Random Ideas

I’ve once again decided to begin work on developing a game engine for Sword Fantasy. I’ve decided to start with Haaf’s Game Engine, and hopefully I’ll have some rudimentary version of the game engine running. The goal is to finish the game engine before moving on to Sword Fantasy.

My goals:

1. Implement a working collision detection engine, either by using an existing one or writing my own.

2. Work on loading screens, menus, narration, message boxes, inventory screens and so on.

3. Obviously, implement some text file parser into the engine for maps, scripts, AI behaviour and savegames.

4. Implement a savegame system. (This will probably more of a between areas kind of thing since I intend for Sword Fantasy to be linear in fashion. I’m not fond of backtracking through a game.) This aims to eventually have a flag system so that if you want to backtrack, you can, although the game will have a mission selector.

5. Implement a physics engine. This is the tricky one. I know there are good ones out there - I am currently looking at Box2D and Chipmunk. I think I lack the skill to implement one - and since it’s unimportant or more of a luxury, I’ll probably skip this goal if it means I’ll actually finish the engine. I know that having one of these will eventually afford me fun puzzles, great graphics and awesome tools with which to build fun levels. However, if it will cost me too much time and effort to implement one, I’ll stick with lame math.

6. Make a rudimentary game. Obviously, making the engine doesn’t equal making a game - and since I don’t have the confidence to pull Sword Fantasy off yet, I’ll be making a simpler similar game to test and demo my final completed merged engine.

As for development timeline:

End of September 2008: Swords + Sticks with rudimentary menu, loading process and exactly one level.

End of December 2008: Swords + Sticks with menus and options (hopefully with gamepad support - since it is meant for gamepads, although the control scheme will work well with keyboards - mice support will come eventually and hopefully the game will scale well to more than one resolution, so some rudimentary error prone option will be around I guess) that save OR inventory, save game system and (hopefully) a repertoire of five levels

I don’t expect to finish anything.

A week ago, I followed Shockrave on his quest for a new printer. He settled for a brother HL2140 from Officeworks - which I think is a decent laser printer. On the other hand, something else caught my eye:

The Energizer USB battery charger. It’s no secret I’m a big fan of Energizer USB rechargable batteries, I have over 16 of them littered all over my apartment in many many devices. It’s a nifty little device that charges battery via USB, and it even works with those USB adapters you may have laying about. While to most people this may not be a big deal, to me it is - when I travel, carrying one USB AC adapter and several USB cables saves a lot of space. (I chose the green coloured one simply because that felt like the most “Energizer Rechargable” brand oriented.)

The cable coils nicely around the device and the USB plug tucks in neatly into a slot built into the charger. Some of you may not value this simple aesthetic yet functional design, but I do.

Fully uncoiled, it looks like this:

Like other Energizer chargers, it supports charging AA and AAA batteries (it actually comes with two 900mAh AAA batteries.

The AAA batteries charge using the familiar fold down piece.

Curious about what it looks like inside underneath the batteries?

This charger can charge just one battery. (Handy for those who use rechargeable in mice like the VX Revolution  that only use one battery.)

Once you’ve loaded the batteries, and closed the cover:

Then, download their software, plug it into the computer and:

(The timer did correct itself to 4 hours after a while. Not sure why it went down all the way to 9 hours 14 minutes.)

I’m not going to lie, it was an impulse buy, and serves little purpose to me now. That being said, if I need to charge only two batteries, this is a lot more convenient than the slightly bulkier travel charger I bring around. It serves its purpose, and like most Energizer chargers, the batteries don’t get as hot as some other chargers do - and if you like having a small USB device that can charge batteries lying somewhere in your room near your computer - don’t hesistate to pick one of these up.

It’s been so long since I last wrote a program that did more than just trivial things. I wonder how awful my programming actually is.

1. The keyboard is mightier than the mouse.

- There is a reason why the keyboard came before the mouse. This is among them. There are plenty of shortcuts involving the keyboard. The main reason they are called shortcuts is because it saves you the trouble of moving the mouse to access them. There are things at which the mouse is better, but in many cases, mastery of the keyboard will lead to a most comfortable computing experience.

2. Have the emergency key shortcuts at your disposal.

- All operating systems usually have a shortcut to save the operating system from crashing completely in the case of some awful program or some terrrible execution somewhere. In Windows, this is usually the ever popular Control+Alt+Delete. In Mac OS X, it’s usually Command(Apple)+Option+Esc. In Linux, I think most desktops use Control+Escape.

3. Computers can fail, and probably eventually will.

- Computers have a lifespan of about 5 years before becoming impossibly obsolete to some people. I myself have survived with a computer for a number far surpassing that, and I have no intention to ever let it happen again. That computer didn’t fail during my active usage, but it soon did after about a year or two after I finally got an up-to-date computer.

4. Since computers will fail, backup often.

- The part with the longest warranty after RAM is probably either your processor or your hard drive. Chances are however that your hard drive will fail eventually after the warranty period. I have not seen a hard drive last more than 10 years in my home, and many have failed within the warranty period itself. I carry out a pretty thorough backup regime, although it has become patchy with the advent of more reliable hard drives. There is now about three copies of each of my university work and notes which are stored electronically, all up-to-date. It will not be long before I make a fourth into a piece of significantly more reliable storage media.

5. The essentials of computing: monitor, keyboard, mouse, Internet.

- Every basic computer should have a monitor, keyboard and a mouse. Internet access isn’t vital yet, but without it, your computer’s potential is wasted. Heck, even my PSP can get Internet access. It is not vital, but if you have it, the whole world is there.