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choas (quokk.au)
submitted 3 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago

No problem, just mention it in the requirements - early on. Not when everything is built to work this one specific way.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

mf said choas

[-] [email protected] 43 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

https://xkcd.com/1425

Alt text: In the 60s, Marvin Minsky assigned a couple of undergrads to spend the summer programming a computer to use a camera to identify objects in a scene. He figured they'd have the problem solved by the end of the summer. Half a century later, we're still working on it.


Edit: seems I'm the third person to comment this! :')

[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

I love how this is actually an example of progress. These days, ML can be used for this kinda thing and it's not too bad at it even.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

"Cat? Dog? Pig? LOAF OF BREAD. SYSTEM ERROR!"

https://youtu.be/LaK_8-3pWKk

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[-] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago

The giant is easy. The ground is easy. The lava though... Do you want the particles to stick together? To visually connect? To collide with each other? To interact with dynamic objects?

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago

Design lead wants parting earth and flowing lava. Budget dictates static assets and baked in animations.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

The player will jump on it, what happens then?

[-] [email protected] 188 points 3 days ago
[-] [email protected] 104 points 3 days ago

This comic is so old, that both should be rather easy now

[-] [email protected] 168 points 3 days ago

She did get her research team after all :)

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[-] [email protected] 56 points 3 days ago

Oh, yeah, the specific example listed was solved within roughly a month of the comic being posted. But the idea still applies, as seen with the twitter post above.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

TBF it had been a long standing problem for roughly a half century before this. Specifically birds were the thing researchers tried to identify first, which is probably the reference here.

[-] [email protected] 29 points 3 days ago

Well, sure, with an image classifier, the bird identification is doable. I'm sure I could implement that if I went looking for some open source thingamabob that does that. But it's still not something I could actually understand. That part definitely hasn't changed over the years.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

Ebird/ Merlin bird id does this wonderfully.

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[-] [email protected] 28 points 3 days ago

only because people never stopped asking it to be able to id birds.

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[-] [email protected] 17 points 2 days ago

Only in 3D. In 2D, you slap some pixels on top and there's your scarf:

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago
[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

I actually do, yes. Hundreds, if not thousands, of hours played and I made it down there and back out exactly once. 🙃

[-] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

Lol, I still died half way up my one orb run, so you're further than me. I save scummed right before Zot:5 and did get it on my second try, but that doesn't count.

It was a gnoll abyssal knight IIRC. What about you?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 21 hours ago

According to the screenshot I took, it was a gargoyle berserker with an axe. I had some ridiculous luck with armor drops, so basically every resistance was either maxxed or close to it. I only really got into trouble down in Zot:5...

And hmm, I should do more with Lugonu. I never really have a reason to pick him, but that means I also don't experiment with him, so I won't really learn what reasons there are to pick the guy...

[-] [email protected] 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I tend to find it's the other way around. Once you've got a scarf modelled and rigged, it'll work* for all animations, but for animated 2D sprites you have a lot more things to do.

* May have visual artifacts like clipping

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[-] [email protected] 93 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Well yeah, we have a character model for the giant demon and the giant demon has a huge use case.

A scarf? That's a model extension. Either you're asking me to create a whole new character with a scarf baked into the mesh that will deform weirdly as the character moves, or you're asking me to implement an accessory-anchor system all for the sake of a scarf (albeit other accessories might use this new framework) which will then need a physics/cloth sim to even look half good.

[-] [email protected] 26 points 3 days ago

You could import fabric physics and just have it lie there, but that's going to be a bigger hit on performance than you possibly can imagine and it will move weirdly (in large part becomes we're not modeling wind, just fabric in a vacuum) and the model features it will lie on top of won't deform accurately from the simulated weight, etc...

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[-] [email protected] 45 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Way back in the 90s I did a contract job at MS Research on a project called "V-Worlds" - a world simulator similar to the Doom or Quake engine, but it was browser-based and everything was a script, so changing how the world worked didn't mean you had to restart a server, just change the scripts and new stuff would appear right in front of you.

Anyway the concept of adding accessories to the player's avatar and even having a pet follow you around came up, and I remember there was an involved discussion of how difficult/impossible that would be. The player's avatar was a special object class that represented a user, and didn't have the same capabilities as ordinary objects in the world. I remember asking, "Why isn't the avatar just a world object the player happens to control? Then you could do all kinds of cool stuff like let the player transform into something else just by switching objects, or let another player run your character." Dead silence. I was just a contractor, what did I know?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

A browser based Doom or Quake engine world sim to run around playing with others sounds like such an awesome concept. I'd love that!! And in the 90"s no less. That would've been crazy impressive.

Microsoft and MMOs, man. I remember they were gonna make a really neat online fantasy one for the Xbox and canned it, too.

That's such a wild story. Thanks for sharing that with us! I wish they wouldn't have cold shouldered you like that...

Here's how I was imagining that went down the whole time I was reading it lmao. Just for you.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 23 hours ago

Wow, nobody's ever put me in a cartoon before. I'm honored!

It does kind of fit the situation lol.

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[-] [email protected] 57 points 3 days ago

Game director : we’re gonna add interact-able doors with proper door opening animations for the characters

The game designers:

The programmers and artists:

The producers:

[-] [email protected] 29 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Now we need to decide in the case of collisions if:

  • Doors violently push anyone out of the way, possibly "crushing" them into walls or
  • Force themselves back closed, turning any random NPC / obstacle on the other side into an unbeatable lock or
  • Just trap an unfortunate NPC in a corner on the other side, or
  • If they use the physics system to swing open, in which case they'll look smooth but possibly bonk the player/actor going through them a few times and could potentially (and comically) insta-kill them if physics is feeling grumpy.

The frustratingly comedic unintended results of any choice makes for great organic marketing though.

Gamedev is magical.

Aside: Know what did this really well though? Resident Evil games after RE:4.

The ability to "slowly quietly open", and then at any time decide to violently action-hero kick it open to send a zombie on the other side flying, was genius.

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[-] [email protected] 15 points 3 days ago

FROM Software: Fuck that, we're doing fog-walls.

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[-] [email protected] 25 points 2 days ago

There’s already a codebase for bursting from the ground in an explosion of lava. Everyone wants that.

You’re the first person asking for a scarf, and our system doesn’t even know what a neck is.

[-] [email protected] 14 points 2 days ago

Time for the old NPC-with-a-train-for-a-hat trick.

[-] [email protected] 44 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Always have to remind myself of this when managers ask me if something could be done. If it's easy, I naturally get a little annoyed that they're even asking. But knowing that is my job, not theirs, and it's good that they ask. There's lots of places where they assume and things go badly.

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[-] [email protected] 62 points 3 days ago
  • "Can you make the player be able to summon a monster from the fifth dimension?" "Yes ok ez lol"
  • "Can you make the player able to exist in the world without having it fall though the ground?" "You are asking too much mate"
[-] [email protected] 30 points 3 days ago

Player: Can you make it so that a 3 inch drop won't kill me?

DayZ Standalone dev: .........

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[-] [email protected] 28 points 3 days ago

I just want a game that lets my avatar be left handed.

[-] [email protected] 36 points 3 days ago

As a gameplay programmer, I got anxiety from reading this (and I think the animators are already in a fetal position on the floor)

[-] [email protected] 25 points 3 days ago

Can't you just swap x for -x. Run some unit tests just in case. We'll push to prod next Wednesday. Sound good? Got to dash, strategy meeting started 5 minutes ago. Seeyoubye.

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this post was submitted on 06 Jun 2025
1195 points (98.9% liked)

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