Customer Reviews

Beginning Flash Game Programming For Dummies

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This book is a really excellent *programming* introduction to Flash; apparently the only one of its kind on the market!

I consider myself a "programmer" type, and had been turned off by most of the other introductory Flash material that I'd encountered, which was mostly designed for graphic designers who wanted to avoid programming. Even the most basic introductory ActionScript books out there begin by assuming you already know how to make a pretty good Flash movie, which is really terrible, because you have to unlearn a lot of so-called "advanced" Flash-animation techniques to get good at Flash programming.

As a programmer, you should be able to read through this book in a day... Then spend another day or two working on the official exercises. You could then easily blow weeks on this book's ten "starters" (available for free on fordummies.com): unfinished games whose final implementation is left up to your imagination. These are a fantastic resource; finishing the exercises and starters will prepare you to read the other Flash introductory in a new light.

I've programmed for years, but actionscript was different enough for me not to be able to pick it up easily. This book helped immensely in learning basic concepts like the timelines, layers, movieclips, etc. I'm close to completing one game as I write this, as a matter of fact, so the book did it's job.

There are two things that need improving, however. First, the code for pong needs improvement. I noticed, when following the author's suggestions that the ball would sometimes bounce into imaginary walls. Specifically, near the top of the screen the ball would bounce within a tiny confined location in an up and down motion, even though there is no bottom wall at the point where it starts going back up. So I downloaded the author's code. Sure enough, he had the same problem in his code as well. I'm sure I could look through the code and figure out the bug, but this should have been caught by the author.

Second, since multi-player gaming is soooo hot right now, I feel that at least two chapters should have been devoted to this. I've searched and found out that you're supposed to use the XMLSocket object. However, the intricacies, like making sure that what one user sees on his screen is the same thing another user sees, network latency, etc, are subjects that would have been much appreciated.

The good thing with this book, however, is that for single player games the author whets your appetite enough so that whatever he doesn't show you you can at least google and find a solution.

This book teaches you how to program games using Flash MX 2004. Unfortunately, that product is no longer available and hasn't been for quite some time. Newer flash programming environments are very different, so many of the samples and techniques in this book will be useless unless you already have Flash MX 2004.

Simply put, this book was published in 2005. That's over four years ago now, so the code will not compile. At all.

I highly recommend it if you're looking for a book that will give you examples that you have to fix, otherwise if you're no good at debugging then save yourself the trouble of buying it.

IMPORTANT NOTE TO READERS: This book is not written for the current Flash CS3, so you need to make a few accommodations. When the book tells you to create a new Flash program, be sure to choose the option to create an ActionScript 2.0 Flash File, NOT the current ActionScript 3.0. In the very first line of game programming code described in this book (on p.38), it uses the "onRelease" property of a button, which is no longer available in ActionScript 3.0. The program won't compile or run, and right out of the blocks, the reader is stuck. However, if you create an ActionScript 2.0 program, it works fine, and then you can continue.

NOTE: I just noticed that Adobe is releasing their CS4 suite about a week from now, which will probably also update Flash again to CS4. Hopefully, Flash CS4 will still provide the ability to create ActionScript 2.0 files, so that Flash CS4 can still be used with this book.

This is as far as we have gotten in the book so far. I will update this review if we discover more things to watch out for when using this book with Flash CS3.

This updated version of the book is copyrighted in 2006 but was released in November 2005, and was written for Macromedia Flash MX 2004. Since then, Adobe has acquired Macromedia, and Flash has gone through two more releases. Flash 8 was released in September 2005 (two months before the book was released), and Flash CS3 was released in April 2007. Flash CS3 added support for ActionScript 3.0, but fortunately also supports ActionScript 2.0 files.

Except for this slight hiccup, this book is working well for us. I've started reading it, and it is very accessible, jumping right into the game programming topics to keep the reader interested. I am a software engineer by training, but I bought the book for my 15-year-old son because he is extremely interested in writing computer games. Flash is the best platform for game writing for teens, because it's fairly easy to use, is quite powerful, and it's incredibly easy to post their completed Flash games to web sites like Kongregate where zillions of other teens will find them and play them. My excited son took to this book like a duck to water, but then got stumped on the very first programming task, because of this ActionScript 3.0 issue. I figured out the problem and got him straightened out, using ActionScript 2.0 instead.

One significant issue, which I'm sure you've discovered, is that the Flash development environment is very expensive. Flash CS3 Professional costs $699 from Adobe, or $670 on Amazon. I was able to find a legal, new, shrinkwrapped copy on eBay for $499, but that's still a lot of money to allow my teen to learn how to program games. I'm sure we'll find other uses for Flash, though, in our web site work, and overall I think it is worth it to keep my son interested in software engineering as a career.

I am a non-programmer computer user (video editor, Photoshop artist) who came to
Flash intrigued but overwhelmed with the prospect of using something called "ActionScript." After several years using Flash for authoring personal web projects, I grew hungrier. Hungry to somehow make basic 2-D games inspired from plonking away on my Apple II all those years ago (Wizardry, Lode Runner, Zork, etc.) Lo and behold, when I spied Andy Harris' "Beginning Flash Game Programming for Dummies" on the bookshelf at Border's, I found the book I had been waiting for. There are dozens of Flash books out there now, it's easy to get lost in a maze of choosing the right one. What makes this book stand out from the rest is that it makes the F in Flash stand for Fun and not for Frustrating. Harris' prose is funny, fascinating and easy to follow, which for this programming newbie is a must. But don't be fooled by the "easy to read" dynamic. Harris also makes sure you get another big F in Flash, that of Fundamentals, which helps you start "thinking" like a programmer, even if you're just a fan of games so far. Already, the choose-your-own adventure game example (in Chapter 3) has rocked my world. Okay, so I'm a little excited. What can I say? After hours combing thru Flash MX and now Flash Pro 8, I've found the secret guidance counselor I was missing so far in the School of Code. If you've got Flash, and you've got game, get this 392-page treasure trove right now, please. Thank you.

I have not read this book cover to cover, but I picked it up to clarify some points on variable scope and execution order. What I found (under the index heading "variable sharing," not "scope") is that the Author has no idea how scope works. "Sometimes you need _root, sometimes you don't" was the extent of his advice.

If you are already a programmer, skip this book. Get one of the "Todd Yard" books instead.

Although I have looked to this book for answers many times, it rarely if ever comes through with the info I need. This book fails to give the reader/ game designer the conceptual info to fill in the blanks of their own personal issues with their own game ideas.
I found the info in here to be scattered and poorly organized, and utterly useless in terms of "back-bone" game programming basics. I have taken game prototyping classes using Flash and this book was useless. Unless you plan to build the most basic games, exactly as they are presented in this book, you will find very little info in here to help you on your more creative and ambitious game projects.

This is a great book! However, it should be called "beginning Flash Game Programming in ACTION SCRIPT 2" This is an older version of Action Script and if you are really want to make flash games they should be in Action Script 3. Great book just out of date.

I have no complaints about the book itself; I didn't get far enough into it to comment either way, but it does appear to be very well written and complete.

A friend ordered this book about the same time I did, and we were both shocked to find out that we needed Flash MX 2004. I suppose we should have assumed that, but nowhere was it mentioned in any of the descriptions or reviews on this or any other site. I ended up returning the book because I can't afford the program right now.

So if you don't already have Flash MX 2004, check the price before deciding to buy this book.