FLASH GAMES

COMING SOON...

We are creating a flash games directory that will allow anyone to add free games to their site, blog, or even their MySpace profile. Sorry, but you'll have to be patient. This service will not be available until September...

In the meanwhile, check out a few of the games you will see here.

CREATE YOUR OWN GAME

Poodwaddle is building this tutorial for Flash game enthusiasts. Follow these lessons over the next few months as we develop a basic pong game. I am a firm believer in the value of brevity, therefore each lesson contains only the essential instruction, minus clutter and rhetorical info.
To the side you can find a list of Flash Games. Some are our own creation. Others are favorites from other authors. Each opens full screen in its own window, uncluttered by excessive ads. You may submit your own creations or suggestions of favorites, however all submissions must pass a strict quality and content review. If you wish to download these games for your own site, right click and choose Save Target.

FLASH INTERFACE

Familiarize yourself with the Flash interface. The following image is taken from Flash 8. However, Flash MX and Flash CS3 have similar interfaces. Highlight areas of the image below to learn their function.

PLANNING

The larger and more complex a game is, the more thoroughly it needs to be planned before programming. Our game will be fairly basic therefore it will require simple planning. We need to create 2 paddles and a ball, the script to manage their motions, and perhaps sound effects. We will need a loading counter, an opening screen, the game screen, and a game over screen. If we were creating a complex game we might want to create a list of the objects we will need to create and organize them in directories. Our game will only have a handful of objects.

SETTING THE TIMELINE

The timeline across the top of the page shows the frames of the movie. In Flash game programming these frames will serve to hold the various screens. Frames can be left blank if the content of the layer does not change. Frames that contain objects are called keyframes. Whenever you want to add objects to a frame, you must have a keyframe. If you try to add objects to an empty frame it will actually be stored back at the previous frame

FLASH DRAWING TOOLS

Before jumping into game programming with Actionscript you gotta learn how to draw. Flash includes several easy tools. Explore the Toolbox (usually located on the left side of the Flash window). I wont explain the function of each tool but trust that you can learn by tinkering. As you experiment take special note of the properties of each tool. In some versions of Flash double-clicking a tool will display more properties. Try double-clicking the rectangle tool.
There are 2 selection tools (the black arrow and the white arrow). The black arrow selects entire objects. The white arrow selects the individual points that comprise a shape or line. There are several other functions for these tools which again are best learned by tinkering. Try grabbing and dragging an unselected line with the black arrow. It should cause the center to bow in the direction of the drag. Also try holding down Alt or Shift key while dragging a point with the white arrow. This should cause the point to round.

MORE TO COME...

Check back tomorrow. We add more each day.