So a while ago I was bored in the summer and found out you could Make flash games and post them on sites like these, and honestly I think one of the biggest things for me was the money. It's stupid I know, but anywho now I have a job and I'm going on with life as usual... All except the thought keeps crossing my head about this I'll check the forums and get hyped up and want to start with flash, but then I realize flash is 700 dollars... And this happens and that, and within a week or two I forgot about it completely. But the thing is that it sounds like a lot of fun to me... And I think the reason it went wrong the first time was I jumped into complicated stuff with the hope of selling some stupid game I made... But I actually enjoyed most of it, I loved it when I got the square to move across the screen, or when I got it so I could control it with my mouse...and the other day I was bored in math, and I grabed my graphing calculator and put in equations in the graph to make cool desings, and sometimes the line I meant to make whent wrong and I looked back at the equations to see I put a negative wrong or something, and I absolutely love blaring music and staying up on the computer all night, doing whatever. So I know it would be fun, but I can't afford flash and I've tried flashdevelop and things similar and they just bug me. What I want to hear about is veteran programmers, how they started. Any feedback?
What I want to hear about is veteran programmers, how they started.
Im not a veteran but i started with learning HTML and than CSS because these are simpler than programming languages and help you get a feel for basic programming. Than i brought a book called learning actionscript 3.0 a beginner's guide which is probably the best AS3 book out there. Right now I'm in the proccess of creating my first flash game which you can help with ideas here. I got a student discount (with my cousins student ID) on Adobe CS4 premium creative suite which saves you over 1000$. I originally got this for Photoshop and Illustrator but i also learnt to use Dreamweaver and Flash.
And I think the reason it went wrong the first time was I jumped into complicated stuff with the hope of selling some stupid game I made
I've seen 15 year old without much knowledge in programming make $200 on their games. It's entirely possible to make money, but you need to put in the extra effort to cover for your lacking of programming skills.
Dreamweaver
No offense, I find it the most useless program adobe sells.
When I first started programming? Probably your age when I went to a free summer camp at a college for learning c++. During free time we played flash games and one of the first I found was games of gondor (AG 1.0, current is AG 2.0). Got interested and stayed that way for a while. Got busy with other hobbies and school till I was like 17 when I put in an honest effort to learn something and I learned intermediate python. Then I studied flash at school since they had CS4 and became fluent with the program and some actionscript. Then I went to university and learned more python and java and a bunch of other programming stuff (CS student). In the meantime I studied more as3, and some came naturally since java is almost the same as as3. So I didn't have to go through the hurdle of switching to oop since I already knew it. That's about it I am currently becoming more familiar with the language and trying to hard to make a complicated game.
I also read the as3 a beginners guide, but found it to be mostly for beginners but some stuff in there was useful since it was flash oriented.
Personally if you're unsure if you're going to waste money on flash because you think it will be to hard. Then try to learn a beginner language like python. If you find it to be fun and are able to make some complexish programs then you can try flash.
Because I rather write my own code in web standards than have another program write it for me. For all my web dev I use Notepad++ and easyphp. Open source ftw.
And besides for all this, i was never really to interested in web design. My friend who is an expert programmer (in many languages) and has done a few professional web design jobs (which he's made thousands of dollars off of even thought he is only 15), told me if i wanted to learn to program, i should start on HMTL due to it's simplicity. It was fun to start with and i created a few little web pages with it. I learned it from because that's where my friend told me to, and they had great tutorials on all you need to know about HTML and CSS but when i went through the javascript tutorial, from what i remember, it only gave some pretty basic knowledge of the language and only the parts that apply to web design. I know javascript pretty much only meant for web design which i still wasn't thrilled about, but the tutorial helped introduce me into some basic programming.
My friend who is an expert programmer (in many languages) and has done a few professional web design jobs (which he's made thousands of dollars off of even thought he is only 15)
Couple things don't add up here first of all expert programmers all have higher schooling. It's not possible to do most things in programmer without having at least grade 12 math and some other higher up math courses, macm, linear algebra and calc. Therefore he is not an expert programmer just an competent one. Also remember the kid I mentioned that made a simple flash game and got sponsored and made $200 for a single game? Yeah he's not very good but still makes money therefore money =/= knowledge.
told me if i wanted to learn to program, i should start on HMTL due to it's simplicity.
HTML is not a programming language but a markup language ergo not the best to learn in prep for real programming languages. All University's I've heard of agree that python or java are the best.
And besides for all this, i was never really to interested in web design.
Then why do you insist on arguing on it then? Why bother even buying dreamweaver? Also web design is really how the website looks you're thinking more on the lines of web dev.
at least grade 12 math and some other higher up math courses, macm, linear algebra and calc.
I'm not sure how many of these courses he has taken but he was homeschooled for 8th grade due to the fact that he already knew more then the schools honors courses so he has taken many higher level maths and I know over the last summer he took a course on algebra 3. This kids is a genius though, he's was too smart for middle school and now he's acing his way through a magnet school.
HTML is not a programming language but a markup language ergo not the best to learn in prep for real programming languages. All University's I've heard of agree that python or java are the best.
I know that it's a markup language, just to get a feel with something really simple. Javascript isn't either a programming language It's a scripting language though It's a lot more like a programming language than HTML.
Then why do you insist on arguing on it then? Why bother even buying dreamweaver? Also web design is really how the website looks you're thinking more on the lines of web dev.
Because when i brought my CS4 package with everything i did want, it came with it. After i started learning HMTL i realized i had dreamweaver and didn't bother looking for any other HMTL editor.
I think the biggest thing is dedication, if you can create a reason why you NEED to make a flash game, one that you can not throw away after a few days, weeks, or months. This is why I think finding a partner or organizing team will help this cause because it requires you to have some responsibilities towards the other developers. Now I have tried a couple of times to have an online development but that tends to blow up when some one disappears for a few days because of their schedules. Then if you do form a team you got to make sure the team has a reason to stick together, sometimes the promise of money will not help if the game develops too slow. Then you have to set a schedule for your team, plan goals, have brainstorming sessions, design problem discussions, and make sure that there is a time frame for each goal. Try to estimate the necessary based on the assigned members experience and their daily schedule, not everyone can sit at a computer for 8 hours a day and program or animate. Hope this helps you, Goodluck
