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Hey All,
I was browsing the shelves at Futureshop and came across a VideoGame Programmer's Starter Kit. It's promise was to be simpler then other vg kits because it doesn't use C or C+ programming, but instead, darkBASIC.
My question is, what is it? A dumbdown of Basic? A mutation of Basic (kinda like Linux's multi flavours)
Hey i heard of it. I think it's supposed to be a new programming language that is better to make high quality games. Try googling it to find more.
>Hope that helps.
although i could be wrong i believe its a varient of x-basic
its actually pretty fun...
i wouldn't ever even consider it HIGH QUALITY, like it claims to be, but its a happy medium.
basically, it uses the BASIC language, and allows you to have access to the directX api via friendly little functions they give you. its pretty fun to make little network games....
goto www.darkbasic.com or www.darkbasicpro.com
have fun
slick_shoes
Yeah.. It's kinda like DIV gamestudio on ACID..
it's a cool way to make 3D game programming easier....
But the_JinX sticks to his C/C++ there's no money in basic ;)
Great question. I've actually haven't been on AO for awhile because I've been playing around with DarkBASIC, and it's big brother DarkBASIC Pro. :bigsmile: I agree to some extent with slick_shoes about it not been as "High Quality" as some of their advertising reads. The language still has some bugs in it that are somewhat annoying, and their documentation is extremely light. It's kinda difficult to learn the language without diving into the DB forums asking questions. It's a fun language, though. I've always wanted to write my own video games, and now I am. C/C++ will always be the professional's language of choice, but as a one man show I'm not trying to compete with Quake III and MOHAA. I'm no good at writing my own music or creating my own high-quality 3D models. But I am getting to use all the texture-making tools I used to use when I was making my own levels for Half-Life and Counter-Strike.
The original DarkBASIC is a true basic implementation which means it's just an interpreter. Things will naturally run a bit slow (although not as much as you'd think), and your end product will usually demand some stiff requirements. DarkBASIC Professional is an interesting caveat for BASIC languages -- it's actually a compiled language. The end result is SPEEDY SPEEDY SPEEDY. If you'd like to see some of the capabilities of the language, I've listed a few demos that should give you an idea of what each version of the language can do:
DarkBASIC (Classic) Examples:
Limit Rush - a fun little hovercraft game.
Virtual Insanity - an extremely professional looking puzzle game
Star Wraith 3 - one of the DarkBASIC creations to get picked up professionally. This one's on some magazine cover cd's.
DarkBASIC Professional Examples:
The Lab - a wonderful demo of some of DBPro's main features (particles, model manipulation, and translucent texturing)
Shadow of the Beast - a neat little demonstration showing how parallax side-scrollers can be done.
Road Terrain - a good example of DBPro's SPEED.
I'm currently working on re-writing the manual for my own use which I will release in a few months (the language has 1050 commands, so it will take awhile :) ). Please let me know if you would like any more information.
Oh, and there is one thing that SUCKS about DarkBASIC. Due to it's need for DirectX, you MUST use Windows. No way around it. Even wine-x can't help you there. This really sucks because I've got a 45 Gig partition for linux on my box and only 15 for windows, but I've been spending all my time in windows lately. Ug. Someone out there want to write DarkPERL for linux/openGL? :bigsmile:
As soon as you find DarkPERL or DarkPYTHON or something, get me the URL ;)
And I must say those demo's rock (my girlfirends box)!!
Yeah. DarkBASIC is really starting to mature a bit as a language, and it's got a good following. They just released a new patch for DarkBASIC Pro which should even speed things up tremendously!
What's the pricetag for such a new thing?
Is there a way I could get it for free off the darkbasic.com site (not pirated - gnu like)
The site itself, darkbasic.com, has a few tutorials for this programming language as well as demo's, forums and whatnot. So if not free, why not? Like Python..
I noticed that it only has a "trial" version on their site. Guessing it's a 15 or 30 day trial period before it locks out. (which sucks since most of us haven't played enough to want it badly by 30 days...)
It's cool but a bummer. Why can't it be like Linux? Download the software free, pay for it on a CD with a Manual/Book and extras?
Unfortunately, the demo is only a 30 day trial -- for either DB Classic or DB Pro. I wish it could be open-source too, but that is sadly not the case. I know that they have stopped development of DB Classic, so maybe they would release that version in the future and only charge for Pro, but there is no plan to do that now. Sorry.
Perhaps the idea behind it is that if you make something good enough, you may be able to sell it for money. Digital entertainment is becoming BIG BUSINESS. Many people working with DarkBASIC offer their creations as shareware, or sometimes they will charge for additional levels. With DarkBASIC Pro, you can now also make standard Windows applications -- much like Visual BASIC. Most professional programming environments where you could potentially sell your creations for profit are sold for money and are not released for free (with at least 1 obvious exception...Python). DarkBASIC is sold with the agreement that any creation you make with DarkBASIC or DarkBASIC Pro you may sell for profit. Don't get too excited yet, though. It takes a lot of work to create something worth selling. We're talking music, artwork, 3D models, textures, sounds, and finally code. If you're really into game design, though, this is a great way to get an introduction into the process of game development.
Good idea, but the box I was reading said "Great to produce no distribute your own video game" It may only apply to that software bundle (if I could remember which)?
Does your copy of DarkBASIC have an installer (compiler) like option to put everything together for remote installation?
I found this at the 3D GameMaker's site's FAQ: Link
&Quote:
Question: Can I sell the games I make with The 3D Gamemaker?
Answer: To sell your games you will need to buy a commercial use licence. The reason for charging is because The graphic elements, sounds and musics that make up The 3D Gamemaker (including the game logic itself) are (c) Dark Basic Software. If you are selling just one boxed or DVD product then you just need the single use license ($99). If you want to make many products then you need to buy the unlimted use license ($500). Links to these licenses can be found on the BUY pages of this web site.
Quote:
Question: After a game in 3d gamemaker has been created, is it possible to sell it on? Who owns the copyright? Can they be imported to playstation, etc?
Answer: It is possible to sell what you make with The 3D Gamemaker, however you will need to obtain a commercial license to do so. The reason for this is to protect the copyright of hundreds of media assets contained on the CD which adds up to many thousands of pounds in models, sounds and music. Copyright of all media assets are owned by Dark Basic Software Ltd. There are no plans to allow The 3D Gamemaker games to be exported to the playstation, not least for the technical and legal difficulties end users would suffer in attempting such a port.
The commercial license is for the 3d Gamemaker only. DarkBASIC comes with a basic set of royalty-free textures, sounds, music, and models, but none of them are very special. The great thing about DB Classic and DBPro is that you can create or purchase your own textures, sounds, music and models for use in your game.
No version of DarkBASIC comes with any kind of installer-builder program to package your software into a distributable form. Both DB Classic and DBPro, however, have the ability to include all your media within 1 executable file. Your game would then be 1 file that can run anywhere. If you write your game to include several additional files and a directory structure, you could easily use WinZip or ZipCentral (freeware) to create your own executable zip file as a very simple installer if you wish. There are also shareware installer-builder programs out there as well.
Oh, and the current price for DarkBASIC Classic is: $39.99 (electronic download), or $49.99 (box set w/manual).
The current price for DarkBASIC Professional is $99.99.
So the core unit itself (darkBasic shell) is free to compose and distribute, so long as you don't use any of the media files? Or isn't the DB also covered by copyright and yang yang?
DarkBASIC is definitely a commercial product in every way. No part of it is free. In fact the cheapest version of DarkBASIC is DarkBASIC Lite which is $14.99. However, this version won't even let you create stand-alone executables (those that contain all the media for your program within the .EXE) -- you have to include all your media along with the runtime executable. Sorry.
If you're interested in DarkBASIC, I would recommend picking up the Lite version of it, and then upgrading to Pro if you find you're really enjoying yourself.
I have seen a ad of DarkBASIC on www.php-nuke.org