Developing a Flash game from scratch - introduction
I figure that as there’s millions of Flash games out there on the Internet they can’t be all that hard to make, right? I don’t mean to say that good flash games are easy to make and I fully appreciate how much time and effort go into making them, but an average game can’t be too hard.
I’ve never touched Flash before so I thought my first ever Flash project should be a game. It should teach me plenty about how to use the software and if I end up with even a half playable game I’ll be happy.
If you’re reading this because you want to do something similar here’s a bit about what I can already do; I’m fluent in PHP, JavaScript, HTML, CSS and all that. I’ve dabbled with Photoshop but am by no means an expert. I’m a web developer. I’ve never worked with Flash beyond embedding other people swf files into my sites.
ActionScript seems to be similar to PHP and JavaScript so I’m hoping to pick that up fairly quickly. As for Flash itself, at the moment it looks very alien and a bit daunting.
Anyway, now that the reason I’m doing this is out of the way here’s what I plan to make:
- A simple get the ball in the bucket/hole type game (I figure this will be fairly straightforward and won’t need too much artistic ability!
- It will be a side on game with platforms, enemies, gravity and anything else I can think of as the project developes
- Levels (gotta have levels)
- Lives (gotta have lives)
- Awards. Something to keep people interested in playing - eg. fastest time, fewest clicks etc.
I’ll be posting updates of each day of development, they won’t be consecutive days because I’ve got plenty of other things to do as well. I’ll list what I’ve learned and how and will hopefully post the work in progress whenever it’s suitable (ie. the game actually works/does something).