The Map

I eventually realised that the only way if I could know if my map generation algorythm was any good would be if I could see the results. With that in mind, I created the map screen, which shows the whole map to the player:-


I'll probably add some colours in the future, although I'll also probably remove it from the final game as it will defeat the object of exploring. Still, in the above map you can see the hills and water, and quite a few dungeons ready to be explored. Next stop: volcanos, pyramids and maybe a bridge or two.

First Things First

Woah! Slow down there young programmer. You're writing a game? Before you do anything, you obviously need a website for your game, a wiki and a forum. (And a blog of course). Even if you've got nothing to put in them, apart from a list of all the things you intend to do, you might as well get them up and running so the Googlebots of this world get to know about them. You never know, someone might actually read them (or, God forbid, actually write something).

The Old New Way

I'm sure I'm not the first programmer to look at my code that I wrote years ago, and rather than think "what a pile of crap" (as usually happens) but actually "What? I knew how to do that? I wish I still did!".

After writing my own 2D library using "nodes" and "spatials" (inspired by the "simplicity" of jMonkeyEngine) it turned out that it wasn't the most efficient way to do the graphics. I ended up using a simple 2D array, meaning I could easily calculate which tiles were visible and only draw those. SO now the game runs pretty damn smoothly*, which is a relief.

(* It does on my phone anyway. Other phones may have different levels of performance.)

Worldcrafter: Map Generation

The only screenshot of Worldcrafter shows the next problem - nice random world generation. At the moment it is a simple flat landscape, which doesn't make for compelling gameplay. I'm currently in the process of creating a world generator, which will incorporate hills, lakes, mountains, and maybe the odd ash-spewing volcano.

Worldcrafter: Day Zero

This is it. The first post of the new game I'm creating called Worldcrafter. I've got so many ideas for it that they're leaking out my head, so I better write them down quickly.

But what is Worldcrafter?

In a nutshell, it's probably going to start off just like a 2D Minecraft for Android, which there doesn't seem to be at the moment*, and even if there was it's probably not to my liking.



* There are thousands of apps on the Android Market, and Minecraft seems so incredibly popular that I find it hard the believe there isn't one. There's a 3D version and a top-down 2D version, but I couldn't find a 2D side-view.

As you can see from the above screenshot, I've got the basic platformer-style engine up and running. If I can work out how to do a video, I'll upload one.

Anyway, I did say it will start off being just like Minecraft, but the similarity will end soon. It will contain more variety of worlds, and also take advantage of the 2D aspect. Maybe the player might be able to enter a Super Mario world! Or build there own world. I want the world to be persistent, so players can create epic landscapes for others to play in. And emergent gameplay. Etc.. etc.. It's all a long way off yet though.