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So, I'm currently looking for an engine for 2D. I've tried Cocos2D but it's iOS only and I wouldn't like to rewrite everything into another language for Android (so, e.g. Java port of Cocos2d for Android is not an option). Instead, I want to write the code once and with least hassle deploy it on iOS, Android and possibly Windows Phone 7. I have both Mac and Windows.
Just to be more detailed, here are my requirements to the engine:
must be cross-platform
must be efficient
should be C++, Java, C# or Objective C since I'm comfortable with them and NOT Flash, Javascript, HTML5 since I am not a web developer
must have a large community, tutorials, additional libraries which cover most of the stuff you'd have when developing on iOS or Android directly (in-app billing, facebook etc.)
the final delivered package must be not too large
the engine can be free, but I also wouldn't mind paying a reasonable price
I've found the following engines:
Marmalade (and IwGame engine on top of it) - C++, found overall very positive reviews of Marmalade but not sure about IwGame. EDIT (March 2013): Looks like Marmalade SDK now includes Cocos2Dx and some in-built IDE which makes it much better (and costs $150 per year for indie dev which is ok with me).
Corona SDK - Lua (efficiency doubtful), also needs internet connection to compile code
Cocos2d-x - C++, received lots of reviews from developers, mostly positive and many think it's best for 2D
Particle code - Java+Eclipse, found no reviews or comments
Moai - Lua, coudn't find any reviews/opinions on it
Monkey engine - seems to have too few features
Haxenme - it's Flash, I've never used it and don't want to
use Unity3d but with 2D packages like 2D Toolkit
ports of SDL to Android (also here) and iOS - doesn't look to have much support or current development (?)
GLBasic - Basic language, I don't like it
playN - seems to be early in development (?)
Gamvas - HTML5, doesn't look like a mature engine to me
Ignifuga - Python, also doesn't look mature
ORX - not sure if it's still developed (?)
Construct 2 - reminds GameMaker, might be ok for rapid prototypes but definitely not for industry-level games
XNA and then port the game using ExEn (would need Mono Touch to port to iOS and Mono for Android to port to Android) - C#, and is probably more thought for folks coming from Microsoft products like xBox (I come from Android). Also, those Mono tools cost $800 in total for small developers
Impact - JavaScript, uses HTML5. I'm not much into JavaScript (e.g. preferred C# on Unity3d), also not sure about efficiency since it runs in the browser (?)
GameMaker - own scripting language GML and I actually remember this one as a tool for non-programmers. Has it actually grown into a real engine, I mean for serious development?
AppGameKit - C++, yet seems to be still pretty new. Haven't found any reviews on it
use Cocos2D and Objective C to develop for iOS only and then make an APK for Android out of it using Stella SDK. Has anyone done this? I'm pretty sure there will be limitations, and how about Google's in-app billing, AdMob and Facebook integration on Android?
Moscrif - JavaScript, looks like it's more for former web-developers
Starling - Flash 11, i'm not much into Flash
ND2D - not yet 1.0, does it have many features?
So, I'd be happy if you could comment from your experiences with the engines and suggest which one in the list (or anything else that I've missed) is the best for the described requirements. I also may be wrong with my first impressions about some of the engines.
I'm currently thinking of Marmalade+IwGame as the best option but since I don't have much info about Cocos2d-x and Particle code, I am not really sure about it.
Thank you!
I would like to do something similar. But I am not sure if my way is a good way...
In my plan, I would display the startup image and then make the program sleeps for 1 seconds and then display the main menu
Shall I use the sleep function to hold the screen for a second?
If I want to use flash image instead of static image? Is it also feasible? What's the usual way to do something like this ?
I am using some high resolution icons as images. However when they render on screen, all of them gets slightly pixelated and don't look good on screen. I tried it with different sizes of icons but it was of no use.
Can anyone suggest where i can be going wrong and what can be the best way to take care of these things. I am new to game programming so any help would be appreciated.
1) I want to convert the swf file to either .wmv or .mp4 format but all the video converters give me an error during conversion. Why is this happening ??
2) I also do not have the save as ".flv" format . Why is that ??
3) There is also text missing in the .swf file . I tried all the solutions given in Google . But nothing worked ( I am using the arial font) . Please help
Hello!
I am currently working on a school project and we need to unwrap it in a way so that we can get the most out of our textures. However the workflow I have now is very slow.
What I need to do is give each Square face their own UV space. When I use normalize (Under Edit UVs) I get a perfect face unwrapped in the 0 to 1 space, however when it comes to triangulated faces it gets messy. Then my workflow has to change into - Planer mapping Y - Unfold it to remove some stretching and then fit it (by hand) in the 0 to 1 UV space.
Does anyone know a better way of doing this? (My teacher spoke about a script however I haven't been able to find one and my Python nor Mel is good enough to create such script :c)
It would be create if someone could help me with this, it'll be a time saver for sure.
Thanks!
As a engineer, there are many tools in the web that allow to generate good color scheme based on the selected base colors.
But the problem is: How to select the base color? Is it just random pick a color or are there any predefined nice colors?
Such as, I want orange, so instead of randomly pick a color that look like orange, are there any existing orange variations that is good for use already?
I'm working on a game aimed to be deployed on mobiles as "native" apps, and desktop web browsers.
Since working on several platforms, Flash and its embedded AIR seemed to be a pretty good solution. But uh-oh.
Working only for now with 4-keyframed movieclips (Adding them to stage, updating their position on every frame, and eventually removing them) makes the game to slow down when about 30 are displayed on desktop screen, about 20 when displayed on my Android (Samsung i9000 - 2.3.3). And I may need more.
So I tried blittering, by redrawing regions of my bitmap, and converting my MovieClips to bitmapDatas spritesheets, stored in my Flash library. Results on desktop are great, with perfect, smooth animations, even with hundreds of objects. But the result on mobile is terrible, FPS drops down to 15 even when only one object is displayed on screen, CPU or GPU rendered.
Because it would obviously be nice that my game works on 'old' devices, is working with Flash and AIR a bad idea at this time if I want to reach a framerate close to or above 50 ?
Is there any tips, or indispensable practices that needs to be used when developping a mobile game with flash ? Is there any common mistakes we have to avoid in these kinds of case ?
What makes a great CCG?
Why do/did they flourish in pop culture?
I've seen Pokemon and Magic used as the stand in for "successful game". Are these really good games or do they succeed because of the collectibles aspect?
Each time you by a pack of cards you are almost always gamboling in some way with CCGs, is that what makes them popular?
Was the Star-Wars CCG game popular because it was a good game or because it was Star-Wars?
Been thinking about poker from a game design point of view, so this looked like a good place to post on it.
The structure of poker is pretty simple. You are given information, a baseline chance of winning. You bet based on that information, then you are given more information. Again your chance of winning. And you bet again. This maybe happens a few times or just twice. Then you show your cards and win or loose.
Your choices each time are extremely simple in comparison to most games. Bet, check or fold. Probably if you designed the game fresh today it would be ignored. So what is it that makes the game popular and robust?
Just a few thoughts.
1.The game rewards long shots. This is the same thing that keeps people playing slot machines. You don't remember all the times that you loose, but you remember the big time that you won. Poker provides lots of ways to lure you into pushing your luck to get the long shot. You keep on betting because you might make the flush. This is probably a good mechanic to slip into a game, in fact it is probably in many games but it is something to consider thinking about.
2.simple mechanics, with complex theory. There is almost no system in the game like we see in many board games. No programmed hoops to jump through to make the game do something, People like the tagline, a moment to learn a lifetime to master. And it applies to many of the great games, like go, chess, poker, backgammon, mancala. Designing a game like this would seem to be trouble though. As many of the people who enjoy this kind of game don't want to learn others. I play Go, I probably wouldn't go back to playing chess in any kind of serious way now. The other thing is that these public domain simple games are honed by essentially thousands of playtesters and they evolve slowly over time. You can see this in the rules of chess with the additions of the castling, and the two spaces on the first move pawn rules, and some piece changes.
3.Player interactions and hidden information. I think this is what makes poker viable for the tv audience and bar league poker tourneys. Open information games reward those that can eliminate possibilities the quickest and arrive at strong moves. Hidden information games remove this advantage from people with strong analysis abilities. This has the additional effect of eliminating analysis paralysis. Some of my favorite war games are the columbia block series because they feature hidden information. This helps both players speed up their turns while adding some tension. It forces you to play the player, or the odds rather than to consider the board positions, or card information. I think in general most people don't consider themselves to have the skills of analysis. While almost everyone thinks they are a good reader of people. That is a skill that most people have. At the same time the game presents itself as a game of skill, while adding a luck element. So the winning player can say, “I won with my superior skill” and the loosing player can still say, “those are the breaks I was lucky or unlucky” leaving everyone happy. Where if someone beats your ass in chess, you just have to admit they are a superior player.
4 many people say that poker wouldn't be a good game without money involved. I think that it is just traditionally played with money But it has several things going for that make it a good money game. Simple widely known rules mean you can find players fairly easy. But I think the real factor in it, is that a game of poker is really something like 50 mini games of poker played in rapid succession. You can win money, you can loose money. There are up and downs, again this applies to slot machines as well. While you can bet money on any game, I think that these minigames within a game lend themselves well to gambling.
5 Theme. Poker is at its face a themeless game. Just cards. But the game itself is the theme at this point. Just as smart people in movies are always seen playing chess. Pokers theme is of daring gamblers and the fish that got away stories, it is all cowboys, and friday night poker with the boys smoking stogies, and now pudgy guys wearing sunglasses playing for millions. It appeals the American ideals of being smarter, and riskier than the other guy and the rewards are big jackpots.
So what does this mean from a game design point of view? I'm not exactly sure.
A hidden information game should be simpler than an open information game. Imagine how boring poker would be played open handed, Notice how nobody plays chess with the doubleblind methods. I think the more interaction you have among discrete pieces or objects in a game the better off you are going with open information.
Coax players into actions with the promises of long shots? Somehow this seems more fitting in a card driven game rather than a dice driven one. A player knows there are 4's in the deck and may stick around to try to see it while the same player might not if it was rolling 8% or less on percentiles.
Just my ramblings as I procrastinate tonight. I would love to hear what you have to think about it.