I've finished setting up the Android SDK in Eclipse and now I have to wonder, what are some popular methods for developing a game on Android? My Java knowledge is pretty limited to be honest so I don't know much about the included graphics library or even if it works with Android, most of my experience is in C++ with Ogre or SFML. I understand SDL is pretty similar to SFML so I might give that a try. Also, should I use the newest version of the SDK (Android 4.0.3 API level 15 is what my AVD is) or an older version to support the most devices?
There are a lot of methods to develop a game on Android. It depends on a specificity of the game you are going to create and your personal expirience.
In my projects I use libgx http://code.google.com/p/libgdx/. It's enough good to satisfy my expectations.
There are some cross-platform frameworks that make it possible to create games for Android and iOS (CoronaSDK, Marmalade).
I heard Ogre code is able to be compiled on Android. I think you should investigate this question :).
Please, let me know if it's possible.
What target version of SDK you should use you can see here:
http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html
Best regards
Some links to help you further:
Getting started in Android game development
Playing with graphics in Android
The Game Loop
Writing real-time games for Android (Google I/O 2009)
About the SDK - start off low, say Android 1.5. If you encounter things that are not available in this version, increase the build target. This way you can reach the most users.
If I'd want to develope for Android as a starter, I'd:
1) Learn Java. It won't be tough if you're used to other languages like C++
2) Make some tutorials (Internet is full of them)
3) Develope for an older version of Android such as 2.2 or 2.3 (There's no need to develope for even older versions, as almost all cellphone's have been updated to at least 2.2). In my opinion, developing now for Ice Cream Sandwich is worthless as nobody will be able to use your application (Ok there are some people, but they're not a lot actually). I think developing for 4.0 is atractive for big companies, with projects that can last for months, so when it's time for their app to be published, the market will be ready. Doing it before that is just closing your market -I assume you're not going to enter with a giant application yet-
And that's kind of everything you should know :)
Related
I want to make an android app which receives sound from the microphone of the smartphone and converts the value to decibels. I am completely new to android development, so have no idea about which IDE or platform to use for this.
Download the latest version of android studio from here
This answer may not be enough for you as you still need to know a couple of things to start building reasonable android applications. Good luck with that!
I have programming experience with Java and Actionscript 3.0 but for now Im looking for lib/framework or engine for ActionScript 3.0 since I want to make games for android and ios. This dosen't seems to be that easy.
I have tryed flashpunk, starling, citrus-engine. I like flashpunk but seems like it dosen't run good at mobile phones at all. And starling where kind of complex and confusing might be that I diddn't use enough time on it but before going any further I need to know what I shall do.
I use Starling and Flash CS6 to publish games in App Store, Google play and Amazon store. It is relative easy if you use project with shared libs and different fla files to target all platforms.
I am developing an application which is kind of similar to Skype with some more features. I am amused and surprised by Skype's response to various mobile platforms i.e. iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, Symbian, Bada OS etc.
I want to know how Skype is able to so rapidly release versions for iPhone, Android and Blackberry?
Do they write code targeting every platform separately or do they write code once and then use some utility to make it available across all platforms?
As a developer I am kind of curious to know the real technique which can be the reason of behind the scene magic. Any clues?
Answers with valid sources and references are more appreciated.
They are an $800 million/year revenue company, its probably not a huge deal to support many platforms.
From Quora : http://www.quora.com/Skype/What-programming-language-was-Skype-originally-written-in
The original internal alpha version of UI was built in QT and we hoped
to do few platforms at same take. However the result looked like crap,
our progress seemed slow and we ditched the QT about 2 months before
public beta release.
Delphi was chosen because our first senior UI developer was very
skilled at Delphi (besides dozen other languages-environments) and we
saw D as most productive, fastest, efficient way to build our app
given our team/lead developer skills and also getting very good UX on
MSWin platform.
For linux the QT remained and on OSX it has been Cocoa from the start.
The functional core components which did the heavy lifting under the
UI have always been the same C/C++ as Ahti pointed out.
They developed different versions for every platform. There is no single language that supports all platforms, unfortunately. If there was, it'd still be a hassle because every platform his it's own platform API.
If I need to develop JavaFx application with rich user interface (3D shapes ... etc) then Do I have to install some kind of libraries on my android 2.3 device to fully support JavaFx features?
JavaFX is not supported on Android ATM.
Still RnD on this is going on, Some People are doing great job on this and some how they got success with some specific platform but still not produces any stable version to the market.
please go through below links to flow up,
1) https://blogs.oracle.com/jfxprg/entry/javafx_on_android
2) https://wiki.openjdk.java.net/display/OpenJFX/Cross+Building+for+Android
Was wondering if anyone knew of some third party android development toolkits.
I have found Basic4Android.
Was wondering what other options are available.Language does not matter.
Thanks
Qt for Android (Alpha version) got launched last week.
Motorola has a custom dev environment built on top of eclipse (MOTODEV). It is not Motorola specific and you can use it for regular development. I have been playing around with it for a week and it is much more convenient than the standard Android Eclipse plugin.
EDIT: Forgot to mention there is AppInventor (currently in Beta) which is a drag and drop development environment from Google. It is a useful tool if you want to get a feel for development or you are developing just for your phone. It does not generate Java code (as yet) and there some restrictions on it like only single screen apps are supported. It has got a healthy community and lot of college students (in the U.S) seem to be using it.
MonoDroid is also another development stack for Android using C# and .NET API's. You can use Microsoft Visual Studio IDE to develop applications using MonoDroid.