In Review

Congratulations! You survived another week. This week you learned about user input, sound, and Java debugging, in addition to writing a couple of games along the way. Let's look at what you did each Chapter in a little more detail before you embark on your final week of Java game programming.

Chapter 8

On Chapter 8, you learned about user input and how it is used in games. You learned about the two primary input devices supported by Java (the keyboard and the mouse) and various issues associated with each. Although it was fairly brief, this lesson gave you the background necessary to understand how user input works in Java games.

Chapter 9

Chapter 9 presented the details of how Java supports user input. More specifically, it showed how to handle user input events generated by the user manipulating input devices. You began by learning about input events and how they are managed in Java by the awt. You then learned how to trap keyboard and mouse input events, culminating in an animated sample applet-Flying Saucer.

Chapter 10

On Chapter 10, you wrote your first complete Java game-Traveling Gecko. Traveling Gecko incorporated practically everything you learned throughout the prior nine lessons, including animation and user input. In developing Traveling Gecko, you learned the importance of fully designing the game before beginning the development of Java code. This strategy served your purposes well and is emphasized throughout the rest of the guide.

Chapter 11

In Chapter 11's lesson, you learned about the fundamentals of sound and how sound is used in games. You began by learning the basics of digital sound and the sound format supported by Java. You moved on to learning about how sound is used in games. You then saw some popular sound editing tools and utilities, and you finished up by learning how to create, edit, and find sounds for games.

Chapter 12

Chapter 12 presented you with the specifics of how to play sounds in Java. You learned that Java's current sound support, although still fairly rudimentary, is enough to provide pretty neat sound effects for games. You finished up the lesson by developing a sample applet, WildAnimals, that showed off Java's sound capabilities.

Chapter 13

Chapter 13 marked another major milestone in your quest to become a Java game programming expert: You wrote your second complete Java game-Scorpion Roundup. Scorpion Roundup incorporated much of the information learned thus far, including animation, user input, and sound. Hopefully, with the development of Scorpion Roundup, you started to feel more confident in your skills as a Java game programmer.

Chapter 14

You finished up your second week of Java game programming with a lesson on debugging. This lesson presented some basic strategies for tracking down and eliminating bugs, along with some thoughts about bugs specific to games. You'll certainly find that bugs are as unique as the games they reside in, so think of this lesson as a starting point in your journey toward bug-free Java game development.