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Comment by jamongkad | Hacker News Reader

Thankyou!Just recently I've been dabbling in Python. What do you think of producing games in Pyglet?

Check out PyGame. Also check out the PyWeek game development challenge.

Building a game in a week is an invigorating challenge. I learned python during one of the PyWeeks and I'd never made a game before. The best part is that because of the short deadline it isn't some huge amorphous task. Even if the game is crap, you learn something, have some fun, and get to see how more experienced people get things done.

I also like to take a holiday from the languages I have to use for work. I mean, Flash games are pretty hot, but spending some time in a different language is good for the brain. Regardless of tool analogy.

Thank you...I'm trying to learn HaXe along with Python. But Python's syntax is so much easier on the eyes. I just want to rapidly produce a game enough to whet my appetite. And I think Pyglet or PyGame is the way to go.

It's a REALLY bad idea. Just because you know how to use a drill machine does not mean you should use a drill machine as a saw.

If you want to make a game for a particular platform, use the tools designed to make games on that platform. You'll learn a lot and it will save you a lot of time learning one technology, and then having to go back to relearn a new technology when you reach a certain stage where your development capacity is limited by the tools you are using.

Er... People do use Python to make games. Well-known ones include Eve Online, Grim Fandango, and Vampire: The Masquerade.

I take it you are advocating learning C/C++ to make games before learning Python? If so, consider why anyone who already knows C/C++ would bother embedding Python or Lua in their game... That would also be "going back to relearn a new technology when you reach a certain stage where your development capacity is limited by the tools you are using". And if you need to know both C and a scripting language to make a game, it doesn't really matter which you learn first... except that by learning the scripting language first you can prototype earlier and faster.

(And, considering the article's context of indie games, being able to rapidly prototype game designs is more important than having them perform well from the start.)

Didn't Grim Fandango use lua?

EDIT: link: http://www.grimfandango.net/?page=articles&pagenumber=2

You're right, my mistake. I get the games using the two languages confused -- both are common choices for game scripting. The same logic applies, though.

(Heh... looks like Lua's also used to drive World of Warcraft. Civilization 4 uses Python, as does Battlefield 2.)

You don't get it. You can use ANYTHING to write a game, but a developer should not be limited by the language of the platform. A platform comes with a preferred language. If you want to use the platform, then use it with what it comes with, don't impose your ideas on it.

I must agree: I don't get it.

You say every platform has a preferred language which should be used instead of others because they would be "limiting", and that Python is a categorically bad idea.

But the original poster didn't indicate which platform he was choosing. What if his platform of choice is Pygame? What if it was the .NET CLR (which effectively "comes with" languages like Boo or IronPython)? Wouldn't Python then be the ideal choice?

And before you dismiss Pygame as too limiting to be a platform, note that one of the games in the article is flOw, originally written for the even-more-limited Flash platform.

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