So far in this series we’ve set up a basic framework to get us started and then added a render loop and some actual bubbles.
This part will make the game interactive, adding mouse and touch input, and discussing some of the pitfalls that can crop up as you do so.
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Now we’ve got graphics, animation and interactivity, what’s left? In this final part of my HTML5 javascript/canvas tutorial we finish off our little game by adding some sound effects – what good is popping bubbles without the satisfying sounds of destruction? Unfortunately, adding audio is far trickier than it has any rights to be, so hopefully this tutorial will save at least one person the troubles I had to go through.
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In the first part of this series we set the stage by putting together our framework and then getting a simple background on screen. This article will add our rendering loop to the code and let us actually get some bubbles out there.
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When I started this little project I had only a vague idea of how it would look and even less of an idea how it would be written or structured. As it turned out I just slapped down a quick gradient background, came up with a simple Bubble class and set a timer to move the bubbles up the screen. That gave me a basic core to work from, but as I started to tweak and add I realised just how messy it was, even for a simple project like this.
So this tutorial is going to ignore all my mistakes and lead you gently to the finished version with something resembling logical sense. This entry in particular will focus on giving us a basic framework to work within, and go as far as putting a background on screen. Part 2 will introduce the render loop and actual animation.
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After my early forays into canvas and Javascript I commented on Twitter how good it felt to be learning something new, something that felt like it opened up a whole new toolbox to me and the attendant possibilities.
The main upshot of this is that I finally have the tools at my disposal to make the game I’ve been promising my two-year-old son for a while now. This project is ongoing but “functionally usable” now. It hit a few bumps along the road so I’m writing this series of articles to describe the development of the game, the problems I encountered and how I overcame them.
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With two weeks to go, Sparki has been successfully funded. In fact they’ve surpassed their initial goal by over $40,000 and climbing.
Congratulations to ArcBotics, I look forward to playing with anything and everything they deliver. Now we just have to wait and see if they make it to $100,000 for the Android app stretch goal.
OK, this “regular feature” concept. Ongoing and at a somewhat fixed interval. Right, Wednesdays. Wednesday shall be music day. And this Wednesday I bring to you the music of the greatest incarnation of Breakout ever created: Shatter.
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About a year ago I found myself with a couple of weeks worth of evenings free, so I decided to sit down and have a crack at making a game. Not because I had an amazing idea for a story or some mechanics, just to see if I could. A few hours a night for two weeks was enough to make some decent progress on the skeleton of the game, and one day I hope to go back and finish it off, at least to the point where my initial plans are all implemented.
This is the first in a series of posts describing the game (working-and-definitely-not-final title: Extraction), what I’ve done so far, and where I plan to go next, with a focus on the parts I personally found most interesting.
For only the second time I just backed a Kickstarter project, this time “Sparki – The Easy Robot For Everyone“. With luck it will manage to get the second half of its $60,000 goal by the end of May 2013.
So why Sparki?