How do you start a project?

Hi



I am a little bit experienced in programming with Eclipse doing PHP5 projects using OOP. However Java is quite new for me and using engines too. I compare it to using PHP-frameworks like Zend or CI but of course it’s somewhat different.



I find the apporach difficult, how you start projects in Java using JME, I’m not speaking about the actual coding but where to start when you want to create a game, how you organize your classes, and so on. In PHP especially using frameworks, I used to put everything in its own class. There is a class for the homepage, a class for the user, one for the login, one for the search, the database model and so on.



I would maybe first create the homepage and a database model and also a view. Then I would add an user and that needs database access too as well as a view and the user might get access to edit features of the content and after few hours a simple CMS is ready. This way I get very fast into the project and it grows as I add features.



I got in mind what kind of game I would like to create, something with robots walking around and shooting each other in third person view.

But where do I start? Am I going to create the mesh loader for the character first or the world-layout, or do I design a level first on papersheet with pencil and start to translate it into JME code? How do you start programming games at all?

We explain all these things in the wiki, especially the beginner tutorials and the “Best Practices” document. If any java-related terms are unfamiliar, ask us or the mighty :google:

https://wiki.jmonkeyengine.org/legacy/doku.php/jme3#tutorials_for_beginners

https://wiki.jmonkeyengine.org/legacy/doku.php/jme3:intermediate:best_practices

https://wiki.jmonkeyengine.org/legacy/doku.php/sdk:project_creation



SDK Tutorial 1 - Basics - YouTube

Oh sorry, I should have noted, that I already looked at the beginner tutorials and tried some of the examples there. The concepts are quite clear to me and easy to follow. However what I was looking for was more what’s covered in the “Best Practices For jME3 Developers” article. Thanks, I will work thru that now.

its best just to have a practice doing a few simple games, then through experience you’ll see how it should be structured