Great PyGame Tutorial Series
Every few months I try to take on a new project in my spare time. After many hours of racking my brain I came up with the idea that I would start playing around with some video game programming. The way I look at it, I play enough games to know what makes a good game good and a bad game suck. Plus this will give me an opportunity to learn something new while keeping my Python skill set up to date.
Searching around the net it was clear that PyGame tends to be the most referenced package for game programming in Python. I also recall sitting in on a PyGame talk at PyCon07 in Texas, which was rather interesting. So PyGame it is. Next step: Find a good tutorial to give an in depth overview.
You might think that the tutorials on PyGame’s site would be a good place to start…or not. I read through a few of the tutorials and after reading them didn’t feel I knew anything more about PyGame then when I started. Sure they tell you about setting up a Surface and show you how to get an eventloop running, but they all seem to assume some preexisting PyGame knowledge, as if by divine intervention we all know the inners of this module. Some tutorials even require that you read other “beginner” tutorials so that you can follow along. I just don’t get it.
Somehow, I don’t know how, I stumbled upon lorenzod8n’s blog and found he had posted a mini-series of PyGame tutorials. THESE TUTORIALS ARE THE BEST I HAVE FOUND. Not only do they show you the basics of PyGame, but they also assume no prior module knowledge..just what I needed. If you like to have everything spelled out for you and don’t want to have to jump through hoops to get the info you need on PyGame, check ‘em out.
Tutorial 1
Tutorial 2
Tutorial 3
…more to come on my adventures in game programming!
Lorenzo E. Danielsson said,
December 6, 2007 at 2:48 am
Well, well, what can I say? I’m happy you like my tutorials. I have planned to write a lot more of them. I’ve been going through a slightly rough patch on the personal side of life for a while, but I’m slowly getting back to myself. So expect pygame tutorial #4 soon. I’ve started drafting it already.
If the turorials really are useful to people it really makes me happy. That is why I write them after all. But I must say I’m surprised. I never imagined getting response at all. Now several people have told me they use my tutorials, and I hear they may even be translated. I really don’t know what to say..
I am not a fast learner myself. I have been programming for most of my life, but it took me a long time to really “get it” (not sure if I have still). Maybe that’s why I “spell everything out”: I got frustrated with beginner tutorials that assumed a lot of pre-knowledge that I just didn’t have.
Anyways, good luck on your journey towards game programming. The only two piece of advice I can give is “don’t give up”. If you hang in there you’ll eventually be able to write the games that you want. And don’t listen to other people if they tell you that you can’t.
Oh yeah, just one more piece of advice: enjoy the ride!
Michael said,
November 8, 2008 at 11:36 am
Very nice tutorial – I already know a little bit of python but still itoccured very useful!
Joe Cool said,
October 21, 2009 at 8:20 am
useful, of course because it acually starts from the beggining, not in the middle like all other tutorials i have found so far…