...know the trade off of template choices?

Hi there,

Ok so there are a TON of template projects to consider when starting a new project.

My question is, how expensive is the tradeoff when choosing one over another? how deep is this decision and how hard is it to change your mind later?

Here is an example. I'm thinking of making a game for Windows 8, but i'm also thinking it should work for iPad and Android Tablets if possible.

I have a windows 8 template but I would want to use AppMobi.. which has it's own template. Will i regret it later if i want to then publish for other devices? Or are the choices fairly superficial and easy to remove/tweak to allow more device publishing?

Thanks!

Caleb

Not very much at all. some a little heavier than others, but over all not much. If you want to see just start two templates and compare them.

jayderyu ok cool thanks!

was mostly wondering wondering in general if there is a common rule of thumb.. i'm so new its hard to tell what the differences are or how significant the choices are, but that gives me a good perspective to branch out from!

Thanks!

Caleb

I wouldn't stress to much about the templates. Just look at them as visual reference material for different platforms, and game mechanics.

Personally I like to start off by creating a blank new project then if I can't remember whats all needed for a certain platform, or type of game mechanics I look through the templates, and examples for what I need.

As far as a rule of thumb goes first consider the types of devises that you want to market, and all there different screen resolutions. Ask yourself do I want the game to fill the screen completely on all devises, or will I be happy with black crop bars showing depending on each devices resolution? I wrote a little something about this here:

http://www.scirra.com/forum/multiscreen-cocoonjs_topic61313_post376578.html?KW=#376578

For example I have been working on a Windows 8 game, and last week I decided I wanted to also make an Android version. As far as the code changes went all I really had to do was add the WebStorage object, and convert all my Windows8.Roaming info. This is were commenting your code well comes in handy.

But when I tested my game It plays, and looks well on high end quad-core 7 inch, and larger devices like the Nexus 7. But on 800 x 480 resolution smartphones the player, and sprites are so small it's unplayable because I built the game at a 1368 x 768 resolution. If I would have built the game for the smallest resolution device that I wanted to market 800 x 480 it wold have worked on all resolutions. Lesson learned :)

So I guess another good rule of thumb is to always build your game to the smallest resolution you want to market first.

Wink thanks for the tips! That makes sense and yea i've tended to make for mobile first, but yea for my more recent projects I've been interested in targeting Nook, Kindle Fire, Windows 8, Mac, PC.. basically resolution of 1024x600 and up.

so does anyone know if we do a "retina graphics" style approach where say you put graphics in that are x2 bigger than the smallest rez.. say like wink's example of 1368x768 is the biggest rez.. but i build the game for 1024x600 (actually 1024x575 is the scale down size ratio, with a hair of black border above and below)

since the source art is 1368x768, would then upsizing the game size be painless?

thanks!

Caleb