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The "Not Quite Amiga but still computer related category" => Amiga Emulation => Topic started by: amicom on July 08, 2013, 07:34:53 PM

Title: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: amicom on July 08, 2013, 07:34:53 PM
Is it possible to do game development for the Amiga in an emulator?
 
I'm thinking of getting AmigaForever Plus, and I was wondering if there is anything else I would have to get to get into game development, such as development ide and etc. Could someone point me in the right direction?
 
I heard about Amiga OS 4.1 and found out, that it is not possible to run OS 4.1 on UAE or WinUAE. Is there another route I could take to develop for OS 4.1?
 
I don't own a PowerPC, just an Intel PC.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 08, 2013, 07:40:42 PM
http://www.softwareandcircuits.com/division/amiga/products/cubic/index.html

This IDE lets you cross compile for OS4, WarpOS, PowerUP and MorphOS. You can compile 68k code too of course.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: Heinz on July 08, 2013, 07:41:35 PM
Quote from: amicom;740234
Is it possible to do game development for the Amiga in an emulator?
 
I'm thinking of getting AmigaForever Plus, and I was wondering if there is anything else I would have to get to get into game development, such as development ide and etc. Could someone point me in the right direction?
 
I heard about Amiga OS 4.1 and found out, that it is not possible to run OS 4.1 on UAE or WinUAE. Is there another route I could take to develop for OS 4.1?
 
I don't own a PowerPC, just an Intel PC.


If you want to develop your games in C/C++ then AmiDevCpp is an option:

http://amidevcpp.amiga-world.de/

If you don't have an OS4 Machine, developing for OS4 is very very difficult, because you can't debug your programs. You can better develop your games for OS3.x and try it in WinUAE. Developing and Debugging for AROS is even easier.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: amicom on July 08, 2013, 07:51:00 PM
Thanks for the link, the IDE looks great.
 
... I'm only now getting all this together. I will look into AROS asap. So for now OS4 is out of the question from what I figured out.
 
Is there planned support for OS4 in UAE or WinUAE? OR is this platform too advanced for emulation?
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 08, 2013, 07:55:32 PM
Quote from: amicom;740238
Thanks for the link, the IDE looks great.
 
... I'm only now getting all this together. I will look into AROS asap. So for now OS4 is out of the question from what I figured out.
 
Is there planned support for OS4 in UAE or WinUAE? OR is this platform too advanced for emulation?

If you know C, x86 assembly and PPC assembly like the back of your hand there is nothing stopping you adding the required functionality to UAE. ;)

On the other hand, I can't think of any OS4 software worth having that isn't already available for 68k.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: bbond007 on July 08, 2013, 08:56:50 PM
Quote from: amicom;740234
Is it possible to do game development for the Amiga in an emulator?
 
I'm thinking of getting AmigaForever Plus, and I was wondering if there is anything else I would have to get to get into game development, such as development ide and etc. Could someone point me in the right direction?
 

http://pouet.net/prod.php?which=58703&howmanycomments=25&page=0

Maybe try this toolchain for UAE
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: rednova on July 08, 2013, 09:24:15 PM
Dear Friend:

If you can use amiga forever (on pc for emulation), is enough to run
amospro (I am sure you can get it online)and is very easy to use and learn,
and it works great and you can make great new amiga games !!!
I used amospro on pc emulation (amiga forever) to read code from the
amospro PD cd, and i can easily change the code and test it.
Amospro runs super on amiga forever, and is easy to learn.
Cheers !!!
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 08, 2013, 10:39:27 PM
As well as AMOS there is AmiBlitz Basic and Pure Basic.

Never used them myself but I've heard nothing but good things from others.

http://www.david-mcminn.co.uk/bernd/ab3/AmiBlitz3full_beta4.lha
http://www.purebasic.com/download/PureBasic.lzx
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 08, 2013, 10:42:15 PM
This is a very popular cross platform tool too.

http://www.hollywood-mal.com/
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: ChaosLord on July 08, 2013, 10:49:26 PM
Quote from: amicom;740234
Is it possible to do game development for the Amiga in an emulator?
 
I'm thinking of getting AmigaForever Plus, and I was wondering if there is anything else I would have to get to get into game development, such as development ide and etc. Could someone point me in the right direction?
 
I heard about Amiga OS 4.1 and found out, that it is not possible to run OS 4.1 on UAE or WinUAE. Is there another route I could take to develop for OS 4.1?
 
I don't own a PowerPC, just an Intel PC.


1. Forget about OS4

2. You never said what language you want to use?

If you like C then I would recommend SASC since it has real working debugger that is guaranteed to work.

Since u r using WinUAE there is no need to do complicated cross-compiling.  You can write real Amiga code at super high speed in WinUAE, compile it at super high speed, run it at super high speed, play with it at super high speed and debug it at super high speed if you use SASC with WinUAE.


If you like BASIC then I recommend either AmiBlitz or PureBasic.  They are both awesome.

For a free superduper text editor we recommend Annotate.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: OlafS3 on July 08, 2013, 11:11:20 PM
there are two additional options in near future

"Amiga Monkey" and Antyriad gx

More informations:
http://www.arkham-development.com/development.htm

and:
http://www.aros-platform.de/html/devtools.html

Both only support AROS and 68k (not AmigaOS and MorphOS but of course other platforms) but that is enough for me :-)
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: NovaCoder on July 09, 2013, 12:50:40 AM
Quote from: Heinz;740237
If you want to develop your games in C/C++ then AmiDevCpp is an option:

http://amidevcpp.amiga-world.de/

If you don't have an OS4 Machine, developing for OS4 is very very difficult, because you can't debug your programs. You can better develop your games for OS3.x and try it in WinUAE. Developing and Debugging for AROS is even easier.


Yep I agree, developing software for a machine you can't test it on is almost pointless.   I spent quite a lot of time developing ScummVM in C++ for classic Amiga's without a real machine so I had to use WinUAE for testing.   I'd do what I thought was a really good build for 030 AGA machines but when people tried it on their Miggys it would be as slow as hell and flicker like a b*tch!  In the end I gave up and brought and got a real A1200 again for testing my ports.  

Of course WinUAE is better than nothing (I still use it for prototyping and as my 'virtual' ECS/RTG Amiga) but it's no good when you get to the optimization stage of development (esp important for Classic HW).
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: amicom on July 09, 2013, 01:09:33 AM
Thanks for all the great info. From what I gathered, I think I will be looking into sasc.
 
However, I'm worried about the note that developing in the emulator leaves problems when trying on actual hardware.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: woof on July 09, 2013, 09:21:45 AM
Have a look to "Louise hardfile" it is a WinUAE hardfile with developpement tools included

http://www.innoidea.hu/subsites/amiga/developer/FILES/HardFiles/gcc111.zip
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: OlafS3 on July 09, 2013, 10:26:09 AM
On WinUAE you can emulate hardware in "real speed" (JIT off and other options)
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: psxphill on July 09, 2013, 11:58:30 AM
Quote from: NovaCoder;740279
Of course WinUAE is better than nothing (I still use it for prototyping and as my 'virtual' ECS/RTG Amiga) but it's no good when you get to the optimization stage of development (esp important for Classic HW).

Yes, both have strengths & as soon as you do something that will push the machine you need to be using both.
 
In your example you would always have to optimise it for running on real machines, whether you did that up front or at the end is sometimes irrelevant. Although I'd prefer to do it up front as it can have knock on effects. Like if you're going to write something that uses a lot of blitter and copper effects then again you're going to need to be testing that on real hardware more often because that could have serious consequences.
 
If you're starting out and writing something like a puzzle slide game, then actually getting something to run at all is going to be enough of a challenge whether it's fast enough on real hardware or not. Sometimes learning is about making mistakes and developing on WinUAE will allow you to make mistakes quicker.
 
I preferred geekgadgets gcc to sasc, it produced faster code for me anyway. Single stepping is quite useful though and although there was a commercial gcc based development environment, I never tried it.
 
For writing a real classic amiga game I'd be tempted to use devpac to write 68000 assembly.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: Tom01 on July 09, 2013, 12:43:11 PM
Quote from: psxphill;740330

For writing a real classic amiga game I'd be tempted to use devpac to write 68000 assembly.


For a platform independent game I would use C/C++ with gcc and SDL.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: OlafS3 on July 09, 2013, 12:50:59 PM
SDL on real hardware?
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 09, 2013, 03:37:28 PM
Quote from: OlafS3;740338
SDL on real hardware?


NovaCoder has made an AGA optimized cut-down version of SDL.

Also there is the old WarpSDL reimplementation that is lightning fast but incomplete.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 09, 2013, 03:50:52 PM
Quote from: psxphill;740330

For writing a real classic amiga game I'd be tempted to use devpac to write 68000 assembly.


Speaking of which, I've got an immaculate boxed copy of Devpac 3 with manuals and original disks for sale if anyone is interested?

Also have AMOS Pro with disks and manuals in same condition for sale too.

Might have BlitzBasic 2 as well but will have to check when I get home tonight.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: fishy_fiz on July 09, 2013, 04:50:42 PM
WarpSDL is no more "incomplete" than Novacoders new AGA SDL, in fact if anything Id have to say the contrary.
The "problem" with WarpSDL however is that the "dev kit" was never publicly released, ergo of no use to anyone.
Chaozer actually sent me the lib and headers some years back when I was chatting to him on IRC, but unfortunately I didnt really know at the time what I was doing, nor did I realise how valueable said files would be to me so I dont think I ever backed them up (very slim chance that I still have them, but even if thats true they could be anywhere).

Thanks to Novacoder though we now have a basic SDL lib for AGA, which has been fun to play with. Dont know if anyone is interested, but I've compiled Reminescence for 68k (flashback replacement engine), along with Bermuda Syndrome (and a few others I abandonded for lack of performance reasons).

As for the original question it depends on what you want to do and what type of languages a person is familiar with/wants to learn. The scope of developing for amiga/amiga based systems is way too broad to give a simple answer. Some sort of elaboration might yield responses closer to what the OP was specifically hoping for.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 09, 2013, 05:18:54 PM
Isn't there some sort of game creation tool called Backbone or something similar?

I think Cammy is quite knowledgeable on it.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 09, 2013, 05:22:04 PM
Quote from: fishy_fiz;740362
WarpSDL is no more "incomplete" than Novacoders new AGA SDL, in fact if anything Id have to say the contrary.
The "problem" with WarpSDL however is that the "dev kit" was never publicly released, ergo of no use to anyone.
Chaozer actually sent me the lib and headers some years back when I was chatting to him on IRC, but unfortunately I didnt really know at the time what I was doing, nor did I realise how valueable said files would be to me so I dont think I ever backed them up (very slim chance that I still have them, but even if thats true they could be anywhere).

Thanks to Novacoder though we now have a basic SDL lib for AGA, which has been fun to play with. Dont know if anyone is interested, but I've compiled Reminescence for 68k (flashback replacement engine), along with Bermuda Syndrome (and a few others I abandonded for lack of performance reasons).

As for the original question it depends on what you want to do and what type of languages a person is familiar with/wants to learn. The scope of developing for amiga/amiga based systems is way too broad to give a simple answer. Some sort of elaboration might yield responses closer to what the OP was specifically hoping for.


Are you or anyone else here still in contact with Chaozer? It would be great if someone could resume work on his code.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: ElPolloDiabl on July 09, 2013, 06:17:30 PM
There is Amiga E.
Google for it and and you will get some links.
Also check this page: http://www.amigacoding.com/index.php/Main_Page (http://www.amigacoding.com/index.php/Main_Page)

You did say Game development so one of the game packages might be a good start to get something going quickly.

If you go for 68k assembler or C you will want the ROM kernel manuals.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: Mrs Beanbag on July 09, 2013, 06:46:39 PM
I manage fine, on the whole, in 68k without the ROM kernel manuals. I have some other books which are perhaps a bit less comprehensive.
Title: Re: How do I get started in Amiga Game Development on an emulator?
Post by: nicholas on July 09, 2013, 06:57:02 PM
Quote from: Mrs Beanbag;740386
I manage fine, on the whole, in 68k without the ROM kernel manuals. I have some other books which are perhaps a bit less comprehensive.


http://amigadev.elowar.com