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Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide

Chapter 1. Installing Panda3D and Preparing a Workspace

It's time to take the first big step. In this chapter we're going to acquire Panda3D and get our work environment set up. Once we have all that done, we're going to take a look at the game we'll be creating over the course of this book.

In this chapter we shall:

Download and install Panda3D
Download and install Notepad++
Install all of the content necessary for the game
Demo the game we'll be creating
Install any optional tools desired
- Blender and Chicken
- Spacescape
- Explosion Texture Generator

There's no time to waste, so let's get cracking!

Time for action – downloading and installing Panda3D

I know what you're thinking: "Less talk, more action!" Here are the step-by-step instructions for installing Panda3D:

Navigate your web browser to www.Panda3D.org.
Under the Downloads option, you'll see a link labeled SDK. Click it.
If you are using Windows, scroll down this page you'll find a section titled Download other versions. This book is written for Panda3D version 1.6.2, which is the most current stable version at the time of writing. Find the link to Panda3D SDK 1.6.2 and click it. If you aren't using Windows, click on the platform you are using (Mac, Linux, or any other OS.). That will take you to a page that has the downloads for that platform. Scroll down to the Download other versions section and find the link to Panda3D SDK 1.6.2, as before.
When the download is complete, run the file and this screen will pop up:
Click Next to continue and then accept the terms. After that, you'll be prompted about where you want to install Panda3D.
The default location is just fine. Click the Install button to continue. Wait for the progress bar to fill up. When it's done, you'll see another prompt.
This step really isn't necessary. Just click No and move on.
When you have finished the installation, you can verify that it's working by going to Start Menu | All Programs | Panda3D 1.6.2 | Sample Programs | Ball in Maze | Run Ball in Maze. A window will open, showing the Ball in Maze sample game, where you tilt a maze to make a ball roll around while trying to avoid the holes.

What just happened?

You may be wondering why we skipped a part of the installation during step 7. That step of the process caches some of the assets, like 3D models and such that come with Panda3D. Essentially, by spending a few minutes caching these files now, the sample programs that come with Panda3d will load a few seconds faster the first time we run them, that's all.

Now that we've got Panda3D up and running let's get ourselves an advanced text editor to do our coding in.

Installing optional tools

There are a couple of optional tools that you can get for free and are worth pointing out. These tools are great for specific things, but none of them are strictly necessary for this book since all of the content they create is provided with the book. Nevertheless, we'll mention them here and provide tutorials on using some of them in the appendices for later projects when you've finished this book and need to create your own content for your own games. Since these tools are optional we won't go step-by-step through their installations, but we will tell you where you can find them.

Blender and Chicken

Blender is an open source, free to use, 3D modeling and animation package based in Python. It's a full service package that's quite powerful and even used in some professional studios. Furthermore, it has an active community and lots of tutorials available on the web to help get new users up to speed with the program. A significant portion of the Panda3D community uses Blender to create their 3D content as well.

Another feather in Blender's cap isn't part of the core package but bears mentioning. That is Chicken, a plug-in for Blender that exports models and animations in .egg files, one of the formats that Panda3D uses. Chicken let's you directly export from Blender to Panda3D without any intermediate conversions, and if you have experience with game development you know how nice that sort of simple pipeline from content creation to implementation really is. If you don't have that experience, then take our word for it. It's really nice.

You can find Blender, and some Blender tutorials, at www.blender.org. Blender v2.5 introduces some major changes that Chicken is not currently compatible with, so it may be wise to get an older version. Blender is available in executable installers, and all the default options work just fine. Do note that Blender doesn't come with Python like Panda3D does. To get the most out of Blender, install the version of Python it requires. For example, Blender v2.49 requires Python v2.6. The version of Python that comes with Panda3D is v2.5, so that won't work. Also, the latest version of Python at the time of this writing, v2.7, also won't work. Python does offer older versions on their website, and version 2.6.6 will work with Blender v2.49. Python also comes in executable installers, and again the default options are fine. Having both versions of Python on one computer won't cause any conflicts either. The Blender installer will direct us to the Python website when it fails to detect a Python version that it can use, but that website is at www.python.org if needed. Python documentation can also be found there.

You can find Chicken at http://chicken-export.sourceforge.net/. Chicken doesn't provide an executable installer, but the zip file that it does come in has a text file with installation instructions for various platforms in it. Note that in order for Chicken to work with Blender, the appropriate version of Python must be installed as noted in the previous paragraph.

Spacescape

The next optional tool was created by Alex Peterson and is used for creating sky boxes. If that's a new term to you, a sky box is basically a very large cube placed around an outdoor environment in a game that provides a backdrop. Spacescape in particular is designed for creating space environments, full of stars and nebulas. The nice thing about spacescape is that it exports all six of the images you need for a sky box, one for each face, and they are all seamless and virtually ready to use. For Panda3D, all you need to do is rename the files. Here are a few example of images you can make in Spacescape:

You can find Spacescape by searching for it on sourceforge.net or by going to Alex Peterson's blog at http://alexcpeterson.com/spacescape. Spacescape doesn't require any sort of installation, per se. All that's needed is to extract the zip file it comes in and place the folder that is contained in it somewhere on the computer. Once that's done, the program will run.

Explosion Texture Generator

This is another tool created by a single author, a gentleman by the name of Sascha Willems. Explosions are pretty common in video games but creating a series of images to turn into an animated "movie" of an explosion can be a real pain. This tool makes it much easier. All that's needed is to input a couple of values for the explosions before and the tool will produce a palette image with every frame of the animation you need. There's a good deal of customization available so you can create gobs of different explosion types. Also, the tool outputs .png files with the alpha already embedded in them, so you don't have to worry about what parts of the image need to be transparent. It's handled for you. Explosion Texture Generator can be found on Sascha Willems's web page at http://www.saschawillems.de/?page_id=253. Here's an example of the output this tool creates:

Like Spacescape, ExploTexGen doesn't require an installation. Just unzip the file and put the contents in a folder, then it will run as intended.

Key benefits

The first and only guide to building a finished game using Panda3D

Learn about tasks that can be used to handle changes over time

Respond to events like keyboard key presses, mouse clicks, and more

Take advantage of Panda3D's built-in shaders and filters to decorate objects with gloss, glow, and bump effects

Follow a step-by-step, tutorial-focused process that matches the development process of the game with plenty of screenshots and thoroughly explained code for easy pick up

Description

Panda3D is a game engine, a framework for 3D rendering and game development for Python and C++ programs. It includes graphics, audio, I/O, collision detection, and other abilities relevant to the creation of 3D games. Also, Panda3D is Open Source and free for any purpose, including commercial ventures. This book will enable you to create finished, marketable computer games using Panda3D and other entirely open-source tools and then sell those games without paying a cent for licensing. Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide follows a logical progression from a zero start through the game development process all the way to a finished, packaged installer. Packed with examples and detailed tutorials in every section, it teaches the reader through first-hand experience. These tutorials are followed by explanations that describe what happened in the tutorial and why. You will start by setting up a workspace, and then move on to the basics of starting up Panda3D. From there, you will begin adding objects like a level and a character to the world inside Panda3D. Then the book will teach you to put the game's player in control by adding change over time and response to user input. Then you will learn how to make it possible for objects in the world to interact with each other by using collision detection and beautify your game with Panda3D's built-in filters, shaders, and texturing. Finally, you will add an interface, audio, and package it all up for the customer.

Who is this book for?

If you are an independent developer interested in creating your own video games or other 3D applications using Panda3D for personal or commercial distribution at minimal expense, this book is definitely for you. A basic understanding of general programming, such as familiarity with the concept of a variable, is necessary. Some familiarity with object-oriented programming and the Python language is expected, but not essential. This book does not cover the creation of three dimensional models or similar art assets, nor does it cover the creation of two dimensional art assets or audio assets.

What you will learn

Create and use tasks

Respond to and handle events

Implement texturing with built-in shaders

Exercise collision detection

Implement a graphical user interface

Utilize the Panda3D animation system

Master the power and purpose of intervals

Add audio and use the OpenAL library

Understand garbage collection

Package the game into an installer

Use Spacescape and explosion texture generator to create certain art assets

What do you get with Print?

Instant access to your digital copy whilst your Print order is Shipped

Paperback book shipped to your preferred address

Redeem a companion digital copy on all Print orders

Access this title in our online reader with advanced features

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jn Jul 09, 2016

This is book is amazing! Great job.

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Amazon Customer Nov 22, 2011

if you want neat tutorial ..this is very good one, it's like its series name packteasy to read,thoroughly exacutable codes are all in.just follow it then you will know how individual developer can make some game in very short time.it's just good.it explains almost every cut to just develop game, means that introduce the very point to write game.quick way but friendly for beginner.if you know what variables means then enough for reading. it explains what is object in easy manner and what is constructor and destructor and why they are needed, etc.easy to understand enough to write game using Panda3D.if you had tried to learn some programming language ever before, this is very easy-to-follow tutorial, it's the orientation of this sweet book.thanks to author, thanks to python and Panda3D.

Stephen Arthur Rogers Apr 18, 2011

I purchased a copy of the Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide as an advanced tutorial, in an attempt to better learn the Panda3D game engine better and gain some practical experience in how to work with it. I had gone through the tutorials at the Panda3D website and while I felt they were good at teaching basic concepts, none of them really "tied it all together". As a personal aside, I'm old fashioned enough to prefer having a guide in hard-copy when learning how to do new things on a computer.The Guide pretty much does as advertised: it goes through the creation of a basic, single-level racing game from installation of the game engine through final packaging of a finished product. It uses an easy to understand writing style, includes step-by-step instructions of how to prepare the code (and then explains what exactly that code does) in relatively small chunks at a time, and includes instances where a coder can tinker with the knowledge they've just garnered. The end product is even reasonably enjoyable.As much as I enjoyed using the Guide, I can't give it a five-star rating. There is some significant errata in the book (at least, in the first printing); at several points it was necessary for me to refer to the author's code (provided at Packt Publishing's website) in order to proceed. Also, while the author does make it clear up front that production of art assets is not something the book covers, it would've been nice if a list of titles that do cover that topic had been provided. That's perhaps more of a personal gripe than anything else; it is clear fairly early on in the book that the final product is heavily dependent on the quality of the art assets.Still, overall this is a decent tutorial. Despite the few problems I had, I still learned much about Panda and feel it was worth the investment. I would recommend this book to anyone who, like me, is starting off with learning Panda.

Dominik Portmann Apr 26, 2014

The book itself is, concerning the content, a really well-written guide for first tries in the Panda3D engine. It explains the basics thoroughly in an understandable way. I recommend it for people trying to get started with Panda3D (yet it is another question how wise it is to get started with Panda3D).One star I deducted for the language. It is understandable but it contains too many mistakes in grammar and orthography.

Brad Oct 24, 2011

When I buy a book on a game engine, I expect an explanation on how the game engine works, its class heirarchy, the funciton interface to the classes. This book has none of that. The author just demonstrates how to load a 3D model of a rocketscooter and proceeds to show off his pathetic mathematics skill by adding his own functions for moving the models in 3D space. The reason Im giving this book 3 stars instead of 1 is that this is not the worst game programming book Ive seen, in fact I have yet to see a game programming book I would call good and worth recommending. The Panda game engine deserves better, it is the best option out there, free, open source, a full featured professional quality C++ engine that can be used to make professional games.

Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide: This is the A-Z of Panda3D for developers who have never used the engine before. Step-by-step, it takes you from first principles to ultimately creating a marketable game. You‚Äôll learn through first-hand experience and clear explanations.

What do you get with Print?

Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide

Chapter 1. Installing Panda3D and Preparing a Workspace

Getting started with Panda3D installation packages

Time for action – downloading and installing Panda3D

What just happened?

Switching to an advanced text editor

Time for action – downloading and installing Notepad++

What just happened?

Installing the game content

Time for action – demoing Suicide Jockeys

What just happened?

Installing optional tools

Blender and Chicken

Spacescape

Explosion Texture Generator

Summary

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Panda3D 1.6 Game Engine Beginner's Guide: This is the A-Z of Panda3D for developers who have never used the engine before. Step-by-step, it takes you from first principles to ultimately creating a marketable game. You‚Äôll learn through first-hand experience and clear explanations.

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