Question

This is an SDL problem, however I have the strong feeling that the problem I came across is not related to SDL, but more to C++ / pointers in general.

To make a long story short, this code doesn’t work (edited to show what I really did):

player->picture = IMG_Load("player");
SDL_BlitSurface(player->picture, NULL, screen, &pictureLocation);

I see nothing on the screen. However, when I do it like this, it works:

SDL_Surface* picture = IMG_Load("player.png");
player->picture = picture;
SDL_BlitSurface(player->picture, NULL, screen, &pictureLocation);

I can see the little guy just fine.

The real problem is that I cannot instantiate Player::picture directly. Even when I try

picture = IMG_Load("player.png")

in player.cpp, I end up with a nullpointer.

Answer 1

I am so stupid. Turns out like I forgot the file extension “.png” every time I tried to store the surface in Player::picture, and conveniently remembered to add it every time I stired it in an SDL_Surface declared in main.cpp.

I had the feeling I was overlooking something really simple here, but this is just embarassing. What’s a fitting punishment for this?