Hello to all the new coders and maybe experienced developers whoâve come across this topic!
Introduction
At the beginning of your coding journey, itâs not worth stressing over finding the most optimal way of doing things right from the start. Instead, focus on practicality and getting something working first. You can always refactor and optimize your code later on. As you learn more, youâll naturally start writing efficient code from the beginning, but perfection is an ongoing journey.
Good coding is so much more than just syntax. At its core, a program is a set of instructions with logic gates. When making an algorithm, its quality is judged based on its complexity and correctness. These terms might sound intimidating, but you donât need to worry about them while youâre making a game in Roblox as a beginner. So, just enjoy learning and experimenting, and have fun while creating.
Core Advice
Iâve worked out some pieces of advice to help you grasp important concepts. I will not cover everything, but here are some key points to consider:
Try Small Ideas, Try What You Learn: Donât attempt the most ambitious project right from the beginning. Instead, create as many prototypes as possible. You can create unlimited places, so take advantage of that! If you learn something new that seems non-trivial, try it out immediately with some lines of code. Without experimentation, your newly acquired knowledge wonât stick.
Donât Reinvent the Wheel; Know the API: Avoid reinventing the wheel; itâs an unoptimized approach for beginners. As a novice, you have much to learn, so use available resources to help achieve your goals. Set your ego aside and actively search through forums or use the search bar in your browser. Additionally, use and read the API! Roblox Studio is packed with features, and understanding the API is crucial for exploring all possibilities.
Leverage Free Models: Building on point 2, make use of free models. If someone else has done the work in scripting or asset creation that meets your needs, utilize it as a learning tool.
Keep Your Knowledge Current: Be active within forums and stay up to date with newly released updates and current best practices. Sometimes, just being part of the community can yield insightful information.
Write Clean and Documented Code: Just because you are new doesnât excuse lazy coding practices. There is much literature on how to write clean code. Comment your code for others and yourself. While it might be understandable now, it may not be months later after multiple projects. Be concise with comments. Also, clean code with good variable names should be self-explanatory.
Learn to Debug Your Code: Debugging is a key competency for any programmer. Use Roblox Studioâs debugging tools, like the Output panel and breakpoints, to track down and fix bugs in your code.
Additional Resources
In addition to the tips and advice provided, here are some useful resources that can further support your development as a Roblox programmer:
These are some very good pointers, so good job!
Only place I disagree with is making small projects, first off, not to sound rude, but lets be honest, no one actually wants to make small projects, we say you should honestly the majority of us probably didnt make small projects
And also you can learn much more from making big projects, as long as you have the mental capacity to watch them fail, you can learn a lot of skills you need later like actually managing a big game and more!
Honestly I feel like new programmers should be reinventing the wheel so they understand why that âAPIâ works the way it does or at least a good idea of how it works. Now what they shouldnât do is throw it out as something theyâre selling or some âBRAND NEW BLAZING FASTâ x, y, z package because that is extremely counter productive and clutters the os ecosystem imo. Everything else is valid
I agree with this, but something that should be there is performance.
Performance and disconnecting functions, limiting some practices, etc. Is such a massive part of scripting that people NEED to know.
While I agree with you, I think this is more a detail that develops over time as you become a more advanced developer.
However, your point stands strongly and should definitely be included in a discussion about good coding practices. As Iâm currently thinking of topic ideas, this could definitely serve as inspiration. Thank you!
been 7 years around as a developer, doing mostly scripting, this is what i recommend you:
learn real programming if you want to make great games. Use lua not only for Roblox Studio, try coronalabs.com and love2d.org to really level up as programmer and be ahead of others in this platform.
it takes a lot of effort to become good with a skill, if you feel like something is easy, odds are that you not really learning and probably feeding on misinformation. Because learning is not easy, it takes a lot of conscious efforts to burn something in your memory, and that is what will build your confidence as a game developer.
figma is great. Itâs the best UI design software for Roblox Studio. You can make AAA quality Interfaces in figma and easily import them to Roblox.
search for GenP in reddit. Will teach you how to install adobe software properly.
use BeepBox to make music. You can definitely make sfx and songs for classic games like fnaf etc, it has a lot of potential. Just make sure to not scratch the surface and rate it as bad.
read articles to learn new things and improve your games
always take free resources in this garbage forum, donât listen to advice outside of this forum because very often itâs unreliable information. When information is reliable you will see that itâs a link back to this forum.
Roblox wont teach you real programming, you should look for that elsewhere, a great website is www.learncpp.com will you teach what variables truly are and will clear many doubts that come from the lack of solid teaching material here in the platform, for example, memory allocation and garbage collection.
if you need to learn computer science concepts you should take a look at www.CS50.ai Itâs a very reliable and smart programming AI that can quickly explain you a concept that you have just encountered. Itâs way more reliable than google and faster to obtain answers.
Really good post. I agree with everything said on here. The next time I see someone on how they can get started on developing on ROBLOX I am going to send them this forum post!
