thoughts on PulpCore advancement

[stemkoski]

Hello all,

I hope to motivate discussion with this post.

I am a professor of computer science (and mathematics) at a university near New York City; I teach courses in Introduction to Computer Programming (Java) and Video Game Programming (among others).  The last time I taught video games, I used David Brackeen's book, "Developing Games in Java" (http://www.amazon.com/Developing-Games-Java-David-Brackeen/dp/1592730051). After reviewing many such books, in my opinion David's was far and above the best book on the subject; our only problem is that it was too short -- the students flew through it and wanted more!

I will be teaching video game programming again in the Spring 2012 semester, and was delighted upon further research to find the PulpCore library!  My primary issue was that my students are typically familiar only with the BlueJ development environment (http://bluej.org) -- Eclipse typically appears later in our CS major.  So I wrote instructions for a BlueJ setup in the PulpCore wiki. 

Next, with rapid browser and Java upgrades, as we have seen, PulpCore applets often have loading issues. As a result, I temporarily considered using some of the other Java 2D gaming application (not applet) libraries available. "Slick" is well-established, but lacks core features like collision detection.  "MarteEngine" is a recent/current attempt to build the missing features on top of the Slick library.  However, several people (Carlo and Piotr) have written desktop interfaces that work very nicely and therefore circumvent applet-related problems. So, I'm committed to using a combination of David's book and PulpCore for my course.

For the course I am teaching, I will be using the PulpCore library with some additional classes thrown into the JAR file: 

* Piotr's desktop interface

* the PulpCore transitions classes (as seen on http://www.jbox2d.org/upload/PulpCoreTransitions/)

* the Phys2D library (available at http://phys2d.cokeandcode.com/ and PulpCore demos seen on http://www.youtube.com/user/provenza24)... the API for Phys2D is straightforward, and unfortunately, PulpFizz (http://code.google.com/p/pulpfizz/) is "dead in the water" as of 2008.  

I would love to see these (or some variation, e.g. polished and optimized versions of desktop code) permanently added to the core, and a corresponding PulpCore version 1.0 release, but I am not volunteering; I feel that David, NoukNouk, or someone else of comparable knowledge and talent should lead that effort.

I believe that what this project needs in order to grow its community is a series of quality tutorials (I'm working on some) and examples, like Milpa, for potential users to see the power of PulpCore.  Some games are out there, but hard to find.  Something along the lines of the Cloning the Classics project (http://cloningtheclassics.com/), which also seems to have been abandoned, would be great to start again.  So, here are my questions for the PulpCore community:

(1) Do you know of any games/applications that use the PulpCore library?

(2) What "classic" games would you like to see in PulpCore? (Asteroids, PacMan, Arkanoid/Breakout, and simplified versions of Super Mario Bros., Legend of Zelda, and Dragon Warrior/Final Fantasy come to my mind... are there any others on your personal "must-see" list?)

(3) What do you believe the key tutorial topics should be?

Thanks for reading this very long post, and please reply with your thoughts!

[Andres Martinez Quijano]

I won't answer any of your questions, just recommend Fizzy: an API on
top of (the awesomest :D ) JBox2D with the simplicity of Phys2D:
http://old.cokeandcode.com/node/1438

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[stemkoski]

Are there any Fizzy & PulpCore demos out there?

[Andres Martinez Quijano]

not that I know of...

[nouknouk]

> (1) Do you know of any games/applications that use the PulpCore library?

Here's at least one, mine ;-)

Some advertising for my little online multiplayer game: it's kind of
arcade pool game available at http://www.bouncebox.fr/bouncebox-web-edition/
(and yes, it's in french only, but game rules are very basic).

More details on the context here:
http://groups.google.com/group/pulpcore/browse_thread/thread/ea48cc41540c5e41/c52654d0c3f98cc5?lnk=gst&q=bouncebox#c52654d0c3f98cc5

Regards,

Nouk²

[David Brackeen]

If you'd like to use JBox2D (which is being updated) instead of Phys2D, look at the PulpCore physics example. The bindSpriteToBody() function takes care of the integration, and could by copy-and-pasted between projects.

This is where I'm at: Off-and-on I've been working on the next-generation of PulpCore, which currently runs on top of LWJGL on the desktop. The graphics are super fast the the audio latency is super low. It includes a build-time texture-packer for OpenGL, input events, and some other new features, but is missing some existing features. At some point this new code could run on browsers via GWT (HTML5 Canvas instead of the Java plugin) or Android. I'm doing this because: 1) The Java plugin situation has gotten worse, and 2) I want Milpa on Android. The PulpCore API has changed enough that it will probably drive everyone nuts, but it needed to happen. I don't know if it will be in any sort of beta state by the time your class starts, but I thought I'd throw that out there, to let you know where my focus on PulpCore is.

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[Mark Kreitler]

(1) Do you know of any games/applications that use the PulpCore library?

I used Pulpcore for a game jam earlier this year, and have continued development so it's in a reasonably playable state: www.freegamersjournal.com/haveeweherd.

 

That project made me an instant Pulpcore fan. Unfortunately, the recent browser headaches caused me to suspend work.

 

(2) What "classic" games would you like to see in PulpCore? (Asteroids, PacMan, Arkanoid/Breakout, and simplified versions of Super Mario Bros., Legend of Zelda, and Dragon Warrior/Final Fantasy come to my mind... are there any others on your personal "must-see" list?)

 

See below.

(3) What do you believe the key tutorial topics should be?

 

In the past, I've found the following breakdowns useful:

 

1) Basic java programming: data structures, awt, event-based game loop for a turn-based game. A good game for this is Battleship vs the computer (years ago I wrote a series of BlueJ based tutorials on these topics).

 

2) Threads and real-time (arcade) game play. Game project: space invaders.

 

3) Processing kinematics equations in real time. Game project: asteroids.

 

4) Enemy AI and pathfinding. Game project: Pac-man.

 

5) Box physics. Game project: Dig Dug

 

I'd be interested to see your final curriculum!

 

Mark

 

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[stemkoski]

David: any chance of a sneak-preview for the new PulpCore? Even if its in an early alpha stage of development, in spite of any disclaimer that everything is subject to change, I'm still interested (and I bet I'm not the only one!). 

[stemkoski]

Another nice PulpCore game to check out:

http://www.perhac.com/shared/forest-defender/forest-defender.html

[jere_uy]

i would definitely love to see an "alpha" :) i'd also like to know if there's anything that can be done to help, i'm no java guru but i've been programming in java for over 3 years and i think i get around quite well. i believe community contributions are imperativa so that pulpcore can grow faster and better. i'd personally like to get involved because i see amazing potential in this api, think about this: it has been inactive for almost 2 years and despite of that it's one of the most known java game programming api's around.

[David Brackeen]

Well... Right now there are no instructions for building or running. The instructions are "in my head." So it needs to get to a better point, but I will look into releasing some sort of "alpha" sooner rather than later.

On Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 5:46 PM, jere_uy <jerem...@gmail.com> wrote:

i would definitely love to see an "alpha" :) i'd also like to know if there's anything that can be done to help, i'm no java guru but i've been programming in java for over 3 years and i think i get around quite well. i believe community contributions are imperativa so that pulpcore can grow faster and better. i'd personally like to get involved because i see amazing potential in this api, think about this: it has been inactive for almost 2 years and despite of that it's one of the most known java game programming api's around.

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[Nouknouk]

Hi,

very interresting project.

I recently ported BounceBox into an Android game a few weeks ago. Therefore I did use of the LibGDX Java framework, which is mainly focused on Android game development with openGL backend, but also supports Desktop (Win/Linux/MacOS) and (afaik) applet deployment ( http://libgdx.badlogicgames.com/ ).

Don't know if you already know LibGDX, and if it could be comparable with you new project. But if it is, what advantages/disadvantages you expect for your own library.

Cheers,

Nouknouk.

[David Brackeen]

I checked in some code to the "develop" branch in hg, for people who are interested.

libgdx is nice. I want PulpCore to also run on HTML5, though.

[Andres Martinez Quijano]

I think that would overlap too much with PlayN, maybe you should join
forces on that field instead?