Pokemon Online RPG coding help!

ok, so I was playing a Pokemon online rpg in school, and my teacher saw it. he loved it and now my final project is to make a online Pokemon rpg.

Im excited to make One, since ive been wanting to make one, but there is one issue

I have no clue what to code in for it

so I need some help with coding! how should I do it and such?

thank you guys so much!

also, if anyone is wondering, I'm a high school freshman, and I'm in a special program that specializes in film, animation and coding

Hi, just moving your thread to Game Development as it seems appropriate for what you're after :) Good luck!

Can you provide some more details?
What Pokemon game did he see you playing?
How much time do you have to finish this project?

Yes I can!
So my teacher saw me playing a game called The Pokemon Kingdom, its an Online Pokemon RPG that I've been playing recently.

I have 4 months to complete it, it does not have to be fully completed by then though. as long as I have some coding done and its functional, then I'm good to go, but I want to complete as much as I possibly can.

since Im a high school freshman without a debit or credit card, I want to use Weebly or Wix or any free site making place to have it on, if it is possible. I think its possible to do it on those sites, just it will be more of a challenge

if you need any more information I can give it to you! :3

stars said:

Hi, just moving your thread to Game Development as it seems appropriate for what you're after :) Good luck!

Click to expand...

Thank you so much! :3

Ah those games are usually written in PHP.
I don't know if it's still the case, but a few years ago there were a few decent free hosting providers available for PHP.
Weebly or Wix doesn't allow you to host your own server side scripts I believe, for these kinds of games you need a server component.

ohhh ok, ill have to look for some

I do need help with coding though, how would I program random encounters and such?

EDIT: Silex supports it as far as I see

Programming an Online RPG is not an easy task and it solely depends on your skills.
Which programming languages do you know, C/++, Java ?
Any experience with Network Protocols like TCP/UDP, Sockets ?
Did you work with Databases (MySQL,PostgreSQL) ?

First you would need to program a base game which contains the game loop which iterates over the game's subsystems like the renderer, input processor, networking.

But that is not everything.
Do you want to write a Renderer from scratch?
If yes this will take you months if you never have written Renderers.

If you know C or C++ I would recommend you:

*SDL/2 - for Rendering, Input Processing and Audio.
*C Standard Library / C++ STL - for Socket programming.

Estimated programming time: 2+ months.

Note: SDL abstracts a lot of low-level programming but you still have to write your own rendering subsystem, but you do not have to concentrate on optimization.

Oh then that's perfect if its 2+ months!
I know HTML really, and Bbcode, no experience with network protocols or databases

So create a game loop, like a map and character sprite?

I feel bad for not knowing much codes like Java or C++, but I am willing to learn! I enjoy learning about coding and I want to program games in the future! For online Rpgs, what do you recommend? Java, c or c++?

And Network Protocols, what do they do and what do you recommend with those?

Databases fall under the question of network protocols.

I forgot to mention that I use a Mac, so are these programs for Mac too? And if not, then what do you recommend program wise with those?

Although I have 4 months, I could work on it over the summer and work on it for my sophomore year if he likes what he sees, he will probably be interested in only watching me do the programming! Either way, I'm up for the challenge of doing this, since I've been wanting to do one, so please recommend what you think is best!

Geomonlover said:

I have 4 months to complete it, it does not have to be fully completed by then though. as long as I have some coding done and its functional, then I'm good to go, but I want to complete as much as I possibly can.

Click to expand...

Okay, so let me start by saying that four months is not a very long time when you have to learn everything as you go along. So my #1 piece of advice is to use as many libraries (i.e. code that other people have written) as possible, and to find out what matters most when it comes to getting a good grade so you can focus on those bits.

Geomonlover said:

I know HTML really, and Bbcode, no experience with network protocols or databases

Click to expand...

Geomonlover said:

since Im a high school freshman without a debit or credit card, I want to use Weebly or Wix or any free site making place to have it on, if it is possible. I think its possible to do it on those sites, just it will be more of a challenge

Click to expand...

Making online games is much more work than offline ones, so I'd save that part until last. But when you get to that part you could use something like AWS Free Tier to host your server for free.

Geomonlover said:

I feel bad for not knowing much codes like Java or C++, but I am willing to learn! I enjoy learning about coding and I want to program games in the future! For online Rpgs, what do you recommend? Java, c or c++?

Click to expand...

I'd strongly recommend none of the above, for a learner I'd try something like JavaScript or Python. JavaScript because there's lots of resources out there, and you can leverage your knowledge of HTML; Python because there's more things built-in, and it's easier to install libraries.
But I haven't actually tried, so if anyone else here has some particular libraries in mind you should take their advice instead.

Geomonlover said:

And Network Protocols, what do they do and what do you recommend with those?

Databases fall under the question of network protocols.

Click to expand...

I'd say these fall into the "worry about it later" group.

Geomonlover said:

I forgot to mention that I use a Mac, so are these programs for Mac too? And if not, then what do you recommend program wise with those?

Click to expand...

Yeah, everything should run fine on Mac.

Wow! This is great to know! Thank you so much! All good info!

If you have a school e-mail address you might be eligible for free editors from Jetbrains:

https://www.jetbrains.com/student/

I couldn't recommend them more, they should serve you well.

@MrGriffin,

I would not recommend javascript either if he has to make an 'online' game.
Client-side javascript is easy peasy, but if a beginner has to set up nodejs with a framework to handle the server side logic that would be confusing I believe.

I strongly recommend PHP for a project like this, it does everything he needs out of the box.
The games he's referring too are usually written in php as well.

khkramer said:

I would not recommend javascript either if he has to make an 'online' game.
Client-side javascript is easy peasy, but if a beginner has to set up nodejs with a framework to handle the server side logic that would be confusing I believe.

I strongly recommend PHP for a project like this, it does everything he needs out of the box.
The games he's referring too are usually written in php as well.

Click to expand...

Yeah, PHP for the server-side stuff is easier than messing around with Node.

The only concern I have is that it's superficially similar to JavaScript, so it might be confusing to learn them both at the same time (whereas something like Python could be easier to keep separate in your mind). But I guess that's one of those things that's different for each person; FWIW I agree that trying PHP first is a good idea.

I do have a student email address! Ill check into that!
And so i should go with PhP code? Ok, will do then! :3

Geomonlover said:

Oh then that's perfect if its 2+ months!
I know HTML really, and Bbcode, no experience with network protocols or databases

So create a game loop, like a map and character sprite?

I feel bad for not knowing much codes like Java or C++, but I am willing to learn! I enjoy learning about coding and I want to program games in the future! For online Rpgs, what do you recommend? Java, c or c++?

And Network Protocols, what do they do and what do you recommend with those?

Databases fall under the question of network protocols.

I forgot to mention that I use a Mac, so are these programs for Mac too? And if not, then what do you recommend program wise with those?

Although I have 4 months, I could work on it over the summer and work on it for my sophomore year if he likes what he sees, he will probably be interested in only watching me do the programming! Either way, I'm up for the challenge of doing this, since I've been wanting to do one, so please recommend what you think is best!

Click to expand...

Of course you need to create a game loop otherwise you won't have a game.

To be honest if you are not proficient in C/C++ or Java you won't be able to do an Online RPG in 4 months.

Network protocols
Are like they are called protocols for transfering data between computers (Internet) in form of packets roughly said.
Traditionally you implement a Client/Server System whereby your Game Executable acts as a Client which sends it requests to the Server and the server responds to them.
In an online game you use it to synchronize the players states, inventory, chat with others and more.

Honestly an online rpg is too complex for a beginner with no knowledge of Programming Languages, Network Protocols etc.

But if you really are up to it then:

It does not matter which Operating System you use.

1. Learn Java (You can use Eclipse as an IDE) - faster results but slower code due to bytecode translation and interpreting, but won't matter nowadays.
2. Learn about TCP/UDP and Sockets.
3. There is a online book called "Game Programming Patterns" which teaches you game programming techniques especially game loop and entity/component architecture.
4.Experiment and do not give up if you reach obstacles.

If you have more questions feel free to ask.

sincerely,
gl4cieR

gl4cieR said:

To be honest if you are not proficient in C/C++ or Java you won't be able to do an Online RPG in 4 months.

Click to expand...

I'm sorry, I can't agree with this sentiment. Hundreds of games are released every year developed in other languages, and it's quite frankly wrong suggest that C, C++ and Java belong to some special class. If nothing else, why not C# or Go?

In general I think that your advice is (as you say yourself) better geared for someone with more experience than Geomonlover, and while I agree that it's really interesting to build all these things yourself from scratch, you can't have real success in four months with that approach.

mgriffin said:

I'm sorry, I can't agree with this sentiment. Hundreds of games are released every year developed in other languages, and it's quite frankly wrong suggest that C, C++ and Java belong to some special class. If nothing else, why not C# or Go?

In general I think that your advice is (as you say yourself) better geared for someone with more experience than Geomonlover, and while I agree that it's really interesting to build all these things yourself from scratch, you can't have real success in four months with that approach.

Click to expand...

That is your interpretation.
I did not say that he can't use C# or Go.

But I am the type of guy who prefers to do things the hard way.
The skills he would gain with programming languages which are closer to the 'metal' will help him more in the future.

If he wants it really easy he can just write the game in PHP and use MySQL/PostgreSQL.

sincerely,
gl4cieR

Sorry for the mostly tangential nature of this post, it's the last thing I'll say on the matter.

gl4cieR said:

But I am the type of guy who prefers to do things the hard way.
The skills he would gain with programming languages which are closer to the 'metal' will help him more in the future.

If he wants it really easy he can just write the game in PHP and use MySQL/PostgreSQL.

Click to expand...

I think we're in violent agreement. You learn a lot of things by taking the hard route, but it would be nigh-on-impossible to finish in four months. So regardless of what anyone thinks the best way to learn is[0], Geomonlover wants to (or probably has to) have something to show after that time, and so taking the so-called "easy" way is the right decision.

Also it's bizarre that you say PostgreSQL as if it's somehow a bad choice, but that's neither here nor there.

[0] and don't get me wrong, I am in no way a PHP lover; but also I've been there, done that with learning C++ as a first language and I didn't have any success until I started working on an already-existing game, for me there was too many things to explore, and I didn't have the necessary experience to be able to make informed decisions.

Ok, I didn't expect this for it to be a full on war between the users. I just came for some help and where to start, not for people to get into a big fight.

Wow.
Your teacher just saw you playing it and, he told you to make a Pokemon MMO?
I wish all the teachers were like that. :)

By the way, good luck with your project.