From: sl859@cc.usu.edu
Newsgroups: rec.games.programmer
Subject: IBM Based Freakouts not Justified.
Date: 12 Aug 92 10:56:57 MDT
Organization: Utah State University

I, wReam, has to jump into the action...

> Well, I for one have been postponing the actual gaming routines in my game
> for about two years now, as they REALLY are much harder to code than the
> low-level graphics, movement, rotation etc. routines. I am talking about
> the artificial intelligence routines of the enemy ships, the goal of my
> game, etc. I am having big problems in coding the routines to handle these
> things,

	Have you posted any questions regarding this subject, after all
that is the purpose of this forum.  I really don't see how your point can
be justified.  Perhaps you have mastered all these routines for your games,
but in reality, many people are still learning.   Please post your questions
on building artificially intelligent computer players.  Give some specifics
I am interested in this.  We (Josh and some others) were building a game
to have a computer player, and eventually scrapped that entire aspect, because
it seemed so difficult, at the time.  Since then I have encountered a few 
"classic techniques" and have had some ideas on how to handle this.  We have 
some ideas from playing StarControl on the Amiga, but have not implemented 
them yet.  (Another Josh is doing that.)  I would be interested in hearing 
some discussion on the different view points.  
        I must say to those who dispute the question of whether it is 
apropriate to post messages in rec.games.programmers regarding IBM based
concepts, "yes it is!"  While some may be down on Josh for posting IBM 
questions, but I can say they are all directly applicable to games.  We
are now in the process of working on a game, that we will probably port to
the Amiga, but the base machine we are working with is the IBM.  
	The fact is that many of these concepts discussed are strictly used 
in gaming and there really not any groups outside of this one that apply.  
Perhaps if this is such a problem a new grout could be formed called 
rec.games.programmer.ibm  and we could branch off from that.  It may seem 
like a stupid idea, but that's usually how things work when a news group
gets too big for its britches.  
	I really don't think that its going to make a difference whether
you complain or not, because this newsgroup gets to people interested in 
things that know what they are talking about.  It has provided some very
interesting discussions on things about all machine systems.  There were 
some on strictly Atari, and Nintendo some time ago, which were pretty 
machine specific, and I found them interesting to read.  No one is 
forbidding people to post messages, and whether people respond to those 
messages or not is really what determines what this news group is about.  If
I want to know something desperately, I usually ask in a couple places, but I 
have had the best luck with people in this group.  Even though games programmers
can be inflamatory, they are also the most brilliant I have encountered, 
because they do this sort of thing for fun, in their spare time, perhaps
and I would prefer talking to them than some professor who has no clue what
his own machine can do.
    	Thankyou VERY VERY much to all those programmers that take time
to respond to the different messages, no matter how machine dependant they
are.  I really feel that this group has room enough for EVERYONE and that
these tizzyfits over one machine type will pass.  KEEP POSTING YOUR 
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS, NO MATTER WHAT OTHERS MAY SAY...  I appreciate the
pointers and this group is one of my favorites (next to the rec.arts.comics...)
(Heh, which covers a much different type of subject!)  
						
							wReam...

P.S.  Game Programmers REALLY do it better! :)





Newsgroups: rec.games.programmer