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Thread: book advice

  1. #1
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
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    England
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    book advice

    Hi all,

    I am looking for advice on books about certain aspects of Flash.

    I have been saying for about a year now that I want to step up to the next level and dive into the world of Flash gaming. My Actionscript isnt fantastic but I feel I understand it enough to move up and try a new challenge and hopefully I will develop a greater knowledge and experience in using the code by looking at flash games. Now that I am working there is a chance I will need to use XML with Flash too and this also interests me, but I dont know what books are out there that are decent enough.

    I know alot of people I have asked have just said "oh you dont need books, tutorials are better" but I disagree. When I learnt HTML 6 or so years ago it was from scratch with just a couple of books - and now I feel I know that best of all. In comparison, I really learnt everything I know about Flash using forums, tutorials, and a range of books - mainly Actionscript bibles and things like that for reference - and I feel that I dont know the best way to code or create sites/flash stuff because different tutorials show different ways and so on and I am learning from my mistakes/experience rather than learning the fundamentals and principles in the first place.
    With things such as flash games and using XML, and i'm sure you will agree, it's much better to learn these from scratch the proper way. As i mentioned, I had been looking into Flash games about a year ago, but found there werent that many books that appealed to me/had good reviews or any reviews/books were too out of date. At the time I had Flash 8 and now I have CS3, but I am coding in AS 2.0. Most of the books I have seen are either for MX or MX2004, and I am assuming they would use AS 1.0 coding which really is a step backwards.
    I have been reading a book at work - Macromedia Flash MX Actionscript Fun & Games - which is a great book because it goes through all the different types of games you can build and gives you the code and explanations, but it uses code like on (release) instead of instanceName.onRelease() which, quite simply, puts me off buying the book.

    Ok so I have waffled on for ages but i thought I may as well write my situation at the start and hope that you lot can help me. I basically want to see what books people have for Flash gaming and using XML in Flash. Tell me what you think is a good book, which I should steer clear from, maybe the pro's and con's of the books you have used/bought on these subjects.
    I have had a book recommended to me - Foundation XML for Flash by FriendsOfEd - does anyone have this and if so, is it any good? Bare in mind I am a complete beginner at both the flash gaming and the Flash/XML side of things and I would like to be eased in but I dont want to waste my money buying book after book and hoping it will be the one!
    I have also seen a book on Flash gaming in Flash 8, this is the link - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Macromedia-F...8817580&sr=8-1

    It appealed to me last year but I was put off buying it by the lack of reviews and the price too. Does anyone have this book, is it any good? What other recommendations do you have?

    I want to code in AS 2.0 on the timeline, not put code on the stage etc, which is what put me off buying the Flash MX book I mentioned above even though the content looks excellent. I know i can change the code myself but I dont want to spend time going through the book and spend extra time working out the correct way of writing the code, I want to learn it properly first time. I hope i dont sound too stubborn! - I just know what I want, or at least i know i havent found it yet.

    I hope you can all help me, ideally I would like to have a big list of books to choose from.

    Thank you in advance

    Spag
    Last edited by spaghbol; 09-03-2007 at 11:18 AM.

  2. #2
    Student
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    puh,- what a long text,I skipped some parts

    I really can recomend any Colin Moock they are a very good Dictionary for all Actionscript topics you want plus several examples on each element with hidden tricks.

  3. #3
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
    Location
    England
    Posts
    137
    yeah i apologise for the long message lol.

    I have Moock's Actionscript for Flash MX Definitive Guide and the Visual Quickstart and Quickpro guides for Flash 8 - they are excellent - and thats the standard of book i am looking for to learn XML-ing with Flash and gaming

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