www.raspberrypi.org/learning/getting-started-with-minecraft-pi/worksheet.md

Minecraft is a popular sandbox open world-building game. A free version of Minecraft is available for the Raspberry Pi; it also comes with a programming interface. This means you can write commands and scripts in Python code to build things in the game automatically. It's a great way to learn Python!

Requirements

Hardware

This resource requires no additional hardware besides a Raspberry Pi with a Raspbian SD card.
Software

Minecraft has been installed by default in Raspbian since September 2014.
If you do not have it installed, or you need to test it works, see the software installation page.


They can program / personalise their own little world, and of course it is part of some schools coursework.


You would be helping them with their homework.
#############################################





As well as finding out your current location you can specify a particular location to teleport to.
x, y, z = mc.player.getPos() mc.player.setPos(x, y+100, z) This will transport your player to 100 spaces in the air. This will mean you'll teleport to the middle of the sky and fall straight back down to where you started. Try teleporting to somewhere else!

Jivesinger

There was a recent initiative called 'Hour of Code'; the idea being to teach folks about programming by spending an hour trying to code something.

While I suspect your game might take more than an hour to put together (it would certainly take me more than an hour) some of the tools around that initiative might be the sort of level you're looking for, if the object is to 'show your working' to your niece and nephew?

So for example these might be useful:
http://code.org/learn
http://www.microsoft.com/about/corporatecitizenship/en-us/youthspark/youthsparkhub/hourofcode/

baxie

Sounds like an ideal project for Scratch. http://scratch.mit.edu/

andydiysaver

agreed on scratch - and if not such is the number of languages/add ons/bolt ons you just bolt on what you're not interested in programming in and find a language to program in the bits you want to see if you can do manually


that newton quote on seeing further because of standing on the shoulders of giants is very applicable here -you can get your hard core Cambridge first class gaming progammers, and what they'll do is hard code in a lot more than the rest of us but even they're building on platforms already built - its all about relative motion

paddyrg

Also worth a look is livecode - very naturalistic language with games tutorials and is free.