From DmWiki

Java for Games Series articles by Daniel MD et al…

I am starting this series because I want to share my experiences as a game programmer, and because I know that “teaching” is the best way to learn. I chose the wiki format because I want people to contribute or correct any mistakes that I make.

First Draft - Just structuring ideas, I am accepting requests for tutorials

Part 1: Getting the Tools

The first step in learning a craft is to have the right tools, in this episode you learn how to setup your gaming system for free (almost, you will need Windows), using free toolkits, and using open source tools.

Ok, the first step into setting up a development system is to have a clean installation of an operating system, in this series we will be using Windows XP (with SP2), take into attention the amount and quality of software you install into this system (this will be a production machine) so installing beta software, or adding and removing software is not a good practice behavior. Try to keep the machine clean. Try to make it exclusive for programming. If you have a big HDD (Hard Drive) make a partition exclusively for work. Being organized is the first step to being productive.

Now that we have a System setup it is time to get a Platform running, we will use the Java 2 Platform Standard Edition 5.0, under the form of the JDK5.0 Update 4, (http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5.0/download.jsp), this is the latest stable JDK. This platform is also known by the codename “Tiger”, so whenever you read Java and tiger think of JDK5.0.

Note: If you want to learn more about the java platform and its latest implementation known as “Mustang” (https://mustang.dev.java.net/), you may also use the java.net forums for discussion and information about java.

Now that we have a Platform setup, we could simply use notepad and write java programs that way, but that is not a very practical solution and that’s why IDEs were invented, you have many choices in this field, in this series we will use NetBeans (http://www.netbeans.org/downloads/index.html), simply download the stable 4.1 version or one of the 4.2 Q-Builds, and install it.

Alternative Java IDEs: Eclipse.org Jetbrain.com IDEA Borland.com JBuilder JEdit Jext

Now that we have a System, a Platform, and a IDE setup, we have all the Essential components for java development, now lets get specific Components for Game Programming, and all auxiliary task (like Content creation).

Content Creation Tools (tools of the trade)

Most games need graphics, to create graphics we can use a huge amount of applications from 2D to 2.5D to 3D. There are many commercial applications, but there are also some open source alternatives, for instance:

For 2D graphics we have: Gimp ( http://gimp.org/windows/ )

For 3D graphics we have: Gmax ( http://www.autodesk.com/gmax )

TODO: ADD Content Creation Tools - Sound Applications, Editors, etc… TODO: List of APIs - OpenGL, and J2ME games. TODO: Define projects