I need to know more about Game development please

[Beny]

Hello,

 

I am a PHP programmer with knowledge of Javascript. I have never developed a game in my life and this is new to me.

I understand that Babylon.js is a frame with functions that help you create effects and other cool things but the part I am not understanding is the design part.

1)let's say I need to have little soldiers running on the field with castles, how to design them? Is there an open source software out there that help you design these sprites as I would really struggle making them in Photoshop.

2)On which device a game made with Babylon.js can run on?

3)Is there a way to create multiplayer games with score board or is Babylon limited?

4)Compared to an engine like Unity, can Babylon create games as good?

 

Thank you so much!

[inteja]

@Beny welcome to the community!

1) Blender is popular, free, open-source and cross-platform software for creating 3D models and animations that can be imported into Babylon.js. It takes some learning and there's no getting around that but there are lots of great resources online to learn. For 2D "pixel art" sprites you can use Photoshop or The GIMP or Krita but Babylon.js is more of a 3D engine than a 2D engine although it does have support for 2D sprites.

2) Any device or web browser that supports javascript and WebGL ... see Can I Use WebGL but performance will vary depending on the complexity of your game and the hardware that it's running on.

3) Babylon.js is a 3D engine and doesn't explicitly handle things like multiplayer or game logic - you need to handle that stuff yourself and there's many options depending on your game's genre and desired gameplay etc. See Colyseus for one multiplayer option that works nicely with Bablylon.js

4) Unity and Babylon.js are both good but are satisfying different niches IMO - Babylon.js excels at web-based 3D games and applications and because it's written in typescript/javascript it means you can seamlessly integrate with the plethora of other web-based frameworks and technologies that are out there e.g. Node.js, React, Angular, jQuery, HTML, CSS etc. If you're wanting to create standalone executables for PC, Mac and consoles then Unity might be a better choice although you can package up web applications like Babylon.js games for console also if you need to. For example, I'm working on a SaaS application that integrates Drupal CMS (PHP, MySQL), Babylon.js and Colyseus.js/Node.js - this would be much harder to do in Unity. In fact I wouldn't even attempt this in Unity.

If you're new to this, regardless of the engine you choose, it's best to start off really small (think tic tac toe rather than MMO) and use placeholder or free assets while you're learning.

[Wolfsbane]

Hi @Beny ,

If this is absolutely your first dive into making a game, I'd actually recommend maybe reading a book like Game Programming Patterns. ( The web version is completely free). It'll give you a better idea of the typical game life cycle, and you can adapt your PHP skills to design better for a game. The book is language agnostic.. so you can use the knowledge with any language.

I know it's nothing to do with javascript, or babylon,js, or creating graphics.. but I'd definitely recommend reading this as one of your baby-steps towards your first game!

 

[Beny]

Thank you so much for both taking the time to reply to my query, I really appreciate.

I have noted all the information you have passed onto me and will check the "Game Programming patterns" which I believe will be a kind of OOP(which I already know with Laravel), and also check on Blender. I have used Gimp in the past but preferred Photoshop.

What I will be looking at creating with my daughter, for now, is a 2d game as it is a bit of a personal dream. I am also a composer so creating war music and game FX will not be a problem ?

 

Regarding multiplayer technologies, I read on it last night and it looks like WebSocket together with Redis will work well. Redis is great as the data is computed inside the memory rather than the disk. 

 

I have all the info to start having fun, thank you so much!