Your views on Corona SDK?
AcrezHD
Member Posts: 2
Hello im very new to both GS and Corona and i would like to get your thoughts on Corona.
I Have yet to learn GS and Corona and im a just wondering if it is worth me learning corona in the long run.
I dont want to create a "One Hit Wonder" App, i want to create a loyal fan base with my games and acutely making a career out of it.
I feel that if i want for example to a job interview to do with game development and said i know to make games using GS i feel i would most likely get laughed at LOL, Where as if i said i know the basic coding language used by Corona (.lua) that it would benefit me a lot more.
So my question is what are your general views on the Corona SDK?
Thanks for your time,
Kind Regards,
Jordan.
I Have yet to learn GS and Corona and im a just wondering if it is worth me learning corona in the long run.
I dont want to create a "One Hit Wonder" App, i want to create a loyal fan base with my games and acutely making a career out of it.
I feel that if i want for example to a job interview to do with game development and said i know to make games using GS i feel i would most likely get laughed at LOL, Where as if i said i know the basic coding language used by Corona (.lua) that it would benefit me a lot more.
So my question is what are your general views on the Corona SDK?
Thanks for your time,
Kind Regards,
Jordan.
Comments
Gamesalad is free, and will wrap your head around some logics that could be useful later with corona too. It's pretty basic though, it's not well optimized and it's hard to get 60 fps rock solid, which in some games it's necessary. But now it's free (is it right?), so it's worth a shot. As I'm working mainly with gs lately, to finish a template, I must say that with corona I wouldn't have had so many headaches, nor I would have to find workaround.
Corona as an endless free trial. You can't build for the appstore, but if I'm not mistaken you can build for your device. It's pricey though, but it's worth it.
Gamesalad i think is a lot easier for designing levels... maps etc. I just need to drag and drop de actors.
My soon coming corona running game template! :P
No seriously, you got plenty of documentation on the anscamobile site, plus if you google lua you find lots and lots of things. There are some templates too, although I do not like the fact that are not well optimized, but are a good starting point to learn, and when you know how to optimize well, it's easy to use their logic to build a better one yourself.
You need to Put they X and Y position or not?
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:corona.com+gamesalad
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:gamesalad.com+corona
Yes, Corona looks good... but perhaps this is not the best place to discuss it. HA HA.
@MagoNicolas
you can't, and you can
What I meant was, for starter, getting your idea out in gamesalad first can usually be more fast, and you can play around with it pretty easily. The final app is made in corona, but those that matter to the dev? It's more a stable and performant platform. When, and if, gamesalad reach corona at least in performance, then one can think of do it all in gamesalad. But if you have both, why can't you use them both?
http://www.anscamobile.com/resources/roadmap/
There are things GameSalad does that Corona does not... like iAds... and um... like iAds!
The point is that you're manually taking work created in GameSalad and recreating it in Corona. There isn't an export function. It's not like starting a Word Document in Microsoft Office and then importing it with Pages from iWork.
For the particle engine, there's an addon, which I bought at half price, but unfortunately found too heavy (it uses lots of ipairs iteration, some ".." operator, things like that) in a really fast paced game, so I simply coded mine. Two functions of 30 lines or so each, didn't need them to do much
With scenes there is really no problem. People likes to use the director class that is meant for that. I do not really like using external libraries, so I just manage everything myself, and it's really pretty simple. If changeScene = level 1 then unload everything and load everything that level 1 needs. You can even put some nice transition effects between a scene and the other, and loading times..it looks like there are actually none.
For the export function, of course I didn't meant it like that. It would be a waste to do ALL the game in gamesalad than redo ALL of it in corona. I was talking about, for example, if I have to do a platform, I study how to move the character well in gamesalad, which lets me prototype faster, than port that same logic in corona.
I think those GameSalad investors should dig deeper... buy Corona! HA HA.
That... or make the software web based... so you at least have to be a customer to generate XML files.
I have emailed Carlos a few times - he has always been absolutely fantastic. You can tell from speaking with him, even briefly, that he is not just a fantastic co founder, but a fantastic person. He puts in a (very) professional effort while maintaining a friendly and casual (when appropriate) attitude.
The staff over there are active on the forums; and if you ask them "Hey guys, when can we get our hands on In App Purchasing?" they'll respond with; "Unless we run into any unexpected issues we're doing our best to get it to you by the end of January."
That's right - January. This month. We're getting IAP.
iAds might be good but frankly I'm far more excited about IAP - it's awesome.
GameSalad is good for a lot of things, I still want to make apps with it - but when I can create an app that has my own splash screen, runs smoothly with no issues, posts to Facebook, has leaderboards and achievements, then that's what I'm likely going to do.
On a side note, I just did a 24 hour project in Corona to see how I'd go, I'll be posting the results shortly - will come back to share a link then.
I'm kinda excited too for i-ap. Thinking of doing a free full version of a game with ads, with iap to buy, take away the ads and add more content (1 time purchase, not those pay for game-money ecc ecc).
That said, I think it is still a very decent example, should post it in 5 odd - just finding my screenshots
I like that these two companies are so close. Yes, Corona is good, but does it have Mac App Store support? End of January, if GameSalad has Mac App Store support, but Corona does not... who wins the round? I think In-App purchases are more important than iAds, but I think the Mac App Store is even more important than in-app purchases.
i know it seems like a 7 headed monster at first. but once you get the hang of the interface (1-2 days)
it is a really easy tool to work with. i have never coded in java before, and im getting quite well with it I must say.
its not as easy as gamesalad OF COURSE, but i guess no other engine will be.
BUT as we all know deep inside our little hearts, easy doesn't mean best.
oh. and we are talking about making games here, not bouncing squares using physics.
As for the ease of use of gamesalad, Photics, it really is not.
I can assure you, working with both, gamesalad isn't easy. It overcomplicate things. Even the running template, it's done in a completely different way, while with gamesalad I was literally forced to come up with something else. Plus, writing code is way faster. It doesn't leak (the software, your code can leak if you write it bad :P), it doesn't crash, I do not have to close and reopen it. I can debug, I can see what's wrong, I can print variables value with a 1 line code, without having to put an actor with a display score in it, and be then able to check everything, find bugs, or see why things aren't working as they should.
And whatsmore, lua and corona api are as easy as gamesalad drag and drop. display.newImage and you put a sprite on scene. display.newBody and you put a physics body to your sprite. Everything in one line.
You get arrays (the table of lua work much like arrays), you get for loops, you get enterFrame possibilities with which you can "constrain" without almost no performance loss at all, and you have complete control over everything.
It just that it's code, and most people fear it, but it's not obj C, you don't have to setup graphic engines or even deal with memory. You just write out game logics.
I think gamesalad is a great piece of software to start. But as you improve, you just need more.
Hopefully it will get updated, I'm still looking forward to it
I consider "best" to be an all around better; and frankly Corona is just as easy as GS after a week or two, even from a non coding background.
As to relations/service - whichever was you want to look at it, Corona communicates better and helps to solve issues faster. I haven't seen half as many CodeMonkey posts here in 6 months as any single staff member over at Corona has made in this past fortnight.
My point is that I know they are two different things, but that Corona is better at both of them. Harsh but true. I do hope that this changes soon as for awhile it looked like it might over here, I'd like that, honestly.
As to the Mac App Store - Corona still has Android, a rapidly growing market - so I'd say it would still be even on that count, at least for me personally. (I'd like to be able to publish to the Mac App Store but really, I prefer portable devices, personally.)
Anyway, here's my 24 hour (kind of 12) Corona project;
http://techority.com/2011/01/11/corona-24-hour-app-project/
My twin drew the wasabi as I told her it was her, lol.
i am very excited about your closing paragraph!
That would be amazing if you would share how to implement basic functions such as button clicks to go to another scene or make an object visible (or not) and play sounds etc ...
I would love to pick up LUA but my thing is audio and gfx ... programming, not so much. But you never know
It's good to get feedback on what people would like to see and what they need help with
I shall attempt to include all of that except for the scene changes, which I will point people to Techority for. (I have a tutorial there as well as a sample project.)
They give a full list of everything thats either new or updated in the latest version, with links to the individual API documents for each item. The docs show Syntax, examples, parameters and remarks... so documentation looks superb compared to the mess that is GameSalad documentation.
The release notes detail ALL bugfixes...not just a vague list.
It also lists know issues...
So yup... just based on the comparable release notes and documentation, Corona looks like it could teach GameSalad a few lessons on how to communicate with its users.
I do like it, but I found it confusing in certain respects.
The 'Director' class stuff is brilliant - it essentially lets you switch between scenes. I could certainly envisage using it to make an adventure game, for example.
I think that, beyond that, it's not as daunting as I thought it would be. It's just extremely difficult for me personally, and to go from something like Attack of the Kraken or Gravitrixx to 'Hello World' is demoralising at best.
I just feel more *productive* with GameSalad as I know what I'm doing with it. After two years almost I'm still learning new stuff, but it's more about optimisation techniques than anything else.
If we got Facebook/Twitter, GameCentre, and the option to have our own splash screen then I wouldn't even look twice at Corona.
Improved game performance would also help!
As I said though, I think it'd be great for adventure games, especially because of the use of Arrays. I'm just not sure I can justify buying the licence for just one or two games in a year.
Cheers!
QS
Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io
If Gamesalad gives us Twitter/Facebook, and GameCentre like you say, as well as another tier to customize the splash, then they will be more competitive than ever!
I think GS is doing themselves a disservice by not having these options, but fingers crossed, they pull it together, and give us the basics.
Otherwise, I think GS is fantastic, and makes game design a lot easier than other programs.
To re-do attack of the kracken, basically you would need:
-a function to move the ship
-a function to shoot the bullet (and you can spawn without hiccups or problems, yay!)
-a function to move the monsters (enterFrame (monster.x = monster.x-monsterspeed) or just use physics, set motion x and it's done)
-a function to let the monster shoot towards player when player is near.
-handle collisions
This would get around 2-300 lines, with comments, and not optimized.
And that's it. Obviously it's just the start, but believe me, you could do that in a couple of hours. You would just have to work on it for a little month, and you could do things absolutely fantastic. And you could handle the radar with almost no loss in performance, adding detailed particles effect, improving enemy IA and still at 60 fps with no slowdown (if you handle the garbage collector correctly). The benefits? Stable and fast framerate, and no loading times between..anything. Ability to have an online leaderboard for each level PLUS achievements. Realistic body collisions, as you can set up polygonal bodies easily. And maybe android support.
As it stands now the difference is too big, and the benefits are too many to let them go.
Gamesalad is made for starters. It draws them near this world, and this is great. But it doesn't keep up with the learning curve. Still, it's too early to give it up, it has a lot of room for improvements and who know, maybe things will be the other way around. It's still worth to make games with it, a lot, but you must be prepared that there will be a lot more problems.
It makes sense for Corona, as that works for Android. But since I've been focusing on iTunes, I think Game Center is better. I think that's a fair assessment. Yet, which is the future? Coding is somehow cooler to the developers of the world. For example, hand-coding HTML is better respected than using a WYSIWYG editor. Yet, what am I learning by manually creating a 100-cell table? NOTHING!
Here are the main problems with GameSalad...
• Performance - This is a problem. I don't care if the editor needs to be restarted every 15 minutes. The games should perform better than they do. They should load fast, run fast and have better memory management
• Community - It would be nice to see a GameSalad roadmap, it would be nice to see better forum software - without a wall of yellow stickies, but it's even better to see the features delivered quickly. Yodapollo stated the important stuff already... new features are on the way and they're quietly working.
• Loading Screen - This is a bad decision. There should be an option to remove it.
• Features - Corona has some great stuff. But if GameSalad eventually gets the exact same features, with the same performance, then why use Corona? If suddenly GameSalad has Android support, OpenFient, AdMob, all of Apple's standards, then where's the advantage to Corona?
It's too bad these two companies aren't on the same side. Instead of two OK SDKs, there could be one really awesome SDK.
For you!
Simplicity is in the eye of the beholder
Like I said, I would feel vaguely comfortable making an adventure game. Not because they're simple games to make, but because there are no moving parts, no physics, nothing too taxing, even for me!
I started a shooter in Corona. I got a scrolling background going, a great stream of bullets and a moving ship.
Then I got stuck.
I still look at it from time to time, but the above shooter I was working on took me three weeks in Corona. It would take me five minutes in GameSalad.
I'm happy that you know how to code and find Corona simple. As I said, I'm interested in it. But I don't see myself making anything too taxing till GameSalad force my hand
Good luck to you!
QS
Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io