Game Dev Diary for "Daughters and the Exotic"

I'm glad to hear that your game doesn't intend to have such explosive loot as PoE! Mine doesn't either :)

Regarding the elif vs else thing, I completely understand playing it safe, and I think that that is always the best option when you aren't sure of something. You can always experiment with minor changes later, or with a smaller, separate program to compare exactly how things function.

This is another way you can interpret what your if/elif is doing:

if(i == 'nothing')
->...
else
->if(i != 'nothing')
--->...

When the "if" condition fails, the program is still falling into the binary "else" clause (because you are using "elif" or "else if"), but you are not leveraging it and are basically doing this:

if(i == 'nothing')
->...
if(i != 'nothing')
->...

So, the "else" aspect of "elif" is not being utilized, but it is still being executed. Which is perfectly fine!

I believe I did this same kind of thing when I was first using if/else statements, or I literally just chained "if" statements with no "else" or "else if" :x

Sometimes, and this may seem crazy at first, but you will feel like a coding genius for knowing when you can pull it off while everyone else you know is still using their "training-wheels" with their if statements, you can actually eliminate "elif" or "else" altogether and simply have an implied else. And actually, because you are using hard breaks, you should be able to do this:

if(i == 'nothing')
->break
// do whatever you do when (i != 'nothing) and break
// this will act like an "else" block
// it can only execute when the "if" condition fails
// and this can only occur when i != 'nothing'
// the "if/else" structure for connoisseurs

I am surprised by your "dreaded while loop" statement. I get where you are coming from; you have to be certain that the exit condition will always be met, no matter what. However, I would focus the dread more on the recursive aspect of the function. Infinite recursion is arguably much uglier than an infinite loop. A loop will spin in-place, not allowing the code to break-away from a specific area of execution; no doubt, this is a problem, and more so if there is a lot of resource usage going on within the loop, or if some array indexing is going on that could get out of bounds if unchecked (eep!). Recursion, however, will continuously inflate the function call stack, sort of like the function is cloning itself over and over again. Each time it calls itself, the program will execute a new instance of the function, and the previous instances will all remain on the call stack (still consuming all the resources that they independently need, such as their local variables), until the recursion reaches its stopping condition, and then the functions will, starting with the most recent function call, begin to "unravel" and release their resources one by one. You must kind of sort of know this already to be making use of recursion. But most people who are not entirely confident with if/else functionality are not going to be using recursion, at least not intentionally, or even have an idea of what recursion is.

Bah, I assumed integer use only.. Freaking Python. How is a guy to know wtf kind of variable anything is when nothing is explicitly specified?! I see variables, but I see no variable types! This is MADNESS!! (my perspective is from C++ and Java, where variables are all explicitly declared; and damnit, I don't think I would have it any other way!) Still my fault for making assumptions!

Regarding the text file storing of items; I don't see why that would be a bad idea. My only advise there would be to try to keep your reading/writing to the file during program execution to the minimum possible. It has been a long while since I messed with file input/output. I remember it being kind of tedious to setup but, once setup, and stress-tested for issues, it was smooth sailing and a satisfying accomplishment.

Unfortunately, I don't have any experience with game engines, graphics, or networking tools. Your thread kind of got me inspired to research tools I could use to make my game (or microscopic demo of something resembling a game) graphical, but I quickly got scared and decided to keep the game text-only; by doing so, I am forced to focus on only the raw game mechanics and framework. Maybe, if I ever get to a certain point of development, I can find a magician who can help me with the graphical side of things.

I'm glad someone with some actual coding knowledge has come to this thread, and also that you've found it inspiring for your own game creation, Perfect_Black. That's thoughtful you putting it in a spoiler, so as not to detract from bearcares' diary. Good idea. A lot of what you have posted so far would require me or any layperson to look up the terms and really study it; I'm content to just read it and know something technical is going on. Really, people getting into a creative subject online in a forum like this and not arguing about something or the other is always a pleasure to witness, one needn't understand everything about it. Of course the more you know, the more fine criticism can be made, and also a sense of just what is involved enjoyed, by virtue of having done it.

A magician sounds like just the thing, when you do make yours.

Blizzard from WoW on is too MLP + Breughel that hasn't been restored properly for my liking.

They look like they belong to him, as described, and also like he has some anime influence there.