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just got DB a little while ago, haven't had too much time to go through tutorials yet, but it seems that most people have the opinion that the purpose of using Dark Basic is for small time projects and mostly for hobby but if you want to create real games you need to use the higher end programming languages.

(please excuse the fact that this will be a pretty big post)

the questions:
1. what are the limitations of Dark Basic?
2. what are the game speed concerns?
3. people have commented on the fact that the modeling is a limitation, but what if you use a seperate model / animation program?
4. what are the limits of game size that are to be considered using Dark Basic?
5. what are the limits of AI and how far can you go within Dark Basic itself?
6. can you set up the software like a professional game (within the program folder having the EXE file as well as the supporting files and having the rest of the files on CD so that the program intsalls the core program but as game play advance it references the cd for the information it needs)?

7. what is the highest level of game that you can produce using Dark Basic?


now that i have gotten the questions out of the way, i will tell you a little about myself and the way I view the world.(just to get an idea of where i am coming from)

i am a very detail oriented individual. i have been a musician for over 20+ years, i have gone to filmschool, and i cannot be simple in anything i do. oh yeah i am also a taurus so that makes me stubborn especially when someone tells me something cant be done. when i attended filmschool everybody kept telling me to start with a short film so i can develope a sense of the storytelling process. well, that was enough for me to really understand that i cannot be half-a**ed about anything because everytime i sat down to write a short script, i ended up with pages of synopsis for a feature film (i actually have a couple in progress right now) and i have a completed script that i will be going into production this year under my own production company. i just can't do anything small. as a musician i was part of the San Diego music scene in the early 90's and when people kept telling us that the only way to get an album recorded, distributed and a tour together, you needed to get signed to a major label. well, we started our own record label. recorded our own full length album, set up our own tour up the west coast and to the midwest playing everywhere in between. played shows with Bad Religion, Green Day, the Offspring and many others. all that because we were told we couldn't do it. 2 years after the band broke up we were still receiving requests and orders for our album in Russia, Japan and other places that we had to reissue the album just to fill the orders. i have made a hand drawn animated short (3 min) in 8 hours total. that includes drawing each frame on a page (no cels), filming each frame and editing. (all within 8 hours)

all this because everybody puts odds against things as being impossible to do.

i look for exploitable advatages within the limitations themselves to focus on doing something new. and now i have found Dark Basic.

I hope that i am not coming across as an ego head. because i am not. i am a very humble person that looks at limitations as a means to push the boundaries. but i am not self sufficiant either. i believe in team work and hopefully being the catalyst for others to take my stubborness towards limitations and create limitless achievments out of what used to be roadblocks.

that is the basis of why i have asked the 7 questions above. i understand that everything has a starting point and that you need to learn the basics first. i also know that there is a community of people out there that have started and been roadblocked by the so called limitations.

as someone new to Dark Basic and someone who was never good in math, i am approaching Dark Basic with the eyes of a filmmaker and someone who has played the high end games out there. (Vice City, knights of the old republic, Call of Duty)

i purchased Dark Basic for the same reason most of you did. you played games that you really enjoyed and you felt the creativity within you telling you that "YOU CAN DO THAT BUT TAKE IT EVEN FURTHER"

i will start with the 7 questions above as my starting point. when they are answered, i will have more along the lines of "Why?" or "What if we did this to make up for that" at the end i bet what was once thought of as limitations will then be looked at as strengths.

please if anyone can answer the 7 questions above or any part of them it will greatly help, not only me but anyone else who comes to Dark Basic with the same intention and passion that brought us here in the first place.

Thank You

because wasn't that the programmers intention in the first place to bring a programming language to the non-programmer to let their creativity soar? to say "YOU CAN DO IT?"

Ok this is a pretty big post and that's why I'm guessing no one responded. So I'm going to just answer the 7 questions you asked:

1. There are a lot of functionality limitations but you might not run into any of them, depending on the kind of game you are making.
2. DB has serious issues with speed any time you combine 2d and 3d graphics. One way to avoid this is to texture plains with 2d images and lock them on the screen instead of using PASTE IMAGE.
3. There are a lot of good modelers that work with db. I use 3d Canvas and some DOGA L3. Doga is not true 3d modeling but its a good start and it gets the job done quickly.
4. There are no real limitations to game size, only your commitment.
5. As far as I know, there are no limitations to AI in DB, just your own skills.
6. You are going to want a 3rd party program to set up installers, but there are a lot of good free/cheap ones.
7. Not quite sure what you mean on this one. You can make any type of game. Your only real issues are speed concerns, and they lessen as computers get faster.

Hope some of that was helpful!