Post #1 · Posted at 2014-12-31 04:23:22pm 9.3 years ago
 playe | |
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Pretty much what the title says, I want to get into themeing now but have no idea where to start learning. I know LUA is probably a good idea but I know nothing of it.
Post #2 · Posted at 2014-12-31 04:40:51pm 9.3 years ago
| riskofsoundingnerdy | |
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| "Yeah, nah." | |
Knowing a bit about LUA is really useful for a start (Stepmania 5 is lua based) but you can also learn heaps other themes/themers. Having experience in theming for Stepmania 3.9 will get you a head start on the metrics but if you don't have prior experience with that it's better to learn from Stepmania 5.
Stepmania 5/docs has some really useful things from listed LUA functions to the very basics of theming like all of the required elements.
These websites have also been pretty useful for me at times:
http://kki.ajworld.net/wiki/Main_Page
http://rhythmarcade.com/wiki/stepmania/sm_395/theming/lua
Google and sites like this and stepmania.com have some useful info floating around too.
Hope this helps, good luck with your theming ventures
Stepmania 5/docs has some really useful things from listed LUA functions to the very basics of theming like all of the required elements.
These websites have also been pretty useful for me at times:
http://kki.ajworld.net/wiki/Main_Page
http://rhythmarcade.com/wiki/stepmania/sm_395/theming/lua
Google and sites like this and stepmania.com have some useful info floating around too.
Hope this helps, good luck with your theming ventures
Post #3 · Posted at 2014-12-31 05:00:52pm 9.3 years ago
| playe | |
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| 89 Posts | |
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| Reg. 2014-04-23 | |
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Wow thanks for the links risk, def gonna look these over and study them.
Will post more here if I need any help understanding some of this stuff.
Will post more here if I need any help understanding some of this stuff.
Post #4 · Posted at 2014-12-31 05:19:49pm 9.3 years ago
Depending on whom you ask, you'll receive various answers regarding this question.
I'll answer by telling you how I learned to theme. It's not necessarily the response you were hoping for, but it's the response you're getting. :)
The Story of How I Learned To Theme™
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
FIRST STAGE: Replacing Graphics
For me, theming kind of started years ago in the days of SM-SSC, when I decided to take two existing themes (default and Optical) and attempt to mash them together by transplanting graphics. I didn't know how to code, it wasn't a very successful endeavor, and looking back it's kind of embarrassing... But, at the time, I was modestly proud of such efforts.
After that, I would tinker around with Metrics.ini, changing various numbers and seeing if I could figure out how to add more speed mods. I still really had no idea what I was doing.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
SECOND STAGE: FGChanges in Songs
Eventually, I got curious about stepcharts with bundled FGChanges (scripted foreground effects), and looked at those. By this time, I was still unfamiliar with Lua, but I had taken one programming class at school, and could kind of make things happen by looking at other simfiles with foreground effects and doing similar but tweaked things. I didn't really appreciate it at the time, but songs with scripted foreground changes are like tiny little pieces of theming contained within a simfile.
I did a few small experiments like this, and eventually undertook something a little more substantial for a custom StepMania tournament.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
THIRD STAGE: Porting An Old Theme To StepMania 5
Though my efforts were hailed as creative and clever I still didn't really have any idea what I was doing. Complicating things, I thought I knew what I was doing. I could make graphics appear and manipulate them (move them around, grow/shrink them, hide them) and I thought that that was pretty much all there was to theming. So, in June 2013, I decided to try recreating a theme made for an older version of StepMania (Simply Love for SM3.95) in StepMania 5.
I kept at it a little bit each day, and slowly progressed, screen by screen, until I was satisfied and released it as a port. It took fifteen months of regular effort, but I learned a TON (about StepMania as an engine, about Lua as a language, and about long-term projects and their psychological toll) and am finally kind of almost competent with theming (I think).
So, five years after mashing two existing themes together in my basement one night, I can finally consider myself (more or less) a StepMania themer. I am designing an original theme for StepMania 5. It was a long road, and there's lots to learn, yet. There's still a ton I don't know! But I'm interested in learning and dedicated to the cause.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
EXTRA STAGE: What do you need?
So, what do you need to start theming?
You need time, patience, and dedication, first and foremost. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither are StepMania themes.
A knowledge of programming is critical. You don't necessarily need to know Lua specifically, because it's an "easy" language to pick up, but you NEED to know how to program. Do you know the basics of code? Variables, conditional branching, loops, functions? If you don't, I would recommend learning first, because otherwise, "you can't really do anything but change graphics, and a number of people have already done that with mixed results."
If you can't code yet, learn. Take a class or teach yourself .
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
ONE MORE EXTRA STAGE: Making a Theme
Once you meet those criteria, you might have what it takes. At that point, I'd recommend doing what I did. Look at existing themes, and start to modify them, bit by bit.
I would recommend not looking at "modern" DDR SM5 themes as examples because I've yet to see any that were cleanly-coded in a way that you would find helpful while learning...
Pick a screen, maybe the ScreenTitleJoin, maybe one of the attract screens, and modify things. Ask questions here when you get stuck. Keep trying, even when it seems hopeless. Learn. Remember to laugh occasionally. :)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Hopefully this helps more than it scares you away.
-dbk2
I'll answer by telling you how I learned to theme. It's not necessarily the response you were hoping for, but it's the response you're getting. :)
The Story of How I Learned To Theme™
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
FIRST STAGE: Replacing Graphics
For me, theming kind of started years ago in the days of SM-SSC, when I decided to take two existing themes (default and Optical) and attempt to mash them together by transplanting graphics. I didn't know how to code, it wasn't a very successful endeavor, and looking back it's kind of embarrassing... But, at the time, I was modestly proud of such efforts.
After that, I would tinker around with Metrics.ini, changing various numbers and seeing if I could figure out how to add more speed mods. I still really had no idea what I was doing.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
SECOND STAGE: FGChanges in Songs
Eventually, I got curious about stepcharts with bundled FGChanges (scripted foreground effects), and looked at those. By this time, I was still unfamiliar with Lua, but I had taken one programming class at school, and could kind of make things happen by looking at other simfiles with foreground effects and doing similar but tweaked things. I didn't really appreciate it at the time, but songs with scripted foreground changes are like tiny little pieces of theming contained within a simfile.
I did a few small experiments like this, and eventually undertook something a little more substantial for a custom StepMania tournament.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
THIRD STAGE: Porting An Old Theme To StepMania 5
Though my efforts were hailed as creative and clever I still didn't really have any idea what I was doing. Complicating things, I thought I knew what I was doing. I could make graphics appear and manipulate them (move them around, grow/shrink them, hide them) and I thought that that was pretty much all there was to theming. So, in June 2013, I decided to try recreating a theme made for an older version of StepMania (Simply Love for SM3.95) in StepMania 5.
I kept at it a little bit each day, and slowly progressed, screen by screen, until I was satisfied and released it as a port. It took fifteen months of regular effort, but I learned a TON (about StepMania as an engine, about Lua as a language, and about long-term projects and their psychological toll) and am finally kind of almost competent with theming (I think).
So, five years after mashing two existing themes together in my basement one night, I can finally consider myself (more or less) a StepMania themer. I am designing an original theme for StepMania 5. It was a long road, and there's lots to learn, yet. There's still a ton I don't know! But I'm interested in learning and dedicated to the cause.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
EXTRA STAGE: What do you need?
So, what do you need to start theming?
You need time, patience, and dedication, first and foremost. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither are StepMania themes.
A knowledge of programming is critical. You don't necessarily need to know Lua specifically, because it's an "easy" language to pick up, but you NEED to know how to program. Do you know the basics of code? Variables, conditional branching, loops, functions? If you don't, I would recommend learning first, because otherwise, "you can't really do anything but change graphics, and a number of people have already done that with mixed results."
If you can't code yet, learn. Take a class or teach yourself .
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
ONE MORE EXTRA STAGE: Making a Theme
Once you meet those criteria, you might have what it takes. At that point, I'd recommend doing what I did. Look at existing themes, and start to modify them, bit by bit.
I would recommend not looking at "modern" DDR SM5 themes as examples because I've yet to see any that were cleanly-coded in a way that you would find helpful while learning...
Pick a screen, maybe the ScreenTitleJoin, maybe one of the attract screens, and modify things. Ask questions here when you get stuck. Keep trying, even when it seems hopeless. Learn. Remember to laugh occasionally. :)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Hopefully this helps more than it scares you away.
-dbk2
Post #5 · Posted at 2014-12-31 05:51:50pm 9.3 years ago
| playe | |
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No actually any information helps man, even if it's how someone else started themeing I like to see a lot of different points of view to help me get started. I'm a pretty open minded guy.
I do actually have SOME coding knowledge, just not in LUA specifically (I coded a bot for a friend's twitch chat.) and looking at the LUA reference thing there's a lot of similarities between mIRC coding and LUA so that actually helps a lot. I do still want to go over it and look at the nitty-gritty LUA files in some themes just to see how things work.
I do actually have SOME coding knowledge, just not in LUA specifically (I coded a bot for a friend's twitch chat.) and looking at the LUA reference thing there's a lot of similarities between mIRC coding and LUA so that actually helps a lot. I do still want to go over it and look at the nitty-gritty LUA files in some themes just to see how things work.
Post #6 · Posted at 2015-01-01 11:23:01am 9.3 years ago
| Kyzentun | |
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| "I'm honestly pissed off." | |
As much as I like Consensual and prefer my code over almost everything I've read in almost any other theme, it's not what I would call a good reference for beginners. It's written to get things done, provide features to the player while reusing code and working abstractly wherever possible to make future changes and improvements easier. It's not written to explain anything to anyone, except in the rare cases where I needed to explain something to future me. Thus, it's likely to be very confusing to anyone trying to figure out how the pieces of a theme fit together. (the most well-hidden confusing part is probably the screen transitioning, no "NextScreen" metrics here!)
You're better off reading the examples in Docs/Themerdocs/Examples and trying them out. Those actually were written with the intent of explaining every detail they cover to new themers. There's a lot they don't cover, but at least they have explanations.
You're better off reading the examples in Docs/Themerdocs/Examples and trying them out. Those actually were written with the intent of explaining every detail they cover to new themers. There's a lot they don't cover, but at least they have explanations.