Dark Basic Professional

A lot of developers like to create and then self-publish their games, offering them for sale from their web sites. One such high-class example written in DarkBASIC Professional is 3D Mahjong. The quality level of graphics, sound and extreme playability showcase perfectly just what DarkBASIC Professional is capable of.

This version of DarkBASIC Professional is ideal for those of you who don't need the printed manual and can get by with the built-in help files. The help files list all of the commands by category and are available from within the editor at the touch of a key. Because there are no packages to send, you get the same programming language at a vastly reduced price and without the usual wait for the mailman to deliver your goods.

There are two versions of DarkBASIC Professional On-line. One is 11 MB and the other is 90 MB in size. When you order you will be given download links to BOTH versions - it is up to you to decide which one you prefer. So if you currently use a modem at home then you can start with the 11MB one, but should you upgrade to broadband then you can login to your account at any time and download the 90MB version too. There are no restrictions on this.

All of the help files are intact, but in the 11MB version especially most of the showcase examples have been removed to save space in the archive. This means when you view a help page and click "Load showcase example" most of the time you will not have that example to view. The 90MB version includes a lot more of these example files, but still not the full amount included with the boxed CD version.

3D Engine features:

Binary Space Partitioning (BSP), Potential Visibility Set, Pixel & vertex shaders, Real time shadows, True reflections, Lights, Matrices, Advanced terrain, Multiple camera views, Particle system, Lightning fast 2D sprites, Polygon collision detection, Bump mapping, Light mapping, Environment mapping, Multitexturing, Bone based animations, Cartoon shading, Rainbow rendering, Low level access of object data, Vector and matrix manipulation.

2D features:

Super-Fast 2D Sprites, Mirror, Stretch and Blur, Fade, Transparency and Rotate, Screen-Sized sprites, Fast Collision, Animated Sprites, Gamma Control, Scale Sprites, 2D Drawing Functions.