v2.0.0.10 (beta 1)

I know I'm kinda sneaking this out there, but I've released what I'm calling v2.0.0 beta 1 (officially v2.0.0.10).  The website is still down - I'm so pissed it's not even funny.  I'm losing followers on a daily basis and it's kind of hard to make a release without a website to back it up.  My emails and inquiries have fallen on deaf ears.  I guess this is what happens when hosting is free, eh?

Anyway, this is really just a version change and a ZIP build of the engine.  I just found myself really wanting to tag this because it's mostly there.  Please start hammering away at this and submitting bug reports.  I'm going to focus on the 2D tile map level editor from here on out.

Website Still Down

The Render Engine's website is still down.  I'm starting to get a bit frustrated, due to the fact that I really can't release v2.0.0 as a beta unless I have a site to promote it on.  I've spoken with my server host and he assures me it'll be up "soon" which seems to be code for "when I get around to it."  I guess I shouldn't complain about it... the site is hosted free and the domain costs me $1.00 annually to renew.  But it is frustrating, as I said.

UI Controls

Something new in The Render Engine v2.0!!  I've added a new demo which showcases the new UI controls in the CanvasContext.  They are still early in development, but when I abandoned the UI concept a while back, I figured it would be something people would accomplish within the browser with jQuery or something similar.  However, there isn't a good way to get UI controls, especially input controls, into graphical contexts.  There's now a new demo for them.  It only functions in Chrome right now, but I'll get it working in the other browsers soon enough.

Recent Changes - Nearing Beta

I finally got level saving and loading working, using object serialization and deserialization.  Objects now have the ability to serialize themselves into JSON, then back again which makes saving and loading a lot more robust.  I've split the 2D tile mapping demo into two parts - one with the editor and one without.  This will help with understanding how the two are related.  Additionally, I pulled comments from all of the JSON files because it was causing headaches that I didn't want to deal with.

Latest Progress

Sorry about the lack of posts, especially while the main web site has been down for a while.  My ISP is working on the issue.  The RAID array has been giving him multiple problems, so he's swapping it out with a new array and will have the site back soon.

The Render Engine Level Editor has been progressing nicely.  I've been battling with how to make the editor work, exactly, because everything is hosted in the browser.  There isn't a server side component to it which makes it a bit difficult to come up with how, exactly, to launch it.  It isn't a game of its own and instead functions as a game add-on.

Level Editor

I've been working on the Level Editor for The Render Engine for some time now.  It's really starting to come together.  It has core functionality in it which allows you to draw actors (sprites) and levels (tile maps) in the interface.  Right now it's still in its infancy, but it's starting to feel like an editor.  Eventually it will be how you set up a level for a 2d tile mapped game.  You can try it out by grabbing v2.0.0 from GitHub and firing up the Tile Mapping Demo.  When the "game" loads, press the F4 key and you should get the editor.  It isn't very intuitive right now, but it at least shows progress.

Updated Demo & Particle Emitters

I've updated the vector demo over at The Render Engine web site.  It now includes a particle emitter component on the asteroids.  I sped up the rotation of the asteroids so the effect is more evident.  I'll probably slow them back down in the future.  I also want to add some jitter to the particles themselves so they don't look so organized.  Go check it out here:
http://www.renderengine.com/demos.php