Flash

[wearymemory]

whats AS3?

AS3

[MadPumpkin]

Okay first, to settle this pointless question that keeps flashing around, the reason why JavaScript has Java in the name is because Java script can directly "communicate" with Java aps

yes AS3, very good idea by the way, lol i do know a lot of it but i am not "fluent"

[wearymemory]

Okay first, to settle this pointless question that keeps flashing around, the reason why JavaScript has Java in the name is because Java script can directly "communicate" with Java aps

yes AS3, very good idea by the way, lol i do know a lot of it but i am not "fluent"

What a gruesome overstatement of JavaScript's capabilities. Excuse me while I go chug a bottle of Pepto Bismol.

[wtetzner]

Okay first, to settle this pointless question that keeps flashing around, the reason why JavaScript has Java in the name is because Java script can directly "communicate" with Java aps

yes AS3, very good idea by the way, lol i do know a lot of it but i am not "fluent"

What a gruesome overstatement of JavaScript's capabilities. Excuse me while I go chug a bottle of Pepto Bismol.

Actually, JavaScript is very capable. It's designed to be an embedded language, much like Lua, although it can be a very powerful language on it's own. If you think it's not very capable, you don't know it very well.

Also, JavaScript doesn't have Java in it's name because it can "communicate" with Java apps. It was purely a marketing decision. Originally, Netscape was going to embed a language based on Scheme into their browser, but Java was being released around that time, so they changed the syntax to look more like Java, and put Java in the name, hoping it would help make it more popular. JavaScript is basically Scheme with a Java-like syntax.

[LeonBlade]

JavaScript is pretty powerful when it comes to HTML, otherwise it's not that great...
However, the fact that JavaScript and Java both have... Java in them doesn't make them the same or associated or anything.

As for Flash, I love Flash!
I know AS2 and AS3.

ActionScript reminds me of JavaScript a little bit... but that's only when your developing in the Flash IDE, when you start writing document classes for your Flash Project, it starts to get more like Java, the whole idea or writing your includes and packages and what not...

[RyanPridgeon]

LeonBlade... I swear you're familiar from somewhere.

By any chance are you a reg on the NG Flash BBS?

[BlueMonkey5]

i still dont know what AS2 or AS3 are! i'll just wiki it :D as for flash, yea it all sounds great (i have to get a little finicky here) BUT Flash games just have that certain "look" if you know what i mean- i can't explain it but you can just point out a Flash game from the graphics, right? i'm very particular with the look of graphics because i am an artist, and like to have my own certain style and not the typical Flash game look. basically, it would be nice if we can use GIMP or GraphicsGale for the sprite editors along with Flash to have more flexibility, and not just the built-in sprite/ graphics editor. I'm going to hope that it's possible. I'll let you guys know what i find out.

[LeonBlade]

LeonBlade... I swear you're familiar from somewhere.

By any chance are you a reg on the NG Flash BBS?

NG Flash BBS?
Umm... not sure what that is lol...

Okay I looked it up...
I may be registered on New Grounds, but I never go there...

[dandymcgee]

i still dont know what AS2 or AS3 are!

Apparently you missed wearymemory's reply:

whats AS3?

AS3

AS = ActionScript

[LeonBlade]

ActionScript 2 and 3 are the same thing really...
But at the same time, they are completely different.

All the same keywords and everything, but the way you write code is completely different.
Say you want to respond to a mouse click event over a Movie Clip.

In ActionScript 2, it was kinda sloppy and you could get around doing it different ways and it wasn't that great...

Code: Select all

myMovieClip_mc.onPress = function() 
{
     // do shit
}

In ActionScript 3, it feels more object oriented and makes more sense, however there is a few more lines you have to write but who cares...

Code: Select all

myMovieClip.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, clickMe);

function clickMe(e:MouseEvent):void
{
     // do shit
}

I like how AS3 is because it feels more organized, but it was a weird transition to make when I went from AS2 to AS3, but in the end it was worth it...
There are some other minor changes like removing the _ in the properties like...

Code: Select all

myMovieClip_mc._x = 9000;

Now looks like this...

Code: Select all

myMovieClip_mc.x = 9000;

And alpha changed from 1-100 to 0-1 like it should be...

Code: Select all

myMovieClip_mc._alpha = 50;
[code]

Now it looks like this...
[code]
myMovieClip_mc.alpha = 0.5;

And of course a lot more changes but you get the idea.
You should definitely check out Flash if you want to learn more about it.
It's easy to pick up and really fun. It appeals to all people really...
Designers, Programmers, Audio, Graphics, etc...
You can grab a CS4 Demo from Adobe's website.

[BlueMonkey5]

Does anyone know a good book for someone just beginning Flash game development? Rada gave me some very good online resources (if anyone wants to know i can post them) but since i'm away from home most of the time, I like to have a good book to read out on the road. Not surprisingly, there's alot of them on Amazon.

There are books about flash game development and then there are books directly about actionscript 3. Any recomendations?

I have read about AS3 and its abilities of OOP, which was not available in its previous versions, and am finding that AS3 (developed by Adobe and very different than the first two which were developed by Macromedia) has really just went full cirlcle and become like the other languages such as Javascript and C++. Actionscript started off with the premis of being linear therefor being simpler from what I understand. But when people started to realize the limitations of this, Adoble developed AS3 which has brought the language to the complexity level of the others. This is what I am finding so far from the books I'm checking out online. I think it's a good idea to get a book about Flash for game dev and a book about actionscript3 seperatley.

[RyanPridgeon]

Become familiar with the environment first, and then get something like the latest Flash/Actionscript Bible.

Personally I grew up with just the F1 button :P

[eatcomics]

i still dont know what AS2 or AS3 are! i'll just wiki it :D as for flash, yea it all sounds great (i have to get a little finicky here) BUT Flash games just have that certain "look" if you know what i mean- i can't explain it but you can just point out a Flash game from the graphics, right? i'm very particular with the look of graphics because i am an artist, and like to have my own certain style and not the typical Flash game look. basically, it would be nice if we can use GIMP or GraphicsGale for the sprite editors along with Flash to have more flexibility, and not just the built-in sprite/ graphics editor. I'm going to hope that it's possible. I'll let you guys know what i find out.

ACTIONSCRIPT 2 AND 3 man....

[RyanPridgeon]

It's also worth pointing out that Flash uses vector graphics, and importing bitmap graphics from other programs is usually a bad idea because it significantly decreases performance.

If you don't like it, don't use Flash :P

[Rada]

It's also worth pointing out that Flash uses vector graphics, and importing bitmap graphics from other programs is usually a bad idea because it significantly decreases performance.

If you don't like it, don't use Flash :P

this is not necessarily true. Flash has classes to manage bitmaps. Bitmap and BitmapData. If you aren't using best practices and just keep throwing things on the display list without any garbage collection, then yes, you will see performance degradation. The same could be said for C if you aren't optimizing your code, it is going to run like garbage.