HN, I just built this 2D game designer. What do you think?

http://www.spritedeck.com/

by zyang • 15 years ago

70 19 15 years ago

teamonkey• 15 years ago

Looks lovely, although I haven't tried it yet. The website is a little sparse on information though and it's hard to see what features the product has from the videos. Some demos would be nice, or videos of the demos. Maybe a SDK reference so we can see what the underlying tech can do.

Of course being able to publish to the web would be an awesome addition (even if it's Flash).

sandyc• 15 years ago

I agree. An About page would really help understand what the product is, and why you've made it.

zyang6• 15 years ago

The demo videos are under the "Learn" tab.

Here is one that shows you how to build comic book apps with no coding, http://www.spritedeck.com/learn/comic.html

And here is one that shows all the fundamental features, http://www.spritedeck.com/learn/

Better docs are coming soon :)

d5tryr• 15 years ago

Those videos don't play on my iPhone, vimeo mentions there is no mobile version, so a text summary of those videos would be helpful for scanning...

phlux• 15 years ago

Does it run under Wine on Linux?

statictype• 15 years ago

Looks interesting.

Couple of suggestions:

1) Please mention somewhere that it requires Adobe Air. Not everyone wants to install it (I didn't mind though)

2) Allow exporting of the layout to some generic vanilla xml/json format (so it can be used by people who are not using Corona). Alternatively, support export plugins

3) When importing images, allow the user to specify if the image should 'stretch' or 'tile' when resizing.

Haven't explored any more of it. It's a good looking app though!

zyang6• 15 years ago

Thanks for the feedback!

SpriteDeck has a customizable, XSLT based code exporter. If you save the project as a ".deck" file, and open it in a text editor, you will see the full dom of the project. I'm working on documentations for that today.

Btw, if you drag the bottom or right resize handle, it stretches. If you use the bottom-right handle, it resizes while preserving aspect-ratio.

wtracy• 15 years ago

I'm on Linux, so I can't test the actual app.

However, I'll say that the website didn't feel very clear about what the app is supposed to do. My first assumption was that this was a game engine.

After glancing over the first page, I saw it depends on Corona. I had never heard of Corona before. (I'm slightly more familiar with PC gaming than mobile gaming.) My next thought was "Which of these two things is the game engine, and what is the second one?" I had to Google to find out what Corona does.

From what I gather, Corona is a Flash-like compatibility layer over iOS, HTML5, and Android. Your app seems to be a sprite editor that exports to Corona. Apparently neither one provides a full game engine.

Is that correct? Whether I'm correct or not, I would recommend updating your site so that people can find that out without having to dig like I did.

zyang6• 15 years ago

Sorry about the confusion. We are targeting Corona community members at this moment, thus the lack of information on Corona.

You are correct, Corona is similar to Flash, and just like Flash, it leaves engine building to the community. Most developers I know have their own custom engines. SpriteDeck has a XSLT based code exporter that can target custom engines. I'm documenting that today.

itistoday• 15 years ago

This is really cool, but I wish it didn't depend on AIR... Any plans for a native OS X app?

http://al3x.net/2011/01/15/user-hostile-platforms.html

Jach• 15 years ago

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2108294

zyang6• 15 years ago

SpriteDeck is developed in six months by myself and a part time contractor. We are bootstrapped, with a limited budget/time. On top of that, we have to support both Mac and Win. We couldn't have pulled this off without AIR.

AlexC042• 15 years ago

Looks good at first glance. It's late at night so I've also not tried it yet. There's something "missing" on the landing page but I can't quite tell what it is. Just a feeling I have.

I've been messing around with Corona since we all read about that 14 year old who "won" the app store.

As it turns out... I kindof dislike Corona in general. Although physics in five lines is cool, and I do have an interactive game compiled for both iPod and Android, I find that Corona is poorly documented and inconsistent.

Maybe I'm being picky and impatient - there's a lot to be said for the ridiculously rapid application development and the incredibly low price of their software license.

At the end of the day though, it's not the cost of the tools that is the main issue - it's your ability to develop with them.

I find asset management in Corona development & the lack of good debugging tools to be positively stifling.

A functioning IDE is a third-party tool.

Oh and LUA as a language? I know WOW supports it, but I hate the lack of direct support for OO (can be done with a big of hacky-ness but it's a frigging pain).

Since then I've picked up the Unity3d engine and run with it.

GUI dev environment. Your choice of C#, Javascript, and some other languages... An active "stack overflow" style support forum. Used by 100,000 developers. Compiles game code for iPhone, XBOX, PS3, Wii & the Web... (not sure about android)

Has physics. 3D native. Imports models from everything from Blender through Maya & 3Dstudio... Bajillions of pre-fab functions standard. Amazing series of tutorials on youtube (look up Tornado Twins). Free license for everyone earning less than $100K (enough to get you rolling)

After a week in Corona with good, but not stellar results, I jumped onto the Unity engine and had fantastic results very quickly.

I really hate to say it because I followed Carlos' tutorials and the anscamobile team seems to very genuinely care about providing a top-of-the-line product, but it's really just not there yet.

Unity 3d is a far better choice. (for now, in my opinion) - you'll at the very least be able to use C# and Javascript "in the wild" if your game plans don't work out. Think about it... what are you going to do with LUA? Write a WOW addon? (to be fair, some of those guys make $100k in profit sharing from sites like curse... but that's another rant)

Anyways.

@ZYANG - you may want to compare notes with your tool against the Corona Rapid Prototype tool built by nerder in Silverlight http://www.nerderer.com/crp/ I was planning on working this weekend on a Unity project, but I'll try to find the time to have a play about with this and get your some, constructive feedback. (if my opinion's worth anything ;)

zyang6• 15 years ago

Corona is 2D. Unity is, well, 3D. Apples and oranges.

AlexC042• 15 years ago

But Unity can be used for 2D development. http://unity3d.com/support/resources/tutorials/2d-gameplay-t...

and can create for iPhone. http://www.zombievilleusa.com/zombieville1.html http://appadvice.com/appnn/2009/12/apptalk-interview-with-no...

They're both development environments, they're both designed to help you create code for mobile devices, they both have physics and are currently marketing in the 'game engine' space.

It may be apples to oranges - but they're still both fruit.

I'm not saying corona has no advantages. There are some... but in terms of product maturity and value for dev time spent (learning the framework, system and language), In my opinion Unity comes out way further ahead.

terhechte• 15 years ago

I had no idea what Corona was. I'd be nice to offer some sort of explanation.

wccrawford• 15 years ago

For everyone wondering about Corona:

http://www.anscamobile.com/

It's a game studio for mobile platforms, including ios and android. It has a yearly fee.

zyang6• 15 years ago

For those who are not familiar with Corona, it's a 2D sprite and event system similar to Flash. In fact, the co-founders of Corona are ex-FlashLite PMs.

Corona uses the Lua vm, which reminds of AS2.

njharman• 15 years ago

Your intro video shows fuck all. I'd expect to see some actual game design / play rather than just composting a few images.

Many when told they will get "X" but can't find "X" will click away to one of the other gabazillion things the internet has to offer.

HN, I just built this 2D game designer. What do you think?

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