Needing some sort of 3D integration in my game
I have a game, an RPG, located at:
http://www.gamelizard.com/game.php?game=rpg
The main screen of the city is just a colored grid. It looks cheesy because it's not what I want to use to manage that screen. I want to make it 3D, or even psuedo 3D. From my understanding of Java 3D, it needs to have its own Component to draw in, which I'm not sure if I can just slap in the middle of my Applet while still being able to draw the other stuff...
But anyway, I don't know what sort of options I have for being able to draw a 3D architecture. All it needs to have is a floor, possibly a ceiling, walls, and doors. I have an int matrix holding the values of each block which would tell which type needs to be drawn where, so I don't even need a pre-made mesh.
Any resources I could look into that might help me accomplish my task?
[859 byte] By [
Malohkana] at [2007-9-29 22:16:49]
It is not trivial to involve yourself in 3D programming - it will take as long again to write the 3D component as it has for the rest of your program, at the very least. You will also need to create models and animations for your characters and enemies, which is as much work again.
Java3D and anything derived from JOGL will work with AWT - I would probably recommend Java3D as an easy environment in which to learn - you can download the API and the Sun tutorials from the main sun site, once you have gone through those you could probably use my tutorial to get some of the basics of using it in a gaming context: http://www.newview.co.uk/e/tutorials/java3d/index.jsp
Cheers for the info _Breakfast_, I'm determined to have a dabble in some 3D stuff some time this year, I'll give JOGL a look when the urge arises :)
Malohkan, the pseudo 3D effect looks convincing, but I reckon it would be easy to get lost in a larger area as the 90 deg rotations and the flat colours make the play area disorientating. If you could rotate the view smoothly it wouldn't be so bad.
