macOS 2D game development..

[Thrash911]

Hello ppl,

I have done some (questionable) 2D programming back in the Windows days.. (Nicely put sentence, I think..). Though I never finished any projects, I found it rather interresting..

I have been thinking of getting back in the game, and do some fun 2D game programming. I have been eyeing BlitzMax, but can anyone here recommend any other programming packages with various flexibility? The less programming, the better. Not because I mind programming, but because I HATE (well, "can't do"..) complex math!!

Any recommendations?

 

[Eric5h5]

Any recommendations?

Yep, I strongly recommend Unity. At first glance it may seem like "just" a 3D engine, but you can do 2D with it perfectly well. Just for fun I recently did a Space Invaders clone and an Asteroids clone. You can download stand-alone games (OS X only) or web player versions (also works on Windows, will require an additional download if you don't already have the Unity player installed) from those links. The Space Invaders clone also has the project folder available, so you can download the 30-day Unity trial and see how I did it.

Doing anything interesting is going to require programming, but you don't have to do any complex math (although you can if you want). It has a built-in physics engine, which takes care of all the scary stuff for you. For example, doing the spaceship controls in the Asteroids clone was a simple matter of "rotate ship left or right...apply force", and that's pretty much it. It's the most fun programming environment ever, as far as I'm concerned. (I use Javascript, which I think is the easiest, though you can also use C# or Boo, which is similar to Python.)

Of course, if you were doing 2D programming just because 3D is "too hard," well, with Unity the sky's the limit....

--Eric

 

[DavidLeblond]

Check out NovaShell. Its probably not as fancy as Unity, but the price is much better.

 

[wrldwzrd89]

As it turns out, I'm doing some 2D game development of my own, and would definitely be interested in a helper library like NovaShell. Thanks for the link!

 

[Catfish_Man]

I'd love to see someone try a layered side scroller engine (like some of the castlevania or mario games) using Core Animation once 10.5 comes out.

 

[cpollet]

I haven't played with it much, but Torque Game Builder may be something you should look in to.

 

[DavidLeblond]

I'd love to see someone try a layered side scroller engine (like some of the castlevania or mario games) using Core Animation once 10.5 comes out.

I'd be all for it but I STILL haven't gotten the hang of Objective-C... for some reason I can't seem to wrap my brain around it.

I've been brainwashed from working in C# all day long.

 

[Soulstorm]

I'd be all for it but I STILL haven't gotten the hang of Objective-C... for some reason I can't seem to wrap my brain around it.

I've been brainwashed from working in C# all day long.

Hah! You don't know what you're missing!