Gianmichele's Forum Posts

  • From this link:

    http://www.raywenderlich.com/114313/tvo ... mpressions

    "As mentioned, the first method of making apps is via TVML, TVJS, and TVMLKit. If these abbreviations sound foreign to you, don’t fret because they should. Here’s what they are:

    TVML is a form of XML and stands for “Television Markup Language”.

    TVJS is set of JavaScript APIs which provide you with the means to display apps created with TVML.

    TVMLKit is the glue between TVML, JavaScript, and your native tvOS application."

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  • I have the same problem with most of the exported games. For example I can't play any of the games from Mojiken.

    http://mojiken.itch.io/

    I keep getting the application can't be opened once I launch it.

  • I understand your logic perfectly. To me though the problem is not that there's a thrid party involved, which in unavoidable, rather the fact that the main focus of the third party is not gaming performance, cause let's face it, google or apple don't care if there a bit of jank every 30 secs on a web site/page, but for a game that is a totally different story.

    > Ashley: I know you're probably sick of me pointing to this, but I would really love for you to read these two articles and then tell me if this is not a technology worth considering

    >

    Given the number of people here criticising us for "depending on third parties too much", I am extremely wary of adding any additional technology dependencies in to the C2 workflow. Even if Haxe works pretty well, we could still get shafted by compiler bugs, missing features and unoptimised parts that kill the performance. In particular I think Stencyl got burned by some of these types of issues. I'd rather stick with HTML5 - it may not be perfect, but it's improving fast and has some huge players backing it, such as Microsoft and Google.

  • Gianmichele Haxe looks awesome! I have been thinking about it for a while.. I'm gonna try out the Three.js Haxe port and if that can compile that to more than JS I am totally sold on Haxe myself <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_e_biggrin.gif" alt=":D" title="Very Happy">

    Yeah, I have been playing with it for a while. Haxe in itself is pretty bare bone though. You're going to need a framework of some sort.

    OpenFL is one of them but even though it mostly works, I don't really like the status of flux which it seems to be constantly in (Stencyl is suffering from that).

    I'm using Luxe engine for now, which although is stil in alpha, is rock solid and with a super plan behind it (read editor and consoles too!).

    Have a look here for more infos:

    http://luxeengine.com/

    http://snowkit.org

    I'm really waiting for the day Scirra is going to embrace a technology like this.

  • Ashley: I know you're probably sick of me pointing to this, but I would really love for you to read these two articles and then tell me if this is not a technology worth considering:

    http://notes.underscorediscovery.com/haxe-from-1000ft/

    http://notes.underscorediscovery.com/haxe-entry-point/

  • Hey there Ashley,

    wouldn't it be great to have like a small picture journal to see the evolution of C3? No text, explanation or lenghty articles, I know it's way too early for that, but just a picture let's say every month to keep the excitement going?

  • 16 fps on a iphone 6 latest Safari

    I think this is a good benchmark. I would expect current hardware (and not so current too) to fly through it!!!

  • I was actually speaking specifically from experience in trying to port Cosmochoria to Wii U. It did not run well on the Wii U dev kit, even after lots and lots and lots of optimizations. The question is not whether the console has the hardware capabilities, it's all down to the simple question of how well it supports & optimizes javascript/html5. We're not dealing with some kind of console native code running on the console here.

    I think the main problem here is because Nintendo webkit is still a canvas implementation and not a webgl one. If and when Nintendo switches that should be perfectly right for games like yours (which is great BTW)!

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  • Here's a thought that would help people evaluate the product behiond what is possible with the free version.

    I think Scirra should have a presence on the app stores where C2 is able to export, of some iconic games, like the one that are right now on the showcase. I'm suggesting to use those, cause let's face it, people want to see something that inspires them and I'm afraid, small tech demos really are not that appealing.

    Everyone here is loving what Scuba Bear, The next Penelope, Cosmochoria, Coin Op Story and Airscape and all the other so why not ask to use them as a real world showcase? Maybe build mobile demo versions?

    These don't need to be full fledged games anyway, but just simple demos with limited functionality, showing what can really be done with C2, so that people can better evaluate the product.

    What do you think Ashley?

  • My comment wasn't related only to performance, but mainly about the fact that Scirra and the users don't have control over the more low level part of the engine.

    Honestly I'm a really scared that an auto updating webview, more than nodewebkit, could break a perfectly working game without any action from the user (or even knowing it really). Who do you think such a user would contact when the game will crash or will start to jitter? And do you think telling them that the problem has been generated by the os auto update and that the solution and timing is up to them, will be enough or will you lose clients?

  • Ashley: I agree completely about the idea of maintaining several different native engine. It is really a waste of resources.

    That is why I was sugesting haxe, which is a language that compiles down to native. You only write in one language.

    Now on the framework side I also agree there are differences, but that really depends on how well such framework is designed.

    snowkit/luxe engine for example is really well thought and modern in design. Everything I have tried works across all the targets, from mobile to desktop and webgl.

    You can also refer to Kha (https://github.com/KTXSoftware/Kha), still based on Haxe, that has full support even for consoles!

  • I'd love for Scirra to take more controls on the exported game. With all the recent problems on node webkit and the other wrappers, that side of the whole game is too prone to go bad.

    Though the idea of auto updating webviews is nice, the risk that a broken update, without the ability to roll back, is too big. I don't want to have to deal with the mistakes of a third party when my game wasn't in need of an update.

    This could be achieved by bundling (or providing a correct link and information) a well tested and working version of nodewebkit for desktop and update only after extensive testing. For mobile the situation is more troublesome for now.

    As for the future, I think they should start thinking into taking real control of the rendering/input/networking part of the engine.

    Haxe is a real candidate as it provides ways to have different native targets. One of the haxe frameworks, snowkit ( http://snowkit.org/ ) is heavily based on webgl standards and deploys to windows, mac, linux, ios, android in native and to webgl too.

    please have a look as it has 3 layers to it:

    • flow, for building and deploying projects
    • snow, the low level part of the engine providing what scirra looks for in a render browser
    • luxe, the high level framework

    This is the killer combo I think we're all looking for.

    My 2c

    Gian

  • I completely see Ashley point of view of supporting HTML5/WebGl. It is progressing at an insane pace and really starting to deliver even on mobile.

    What I'd love to see from Scirra is taking this exporters into their own hand/control a bit more. Deliver a working version of node webkit (and don't update if it breaks), and also one for Cordova, since it's going to be the standard for mobile export.

    Is it going to be so overkill?

    Now imagine this scenario happening with autoupdating webviews on mobile