Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Gurus:Table of Contents

Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Gurus
by Andre LaMothe
Sams, Macmillan Computer Publishing
ISBN: 0672313618 Pub Date: 09/27/99

Introduction
Foreword

About the Author

Part I—Windows Programming Foundations

Chapter 1—Journey into the Abyss

A Little History
Designing Games
Types of Games
Brainstorming
The Design Document and Storyboards
Making the Game Fun
The Components of a Game

Section 1: Initialization
Section 2: Enter Game Loop
Section 3: Retrieve Player Input
Section 4: Perform AI and Game Logic
Section 5: Render Next Frame
Section 6: Synchronize Display
Section 7: Loop
Section 8: Shutdown

General Game Programming Guidelines
Using Tools

C/C++ Compilers
2D Art Software
Sound Processing Software
3D Modelers
Music and MIDI Sequencing Programs

Setting Up to Get Down—Using the Compiler
An Example: FreakOut
Summary

Chapter 2—The Windows Programming Model

The Genesis of Windows

Early Windows Versions
Windows 3.x
Windows 95
Windows 98
Windows NT
Basic Windows Architecture: Win9X/NT

Multitasking and Multithreading

Getting Info on the Threads
The Event Model

Programming the Microsoft Way: Hungarian Notation

Variable Naming
Function Naming
Type and Constant Naming
Class Naming
Parameter Naming

The World’s Simplest Windows Program

It All Begins with WinMain()
Dissecting the Program
Choosing a Message Box

Real-World Windows Applications (Without Puck)
The Windows Class
Registering the Windows Class
Creating the Window
The Event Handler
The Main Event Loop
Making a Real-Time Event Loop
Opening More Windows
Summary

Chapter 3—Advanced Windows Programming

Using Resources

Putting Your Resources Together
Using Icon Resources
Using Cursor Resources
Creating String Table Resources
Using Sound .WAV Resources
Last, But Not Least—Using the Compiler to Create .RC Files

Working with Menus

Creating a Menu
Loading a Menu
Responding to Menu Event Messages

Introduction to GDI

The WM_PAINT Message Once Again
Video Display Basics and Color
RGB and Palletized Modes
Basic Text Printing

Handling Important Events

Window Manipulation
Banging on the Keyboard
Squeezing the Mouse

Sending Messages Yourself
Summary

Chapter 4—Windows GDI, Controls, and Last-Minute Gift Ideas

Advanced GDI Graphics

Under the Hood with the Graphics Device Context
Color, Pens, and Brushes
Working with Pens
Painting with Brushes

Points, Lines, Polygons, and Circles

Straight to the Point
Getting a Line on Things
Getting Rectangular
Round and Round She Goes—Circles
Polygon, Polygon, Wherefore Art Thou, Polygon?

More on Text and Fonts
Timing Is Everything

The WM_TIMER Message
Low-Level Timing

Playing with Controls

Buttons
Sending Messages to Child Controls

Getting Information
The T3D Game Console
Summary

Part II—DirectX and 2D Fundamentals

Chapter 5—DirectX Fundamentals and the Dreaded COM

DirectX Primer

The HEL and HAL
The DirectX Foundation Classes in Depth

COM: Is It the Work of Microsoft… or Demons?

What Exactly Is a COM Object?
More on Interface IDs and GUIDs
Building a Quasi-COM Object
A Quick Recap of COM
A Working COM Program

Working with DirectX COM Objects

COM and Function Pointers
Creating and Using DirectX Interfaces
Querying for Interfaces

The Future of COM
Summary

Chapter 6—First Contact: DirectDraw

The Interfaces of DirectDraw

Interface Characteristics
Using the Interfaces Together

Creating a DirectDraw Object

Error Handling with DirectDraw
Getting an Interface Lift

Cooperating with Windows
Getting into the Mode of Things
The Subtleties of Color
Building a Display Surface

Creating a Primary Surface
Attaching the Palette
Plotting Pixels
Cleaning Up

Summary

Chapter 7—Advanced DirectDraw and Bitmapped Graphics

Working with High-Color Modes

16-Bit High-Color Mode
Getting the Pixel Format
24/32-Bit High-Color Mode

Double Buffering
Surface Dynamics
Page Flipping
Using the Blitter

Using the Blitter for Memory Filling
Copying Bitmaps from Surface to Surface

Clipper Fundamentals

Clipping Pixels to a Viewport
Clipping Bitmaps the Hard Way
Making a DirectDraw Clip with IDirectDrawClipper

Working with Bitmaps

Loading .BMP files
Working with Bitmaps
Loading an 8-Bit Bitmap
Loading a 16-Bit Bitmap
Loading a 24-Bit Bitmap
Last Word on Bitmaps

Offscreen Surfaces

Creating Offscreen Surfaces
Blitting Offscreen Surfaces
Setting Up the Blitter
Color Keys
Source Color Keying
Destination Color Keying
Using the Blitter (Finally!)

Bitmap Rotation and Scaling
Discrete Sampling Theory
Color Effects

Color Animation in 256-Color Modes
Color Rotation in 256-Color Modes
Tricks with RGB Modes

Manual Color Transforms and Lookup Tables
The New DirectX Color and Gamma Controls Interface
Mixing GDI and DirectX
Getting the Lowdown on DirectDraw

The Main DirectDraw Object
Surfing on Surfaces
Playing with Palettes

Using DirectDraw in Windowed Modes

Drawing Pixels in a Window
Finding the Real Client Area (51)
Clipping a DirectX Window
Working with 8-Bit Windowed Modes

Summary

Chapter 8—Vector Rasterization and 2D Transformations

Drawing Lines

Bresenham’s Algorithm
Speeding Up the Algorithm

Basic 2D Clipping

Computing the Intersection of Two Lines Using the Point Slope Form
Computing the Intersection of Two Lines Using the General Form
Computing the Intersection of Two Lines Using the Matrix Form
Clipping the Line
The Cohen-Sutherland Algorithm

Wireframe Polygons

Polygon Data Structures
Drawing and Clipping Polygons

Transformations in the 2D Plane

Translation
Rotation
Scaling

Introduction to Matrices

The Identity Matrix
Matrix Addition
Matrix Multiplication
Transformations Using Matrices

Translation
Scaling
Rotation
Solid Filled Polygons

Types of Triangles and Quadrilaterals
Drawing Triangles and Quadrilaterals
Triangular Deconstruction Details
The General Case of Rasterizing a Quadrilateral
Triangulating Quads

Collision Detection with Polygons

Proximity AKA Bounding Sphere/Circle
Bounding Box
Point Containment

More on Timing and Synchronization
Scrolling and Panning

Page Scrolling Engines
Homogeneous Tile Engines
Sparse Bitmap Tile Engines

Fake 3D Isometric Engines

Method 1: Cell-Based, Totally 2D
Method 2: Full-Screen-Based, with 2D or 3D Collision Networks
Method 3: Using Full 3D Math, with a Fixed Camera View

The T3DLIB1 Library

The Engine Architecture
Basic Definitions
Working Macros
Data Types and Structures
Global Domination
The DirectDraw Interface
2D Polygon Functions
2D Graphic Primitives
Math and Error Functions
Bitmap Functions
Palette Functions
Utility Functions

The BOB (Blitter Object) Engine
Summary

Chapter 9—Uplinking with DirectInput and Force Feedback

The Input Loop Revisited
DirectInput Overture

The Components of DirectInput
The General Steps for Setting Up DirectInput
Data Acquisition Modes
Creating the Main DirectInput Object
The 101-Key Control Pad
Problem During Reading: Reacquisition
Trapping the Mouse
Working the Joystick
Massaging Your Input

Going Deeper with Force Feedback

The Physics of Force Feedback
Setting Up Force Feedback
A Force Feedback Demo

Writing a Generalized Input System: T3DLIB2.CPP

The T3D Library at a Glance

Summary

Chapter 10—Sounding Off with DirectSound and DirectMusic

Sound Programming on the PC
And Then There Was Sound...
Digital versus MIDI—Sounds Great, Less Filling

Digital Sound—Let the Bits Begin
Synthesized Sound and MIDI
It’s MIDI Time!

Sound Hardware

Wave Table Synthesis
Wave Guide Synthesis

Digital Recording: Tools and Techniques

Recording Sounds
Processing Your Sounds

DirectSound on the Mic
Starting Up DirectSound

Understanding the Cooperation Level
Setting the Cooperation Level

Primary and Secondary Sound Buffers

Working with Secondary Buffers
Creating Secondary Sound Buffers
Writing Data to Secondary Buffers

Rendering Sounds

Playing a Sound
Stopping a Sound
Controlling the Volume
Freaking with the Frequency
Panning in 3D

Making DirectSound Talk Back
Reading Sounds from Disk

The .WAV Format
Reading .WAV Files

DirectMusic: The Great Experiment
DirectMusic Architecture
Starting Up DirectMusic

Initializing COM
Creating the Performance
Adding a Port to the Performance

Loading a MIDI Segment

Creating the Loader
Loading the MIDI File

Manipulating MIDI Segments

Playing a MIDI Segment
Stopping a MIDI Segment
Checking the Status of a MIDI Segment
Releasing a MIDI Segment
Shutting Down DirectMusic
A Little DirectMusic Example

The T3DLIB3 Sound and Music Library

The Header
The Types
Global Domination
The DirectSound API Wrapper
The DirectMusic API Rapper—Get It?

Summary

Part III—Hardcore Game Programming

Chapter 11—Algorithms, Data Structures, Memory Management, and Multithreading

Data Structures

Static Structures and Arrays
Linked Lists

Algorithmic Analysis
Recursion
Trees

Building BSTs
Searching BSTs

Optimization Theory

Using Your Head
Mathematical Tricks
Fixed-Point Math
Unrolling the Loop
Look-Up Tables
Assembly Language

Making Demos

Prerecorded Demos
AI-Controlled Demos

Strategies for Saving the Game
Implementing Multiple Players

Taking Turns
Split-Screen Setups

Multithreaded Programming Techniques

Multithreaded Programming Terminology
Why Use Threads in a Game?
Conjuring a Thread from the Plasma Pool
Sending Messages from Thread to Thread
Waiting for the Right Moment
Multithreading and DirectX
Advanced Multithreading

Summary

CHAPTER 12—Making Silicon Think with Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence Primer
Deterministic AI Algorithms

Random Motion
Tracking Algorithms
Anti-Tracking: Evasion Algorithms

Patterns and Basic Control Scripting

Basic Patterns
Patterns with Conditional Logic Processing

Modeling Behavioral State Systems

Elementary State Machines
Adding More Robust Behaviors with Personality

Modeling Memory and Learning with Software
Planning and Decision Trees

Coding Plans
Implementing a Real Planner

Pathfinding

Trial and Error
Contour Tracing
Collision Avoidance Tracks
Waypoint Pathfinding
A Racing Example
Robust Pathfinding

Advanced AI Scripting

Designing the Scripting Language
Using the C/C++ Compiler

Artificial Neural Networks
Genetic Algorithms
Fuzzy Logic

Normal Set Theory
Fuzzy Set Theory
Fuzzy Linguistic Variables and Rules
Fuzzy Manifolds and Membership
Fuzzy Associative Matrices
Processing the FAM with the Fuzzified Inputs
Warm and Fuzzy

Building Real AI for Games
Summary

Chapter 13—Playing God: Basic Physics Modeling

Fundamental Laws of Physics

Mass (m)
Time (t)
Position (s)
Velocity (v)
Acceleration (a)
Force (F)
Forces in Higher Dimensions
Momentum (P)

The Physics of Linear Momentum: Conservation and Transfer
Modeling Gravity Effects

Modeling a Gravity Well
Modeling Projectile Trajectories

The Evil Head of Friction

Basic Friction Concepts
Friction on an Inclined Plane (Advanced)

Basic Ad Hoc Collision Response

Simple x,y Bounce Physics
Computing the Collision Response with Planes of Any Orientation
An Example of Vector Reflection
Intersection of Line Segments

Real 2D Object-to-Object Collision Response (Advanced)
Resolving the n-t Coordinate System
Simple Kinematics

Solving the Forward Kinematic Problem
Solving the Inverse Kinematic Problem

Particle Systems

What Every Particle Needs
Designing a Particle Engine
The Particle Engine Software
Generating the Initial Conditions
Putting the Particle System Together

Playing God: Constructing Physics Models for Games

Data Structures for Physics Modeling
Frame-Based Versus Time-Based Modeling

Summary

Chapter 14—Putting It All Together: You Got Game!

The Initial Design of Outpost

The Story
Designing the Gameplay

The Tools Used to Write the Game
The Game Universe: Scrolling in Space
The Player’s Ship: “The Wraith”
The Asteroid Field
The Enemies

The Outposts
The Predator Mines
The Gunships

The Power-Ups
The HUDS
The Particle System
Playing the Game
Compiling Outpost

Compilation Files
Runtime Files

Epilogue

Part IV—Appendixes

Appendix A—What’s on the CD

Appendix B—Installing DirectX and Using the C/C++ Compiler

Using the C/C++ Compiler

Appendix C—Math and Trigonometry Review

Trigonometry
Vectors

Vector Length
Normalization
Scalar Multiplication
Vector Addition
Vector Subtraction
The Inner Product, or the “Dot” Product
The Cross Product
The Zero Vector
Position Vectors
Vectors as Linear Combinations

Appendix D—C++ Primer

What Is C++?
The Minimum You Need to Know About C++
New Types, Keywords, and Conventions

Comments
Constants
Referential Variables
Creating Variables On-the-Fly

Memory Management
Stream I/O
Classes

The New Struct in Town
Just a Simple Class
Public Versus Private
Class Member Functions (A.K.A. Methods)
Constructors and Destructors
Writing a Constructor
Writing a Destructor

The Scope Resolution Operator
Function and Operator Overloading
Summary

Appendix E—Game Programming Resources

Game Programming Sites
Download Points
2D/3D Engines
Game Programming Books
Microsoft DirectX Multimedia Exposition
Usenet Newsgroups
Keeping Up with the Industry: Blues News
Game Development Magazines
Game Web Site Developers
Xtreme Games LLC

Appendix F—ASCII Tables

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