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This module is one in a collection of modules designed to teach you about the anatomy of a game engine.
Although the modules will concentrate on the Java game library named Slick2D, the concepts involved and the knowledge that you will gain is applicable todifferent game engines written in different programming languages.
The purpose of this module is to teach you about some of the characteristics of game engines in general, and to teach you how Slick2D fits those characteristics.
I recommend that you open another copy of this module in a separate browser window and use the following links to easily find and view the Figuresand Listings while you are reading about them.
In order to write a game program using the Slick2D game library that will run as a Java application, you must, as a minimum,perform the steps shown in Figure 1 .
Figure 1 . Steps for writing a Slick2D game program. |
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1. Define a class containing a main method that will run as an application.
2. Define and instantiate an object from a class that implements Slick2D'sGame interface. (Can be combined with item 1 above.)3. Instantiate an object of Slick2D's AppGameContainer class, passing the
Game object's reference (from item 2 above) as a parameter to theAppGameContainer constructor.4. Call the start method on the object of type AppGameContainer
(from item 3 above). |
The purpose of this module is to teach you about some of the characteristics of game engines in general, and to teach you how Slick2D fits those characteristics.
What you have learned
In the previous module, you learned how to download Slick2D and how to install Slick2D in such a way that you can easily compile and execute Slick2D programs fromthe command line with no need for a high level IDE such as Eclipse or NetBeans.
What you will learn
To begin with, you will learn what we often mean when we speak of a "game engine." You will also learn how that terminology relates to something that we often refer to as a "software framework."
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