Confessions of a Would-be Programmer An article by Graham Raven Okay, wouldn't we all just love to be able to casually say at parties "Actually, I'm a computer programmer in my spare time"? Everyone knows you need a brain the size of Southampton to be able to do that! However, reluctantly, I have to admit it, I'm not! I do have high aspirations of one day reaching the heady title of 'novice', but until then I'll dream on, and plan of course! Now for most people these few facts would tend to put a brake on any heart-felt ambitions they might have to make their own computer game, in this case, an RPG. However, I'm something of a fanatic when it comes to RPGs and I'm not going to let some trivial difficulty such as 'Doing the Impossible', interfere with my plans. My first long term RPG was an American game called Mordor. It allegedly had some 200 or so hours of game play in it, and I played the game for three years. It seems that I can get rather more out of these games than even the programmers originally intended. Maybe it's the chance to express various different sides to my character, or 'personalities' in a magical world, and me being me, why create one alter ego to be 'you' in a new world, when you can create a dozen, plus another twenty as support characters, not to mention the 'extras and incidentals'? Having eventually played Mordor to death, I immediately set about planning my own RPG. I cheerfully ignored the programming issue, I'd cross that bridge when I came to it, and dived into research and development, and I must add, I was enjoying every minute of it. Some two and a half years later there had flowed many tens of thousands of words concerning every aspect of my proposed game imaginable. Conversations which the 200 plus NPCs could have with the player, 'life programs' which would detail the possible variations for each NPC's lifetime, the world's history of course, the scores of books which would rest in the libraries and bookshops and naturally enough the gossip and news, randomly chosen (how else?), which would be talked about by everyone and read in the broadsheets which come out every fortnight. Above everything I wanted the characters to come to life in this world, and I wanted the ability to talk sensibly with them (or as sensibly as could be achieved) Hmm, this game was rapidly becoming a 'world', and I must say that I liked the idea very much. I also ignored the fact that a team of professional programmers had taken two years to make Mordor, and I was supposedly going to improve on their game no end! All the while, of course, I continued to play any RPGs that I could lay my hands on. Do I play other computer games? ie Non- RPGs? Not if I can help it! It's research you understand (nothing to do with compulsion at all, honest!). I play an RPG and try to pick out which elements I find enjoyable, playable, convincing, silly and those which offend my sensibilities etc, and aim to add the good bits to my own game. Of late I've been 'investigating' The Fates of Twinion, which I started out initially disliking for various reasons. This type of game however, has the same hypnotic powers of a TV set, which despite the fact that you hate football, still silently draws your attention until you find yourself gazing steadfastly at the game. So at present I find myself as a level 12 chaotic barbarian, just for experimental purposes of course. Being 'God' of this world, I can potentially have anything in my world that I wish, this world will be 'perfect' (fingers crossed!). Death and dying will neither be encouraged nor trivial in this world. I've long thought it rather too easy in most RPGs to do something stupid, say get burnt to ashes by a dragon and then be resurrected as good as new. Hmm, I also decided NOT to have a SAVE game function; if the player does something dumb, then they suffer the consequences! Should you wish to spend an evening with a male or female character of negotiable virtue, then that is your choice (though, there will be few graphics of such activities!) and fate will decide on whether you are merely robbed blind, or possibly catch something nasty to boot! It was however, becoming increasingly bothering to me that regardless of all the planning, the game was no nearer manifesting on my heard drive. I looked at various game creation programs but none of them have the flexibility I demanded. My game needs its own custom conversation program at its core, even the graphics will take second place to that. I've dabbled with Dark Basic which I must say, is an excellent language with all manner of built in features to help the programmer achieve an almost state of the art game. The only problem with Dark Basic is, if anything, it's too good! It has all sorts of features that simplify the programming of 3-D graphics for example, but regrettably it can't handle 2-D so well, and I want 2-D! Hmm, "I WANT!" I like the sound of that! Version three or four of my game may well go for full 3-D, together with the ability for the player to get married and settle down and start a family, assuming I can get my head around how to program all that, which is unlikely! Meanwhile, I've been forced to come back to Visual Basic, the language that I have always felt in the back of my mind, was the real language for my project. I have long had a love/hate relations ship with Visual Basic, the 'hate' part being almost entirely concerned with the jargon Microsoft use to 'explain' it to the user. A friend did recommend that I ignore the manual completely and simply thrown myself into the language and try to rely on the help file when I got stuck, and I have to say that I have managed to make a little progress in this manner. Many frustrating 'dead ends' have happened as well of course, often resulting in utter despair that I'd ever make any progress at all. At one point I downloaded an old demo version of The Elder Scrolls from the net, and my wife said "Oh that's nice dear, now you don't have to bother with that game you've been trying to make for years" (!) Thankfully my son (Mike) who's an IT freak, encouraged, insisted and bullied me into not giving up and eventually a small but real break through was achieved when I realised that I could write pseudo code that bore a vague resemblance to the working program I needed. I remember my first dreadfully simple map editor that I made some three months ago. I was overjoyed when it actually worked! I still have a very long way to go and to be honest, if I knew how to make a text only game I'd probably jump at that option. Yes, I've looked briefly at TADS and it looks utterly incomprehensible to me! (at least I've got the vaguest idea about VB!) I also need to 'create' some 200 plus images of NPCs, not to mention the scenic views, and I haven't the faintest idea about how to set about this. Undeterred, I still believe that I'll find a way when I get to that part of the job. The project continues, and to my heart's delight, Mike is now doing programming at college! Apparently he's still at the beginner's stage as yet and programming databases is a long way off. I live in hope! It wouldn't surprise me if my game takes ten years to make, and I'm equally sure that I'll be playing it for just as long once it is up and running. Of course, I shall be endlessly modifying and improving the game once it does work. I think I've got a hobby for life! PS Anyone who's mildly brilliant at programming databases and who'd like to show off just how good they are invited to get in touch, or anyone who's interested in collaborating on a game project. You can find me at - http://grahamatraven.cjb.net Email graham_at_raven@yahoo.co.uk - o -