Developing a game intended for multiple end platforms can present some unique challenges to consider. For one, the differing pixel resolutions on apple devices over the years necessitate at least some different background images and layouts to accommodate the different aspect ratios. My initial technique to deal with this problem was to include a copy of each background for each device present in its scene, with its rendering switched off.
Recently, I had the opportunity to work on an exciting in-house project for Grio called Filedart. This service, which will launch in the near future, affords the denizens of the web the ability to effortlessly upload content to the cloud by dragging photos or files to a small icon in their taskbar. After the file is uploaded by the client, the service automatically copies a mini-fied URL to the client’s clipboard. This URL leads to a brand-new, public web hosting wrapper for that file that they can easily distribute to their friends of colleagues to share. The service is free, and users don’t even have to log-in to use it.
Our most recent in house project was a fun children’s game called Whack Attack, and was built with Unity 3D and released for iPhones and android devices. Unity is a great tool, but it is definitely (and obviously) more geared for game crafting in the third dimension. Our game deals mostly with two dimensional sprites, although they are set in a pseudo 3d environment to attain some basic perspective.
Constructing our next internal video game (Whack Attack) in the Unity software system has been a joyful experience and a return to my roots as a video game programmer. Instead of dealing with tables and lists for an enterprise web application, I find myself programming mole AI and hit reactions. As an internal project, the few hours a week I get to spend making cartoon mammals run around my phone are a welcome diversion, and makes my return to client work that much more satisfying.
On my previous project, I was busy delving into the relatively new world of Unity game scripting as my go-to solution for dynamic content. Now I’m working on a game that has me going back into the world of Flash, so I thought I would write a brief commentary on the differences I perceive between the two frameworks as it pertains to 2D game-crafting.