Developers! Now it’s your turn with new Data Shares and Notifications API in SDK 0.26.0

SDK 0.26.0 is the first SDK release since Turbulenz went open source and there are plenty of new features for devs to sink their teeth into.

As well as all the improvements added to the turbulenz_engine, turbulenz_local and turbulenz_tools Github repositories, you can find the following new features:

Data Shares API

The Data Shares API is a new Turbulenz service that allows games to save information between users, that are online or offline. While the User Data API allows games to save information specific to that user, Data shares allow running games to save key-value pairs that other games can read. One application of this feature is to create turn-based games or share game generated content with other users when the original player is offline. See the Data Shares API for more details.

Notifications API

The Notifications API is a new Turbulenz service that allows games to send notifications to users. These notifications are akin to the short messages that users of Turbulenz receive informing them of site activity, such as badges achieved or scores beaten in leaderboards.

Games are now able to send instant or delayed messages to a user (including the current user), which will be received in real-time (online playing), as a site notification (online) or as an email (offline). They can be used to inform users of activity, such as “It’s your turn” or “Your base is under attack”.

When used in conjunction with the Data Shares API, developers can now write games that combine, turn-based online/offline play with real-time communication. The new Tic-tac-toe app demonstrates how the APIs can be combined. See the apps directory of the SDK/Github repository.

Rapid prototyping with Protolib

Inspired by prototyping libraries used by the Turbulenz team for rapid development of game concepts, the Protolib API is a new way for Turbulenz developers to get started building games. The high level API is for 2D and 3D development and is designed to simplify features such as model loading, sound playback, text rendering, input and much more. Sitting on top of the TypeScript and JavaScript APIs is a great stepping stone to using more advanced Turbulenz APIs, whether it be throwing together game concepts or entering game jams. To help you get started, SDK 0.26.0 includes the Protolib Sample App a combined demonstration of the various APIs and Protolib Template App a skeleton app structure to start building a Turbulenz app from scratch.

Protolib was used during the Turbulenz Getting Started Webcast to build Debris Dodger a simple game example, built in 40 minutes.

See the Protolib documentation to get started.

Local server upgraded

Part of providing the Notications and Data Shares APIs, the local server now has support for logging multiple users in at the same time. This allows games to test multiple users interacting on the same server, which is the same functionality provided on hub.turbulenz.com and turbulenz.com.

In addition to the open source changes to how the Turbulenz local server and tools are packaged, the deployment process has been improved, now remembering which developer was logged in when deploying and making the discover of previously deployed project versions easier.

Rendering performance improvements

This SDK includes additional performance improvements to the 3D renderers focussing on reducing the CPU cost preparing for rendering. There are also improvements to the 2D canvas implementation, confirming it as viable option for accelerated canvas 2D rendering. These improvements should benefit machines that were previously CPU limited.

Fixes summary

• Various fixes for the viewer rendering.
• Addition fixes to the dae2json and obj2json importing.
• T1424 - Local does not remember the password when deploying a game from Local to Hub.

More details of these features and additional improvements can be found in the release notes.

No longer a blank Canvas - native HTML5 Support

turbulenz.com now supports HTML5 Canvas, plug-in-less, gaming! We don’t just support it, in fact, we’ve embraced it with loving arms and given it a big hug. We’ve been waiting for web standards to catch up for a few years now, and they’re finally nearly where they need to be for next-generation web gaming. As a result all of our games can now be played natively in browsers that support WebGL such as Chrome, Firefox 10 and Safari (in developer mode). We recommend using Chrome for the best experience at the moment. The Turbulenz Engine has always been an HTML5 JavaScript engine and now the final link in the chain has been completed the game sites supports native HTML5 application deployment.

Read More

Multi-player, Multi-configuration, Multi-ple choices!

This release of the Turbulenz SDK is all about multiplying the possibilities. We’ve spent some time making it easier to develop for different target configurations simultaneously. Using the new makehtml and maketzjs tools you can write code once, create a canvas and a plugin compatible version of your game at the same time.

Now that you can target multiple configurations, why not add multiple players? We’ve introduced a new multi-player match making service. When integrated into your game it automatically pairs players with their friends ensuring that you’re not playing alone when you could be playing together.

There’s a new place for the full set of release notes.

Read More

Turbulenz SDK 0.17.0 now available

Have you been working on a HTML5 game using canvas? Turbulenz SDK 0.17.0 introduces canvas support, providing the first step in bringing your game to the Turbulenz platform, not to mention making it playable on browsers that lack canvas compatibility. In this SDK we’ve also revamped our input support providing a system of mapping keys that works for Windows/Mac and across different keyboard configurations.

The full release notes are available on Github - you need access to the Turbulenz SDK repository to read these. Get in touch if you want early access.

Read More