I am currently working on a 3D engine in AS3, I have designed it for the new upcoming Molehill API but I also want to render to the current AS3 graphics API. I thought that I would write a stack based implementation to render to the target DisplayObject. I then realised that I could essentially create an OpenGL API style interface to abstract my 3D engine from the actual rasterizing processes. (Just like any 3D engine built on OpenGL) This would also then allow other 3D engines to make use of the code as with any other imported library. Obviously there would be functionality handling the viewport, matrix stack etc, but a simple example my be:
AS3GL.begin( AS3GL.GL_TRIANGLES );
AS3GL.color3f(1,0,0);
AS3GL.vertex2f(0,0);
AS3GL.color3f(0,1,0);
AS3GL.vertex2f(.5,0);
AS3GL.color3f(0,0,1);
AS3GL.vertex2f(.5,.5);
AS3GL.end();
I wondered if anything like this already exists for AS3 that I could use, or if anyone has any detailed information about the inner state systems and/or stack implementations of OpenGL.
Adobe Mole here. What you want to do is very possible. You should start with reading old OpenGL specs. However please consider what you really want to do and why. As an educational exercise it is great to map tech from the 70s to a modern API. If you want to do a useful library or learn modern 3d, this is a dead end. One great thing about the Molehill API is that it does the right balance between a scripting language and GPUs: Use script to batch big chunks of triangle drawing. Doing multiple calls for every single vertex defeats that model.
I have decided to start this as a project myself, if anyone wishes to contribute please contact me. I have registered the site AS3GL.com and setup a google code repo ready for this. If anyone is able to send info about the stacks and inner workings of OpenGL, I would appreciate any info.
[EDIT]
This library became discontinued, but here is the GitHub repo for reference 'dev branch' https://github.com/Zest3D/as3gl/tree/dev
Related
I am creating a software for calculating gearbox parts using Swing and OpenGL (with JOGL).
With this software the calculated parts are shown in 3D. The following picture shows an example part:
At first the geometry is specified/calculated (tip/root Diameter, width, number of teeth...) and out of this data the 3D-part is created. This example part is made with JOGL-Code because it's easy to use for me and can be integrated in a Swing-GUI.
Now a played around a bit with JavaFX Application GUI's and decided to continue making my software in JavaFX because it offers everything i need, looks much better and so on. The problem is I can't use my JOGL-OpenGL graphics.
So here are the possibilities for me:
Search for a way to integrate OpenGL-graphics in a JavaFX-Application - but I googled a bit and this seems to be quite difficult and the possible solutions seem to be very slow.
Use JavaFX integrated 3D-graphics (TriangleMesh) - but this is difficult to understand and I can't find good examples to learn it.
Any other solution?
Can you please help me finding a good solution? What would you do? My favorite would be to continue using OpenGL, but is there any good solution for this yet?
If you are looking for some JavaFX 3D resources that may help you decide whether its already mature or not, these are available, among others:
3DViewer here from the OpenFJX project.
InteractiveMesh importers and browser.
F(X)yz, a new JavaFX 3D library that provides additional primitives, composite objects, controls and data visualizations that the base JavaFX 8 3D packages do not have.
Multimodel3DFX, repository contains the code for the example shown on the article "Building Castles in the Sky. Using JavaFX 3D to model historical treasures" published in Oracle Java Magazine, issue from November/Dicember 2014.
Using a PolyLine3D from F(X)yz and the Multimodel3DFX plaftorm I was able to extrude a 2D polyline of a spur gear, so you can see how it's rendered in a JavaFX 3D subscene:
These are also mathematical 3D models generated using the F(X)yz library, all of them based on TriangleMesh.
As you can see, JavaFX 3D API, with its pros and cons, can be easily extended to achieve complex tasks.
Here I see the following:
.... the team of Cocos2d-x are working on something called "Javascript binding for Cocos2d". What that means is your very same code running on Cocos2d-html5 engine can work flawlessly on Cocos2d-X and Cocos2d-iPhone without or with little modification. And all that translates to "almost native fast on mobile phones".
What I can not understnad is that how the code written in one language can be translated to another one? Do they mean that there is a tool that gets as an input JavaScript code of Cocos2d-html5 game and translate it to C++ Cocos2dx code or backwards?
EIDT: Can I port easily the C++ game written with Cocos2Dx into Cocos2D-html5? What I have to do for that?
Cocos2d-x and Cocos2d-html5 share the same Javascript API and are written to give developer an advantage to write your code in Javascript and it will work with both of these frameworks.
As for you second question, Cocos2d-html5 runs Javascript natively whereas Cocos2d-x uses SpiderMonkey (a Javascript engine written in C/C++ by Brendan Eich) to run your Javascript code.
Although, there is one important thing to consider. Developing games using native language and APIs takes less time, easy to debug and are easily expandable and maintainable. So, in my opinion one should use cocos2d-iphone if the game is only for iOS, cocos2d-x if the game is on multi-platforms and cocos2d-html5 only if the primary target of the game is web.
It means that both cocos2d-x and cocos2d-html use the same Javascript API. So under ideal circumstances the same JS code runs on html5 and another time with the -x engine.
However there can still be differences because behind the scenes the implementation may be subtly (or not so subtly) different with each engine. Also not all features (ie touch input, accelerometer, shaders) can be available on every engine. Hence the phrasing "with little modification".
But if your main target isn't web there's little sense in using the JS API because it adds an extra layer that makes it more difficult to debug code issues, and the overall performance suffers compared to writing directly (in C++) for -x.
Plead/Preparing for standard SO backlash
This is a generic question I apologize as I'm not an SO "noob" and I realize this doesn't fit the format exactly, if you can suggest a better place for this query I'm all ears. If you choose to down vote or close please suggest an alternative.
Question
Is anyone aware of projects that already generate a PSD file from within AS3?
Background (everything below here you may not care about if you just want to answer a question, but if interested I could use a hand)
I've found an AS3 PSD parser here.
For some basic tests this has worked fine (after some tweaking to avoid errors). However, now the task is to reverse this process to write a PSD file.
Current plan (and overall goal)
I also found a file format specification document.
My plan at this point is to just start from the top and work my way through the document building each of the parts of the file (and helper value objects) as I go along. Since this will be a very time consuming process, I'm wondering if there's any other previous work I could build off of.
Ultimately my goal is to integrate this code into a mobile drawing project I've been working on for some time. Since it's a mobile project I have to deal with the possibility that the OS kills my app to reclaim memory, in that case I need to be able to save/load the existing state of the app (currently has layers of BitmapData similar to photoshop, plus would be cool to be able to open PSD files and open my files from the device in photoshop with layers preserved).
Links to live version and code
The app can be downloaded here (is free will remain free, no ads, app is funded by love and the desire to create something cool everyone can have/use):
Google Play
Amazon App Store
Still working on an iOS release (process is more involved than the other two stores)
The code can be found here on github (Flash Builder project files in the FlashBuilderProject/FingerPainting folder).
Legal
Essentially the code contained in that repository is all MIT or Apache Licensed (will be going back to double each of the authors sites to get the original licenses to copy in now, just in case). I'm not a lawyer, but I believe I legitimately obtained everything in the project currently and am simply obligated to include the licenses and make my extensions of the source code available in some cases. (fonts came from google web fonts and downloaded Roboto from Google directly http://developer.android.com/design/style/typography.html). Any code in the com.shaunhusain package I wrote and you can assume is GPL for now. If anyone more legally savvy wants to tell me I'm breaking the law, and how, I would appreciate it.
The portions included and used from other sites include
Actuate MIT License
PNGEncoder2 License included in source from Adobe permits usage.
ShareANE I don't have a license for this one (he didn't include one) the author is chinese, as such I'm having some difficulty figuring out how to contact him, but am assuming I'm safe to use his code.
A couple of pieces of code are in the repository but currently not used including a GIF parser/encoder from bytearray.org and a ColorMatrix class from Grant Skinner.
Update
After trying this for a while I ended up deciding to just use the ORA format since it is open and far far simpler and works fine with GIMP and Krita (open source editors).
I'm not sure about the intended use, but if you are compiling the file in Flash, you might be able to use JSFL to export the fla to a PSD. Then tie the JSFL functionality to a button in a SWF that you load as a panel in the IDE. JSFL is pretty powerful, however it only works within the IDE/locally.
We're building a web-based application that requires heavy image processing. We'd like this processing load to be on the client as much as possible and we'd like to support as much platforms (even mobiles) as much as possible.
Yeah, I know, wishful thinking
Here's the info:
Image processing is rasterization from some data. Think like creating a PNG image from a PDF file.
We don't have a lot of server power. So client-side processing is a bit of a must.
So, we're considering:
Flash - most widespread, but from what i read has lackluster development tools. (and no iPhone/iPad support for now).
Silverlight - allows us to use .NET CLR, so a big ++ (a lot of code is in .NET). But is not supported for most mobiles ( rumored android support in the future)
HTML5 + Javascript - probably the most "portable" option. The problem is having to rewrite all that image processing code in Javascript.
Any thoughts or architectures that might help?
Clarification: I don't need further ideas on what libraries are available for Silverlight and Javascript. My dilemma is
choosing Silverlight means no support for most mobiles
choosing Flash means we have to redevelop most of our code AND no iPhone/iPad support
HTML5 + Javascript we have to redevelop most of our code and not fully supported yet in all browsers
choosing two (Silverlight + Flash) will be too costly
Any out-of-the-box or bright ideas / alternatives I might be missing?
This is the sort of issue that software architects run up against all the time. As per usual, there is no ideal solution. You need to select which compromise is most acceptable to your business.
To summarise your problem, most of your image processing software is written in .NET. You'd like to run it client-side on mobile devices, but there is limited .NET penetration on mobiles. The alternatives with higher penetration (eg. Flash) would require you to re-write your code, which you can't afford to do. In addition, these alternatives are not supported on the iPhone/iPad.
What you ideally want is a way to run all your .NET code on most existing platforms, including iPhone/iPad. I can say with some confidence that no such solution currently exists - there is no "silver bullet" answer that you have overlooked.
So what will you need to compromise on? It seems to me that even if you redevelop in flash, you are still going to miss out on a major market (iPhone). And redeveloping software is extremely costly anyway.
Here is the best solution to your problem - you need to compromise on your "client side execution" constraint. If you execute server side, you get to keep your existing code, and also get to deploy to just about every mobile client, including the iPhone.
You said your server power is limited, but server processing power is cheap when compared to software development costs. Indeed, it is not all that expensive to outsource your server component and just pay for what you use. It's most likely that your application will only have low penetration to start off with. As the business grows, you will be able to afford to upgrade your server capacity.
I believe this is the best solution to your problem.
Host you image processing on Amazon E2C, Azure, or Google. IIRC E2C has many common image processing problems packaged and all ready to go.
Azure probably more familiar ground in term of sharing code as a web service
You just pay for CPU cycles and transfers/storage etc
I'm sure there will be Silverlight and JS people posting examples. Here are some image editors written in actionscript:
Phoenix
PhotoshopExpress
There is an ImageProcessing library to start with.
Plus PixelBender is available in Flash Player 10, it's fast, it runs in a separate thread
and people do some pretty mad things with it.
HTH
Some help for the Silverlight part:
There is an Silverlight image editor called Thumba.
And Nokola recently made one called EasyPainter and he will also provide the source code in the furure.
For the image conversion I would recommend the open source library ImageTools that also includes some basic effects.
Silverlight has a class for pixel manipulation of bitmaps called WriteableBitmap. The open source library WriteableBitmapEx is a collection of extension methods for Silverlight's WriteableBitmap. The WriteableBitmap API is very minimalistic and there's only the raw Pixels array for such operations. The WriteableBitmapEx library tries to compensate that with extensions methods that are easy to use like built in methods.
Pixel Shaders can also be used to make some fast and advanced effects. Although they are limited by Shader Model 2 shaders can be used for fast bluring, tinting and such things.
DISCLAIMER: I consider myself as an advocate of the Flash platform. I admire Silverlights huge potential as a technology to deploy almost any .NET content through the browser, but it has low penetration, is horribly marketed and -although perceived as such by many (mostly people who don't know either Flash or Silverlight)- is no competitor of Flash, as much as Flash is no competitor of Sliverlight. The idealist in me loves the idea of doing everything in HTML+JS using a standard, instead of relying on 3rd party proprietary software. But the truth is, JS is slow and the API is limited, and implementations of JS, HTML and CSS are terribly inconsistent accross browsers.
If you really wanna stick to .NET and are so interested in targeting the iPhone and its siblings, then you might wanna check out MonoTouch.
Still, even though this may surprise you, I am going to tell you to use Flash. :)
Why? The image processing bit is the smallest part of your application. Whatever it is you are writing, I am very sure of that. I don't know about Silverlight, but in Flash the filters used by "Thumba" and "EasyPainter" can be created within a day, most of them simply using ConvolutionFilter, ColorMatrixFilter, DisplacementMapFilter and BitmapData::paletteMap or even simply by applying one of the other filters Flash offers out of the box. Any additional things can be created using PixelBender, which was pointed out by George. The kernel language is a subset of C, so porting classic filters shouldn't be too time consuming. Also alchemy (an LLVM backend targeting Flash Player 10) would be an option worth investigating, although it's not very stable yet.
The biggest part of your app will be a lot of GUI design, GUI implementation, Business Logics etc. Flash is really great when it comes to simple, yet reasonably fast image manipulation and with the Flex framework and MXML you have a powerful tool to productively create the GUI of your app, that can interoperate very well with a multitude of server solutions for virtually any platform.
Also, Flash has a great and active community, offering tons of tutorials, code snippets, libraries and frameworks, and a big ecosystem, with cross-compilation tools to deliver flash content to other platforms (including the upcoming Flash CS5, or the mentioned Elips). I don't understand, where you got the impression, that the Flash platform lacks developement tools. The difference to the .NET suite is that they are provided by a multitude of vendors. The upcoming Flash Player 10.1 was already pointed out by George, but never the less, I wanted to stress, that this makes many of the cross-plattform considerations obsolete.
Last but not least, I'd like to point out Haxe. It allows compiling to SWF, but also to C++, using the very same API provided by NME, to target the iPhone. Also there's work in progress on an android backend. If you're aren't playing to launch within the next 4-5 months, then this is definitely an option.
Your issue is a perfect target for the Haxe programming language. Haxe is written for the web and can compile to JavaScript, Flash and Objective-C (possibly Java/.NET soon).
So you do not choose which platform you are going to invest in but in which language. Haxe is easily adoptable for an AcitonScript programmer.
It makes no sense to run your imageprocessing algorithms in a JavaScript sandbox when Flash is available because it will be much faster. It makes also no sense to run heavy image processing algorithms on a mobile device like the iPhone with JavaScript. I would only support JavaScript as the worst fallback solution.
If you do not like to use Haxe I would go with Flash. You can deploy your Flash application for the iPhone aswell if that is your problem. This is also very great because you get native ARM code. There are actually great tools for professional Flash development available. FDT and IntelliJ IDEA are two of them. The best Haxe IDE is probably FlashDevelop at the moment of writing.
So I would definitly not use JavaScript as the only solution. Haxe is perfect for what you try to achieve. If you do not trust or do not want to invest in Haxe you can use Flash because of the iPhone/iPad export.
Depending on your usecase I would also encourage you to look at cloud hosting like Amazon EC2 and Google AppEngine for instance. Hosting costs are cheap and scaling will be easy for your task. The experience will be much better when it comes to complex operations that can take even a lot of time on a desktop system.
In addition to other answers, another option may be a hybrid solution. For example, use Flash/Silverlight for the majority of your target audience and use server-side processing for those that don't support it (or you could create a native app for iP[hone|ad])
You may have to do something like this anyway as the mobiles you are targetting may have insufficient processing power depending how complex your image processing gets.
Of course you still have the option of upgrading your server which, although you've currently discounted, is probably far cheaper than spending development time creating/deploying/testing a client-side solution.
You can use Silverlight for all Silverlight enabled clients and for non Silverlight clients, do the image processing server side. Since the Silverlight code is C#, you can double compile it to make (mostly)the same code work as Silverlight and non-Silverlight (i.e. server). This gets you the best of both worlds.
You don't say what language "all that code" you'd have to rewrite is in. Might a semiautomated translation to Javascript be practical?
Perhaps you could start out server-side, as CraigS suggests, and then move functions into the client over time instead of rewriting all at once.
Have you checked the editor of Pixlr.com ?
Take a look at their API as well..
The best solution is to use silverlight (so you already have the code ready). If the client can't run it (mobile phones, etc) then process it server-side.
It's the best compromise.
Depends on the type of image processing and the end user experience you are targeting.
As you are looking to target mobile phones your image processing will need to take into consideration the type of handset the user or the receipient has (if messaging via SMS/MMS), as different handsets have different resolution screens and handle different image formats for main images and thumbnails.
I'd suggest that you consider a hybrid cloud architecture as was mentioned in the Microsoft PDC keynotes this year. This would enable you to have your own server(s) to support your application, but if you require additional capacity due you scale out into the cloud using AppFabric.
Additionally, to maximise the market availability of your product pulling the image processing to a common reusable infrastructure allows you to target different platforms, exploiting the positives in each.
I have worked on a solution that hosted its image processing and delivery infrastructure server side and then built different UI offerings allowing sales via desktops, MNOs and AppStores. It can work and from a business perspective can offer economies of scale benefits.
Why not mention Java Applet ?
Good sides are:
almost all browser support ?
need install JRE ?
all OS support
Java provide Java Advanced Image kits, but if c++ dll can be called, that is best (JNI can call c++ dll )
In Python, one of the most popular libraries for image processing is pillow. Through the pyodide project (python running inside browser via emscripten), it's possible to use libraries like pillow and numpy for image (or matrix) processing, and convert the output to a base64 string (via Python standard library). This can then be passed to your <img> html element, either native JS document or with a library like React.
The way I see it, there's no one solution that meets all of your needs. Your best option, imo, is to go with Flash and hope that Adobe sets an agreement with Apple to get Flash on the iPhone/iPad. The major downside, of course, is you'll have to rewrite much of your code.
If the mobile sector isn't absolutely critical, then choose the Silverlight option for reasons you mentioned already. You could also use Silverlight in an out-of-browser mode to work as a desktop application.
This question is directed to anyone out there that is just starting in hobby game development. The first thing that comes to ones mind is:
Which language/framework should I use?
List of solutions:
Adobe Flash -> done
Allegro
Apocalyx
Blender Game Engine
Blitz3D
Devkit Pro
Game Maker
Gosu
IndieLib
jMonkey Engine -> done
Microsoft Silverlight
Microsoft XNA -> done
Multimedia Fusion / Games Factory
OGRE -> done
pygame -> done
pyglet -> done
RubygGame
SDL -> done
SFML
Torque 3D
Unity 3D
Custom -> done
Answer template:
Framework Name (Linked)
Pros:
Pro1
Pro2
...
Cons:
Con1
Con2
...
Microsoft XNA Game Studio
Pros:
Uses .NET languages; managed memory, ease of the Visual Studio environment, etc.
Good mix of high-level and low-level
Supports both 2D and 3D very well
Is proven; look at the Xbox Live Arcade, all of those games are made with XNA
Games can be easily run on a networked Xbox
Cons:
Uses .NET languages; can't use Java, C++, etc.
Not too many resources (i.e. books) out yet, though it is easy to learn and use so that may not be an issue
Windows-only. Mono (on Linux) doesn't support XNA at all.
XNA 3.0 was released less than a year after 2.0, and now we're at 3.1; frequent changes like these can hinder documentation, i.e. books get outdated quickly and many things break when upgrading a 2.0 game to a 3.0 game.
As of 2014, discontinued.
If you have the time, do it all yourself. It's worth the experience and you'll learn a lot, instead of how to work with framework X . ;^)
Pros
Full Control
Strong Learning Experience
Consistent code between game engine and program
Tends to be well-suited towards the application it is applied towards.
Supports any language/environment
Cons
High difficulty
No online documentation
Generally, less generic. Harder to apply to other games.
Harder for other people to use.
Probably buggier than more popular frameworks.
Not well-tested.
Harder to get help.
jMonkeyEngine
Pros
Uses Java; managed memory, highly supported in many mature IDE's (Eclipse, NetBeans, etc.), highly portable
Good mix and high-level and low-level
Modern 3D scenegraph
Built atop LWJGL, a very mature and well-working game library
Very lightweight; doesn't add very much overhead
Built in 3D model loading in a variety of formats.
Built in modern node-based 3D scenegraph.
Easy to use.
Open source; constantly evolving and improving.
Includes culling, collision checking, etc.
Has the option to save and read its own ultra-compact, ultra-fast binary model format.
Full list.
Cons
Uses Java, so compiles JIT and can therefore be a bit slower than C++ and other options.
Hasn't been used in many commercial apps (and therefore not as "proven").
Has no attached editor of any kind, everything must be done in pure code.
Difficult to do 2D games (for that you could try Slick).
pygame
Pros:
Easy to get started and create something visible.
Cross-platform.
Lots of open source games available to inspect the source.
Python language's pros (flexibility, dynamic typing, strings/arrays/tuples, etc.).
Cons:
Performance-wise does not scale to very large games (which hobby game development rarely is).
Mostly suited for 2D, although 3D is possible.
Difficult to distribute as closed source.
Also SDL could be inserted as pros and/or cons.
OGRE (Object-Oriented Graphics Engine)
Pros:
Tons of 3D features
Cross-platform, uses DirectX or OpenGL
Plugin architecture for even more features
Does not try to be an everything-engine, only a graphics engine (doesn't even try to handle input, as many graphics libraries tend to do)
Cons:
Uses the Singleton pattern
Very hard to do 2D or primitive rendering (individual polygons, lines, etc)
Tons of code makes the learning curve quite steep
pyglet
Pros:
Low difficulty
Cross-platform
OpenGL accelerated graphics by default
Further OpenGL graphical enhancements easy to add
Python language
Cons:
Less well-known than pygame
Game 'loop' is a bit unconventional
OpenGL knowledge required for advanced graphics and to maximise performance
SDL
Pros
SDL officially supports Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iOS, and Android
It is used by video playback software, emulators, and popular games including Valve's award winning catalog and many Humble Bundle games.
Open source
SDL is written in C, works natively with C++, and there are bindings available for several other languages, including C# and Python.
Cons
No special IDE like Unity
A bit low-level
The pros of any framework (gaming, web, etc.) is that they remove the unnecessary boilerplate code you'd have to normally write.
The cons often come up later on, once you want to go beyond the capabilities of the framework it can become very difficult. With many of the more complex frameworks, extending their functionality to make it do something it wasn't designed to will results in you having to write a lot of your own boilerplate code.
just starting in hobby game development
You should program a few games before attempting your own framework, otherwise you don't know what to put in it and how to write it. You'll end up endlessly rewriting it to "get it right", when really there are lots of good (and bad) ways of doing it, depending on what it is used for.
"Frameworks" can also be a pain, as they offer a partial solution to a problem. E.g. you just extend a few classes and boom, you have a game. But if your game doesn't suit the framework design you just end up fighting with it and hacking it. The "toolbox" approach tends to be a better approach as it just supplied functionality without forcing you too much into how you should use it. E.g. the standard C libraries are are toolbox and don't force you to structure your code in a certain way.
To start off with you have to ask yourself:
what sort of games you'd like to write.
what you'd like to develop for?
Web browser?
Facebook?
PC?
PC and Mac? i.e. cross platform
Console?
iPhone and iPad?
which language you'd like to use (but this may be set by the platform you chose)
The learning curve for writing games can be quite steep as you might have to learn:
how to program in a new language
how a new API works
how to do the graphics and sound
how to debug it
perhaps how to hook it into other system
Don't be put off it this sounds like a lot of work! The key to writing good games is sticking it out and having the determination to carry on and finish. Have you seen the film, Indie?
My advice:
Start simple - There is a lot to learn, if you take on too much to start with you will be scared off and think it is to hard. So...
Easy language - You'll hear lots of people ranting on the internet about how great certain languages are. Well, they all have their pros and cons. Some are easier to learn that others. E.g. Python or Lua are quite easy to learn. They are scripting languages, which are a lot more forgiving and less complicated to games together with. They don't have things like pointers, memory allocation, etc to worry about.
Python tutorial.
Lua has a tutorial (which I wrote!)
Just make a game! - You'll hear other people talking about patterns and singletons and data driven design etc. None of that matters when you start out. You aren't trying to impress anyone with your code. People will judge you on the end result not the code! Trust me, some of the best games you've played on console etc have terrible code!
Use a small, well maintained library. I'll make it easy, there are other choices, but:
if you want to choose Python (a good choice!) use pygame. Use Eclipse (for Java Dev) with PyDev. Magic and free!
if you want to use Lua (a good choice!) use Love
Look for other game examples - Pygame has tons of examples and games using it. Check the license and if you are allowed, just rip the code. Patch, splice, but put a comment about where you got the code, it is polite, and may be necessary according to the license. Don't ignore the licensing.
Look at Ludum Dare. Tons of great examples and source code to see how it is done quickly.
Then once you have made a few games consider the more complicated libraries and languages. Then you can ask more specific questions about how to solve certain problems. Have fun!
Flash
Flash is a great tool for those who have limited programming or art experience, but want to start cranking out a game.
Pros:
Symbols make graphical creation and manipulation very easy
Symbols have built-in bounding boxes; bounding boxes have built-in collision detection
Ports easily to web
Built-in layers and display architecture make displaying content simple
Lots of support, documentation, libraries
Vector art is easy to create
Cons:
Relatively slow
No method or operator overloading
Requires a purchase, either Creative Cloud or buying Flash outright
Pixel art must be ported in, which can be aggravating
I highly recommend flash if you have access to it, its one of the programs I use most often.
Pro's for XNA in my opinion are that XNA apps can run on Xbox360 in addition to PC, and you can pick your favorite language from anything supported by the .NET Framework - which is quite many.