Tilemaps and Isometric Rendering

A lot of engines seem to focus on tilemaps and games rendered with such.  They also seem focused on isometric rendering for that 3D'ish look.  This past weekend I wrote a quick test to load a set of tilemaps and then I wrote a map loader to initialize an isometric world.  So far the tests are going nicely and it's looking like something that would benefit the engine.  I plan on adding the isometric demo to the engine demos so that people can get a look at loading the tiles, loading the world, and then streaming a world over the web.  I'll probably also use it as a foundation for a couple of other demonstrations such as simple multiplayer and generic AI with pathfinding.  Eventually this demo will be a showcase of technologies provided by The Render Engine.

It doesn't supplant the 2D sprite-based demo and game editor, but it's a step in a new direction that should help show the flexibility of the engine.  It's hard to get people to understand that The Render Engine is just a game engine and not a full game.  Showing them a mostly functional Asteroids clone, a simple physics ball bouncing demo, and a text renderer doesn't really showcase what the engine can do.  Instead, most people think that The Render Engine is an Asteroids clone or "a game from the early 1980's" which it isn't.  It's a framework for creating games, and the demos are just examples of the capabilities of the engine.  None of the demos are intended to be full games.

However, after spending some time cleaning up the Asteroids clone it occurred to me that it might be interesting to take that and expand on it.  Make it into a full game which can be played on Facebook, for example.  Add some more features to it and work out an interface with the Facebook API.  That might really show people what is possible with The Render Engine.  Not that I want people to think that the engine is there to make the next "Farm-whatever", but it might just be another person's stepping stone.