Nathan's take on RISC OS games programming

As a few of you may know, I have been involved with a lot of behind-the-scenes projects in the RISC OS world, some that have fruited, some in progress and some dead. Over the past 4 years I have become to realise the difficulties that underlie this tiny market through my own and colleagues mistakes.

The 2D vs 3D debate

The constant comment on the newsgroups and forums always involves someone saying something along the lines of "A game has to be 3D to be any good." Whereas this comment may hold some water in PC land there are a number of recent games that are 2D available for the Dreamcast and even the PlayStation 2 such as:

• Capcom Vs SNK
• Fantavision
• Slipheed

Added to the fact that the RISC OS market is small, the gaming market is even smaller. How many games developers do you think there are? 10?....5?....VOTI are one, Artex another and Paradise as well as the odd other game that strains through. In PC land vast groups of people work on a project but there is simply no manpower or reward for doing this on RISC OS. RISC OS developers are driven by enthusiasm rather than money and most of the coding takes place in spare time, and games take an age to complete. Graphics artists are hard to find, coders are hard to find, group coordination is hard to find....enthusiasm is hard to find.
 

Also, in my personal experience, the number of coders who say and never do is frightening. I take on board that everything has to be in the spare time but I don't like "It'll be done this weekend." when it never is. Worst still is no sign of anything being produced and then they just vanish. I have come to rely on only a few coders now and am very wary about getting new coders onboard.
 

3D engines have also been widely publicised but none have been finished to be used by anyone and the current developers can't take time out to write one because that stops another game or two being released in that time frame. It's a pity that these sad "2D games are rubbish" people don't help out in the market, it's strange why they bother posting to RISC OS boards at all, maybe they get a kick out of it.

Newsgroup/Forum Problems

The sole coders amongst us have it harder, they have to do everything themselves and sometimes venture onto the newsboards asking for ideas, one of the worst comments to make here is, "You don't want to do that, you want to do a game based on...."
 

Coders have their own ideas and will implement new ideas just so long as it doesn't mean a complete rewrite. This type of comment kicks them in the teeth and I have had to save many a person from abandoning projects because of stupid, misplaced comments given to them, even by only one person and sometimes I haven't been able to talk them out of it.

The Future

I am constantly in search of people to put together for groups to tackle projects. I have made no money off this scene, I gave all SunBurst money to Owain and all Chaos Engine monies were turned down. Stupid isn't it? I feel guilty taking any money as I want the coders to have the maximum they can have.
 

If you are a coder, graphics artist or musician or want to offer your support then get in touch, I'll arrange suitable teams and keep support high.

Epilogue

It comes down to this....everyone goes on about the RISC OS community, if this is true then why can't we stick together and help each other out with helpful ideas and resist any urge to post something detrimental to anyone. We are in the same boat and currently it has holes in it, the gaming market is one such hole. There are too many holes for our patches, we need coders and groups....get active and do something....there is no room for enthusiasm killers.