

HN, I just built this 2D game designer. What do you think? - zyang
http://www.spritedeck.com/

======
wtracy
I'm on Linux, so I can't test the actual app.

However, I'll say that the website didn't feel very clear about what the app
is supposed to do. My first assumption was that this was a game engine.

After glancing over the first page, I saw it depends on Corona. I had never
heard of Corona before. (I'm slightly more familiar with PC gaming than mobile
gaming.) My next thought was "Which of these two things is the game engine,
and what is the second one?" I had to Google to find out what Corona does.

From what I gather, Corona is a Flash-like compatibility layer over iOS,
HTML5, and Android. Your app seems to be a sprite editor that exports to
Corona. Apparently neither one provides a full game engine.

Is that correct? Whether I'm correct or not, I would recommend updating your
site so that people can find that out without having to dig like I did.

~~~
zyang
Sorry about the confusion. We are targeting Corona community members at this
moment, thus the lack of information on Corona.

You are correct, Corona is similar to Flash, and just like Flash, it leaves
engine building to the community. Most developers I know have their own custom
engines. SpriteDeck has a XSLT based code exporter that can target custom
engines. I'm documenting that today.

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statictype
Looks interesting.

Couple of suggestions:

1) Please mention somewhere that it requires Adobe Air. Not everyone wants to
install it (I didn't mind though)

2) Allow exporting of the layout to some generic vanilla xml/json format (so
it can be used by people who are not using Corona). Alternatively, support
export plugins

3) When importing images, allow the user to specify if the image should
'stretch' or 'tile' when resizing.

Haven't explored any more of it. It's a good looking app though!

~~~
zyang
Thanks for the feedback!

SpriteDeck has a customizable, XSLT based code exporter. If you save the
project as a ".deck" file, and open it in a text editor, you will see the full
dom of the project. I'm working on documentations for that today.

Btw, if you drag the bottom or right resize handle, it stretches. If you use
the bottom-right handle, it resizes while preserving aspect-ratio.

------
zyang
The demo videos are under the "Learn" tab.

Here is one that shows you how to build comic book apps with no coding,
<http://www.spritedeck.com/learn/comic.html>

And here is one that shows all the fundamental features,
<http://www.spritedeck.com/learn/>

Better docs are coming soon :)

~~~
d5tryr
Those videos don't play on my iPhone, vimeo mentions there is no mobile
version, so a text summary of those videos would be helpful for scanning...

------
AlexC04
Looks good at first glance. It's late at night so I've also not tried it yet.
There's something "missing" on the landing page but I can't quite tell what it
is. Just a feeling I have.

I've been messing around with Corona since we all read about that 14 year old
who "won" the app store.

As it turns out... I kindof dislike Corona in general. Although physics in
five lines is cool, and I _do_ have an interactive game compiled for both iPod
and Android, I find that Corona is poorly documented and inconsistent.

Maybe I'm being picky and impatient - there's a lot to be said for the
ridiculously rapid application development and the incredibly low price of
their software license.

At the end of the day though, it's not the cost of the tools that is the main
issue - it's your ability to develop with them.

I find asset management in Corona development & the lack of good debugging
tools to be positively stifling.

A functioning IDE is a third-party tool.

Oh and LUA as a language? I know WOW supports it, but I hate the lack of
direct support for OO (can be done with a big of hacky-ness but it's a
frigging pain).

Since then I've picked up the Unity3d engine and run with it.

GUI dev environment. Your choice of C#, Javascript, and some other
languages... An active "stack overflow" style support forum. Used by 100,000
developers. Compiles game code for iPhone, XBOX, PS3, Wii & the Web... (not
sure about android)

Has physics. 3D native. Imports models from everything from Blender through
Maya & 3Dstudio... Bajillions of pre-fab functions standard. Amazing series of
tutorials on youtube (look up Tornado Twins). Free license for everyone
earning less than $100K (enough to get you rolling)

After a week in Corona with good, but not stellar results, I jumped onto the
Unity engine and had fantastic results very quickly.

I really hate to say it because I followed Carlos' tutorials and the
anscamobile team seems to very genuinely care about providing a top-of-the-
line product, but it's really just not there yet.

Unity 3d is a far better choice. (for now, in my opinion) - you'll at the very
least be able to use C# and Javascript "in the wild" if your game plans don't
work out. Think about it... what are you going to do with LUA? Write a WOW
addon? (to be fair, some of those guys make $100k in profit sharing from sites
like curse... but that's another rant)

Anyways.

@ZYANG - you may want to compare notes with your tool against the Corona Rapid
Prototype tool built by nerder in Silverlight <http://www.nerderer.com/crp/> I
was planning on working this weekend on a Unity project, but I'll try to find
the time to have a play about with this and get your some, constructive
feedback. (if my opinion's worth anything ;)

~~~
zyang
Corona is 2D. Unity is, well, 3D. Apples and oranges.

~~~
AlexC04
But Unity can be used for 2D development.
[http://unity3d.com/support/resources/tutorials/2d-gameplay-t...](http://unity3d.com/support/resources/tutorials/2d-gameplay-
tutorial)

and can create for iPhone. <http://www.zombievilleusa.com/zombieville1.html>
[http://appadvice.com/appnn/2009/12/apptalk-interview-with-
no...](http://appadvice.com/appnn/2009/12/apptalk-interview-with-noah-bordner-
developer-of-omg-pirates-and-zombieville-usa/)

They're both development environments, they're both designed to help you
create code for mobile devices, they both have physics and are currently
marketing in the 'game engine' space.

It may be apples to oranges - but they're still both fruit.

I'm not saying corona has no advantages. There are some... but in terms of
product maturity and value for dev time spent (learning the framework, system
and language), In my opinion Unity comes out way further ahead.

------
teamonkey
Looks lovely, although I haven't tried it yet. The website is a little sparse
on information though and it's hard to see what features the product has from
the videos. Some demos would be nice, or videos of the demos. Maybe a SDK
reference so we can see what the underlying tech can do.

Of course being able to publish to the web would be an awesome addition (even
if it's Flash).

~~~
sandyc
I agree. An About page would really help understand what the product is, and
why you've made it.

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njharman
Your intro video shows fuck all. I'd expect to see some actual game design /
play rather than just composting a few images.

Many when told they will get "X" but can't find "X" will click away to one of
the other gabazillion things the internet has to offer.

------
wccrawford
For everyone wondering about Corona:

<http://www.anscamobile.com/>

It's a game studio for mobile platforms, including ios and android. It has a
yearly fee.

~~~
zyang
For those who are not familiar with Corona, it's a 2D sprite and event system
similar to Flash. In fact, the co-founders of Corona are ex-FlashLite PMs.

Corona uses the Lua vm, which reminds of AS2.

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terhechte
I had no idea what Corona was. I'd be nice to offer some sort of explanation.

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itistoday
This is really cool, but I wish it didn't depend on AIR... Any plans for a
native OS X app?

<http://al3x.net/2011/01/15/user-hostile-platforms.html>

~~~
Jach
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2108294>

~~~
zyang
SpriteDeck is developed in six months by myself and a part time contractor. We
are bootstrapped, with a limited budget/time. On top of that, we have to
support both Mac and Win. We couldn't have pulled this off without AIR.

------
phlux
Does it run under Wine on Linux?

