Whoever said that didn't do a good job distinguishing between casual games and huge professional games. Presumably they would also say that Flash is too slow for making games, but that doesn't stop people from making Flash games.
My very rough estimate is that you can easily get Flash-level performance from python+Pygame, and with some work you can get better-than-Flash-level performance. You're unlikely to get C++-level performance without a lot of work, though. Python may be too slow to write Portal 3 or something, but I've never seen a Flash game that I thought python couldn't handle (if someone would write a good vector graphics library for it). -Christopher On Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 1:35 PM, Nick Arnoeyts <[email protected]>wrote: > Yeah, I'm probably worrying prematurely. > I'm very easily influenced by FUD and there are a lot of messages floating > around that Python (and Ruby) are too slow for making games. > > yours truly > armornick > > > 2011/11/23 Christopher Night <[email protected]> > >> I don't know why you would be concerned about performance in a visual >> novel game. Aren't they pretty undemanding? I haven't played these games >> very much, but isn't it just a series of still images (no animations) and a >> simple GUI? >> >> You might want to look at a pyweek entry called Gregor Samsa. I know that >> team put some effort into optimizing things and wound up with a respectable >> framerate even on mobile devices running Android: >> http://www.pyweek.org/e/tihoas/ >> >> But again, I feel like performance is the least of your concerns if >> that's your kind of game. If there's some specific thing you're expecting >> to cause low performance, maybe you can ask about it specifically. >> >> Good luck! >> -Christopher >> >> >> On Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 11:46 AM, Nick Arnoeyts >> <[email protected]>wrote: >> >>> Alright. Thanks for your reply everyone. >>> >>> I'm currently still working on a Ren'py project, but I'm probably going >>> to try pygame once that's finished. I'm mostly making visual novels, >>> though, so it's possible that I'm staying with ren'py until I reach its >>> limits. >>> >>> yours truly >>> armornick >>> >>> >>> 2011/11/23 stabbingfinger <[email protected]> >>> >>>> Hi, Armor Nick. >>>> >>>> Some common bottlenecks I've encountered: >>>> >>>> rendering many images per frame >>>> brute force collision checking >>>> computationally intensive logic and AI >>>> real-time image transformation >>>> heavy usage of images with SRCALPHA >>>> 2D and 2.5D layering >>>> particles >>>> >>>> These are easy limits to hit early on especially in scrollers, >>>> platformers, and bullet hell type games, or when you start adding >>>> environment and GFX. >>>> >>>> But there are clever techniques that pygamers have developed to deal >>>> with them in the form of cookbook recipes, libraries, and modules. Many >>>> issues can be easily mitigated by selecting a culling technique or two to >>>> reduce the number of things processed each game loop. >>>> >>>> Some people popping into IRC lately seem easily frustrated by these >>>> challenges, wanting an inefficient workload to just perform well. I can >>>> understand the sentiment. But I personally get an immense amount of >>>> pleasure from conquering these challenges. :) >>>> >>>> When I started pygame three years ago I was told you can't do a >>>> scrolling action-RPG: it's too much work for the CPU. Since then, computers >>>> became a significantly faster and several people have produced reasonably >>>> impressive action-RPGs, as well as other genre. >>>> >>>> For some examples one only has to look among the top places at >>>> pyweek.org, where pygame competes with the likes of pyglet, cocos2d, >>>> and rabbyt, all of which have the proclaimed advantage of 3D acceleration. >>>> It's become clear to me that for most hobby games the only real limitation >>>> is the resourcefulness of the programmer. >>>> >>>> I personally haven't yet hit a wall with Python or pygame that forced >>>> me to look at another framework or a natively compiled language, and I've >>>> done a few relatively ambitious projects. >>>> >>>> That may seem like a biased representation of Python's and pygame's >>>> capabilities, but I assure you it's not. A few times a year my eyes wander >>>> to other game development libraries or engines, but I keep coming right >>>> back to pygame. >>>> >>>> Hope that perspective helps. >>>> >>>> Gumm >>>> >>>> >>>> On Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 6:08 AM, Chris Smith <[email protected]>wrote: >>>> >>>>> You can use Renpy for graphic novels. SNES RPG's would be no problem. >>>>> For AI and other things, python might be slow but you will probably be >>>>> surprised how far you can go with it. It'll certainly be easier than going >>>>> the C++ route (although I'm not a C++ fan, to be honest... I'd use Lisp if >>>>> I needed the code to be faster). >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On 23 November 2011 21:47, Nick Arnoeyts <[email protected]>wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> I'm actually not quite sure what I'm going to write yet. Either an >>>>>> RPG in the style of SNES-era Final Fantasy, or a visual novel (if you >>>>>> know >>>>>> Higurashi or Clannad). I'm not (yet) interested in 3D and I would >>>>>> certainly >>>>>> do something like that in C++. >>>>>> >>>>>> Pygame is probably fast enough for the graphics, but I was wondering >>>>>> how performance would be for AI and other calculations. >>>>>> >>>>>> yours truly >>>>>> armornick >>>>>> >>>>>> 2011/11/23 Chris Smith <[email protected]> >>>>>> >>>>>>> You can't really compare the language C++ with the library Python. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> You could compare C++ / SDL with Python / Pygame, and probably C++ >>>>>>> would be faster (but maybe by not as much as you think)... but it would >>>>>>> certainly take a lot more time to write the code. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> As to what you can do with Pygame, well it is a 2D library that I >>>>>>> find fast enough for most things. In some ways I think Pygame is a >>>>>>> little >>>>>>> 'old-school': Pygame does not do a lot for you, but it gets out of the >>>>>>> way, >>>>>>> and perhaps most importantly, it's small enough to fit in my mind but >>>>>>> big >>>>>>> enough to do what I want. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Unless you develop as part of a team you need 3D, you are unlikely >>>>>>> to choose a project that Pygame cannot handle in some way. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Perhaps you could tell us more about what you wanted to write... >>>>>>> that would make it easier to tell you if Pygame could do this for you. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Chris >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> On 23 November 2011 21:07, Nick Arnoeyts <[email protected]>wrote: >>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Hey everyone >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> I was wondering what the limits of pygame performance are. What is >>>>>>>> the absolute maximum kind of game that can be written with it, and what >>>>>>>> kinds of things are better done in pure C++ than python? >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> This is probably a question that's asked periodically on the >>>>>>>> mailing list, so I apologize in advance. >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Yours truly >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> Armor Nick >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>> >>>> >>> >> >
