flixel is a completely free collection of Actionscript 3 files that helps organize, automate, and optimize Flash games; an object-oriented framework that lets anyone create original and complex games with thousands of objects on screen in just a few hours. flixel is not intended to be used with the Flash IDE, since it is a pure Actionscript library. The developer recommends using Flex Builder, FlashDevelop (Windows only) or mxmlc.
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A new release of the SIO2 game engine for the iPhone and iPod Touch has been released featuring improved stability and enhanced support for OpenGL ES v1.1. This release also includes numerous bug fixes and major
optimization — performance is up to 40% faster! SIO2 1.4 also include a new action strip based animation system, faster, smaller and more flexible than any previous versions. SIO2 can be used for free or for commercial products. The SIO2_SDK comes with a set of 20 tutorials, and video tutorials, documentation, online support through forum, email and IM, and also include outsourcing services.
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0 A.D. is a free, cross-platform, under-development, 3D, historically-based, real-time strategy game. If you’ve played or seen Microsoft’s Age of Empire series, then you’ll have a good idea of this RTS game. The developers recently announced that the code available as GPL and the art content is available as CC-BY-SA.
here’s roughly 150K lines of C++ for the game engine, and another 25K for editing tools. Gameplay scripting uses JavaScript. We build on top of low-level libraries (OpenGL, OpenAL, ENet, …), not an existing game engine (like OGRE). The code isn’t all extremely clean or extremely modular or extremely well-written. It’s been written by a wide variety of programmers, and it’s far from a “completed” codebase. We want to continue cleaning things up as part of the normal development process. We’re not averse to rewriting entire subsystems if that’s the most effective way to make them satisfy our requirements. But in many areas it’s quite solid.
[Submitted by GameHaxe]
Haxe is an open-source langauge very similar to Adobe’s ActionScript. It has many features that make it a desirable language — see haxe.org for more details. From the same code base, you can generate “neko” bytecode that will run on Mac, Linux and Windows, JavaScript code that will run in a browser, PHP code to run on a webserver or Flash code for browser based games.
And now C++ code that will run on Mac, iPhone, Linux, & Windows. Due to the similarities between Haxe and Actionscript, it is possible to write code using the Flash API, and then compile it to run on the iPhone. See http://gamehaxe.com/2009/07/28/haxe-iphone-cpp-at-last/ for more details. “Under the Hood”, the code runs SDL with OpenGL ES support and has built-in garbage collection to make coding easy.
If you are familiar with the Flash graphics API, you will be able to write games for the iPhone and also have them run in a browser — doubling your output.
I’d like to point our some sites that have some great free game assets that can help make your next game much more polished. CG Textures and Mayang have some great textures. Categories include bones, metal, skies, concrete, doors, wood and more. The Pixlpusher is dealing in some great goodies for owners of Photoshop. I especially like his free Cosmic Photoshop brushes — can you say space shooter? If you have retro on your mind, one of the best legal sprite pack available is Ari Feldman’s SpriteLib which was graciously released under GPL and features sprites for a 1940’s shooter, Arkaniod clone and tank battle game. Game Beep offers many free downloads (and commercial products as well) of sprites, textures and models (3d GameStudio format needs conversion). Be sure to check out Lost Garden — a beautiful RPG tile set by www.lostgarden.com
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In Advanced Game Design Course 9-13 year-olds will learn to create their own complex games, learning key programming concepts along the way. This class moves beyond the basics, teaching you the essentials of game balancing, important game design principles, and how to build a complex game from the ground up with Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Flash. In addition, the class will also teach how to design your own characters and environments with Photoshop and build custom animation for your games with Flash. Classes are held over a 5-day period and held at Stanford University and the University of Pennsylvania.
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REAL Software is now shipping REALbasic and REAL Studio 2009 Release 3. This release boasts more than 100 improvements and 31 new features, including the addition of OpenGL support for 3D images and animation. REAL Software claimes that REALbasic should now be able to develop 3D applications 50% to 70% faster over those using traditional C-programming methods. The new OpenGLSurface control does require a knowledge of the OpenGL language. However, there are some open source projects that are implementing an RB3D-compatible API on top of the OpenGL for developers who currently use RB3D.
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Cross-platform game creation tools seem to be on our agenda this week. Today, we highlight Atmosphir, a free Nintendo-like 3D adventure game and creation tool. In a nutshell, this is a 3D platform game with a very slick level editor. The level editor allows you to create new maps (worlds) and populate them with custom characters, challenges, platforms all without programming. This is done by dragging and dropping bridges, platforms, doors, objects hazard props in a 3D isometric view — very intuitive and LEGO-like. Atmosphir runs on the Mac and PC and plans for consoles are also in the works. Although it is strictly single-player game, the developers are working towards adding multi-player options in future versions.
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Verge3 is a 2D game engine focused on making it easier to create 2D RPGs, similar to games from the Super Nintendo and Genesis 16-bit era of gaming (or earlier). Recent versions of this free project has added the ability to use Lua to script Verge games. VergeC, or just VC, is the C-like scripting language that is used to create the various aspects of Verge games, such as map events, menus, inventory, battle system, etc. verge3 is comprised of two applications, MapEd3 and ChrMak5. MapEd3 is the Verge3 Map Editor. It is a development tool that you can use to create and edit custom maps for Verge3 to use. You can edit and place tiles, set up obstructions and events, and do other map-related stuff. ChrMak5 is a character maker that creates Verge3 .chr files. This is an image file with a set of character animations on it. Unfortunately, these two vital tools are not currently available for the Mac, but have been under development for some time. There is however a SDL-based playable of a tech demo called “The Sully Chronicles” that runs on the Mac. fmod sound library is utilized to play all music and sound effects. The SVN does contain an Xcode project for adventurous C++ programmer who wants to help accelerate the Mac OS X release of Verge3. Please note that the tech demo will cause some chaos to your desktop icons.
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Platinum Arts Sandbox is standalone 3D Game Maker and 3D Game Design program currently based on the cube 2 engine. This open source application allows kids and adults to create their own video games, worlds, levels, adventures and quests. The developers claim that it is easy enough for kids to use but powerful enough for full game projects. Side-scrolling and RPG games can be made and it even features a powerful scripting language as well as the ability to import md2, md3, md5 and obj model formats. Version 2.3 adds:
Sandbox runs on Mac, Linux and Windows and contains code project files for VS, Codeblocks, Linux makefile and Xcode.
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