Hi! New to Corona here.
Just to help me get an understanding of the limitations of Corona SDK – could the popular LetterPress app have been made using Corona SDK? With all it’s cute physicy bounciness, large dictionary, game center features, and all?
Just trying to get an understanding of what limitations Corona might have before I dive too deep.
Best! [import]uid: 191855 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 332875[/import]
I’m going to say not only yes, but most certainly yes. You could make a game like this with Corona SDK.
Not to toot my own horn (OK, a little bit), but earlier this year I released ‘Super Wordy’: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roaminggamer.superwordy
It used animations, other stuff (certainly not the same as LetterPress, but not necessarily easier or harder than what Atebits did with their game):
Video of Super Wordy (not a marketing video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIL6fi_Ls2I
This was a pretty raw entry and today I can see it needed some more artwork love as well as a little more play testing. For all that I’m still pretty happy with it.
Cough…cough… so back to your question. Yes, it could be made with Corona SDK, so if you’ve got similar ideas go for it.
[import]uid: 110228 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130653[/import]
I’m going to say no – only because I don’t think Corona SDK allows you to to GameCenter multiplayer stuff like LetterPress does.
But for everything else, I’ll go along with @emaurina. 
As far as the multiplayer thing goes, if you don’t *need* to go through GameCenter then for sure you could do it with Corona.
Jay
[import]uid: 9440 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130654[/import]
@Jay,
Yes, I failed to address the ‘Game Center’ part of the question. 
That said there are other ways to set up multiplayer games. Matchmaking, leaderboards, etc are all solveable problems with Corona SDK.
Shoot me for being too happy w/ Corona. I like to encourage new folks to join as much as possible. [import]uid: 110228 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130656[/import]
I saw your video emaurina - technically I see that corono is really capable of a lot.
Do you think that Game Center functionality will eventually be available in Corona SDK or is it one of those things that will likely never happen?
Time to study some sample code. [import]uid: 191855 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130659[/import]
I’m going to say not only yes, but most certainly yes. You could make a game like this with Corona SDK.
Not to toot my own horn (OK, a little bit), but earlier this year I released ‘Super Wordy’: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roaminggamer.superwordy
It used animations, other stuff (certainly not the same as LetterPress, but not necessarily easier or harder than what Atebits did with their game):
Video of Super Wordy (not a marketing video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIL6fi_Ls2I
This was a pretty raw entry and today I can see it needed some more artwork love as well as a little more play testing. For all that I’m still pretty happy with it.
Cough…cough… so back to your question. Yes, it could be made with Corona SDK, so if you’ve got similar ideas go for it.
[import]uid: 110228 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130653[/import]
I’m going to say no – only because I don’t think Corona SDK allows you to to GameCenter multiplayer stuff like LetterPress does.
But for everything else, I’ll go along with @emaurina.
As far as the multiplayer thing goes, if you don’t *need* to go through GameCenter then for sure you could do it with Corona.
Jay
[import]uid: 9440 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130654[/import]
“Shoot me for being too happy w/ Corona. I like to encourage new folks to join as much as possible. :)”
Haha!
I know what you mean, but at the same time I’d hate for someone to *need* Game Center multiplayer, get started, find out it’s not there, and then go back to their boss/client and look like a doofus. Painting yourself into a corner is not fun (speaking from experience).
I’ve seen multiple people leave Corona “in disgust” because it didn’t have feature X or feature Y – and what’s funny is that in most cases there were alternate ways to do what they wanted.
Jay
PS - So nice to see you over here in Corona land (and the code you’re making available) – I was a fan of Torque (TGB, mostly) back a few years ago.
[import]uid: 9440 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130664[/import]
@Jay,
Yes, I failed to address the ‘Game Center’ part of the question. That said there are other ways to set up multiplayer games. Matchmaking, leaderboards, etc are all solveable problems with Corona SDK.
Shoot me for being too happy w/ Corona. I like to encourage new folks to join as much as possible. [import]uid: 110228 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130656[/import]
Everything except the Game Center multiplayer can be done in Corona. Worth noting that people quite universally like the app - and dislike its dependency on Game Center for matchmaking.
I happen to be making a turn based “game” right now and rolled my own system. Since I want to target multiple platforms (let Android users play their friends with iPhones), and needed some more advanced features than it supports anyway, Game Center multiplayer was never a legitimate consideration for me, although it certainly can be convenient.
Game Center turn by turn has been mentioned by the Corona team in the past as something to look into but I don’t know of any plans for it at the moment. [import]uid: 87138 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130666[/import]
I saw your video emaurina - technically I see that corono is really capable of a lot.
Do you think that Game Center functionality will eventually be available in Corona SDK or is it one of those things that will likely never happen?
Time to study some sample code. [import]uid: 191855 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130659[/import]
I don’t know what Letterpress is but check out “Word Smack” by EA, that was done in Corona.
Dave [import]uid: 117617 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130672[/import]
“Shoot me for being too happy w/ Corona. I like to encourage new folks to join as much as possible. :)”
Haha!
I know what you mean, but at the same time I’d hate for someone to *need* Game Center multiplayer, get started, find out it’s not there, and then go back to their boss/client and look like a doofus. Painting yourself into a corner is not fun (speaking from experience).
I’ve seen multiple people leave Corona “in disgust” because it didn’t have feature X or feature Y – and what’s funny is that in most cases there were alternate ways to do what they wanted.
Jay
PS - So nice to see you over here in Corona land (and the code you’re making available) – I was a fan of Torque (TGB, mostly) back a few years ago.
[import]uid: 9440 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130664[/import]
Everything except the Game Center multiplayer can be done in Corona. Worth noting that people quite universally like the app - and dislike its dependency on Game Center for matchmaking.
I happen to be making a turn based “game” right now and rolled my own system. Since I want to target multiple platforms (let Android users play their friends with iPhones), and needed some more advanced features than it supports anyway, Game Center multiplayer was never a legitimate consideration for me, although it certainly can be convenient.
Game Center turn by turn has been mentioned by the Corona team in the past as something to look into but I don’t know of any plans for it at the moment. [import]uid: 87138 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130666[/import]
I don’t know what Letterpress is but check out “Word Smack” by EA, that was done in Corona.
Dave [import]uid: 117617 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130672[/import]
I’m using a 3rd party called Game Minion for a app I’m currently building that uses multi-player turn-based play.
While I don’t speak for Corona Labs and what plans they have, I do know they understand that there needs to be some level of multi-player support as well as a way to deal with leader boards and achievements in the wake of OpenFeint’s demise.
But do they go native routes, and have apps on Android not talk to iOS (which you get if you have Game Center, Game Circle for Amazon, A yet to be determined platform for Google and nothing for the Nook or do they find a platform-agnostic system that will work on all four? If they go the platform-agnostic way, do you have a service like OF that is branded to the vendor or do you have something that just runs silently in the background and give your app features but looses the social aspect of going to Game Center to see all your games?
These are the tough questions that Corona Labs has to answer before we can get something and then there has to be a vendor that can scale, be up all the time and not pull and OpenFeint and get bought and shutdown.
In the mean time, I highly recommend you check out Game Minion. They are very Corona SDK friendly and have a module to make their REST API based calls easy.
[import]uid: 19626 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130688[/import]
I’m using a 3rd party called Game Minion for a app I’m currently building that uses multi-player turn-based play.
While I don’t speak for Corona Labs and what plans they have, I do know they understand that there needs to be some level of multi-player support as well as a way to deal with leader boards and achievements in the wake of OpenFeint’s demise.
But do they go native routes, and have apps on Android not talk to iOS (which you get if you have Game Center, Game Circle for Amazon, A yet to be determined platform for Google and nothing for the Nook or do they find a platform-agnostic system that will work on all four? If they go the platform-agnostic way, do you have a service like OF that is branded to the vendor or do you have something that just runs silently in the background and give your app features but looses the social aspect of going to Game Center to see all your games?
These are the tough questions that Corona Labs has to answer before we can get something and then there has to be a vendor that can scale, be up all the time and not pull and OpenFeint and get bought and shutdown.
In the mean time, I highly recommend you check out Game Minion. They are very Corona SDK friendly and have a module to make their REST API based calls easy.
[import]uid: 19626 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130688[/import]
If you check out Word Smack for capabilities as mentioned by Dave Baxter, and are curious how we did anything in that game in Corona, I can give you some ideas :).
It was a very quick, small project relative to what I’ve done before here, and Corona was incredibly helpful and responsive to our issues.
But overall I’d say it could easily replicate something like Letterpress, and if you really need something like GameCenter Multiplayer (though I’d still suggest a custom solution as it will be MUCH easier to port over to Android later), you can always invest in Corona Enterprise. [import]uid: 134101 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130703[/import]
Hey Ntero - so can we presume you work for EA?
I’d be interested to see how you got the whole social play working - can this type of Facebook turn-bu-turn work straight out of the box with Corona? Been looking at the Facebook API and know a fair bit about Corona - but I’m hitting a brick wall with this and hoping somebody might be able to shed some light. [import]uid: 33275 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130704[/import]
With regards to your first Q, Yessir, but I am in no way a representative, simply another programmer.
Secondly, almost all of the Async mechanics are more of a server-side issue.
Essentially you need to create a server-side system of getting a list of games for specified users, and then a definition of a game. Regardless of whether you use Facebook, Game Center, Twitter Accounts, etc… that’s just another way of the user providing credentials to who they are within your system. Link those identifiers with your own.
Once you can identify who someone is, and get their information and games out of your server’s database, then you use that information back on the client to identify what each user can do (can he play, should he wait, what scores can he see, how many games/tokens does he have, etc…).
And if you worry about security, make sure that the Client never gets to pass the game definition to the server, only the other way around. i.e. the Server will give you a block of data for a game, but you can only submit moves, and the Server then gives you a new game structure. It means you need more server-side logic, but it also makes it harder for people to screw around with your game data.
This means that even with a simple network layer (i.e. Network.request only), you can setup an Async system + accounts, since it’s largely a design issue, and not a technical one. [import]uid: 134101 topic_id: 32875 reply_id: 130707[/import]