At the request of a reader I put together a guide on how to build your SFML 1.6 project in release mode, then how to package it for distribution.

 

It’s part of the main tutorial series, but can be accessed directly here.  If you are looking into how to distribute a release version of your SFML game, be sure to check it out

 

 

In doing so, I ran into a NASTY C++ related problem, which I will mention in a post shortly!

Programming Tutorial, CPP, Pang, SFML

 

 

I have to say, Nathan does quick work, much faster than I do!

 

As I said in this earlier post Nathan volunteered to port my SFML C++ tutorial to SFML 2.0.  Well, he is done.  So in addition to the 1.6 projects, you can now download source for SFML 2.0.

 

Keep in mind, the instruction are still for 1.6, that hasn’t changed, but you can now see code for either version.  Shortly I will edit the tutorial posts themselves to include the new download option, but for now you can download the 2.0 version sources here.  Part 8 does not include the FMOD sources, which were for demonstration purposes only and made the project quite a bit larger.

 

GameFromScratch C++ Edition SFML 2.0 downloads:

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

 

 

While he was porting, he ran into and reminded me of a bug that I encountered and Ninja-edited for future versions.  You may find that on occasion the ball disappears completely, at least in versions before part 9.  That was because GameBall used a counter from when the game started, instead of when play started.  So if you took a while to start the game, the ball could actually move on its own ( and off screen ).  The fix was a fairly simple flag I added in part 9.  For the fix details, take a look at the first few lines of GameBall::Update().

 

Thanks again Nathan.

Programming Tutorial, SFML, CPP

 

 

Nathan, a reader of this site, has graciously agreed to provide his port(s) of the Game From Scratch C++ tutorial from 1.6 to 2.0.  He started with chapter 6, as prior chapters mostly involved simple changes in property/method names, as SFML has moved to CamelCase.  Chapter 6 is the first chapter where more intensive changes needed to be made.

 

 

So if you are following along my C++ tutorial, but would prefer to work with SFML 2.0, download these projects instead.  Nathan has promised to make each following chapters code available as well, and once I am up to current, I will edit in the original tutorial posts so you have an option of downloading either 1.6 or 2.0 project versions.

 

Sometime in the future, I will put together a post on what is required to port from 1.6 to 2.0, I promise… sometime.

 

This project is exactly like the 1.6 ones.  It is preconfigured ( with SFML 2 release candidate ), so  all you have to do is download, unzip and open the solution in Visual Studio.

 

Download Pang6 here.   Will update as further chapters become available.

 

Thanks Nathan.

 

EDIT: Link fixed.

Programming Pang, CPP, Tutorial

 

 

 

Research in Motion, of Blackberry and Playbook fame, recently released Gameplay 1.2, a cross-platform 3D game programming library aimed at Indie developers.  As a game maker, it is easy to ignore RIM these days, especially with their CEO making comments like:

 

"We plan to refocus on the enterprise business and capitalise on our leading position in this segment,"

 

That doesn’t exactly give you the warm and fuzzy about the future of RIM consumer devices now does it?

 

That said, ignoring GamePlay would be a foolish thing to do.  Why?

 

Well first off, it’s free.  I like free.  As in, I really like free.

 

Second and perhaps most amazingly, it is cross platform.  You can target Mac OS, Windows, iOS 5.0 or higher devices, Android 2.3 or greater devices in addition to Blackberry Tablet OS 2.0 and Blackberry 10 devices ( when they arrive ).

 

Third, it’s IDE agnostic, except when required otherwise ( aka, compiling for iOS ).  I can work in my preferred Visual Studio environment.  You however have the choice between Visual Studio, XCode or Momentics IDE ( an Eclipse based IDE Rim inherited from QNX ).

 

Fourth, it’s open source and hosted on GitHub.

 

Here is a screen shot from a demo game in development:

 

 

I have to say, it looks impressive to me.

 

 

Oh, did I happen to mention it’s C++ based?  I think I just heard half of you cheer, while the other half swore!

 

 

I do have to say, the folks at Marmalade probably aren’t pleased.  They both fill the same niche… but gameplay is free.  Now the question is, how good is it?

 

Feature-wise, here is what you can expect:

 

Current features in gameplay

• Written completely in C++ and well documented using doxygen.
• Solution and workspaces for Visual Studio 2010, XCode 3.2.1 and Momentics IDE’s.
• Platform-Game abstraction layer separating all operating system code from game engine code.
• Input system support for Mouse, Keyboard and Touch.
• Full vector math library with classes for Vector2/3/4, Matrix, Quaternion, Ray, Plane. Also Frustum and BoundingBox/BoundingSphere classes for object culling.
• Solid OpenGL 3.2+ (for Desktop) and OpenGL ES 2.0 (for Mobile) based rendering system with classes for RenderState, FrameBuffer, Mesh, Material, Effect, Pass and Techniques.
• Easy-to-use and efficient Font and Sprite classes.
• Scene-graph components such as Scene, Node, Light, Camera and Model.
• Binary encoding tool for creating optimized bundles for loading TTF fonts and 3D game assets supporting both COLLADA and FBX formats.
• Extensible animation system with classes for Animation, AnimationClip and Curve with built-in AnimationTarget’s on Transform and MaterialParameter’s classes.
• Complete 3D audio system with additional support for compressed audio using OGG and supporting HDMI gaming.

 

New features in gameplay v1.2

• Newplatforms now supporting:
  • BlackBerry Tablet OS 2.0 and BlackBerry 10 ready!
  • Apple iOS 5.1 for iPhone and iPad
  • Google Android 2.3+
  • Microsoft Windows 7
  • Apple MacOSX
• New shader-based material system with built-in common shader library.
• New declarative scene binding.
• New declarative particle system.
• Improved physics system with rigid body dynamics and constraints.
• New character physics and ghost objects.
• Improved animation system supporting animated skeletal character animation.
• New declarative user interface system with support for declartive theming and ortho, and 3D form definition with built-in core control classes such as Button, Label, TextBox, Slider, CheckBox, RadioButton. Also includes Layout classes such as Absolute/Vertical and FlowLayout.
• New cross-platform new game project wizard scripts.
• New game developer guide.
• New game samples and tutorials.

 

 

With the following coming soon:

 

The ‘next’ feature branch for v1.3, v1.4, v1.5

• Optimizations and Performance improvements
• Shadows
• Terrain and Sky
• Gamepad input for Wii, Xbox 360 and Bluetooth® HID controllers
• Scoreloop Social integration
• Editor

 

 

Editor hmm?  Wonder what that means?

 

 

I am going to download and play with the SDK, and if I get some time ( something I am chronically short of lately ) I may post a walk around and possibly a tutorial or two.  Has anyone out there been playing with this technology?  Any opinions?

 

 

If you are interested, check out the announcement blog post as well as the source on GitHub.  Oh and perhaps most impressive of all for an open source gaming product… there is actually documentation. The documentation is available here including this development guide[direct pdf link].

 

I have to say, congratulations to Sean Paul Taylor and Steve Grenier on this impressive release!

General CPP, Engine, Android, iOS, iOS

 

I am noticing from search traffic that this is an extremely common question, people seem to want to know if you can use C++ with the PS Studio SDK.

 

 

Simple answer and you aren’t going to like it.

 

 

No, no you can’t.

 

 

 

I wouldn’t hold your breath either, it’s the mono runtime behind the scenes that is providing the portability across devices.  If you want native C++ support you need to have access to the full development suite.  Even becoming a PSN developer to develop PSN Mini games requires well over 1000$.

 

 

 

If for some reason you prefer C++’s syntax over C# ( this may in fact be a sign of insanity by the way… ), you *might* and I emphasize *might* be able to take advantage of this project CPlusPlus, at some point, but even then you would have to write pure CIL code.  Without native access, there would be very little point using C++ in this situation.

 

 

 

Therefore for all intents and purposes, no you cannot use C++ with PlayStation Suite. C# is the only game in town and I wouldn’t expect to see that change any time soon. 

Programming PSSDK, CPP, C#