Josh, I'm not quite sure how to say this without offending you, but the fact of the matter is you really have to learn a lot of this by studying it firsthand. You can't always depend on some sort of wizard, script helper, or a list of formulas because programming software just does not work that way. There is a lot more to a program than code. There is the issue of programming theory, experience, and logic involved in putting any kind of program together.
For example, let's say you want a very basic artificial intelligence system for your game using fuzzy logic. So you click on some wizard that creates a very basic template using some sample fuzzy logic code. Now, if you don't know both the theory and techniques for fuzzy logic how are you going to modify that code to suit your particular game? Well, the truth of the matter is you can't. You'll have to go out and spend some time and money on reading a book or two on both the theory and techniques for fuzzy logic before you will understand the sample code. Just handing the code to you isn't going to explain to you how it works and how it should be properly modified to meet your needs. That is imho the problem with automated systems. They still assume you know and understand what you are doing in the first place and that you have enough skill to actually modify the templates to fulfill your needs. The same goes for math formulas. A formula is just a method for figuring out some unknown value or values. You still have to know how the formula works. Otherwise if you don't you might unintentionally use it incorrectly causing runtime errors in your code. So just handing you a list of formulas isn't necessarily the answer you want. Knowing how to actually work the formulas firsthand will go along way to programming error free code. To quote an old favorite "there is no such thing as a free lunch." Programming is like that too. Nothing worth while is free or automated. Having a firm understanding of how the code works is your best chance at writing stable code. Not knowing how the code works will lead you into errors, problems, and misery. So staying away from automated systems until you know the language well is a good idea. To give you an example of what I mean Microsoft Visual Basic .NET has a number of automated wizards, templates, that allows a developer to create a project rapidly. So let's assume i open VB .NET click on a Form wizard and create a simple dialog box. I use the form editor to set the size of the window, to set the window title, etc. Then, I open up the toolbox and drag a label to the center of the screen and add "Hello World!" to the caption. Finally, I drag and drop a button from the toolbox, name it Close, and then press f7 to open the editor. In the close button clicked event I add Close() to the event. I save my code and compile the project. Voila, At this point I have created a very basic Windows application, but what have I learned about the Visual Basic language itself? Truthfully, I haven't learned a thing. I let Visual Basic .NET do all the work of creating the dialog box, creating the lable, and even the Close button. The only code I added was the Close() method to close the app. Otherwise the IDE did everything for me. If I just want to save time automated wizards like that can be a great time saver, but if I am a student trying to actually learn how a VB .NET form works or how to create my own Windows forms manually I haven't learned a thing. I still wouldn't know anything more than when I started. That's precisely why I would be against any kind of script helper, script wizard, etc because you have to know how this stuff works to really use it effectively anyway. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
