Forums » Impact Engine » Simply Awesome

At the beginning I was sceptical whether the $99 I spent for a license was a good move but I have to admit that impact engine is simply awesooooome!

After first two rather unsuccessful attempts at making games with it I thought I got ripped off but I sat down over the last three days analysing all the examples and I was able to make a Biolab Disaster clone really quick... All needed code was in the examples like techniques for spawning projectiles, respawning the character, collision detection, particle generation, camera follows, triggers, kill-zones etc.

Weltmeister simply rules... but I found myself longing for a brush size selection it would be great to choose a tile and then resize the brush and fill the clicked area with the tile that was selected.

Although I would expect to get within this $99 much more tutorial than it comes with.

I think it'd be great if ImpactJS could partner with an excellent 2D sprite library/tileset and get that to be included with a license.

Well if you are creative you can create your own tiles... and anyway there is so many resources on the web you'll probably find any tileset you want. Also use resources like iconfinder.com.

But yeah I agree - this $99 should include at least the full source of Biolab or at least the dodgy tricky parts.

http://www.spriters-resource.com for sprites ;)

Great :D

I've also been checking out spriters resource. It's really cool. If you combine that with http://vgmaps.com/ then you can get the whole deal in some cases. Was just looking through some NES classics like Blaster Master, etc. last night.

I also found this site which claims to have some royalty free (CPL) sprites:
http://www.widgetworx.com/widgetworx/portfolio/spritelib.html

Also here is a free download for an out of print book about game design that has a lot of theory about sprite design, etc.
http://wiki.yoyogames.com/index.php/Ari_Feldman%27s_Book_on_Game_Graphics

Since I'm a beginner with javascript and game design, I agree that more example code and projects would be helpful.

However, the IRC chat room and the Forums have been very helpful and responsive. I've been able to get my topdown game up and running using code from Pong, Jumpnrun, and from IRC and the Forums.

For myself I have also found some useful info online, for example:
http://www.tonypa.pri.ee/tbw/start.html
http://cloningtheclassics.com/
http://www.effectgames.com/effect/#Article/tutorials/Platformer_Tutorial
http://oos.moxiecode.com/#Tutorials
http://glimr.rubyforge.org/cake/canvas.html#KeyboardTest

I've also been looking at other engines to help me wrap my head around the process a little better. I think they're all OpenSource. Some of them also have great GUI implementations:
http://jumpcraft.com/
http://rpgjs.com/
http://game-editor.com/Main_Page
http://www.stencyl.com/
http://www.konsolscript.org/
http://craftyjs.com/

Thanks for the link to the Ari Feldman book axphin, looks super interesting!

If you're looking for some more examples, I've posted the source code here for my YOSS game (actually an earlier more simple version). Although it's a simple space shooter, it has some game mechanics which can be applied to multiple types of games. I've been told that portions of it have been helpful, particularly the Director code (which is now a plug-in) as well as the player controller code. Additionally you can see a method for controlling game flow in main.js.

@MikeL
Thanks I noticed your director in one of the posts - I have to say the code snippets on the forum are valuable resource it actually helped me to work out loads of things.

Impact is great - I did my games before from scratch and it was a pain in the butt in many aspects and then I came across impact and its great...

Price is a bit steep but I guess there will be a lot of 1.XX version updates (like jQuery) before it jumps to 2.XX this way the spending $99 to anyone won't be so painful.

hmm, anyone have a clue what's in store in 2.XX ?

hope there's something to do with multiplayer support, and isometric views!

I think I read somewhere it will support multiplayer and isometric maps still in the 1.XX versions...

Quote from Jerczu
I think I read somewhere it will support multiplayer and isometric maps still in the 1.XX versions...

These things are definitely on my list, but not for 1.x. Sorry.

I myself have a hard time figuring out what features to add and when. I'm terribly bad at planning such things - and I know that that's a cheap excuse.

1.18 will feature a new Debug class with lot's fancy utilities to analyze and debug your game. Beyond that, I really have to make a plan some day :/

Damn!... ;)

It's always nice to have more tools and features, but I'd like to see more examples of how to use the current code, and how to make plugins. It would be nice to have the whole Biolab Disaster code to work with and to learn from.

@stahlmanDesign -

You don't need whole biolab disaster code to actually learn how to make a game like this. I personally used snippets from jump and run demo that you get with your download to learn how to do stuff and took off from there.

In jump and run demo you get pretty much everything you need projectile spawning, collision detection, npc entities and the rest of it comes from your creativity and a search bar in the forum section.

I don't know how others learn but I'd rather spend hours and hours on doing some stuff rather having it given to me.

If you want something "easier" (and free for all of the complainers) try StencylWorks which is flash based.
http://www.stencyl.com/

It has a lot of pre-built stuff and a marketplace where you can grab more items or post your own.

I'm sure there are plenty of other examples, but Stencyl seems pretty good for people who want to focus more on the visual elements and less on code. I actually like using it along with Impact because it helps me wrap my head around game design concepts.

Regarding more sample code for Impact, I would love that actually. I do like branching out from the samples that exist and experimenting on my own. I like interfacing with everyone on the forums and in IRC to solve problems and learn more, but I do agree that some additional code would be nice. I'm just not sure if Dominic has the time to create all of that. He should probably be focusing more on updates and documentation. Right now the Code section of the forums is the best place for looking up sample code I suppose, but I don't know if it is the best way to organize it. Also I think there should be a separate Gallery section from the Games section so that new users can see right away stuff that was finished with Impact. And the Games forums can still be used for pimping new releases and discussing bug reports, etc.

I think when people buy into something or are trying to decide about buying into something it helps tremendously to know the forums are active and that there is plenty of content to keep them going. More samples would only help. Dominic may just need more help to make that happen.

welcome to the world of game development, where the more code you ponder and write, the more insight you get, and hopefully be able to translate that into a working game!

here's a really good motivational article to complete your game
http://makegames.tumblr.com/post/1136623767/finishing-a-game

I was attracted to Impact because I have used other frameworks including Flash & Cocos2D, and I recognize the brilliant structure of Impact. I've unbaked a few games to see how something was done, and that helped me get on the right track whereas just poking around would have led me to create my own far less efficient solution, because I didn't know how to use the tools.

If you were a doctor you might recognize a set of beautiful instruments, but no one would then just say, "just start experimenting, you'll figure it out!"

I got the source for Dino Love, a game made for a 48 hour challenge, and with that code I learned about making your own entities for changing levels and for displaying messages and using spawn points. It was very helpful, especially because of the crash-course nature of the game. It showed what you can do in a short amount of time when you know how to use Impact beyond the basics.

@stahlmanDesign - whatever floats your boat mate - Personally, I'd rather figure it out myself and code it my own way 10 times before it works rather than copy others. Plus the docs are quite well written.

Granted, some more tutorials would be appreciated but on more difficult stuff than absolute basics.

@stahlmanDesign Would it be possible to send me the Dino Love source? Just like you I learn most quickly by checking out example code.

Thanks a lot if you can send it to:
rob [at] robboerman [dot] com

Rob

I can't find it on the internet anymore, but the guys offered it to the public, so here is a link to download it.

[edit] @TylerAppmobi I removed the folders impact and weltmeister from the lib folder. Replace them with your purchased copy.

Great, thanks!

That bundle looks like it has weltmeister in it. If this is on the internet for free download I'd strongly recommend taking that out.