PHP Game Creation Resourses

[freshrod]

Greetings.

Yeah, I'm one of those guys how is trying to use PHP to create some crazy game. Actually I am really trying to learn PHP, but just copying examples out of books wasn't really forcing me to learn PHP. I was just learning how to copy text well.

So I notice that, while there seem to be several threads and questions relating to game creation, there doesn't seem to be any one section dedicated to this topic. I haven't found one any where else either.

I was wondering if anyone knew of one (or if I was just missing it here somewhere), or wondering if perhaps we could start one?

Thanks for any help.

[.josh]

was there something in particular about game creation you were wanting to discuss? making a game isn't really the same as making something else like say, a guestbook or hit counter or even a message board. programs/scripts like those things have a bunch of features that are pretty standard all across the board, so it's a lot easier to base a discussion group on them. With games, there is no set method. How a game should be is entirely up to you. All anybody can really give you advice on is to tell you to make it challenging but fun and also well balanced.

Perhaps people can give suggestions on HOW to make a game more challenging or more balanced, or maybe come up with a new feature or 2 that ties into the game, but those kind of discussions are more or less dependant on a pre-existing work in progress.

I do agree that I see a fairly steady amount of people come in saying things along the lines of "so i'm making this game and..." but they are usually asking a specific question like "i can't get this query to work" or something. But I also do see questions that are in fact "gameplay mechanics" questions and not actual PHP questions on a fairly regular basis.

I think it would be nice to have a forum that focuses on "gameplay mechanics" questions/tips/advice/discussions but would it really belong on this site? This site focuses on many things but the one element that ties all of the things together is that each section deals with actual coding of a language (or whatever pseudo name you would call each thing like javascript, sql, php, etc...). Gameplay Mechanics is not necessarily a programming topic. We can talk all day long about how different stats on a character should be balanced or what pricing in stores should be based on and not once would we HAVE to bring up the actual coding of it. Now I'm not saying that code wouldn't EVER be brought up, but my point is is that it's not the central element to gameplay mechanics, and therefore might not be an approved forum on this site.

Would be cool though.

The best places I have found for talking about game ideas and what things work or don't work in different types of games etc.. are forums for other games. Are you interested in a "build an army" type of game? Go to the forums for games like darkthrone.com or kingsofchaos.com or mediwar.com Or maybe you like commerce type of games? go to tradewars' forums or some other game based on buying/selling stuff. All day long people post ideas on how they think they can improve some existing game or what seems to be balanced or not balanced in it.


Well that's my 2 cents.

[freshrod]

Wow. Thanks for the in depth post, Crayon Violent. I think you thought more about it than I did. lol.

I guess to be more specific, I was thinking that a lot of the posts had to do with MMO-RPG type games. Kind of like the ones you mentioned. This seems to be a really popular field (maybe toooooo popular) right now, and it actually seems to include many different aspects of making dynamic websites. The fact that they are so popular is what really seemed strange that I don't seem to find any forums or sites dedicated (or even with just a section dedicated) to it.

I just thought that if there was a forum or something specific to that, it would be a great way to collect many different question, and more importantly, similar answers (or even tutorials) in one place.

While I agree that all games are different (well... hmmmm) many of the things about them can be recycled, such as similar codes, functions, queries, and DB structure.

Just a thought.

p.s. I like your picture.

p.s.s. Yeah, there was one thing I'm thinking about now with my own game, but it really isn't a PHP question. It has to do with how to set-up the DB. Not the SQL or anything, but like the best way to arrange it, if that makes sense? For instance, there are users (with their own stored unique info), and the users have characters (with different unique stored info), so should these be 2 separate tables in the DB, or just one big old long one? What would that do to the DB drag.... blah, blah, blah. Questions like that.

[Barand]

[!--quoteo(post=370191:date=May 1 2006, 01:44 AM:name=freshrod)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(freshrod @ May 1 2006, 01:44 AM) [snapback]370191[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
p.s.s. Yeah, there was one thing I'm thinking about now with my own game, but it really isn't a PHP question. It has to do with how to set-up the DB. Not the SQL or anything, but like the best way to arrange it, if that makes sense? For instance, there are users (with their own stored unique info), and the users have characters (with different unique stored info), so should these be 2 separate tables in the DB, or just one big old long one? What would that do to the DB drag.... blah, blah, blah. Questions like that.
[/quote]

Questions like that we can help with.

It depends on the relationship between users and characters. Is it

A ) A user has several charcters. Each character can only have one user.

or

B ) A user has several charcters. A character can have one or more users.


If it is A, you need 2 tables
[code]user              character
----------        --------------
userid     <--->  userid
nickname          characterid
etc               name
                  etc[/code]

If B, you need 3, as above but with intermediate link table
[code]user              user_char              character
----------        --------------         ------------
userid     <--->  userid          +-->   characterid
nickname          characterid  <--+      name
etc                                      etc[/code]

[freshrod]

Thanks Barand,

It was A by the way.

You wouldn't happen to know any good resources where I could find answers to those sorts of questions as they would relate to game creation, would you? Or I guess I can just keep posting here.

Don't get me wrong, I love this site!!! I just didn't know if everyone wanted to hear about my troubles making a game, or if there was a place specifically for that kind of thing.

[SharkBait]

I know other programming forums I belong to have Game Programming section, but they seem to be more for the 'My Game isnt working... this code seems to break it, how do I fix it'.

I too had questions about game mechanics and Crayon Violet was more than kind enough to add her thoughts etc about it.

I have seen some 'Game Mechanic' forums in the past, but I can't remember where they are located anymore.

*shrug*