Recently in my programing course at uni (computer science 1B) we have been looking at manipulating input and output streams and how to save direct copies of object data to files via serialization. So to save my game state i first made all objects implement the serializable interface.  which allows them to be writen to a file directly rather than converting information about the object to the primitive data types and then having to convert back the the object manually. So using object output and input streams I am now able to save the state of my game. I’ve also written a nice series of statements that allows me to specify file names and whether or not to overwrite a file if it already exists etc thought i do need exception handling stuff yet. To allow for things like FileNotFound exceptions n stuf…. XD

But in any case, my next step is to now produce a data writer which will allow me to save specific knind of objects and entities rather than implementing things like walls etc in the main core of the program i’d create them and save as data files… and reload when required. Ugh thats it for tonight i just walked away for two hours and now am pretty tired.

Till next time
Rikhter the forever Knight

This is Rik back again finally getting around to posting again. THe program has undergone lots of changes and right currently im in the middle of re-writeing stuff but i’ll start from where i last left off.

Now during my experimentation with thread i was harshly interupted by exams which i did quite well on as i mite add… 2 High Distictions and 2 DIstiction hehehe. But anyways and after that i went home for the holidays and started talking to my dad a bit more about my game design. In this temporary alliance we hunted and slew a few problems, only to realise that they were simply heads of a hydra and propmtly sprouted several more heads.

The first sort of issues was really only a semantic one but still needed fixing to make my system practical. I had my co-ordinate system in my 2D arrays int the order y, x which mathematically speaking is backwards and confusing. SO… I changed that thou the blow was only half hearted and thats what stuffed me around.

So here i am again re-writing the code from scratch, but i have made many additional improvemenst and im up to the same point at where i ot stuffed around last time so, I think im set.

Hopefully re-implementing my threads (lol almost called them strings) will end better than the last attmept which caused stupid things to happen :S.

Till next time…
Rikhter

Threads allow multiple units of code to be executed simultaneously. The main method that is executed when a java program is being run is a form of thread. It’s from within this thread that “child” threads are executed. A child thread being blocks of code similar to that of the main thread.

Though this is an awesome thing it doesn’t solve my imeadiate problem. Since last time i have re-written the feild class so that it contains a 2D array of arraylists so i can “add” and “remove” devices and devicers without destroying any previous reference to what is in that position. (Note: print field method now prints the symbol corresponding to the device in the first position of the ArrayList.) After doing this I decided i would attempt to also re-write the the code that changes the postion of the character by pressing the arrow keys.

Initailly i was using some borrowed code from an example in one of my lectures to do this but i had to produce a small frame that wasn;t being used. So i looked up the required KeyListener interface and the KeyEvent class. And tried to implement them in a comand line program. Unfortunately I don’t know how to prevent the program from exiting so that it will wait to accept input from the user. I have already prepared the end to be my kill switch i just need the required code…

good night all…

Edit: 3/6/09

Hey I’m back! Refreshed after a goodnight’s sleep. Now last night I added some basic functionallity, its now possible to move the main character around though i still need to adress collisions and other problems that i’ve generated. By creating a new class called PC(player character) that extends the devicer class and adding fields so that it tracks what location its at. Now using the key listener interface and classes i can now esentialy move the character on the field. I now have to adress the issue of spaces in the field being occupied and prevent the character from moving …. also getting it to recognise the edge of the field thought this shouldn’t be a problem.

I now need to keep adding more features. until i get tot he point where i want better representation. At the moment the game will be turn based making this real time would be silly the player wouldn’t be able to react properly. So for now just keeping things simple i’ll work on collisions and devicer – device interactions next.

Till next time.

Rikhter.

Back from writing my code and there is epic success! That’s the first time in a while I’ve wrote a block of code and not had a gazillion errors XD, anyways I have changed my structure a bit. The field was initially going to be my main driver class that tests everything but it occurred to me that its better these two things are separate. So in the field class I have created an instance field which is an array that takes device objects.

Initially I had an array of String objects so that this array could be printed out directly but, in doing that i think functionality is lost. You can only refer to the ident string that’s been placed in the array this way u can access the entire device object thru that particular position in the array. Though now a problem springs to mind what if you want two devices to occupy the same space? lol. It becomes complicated now XD and we have a an array of arrays of array lists which contain devices and devicers, ha-ha XD. More thought to this later.

I just realised I haven’t mentioned that the Devicer class has been turned into a subclass of the device class. This way I can place both Devicer and Device objects into the field. At the moment I haven’t defined any additional fields or methods for the devicer class yet so this may only work now due to its present state hopefully it will continue to work or I may have a problem.

This is so awesome, I see this becoming massively complicated quite quickly. I’m just gonna move one step at a time though try not to get ahdead of myself to quickly.

And for my next step adding some basic functionality, for what is a game if u can’t control some entity of the world it creates .

To do this I’ve set of my field as a two dimensional array in java, essentially a matrix. And by “placing” devices and devicers into the array and calling their ident. Which is a character that represents what is positioned in that location and printing these as text on the screen.

Right time to go write some code

Device:  A real world (RW) object/thing that is inanimate has no conscious thought or will but has “purpose”.

An simple example might be a chair, it has some form of existence and a purpose. To be sat on… ehehe…. Now although this term Device, covers all things that are without consciousness, what about humans or animals? These I call the Devicers.

Devicer: A conscious object or thing that moves and manipulates the world around itself, in my theology I think that a consciousness can be called a “will”. A force that acts on that which is within its reach.

So we have Devicers and Devices. Where Devicers interact with Devices to achieve some goal as the will desires. But what is interaction exactly?

Action: An action that is applied to a Device by a Devicer, some way for a Devicer to reach out and act upon that which is within its reach.

So now we have three basic concepts that allow us to shape and manipulate a world.
DEVICER - DEVICE - ACTION

I am currently learning Java. Java is an OOP (object oriented programming) language and so these above three concepts will be the main class types in my program. Thought without a defined area to exist in these things are quite almost meaningless there would be no way to filter between which object is at which location, etc. So I will also implement another class called field. Which will be the area within which Devicers and Devices can be controlled.

TEM (The Esper Melodies) is the beginning of something I hope will one day be something that is massively used that gives its users such awe and wonder as I have come find in my many sources of inspiration. TEM will be my ongoing personal project and my ultimate goal is to see it fully functioning as my ideal MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game).

All comments, and questions are welcomed and I will try answer and respond to all. I love the criticism!
(Remembering that I’m completely new to what I’m doing , so please be nice XD)

<insert cool signature sign off here>
Rikhter