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[Zombiejunk]

I wanna make a game but without using a pre-made engine, Python doesn't have one I don't think. Any advice?

[Ziusudra]

The single most important programming tool - for beginers or pros - is a web search.

The first two google results for "python game engine" list several:

https://gamefromscratch.com/python-game-engines/

https://wiki.python.org/moin/PythonGames/

[Zombiejunk]

Oh bollocks, my fault

[Ziusudra]

A second piece of advice is: start small. Get a playable "minimum viable product" and then build on it or use what you learned on something else. If you start out trying to make something too complex, it's unlikely you'll finish it.

[Starver]

Also, I assume you have an idea about what game you want to make...

Something of a Space Invaders/Dig Dug/Snake game (with or without embelishments like parralax background layers to fake 3Dness) is a fairly good start. Jumping straight into No Man's Sky[1] territory is probably not viable.

Learn what you can actually express in a program. Learn what your development environment is capable of. Make the best use of the latter to convey the former, or look further afield if you find that .py games just don't work well enough for your high-octane FPS-cum-racecar-sim. You could probably make a workable Syndicate, or even a 2.5D thing like Wolfenstein. Though even there a proper C-family language is probably more useful (eventually). Though long gone are the days that you had to totally understand how you might yourself have to directly interface with the screen buffer RAM to move sprite data around or draw polygons/polyhedrons and undraw their old positions. Not that it isn't useful to have an idea what is involved.

If you can do what you want by a not-necessarily-complicated UI, however much complexity of background simulation you envisage, have you looked into the Curses part of this forum? Here: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?board=3.0


None of this is to try to put you off (I think it might look a little like it, which is why I waited for other replies first) but is intended to make sure you know where you want to go. "I want to make a game" is an easy thought, but hard to advise for given the potential open-endedness of it.

[1] Not that I've played it myself. Mainly because I have for decades had my own idea for a kind of NMS+Minecraft+Scorched Earth+Settlers+Magic Carpet+Battletank+Elite game in mind (before most of those ever existed and stole my pot3ntial thunder!) which I always knew how I wanted it to look, even if I didn't yet know how I wanted I wanted it to work. And by this point I'm thinking that the less I know about one of the last bits of alleged (if anachoronistic) 'inspiration' works, the less likely I am to actually copy it when I finally release my Magnum Opus.   Anyway, the point is don't try and jump straight to this. I'm toying with bits and piecezls of the Grand Plan, and am much more likely to release something with lower scope and higher achievability from one of the sub-fiddling projects. The one that's perhaps best describable as KSP+Stars!+Urban Dead is probably the most likely, for reasons I won't go into right now.

[Zombiejunk]

I have a basic idea of the game I want to make, It's an espionage game with life simulation elements. I had to do much research to find out about the subject matter of the game though, as for art, Ascii or Pixel art

[Starver]

At face value, that makes me think you'd definitely be able to employ the LCS-like Curses interface.

Though a more GUI-like labels-and-image-canvases approach (whatever Python does with/like TCL+Tk?) could be a little more attractive to the average John Q Player, either approach should quickly get to an interface sufficient to show the details you want your front-end to reveal of the internals you'll continue to develop and improve.

Eventually, you might find it easier to beautify a windows/frames/component-canvases thing with cosmetic changes, than a 'pure ASCII/ANSI' starter, but the charms of your worldview details might not need complex renderings. I mean, there are games like that... ...though for the life of me I can't think of any off the top of my head.. 

[Zombiejunk]

But how do I implement Life simulation in something like this, that will be my main challenge. Not coding it, that I can learn but how to do it like Cataclysm of DF itself. My idea is ambitious because I wanna make something like a 007 game or Perfect dark in ascii while making your life outside of work a factor

[Zombiejunk]

Or would it be smarter to try the LCS approach, But having Dwarf Fortress or Unreal World Style combat is non-negotiable, I won't budge on that

[Starver]

Spoiler: Your game interface design issues (click to show/hide)

Did you mean "Life simulation" as in "Conway's Game Of Life" (RIP)

I didn't think so originally (didn't seem to fit the rest), but maybe you did. If so, you'll have grid/table or maybe pixel(/full character block)-painting options.

If you mean simulating a 'character' with aims to follow, reactions to other characters/circumstances, timed events occuring, a choice of paths (plot, if not map-based) to follow, etc, then that is coding. Whether you have a blob (e.g. the Dwarf 'face') running around a screen or you update the bit of your text that says "Your character feels intruiged, and is healthy" to now say "You character feels scared, and has an injured leg"...

If you want a FPS interface, you can do it in ASCII, it might even be a useful way to learn 3D basics. Or do it another way (ok, not so serious a suggestion, but always good for sharing.

edit: Whoops, I messed up the tagging!

You choice of what kind of combat you use... That's up to you and your coding.

Before all that, though, work out what you want behind the scenes. It may greatly influence what you want the look to be to first work out (perhaps with a simple text-scrolling output that's not your ideal interface) the kind of workings-out that power your simulation.  And then may direct you to the kind of programming environment you want to use.


And if you're still at the "how do I program?" stage (not sure, but you're giving off some of those vibes, maybe accidentally), start there. Simple I/O. "I'm thinking of a random number, guess which one?", maybe. Don't expect a Goldeneye from scratch. Don't expect a Dwarf Fortress from scratch. Or Pac-Man, or Lunar Lander (though there are tutorials that guide you specifically to such games, which may or may not teach you enough to make something else).

[Zombiejunk]

I'm in the phase that I can understand code, At least in python and Java. I really don't want to use Unity or unreal because of issues I had with them. and the simulation I mean is the one Dwarf fortress uses, But I need to get better at code.
I wasn't going for an FPS interface, And well for combat, I may have to figure out how to do the kind I'm trying.
But if I give off the vibes of beginner 'how do I program' its because I sorta am

[Domaryx]

Interesting idea! Hope you succeed! Good luck to you!

[Zombiejunk]

My only pitfall would be the fact that I am truly horrible at art. I learn coding first, my art is dreadful as a result.
For Example: .

[EuchreJack]

Awesome Art!

Play some Covert Action, if you haven't already, and compare/contrast.  Since that is my definition of the best espionage game ever, your graphics are PERFECT.

[Zombiejunk]

Just got a new PC, I never heard of Covert Action. As for my art, I have unreasonable standards towards my work