2006 PGD Annual: Stage 6 feedback

[Huehnerschaender]

Hi NecroDome.

Finished your game, too. Very nice work!

The endboss was nice, but he was not able to hit me when I stay in the middle of the screen between the shooting parts of his "turret". So the endfight was very easy, just don't move and shoot

I had another exception in level 2, but after clicking the message box away I was able to go on.



All in all a very nice work you made! Fast gameplay, nice graphics and tons of action.

[NecroDOME]

I'm trying to fix that... but the problem is: I don't know where the error is it seems thats i'ts almost random

[Huehnerschaender]

use try...except much... and handle errors your own way (logging etc). This way you will find it. And of course you could just prevent the messagebox from appearing (dirty way).

[NecroDOME]

How can I prevent the messagebox from appearing? (Code plz)

[AthenaOfDelphi]

One sure fire way is to hook the application.onException event.

The prototype is:-

procedure (sender:TObject;e:exception) of object;

Any unhandled exception else where in the code will be caught by this... or thats the theory. If you are using threads or anything like that, its not guaranteed.

What you do with the exception once its in there is up to you.

[Huehnerschaender]

Are you using Delphi?

If so, just place your render and processing calls in a try-except block and do nothing in except block.

try
  processgame;
except
end;

try
  rendergame;
except
end;

As I already mentioned, this is the dirty way. There always is a good reason for exceptions to be thrown. This way you just ignore it, even if the system gets unstable as a result of the error.

Greetings,
Dirk

[Huehnerschaender]

Yes, I'll be posting the final entries on the details page of the competition page. I'm going to be away at sea for the next 2 nights however, so I'll start it when I get back from that.

Hey WILL,

howsit? :lol:

[NecroDOME]

Thanks, I will try it when I update .S.C.A.G.

[savage]

Are you using Delphi?

If so, just place your render and processing calls in a try-except block and do nothing in except block.

try
  processgame;
except
end;

try
  rendergame;
except
end;

As I already mentioned, this is the dirty way. There always is a good reason for exceptions to be thrown. This way you just ignore it, even if the system gets unstable as a result of the error.

Greetings,
Dirk

Unless this has changed recently and IIRC, there used to be a speed penalty for wrapping code with try/except ( maybe even try finally ), especially in a render loop. I would suggest trying to find out what causes the AV and fixing that instead and only use a try except at the very top of the code hierachy.

[AthenaOfDelphi]

try...except does hit you with a speed penalty, but only if you make use of the except.

var
   count : integer;
   loop : integer;
   start : cardinal;

   fred : TLabel;
begin

     count:=0;
     fred:=nil;

     start:=getTickCount;

     for loop:=1 to 1000000 do
         begin
              inc(count);

              if &#40;fred<>nil&#41; then
                 fred.caption&#58;='Hello';
         end;

     memo1.lines.add&#40;'No Try &#58; '+intToStr&#40;getTickCount-start&#41;&#41;;

     count&#58;=0;

     start&#58;=getTickCount;
     for loop&#58;=1 to 1000000 do
         begin
              try
                 inc&#40;count&#41;;

                 fred.caption&#58;='Hello';
              except
              end;
         end;

     memo1.lines.add&#40;'Try &#58; '+intToStr&#40;getTickCount-start&#41;&#41;;
end;

This code snippet... the first loop executes in between 0-10 ticks, the second takes around the 270-290 tick mark. If all references to fred are removed, then they execute in the same time.

My quick test was compiled with Delphi 5 and was done on an Athlon 800.