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[l0bster]

private beta: https://the-l0bster.itch.io/pocket-platformer

A free, super accessible browser tool to create your own platformer games. Inspired by mario maker, bitsy and pico8.

• Design your levels by simply drawing stuff on the screen
• Redraw sprites to give it a personal touch
• Export the game and share it with the world  

First post:

Hello there  

So i started this project. I'm not 100% sure yet, which direction to go with it, but so far it was fun jamming with it, and i'll definitely will stick to it for a while.
The idea was to make a super accessible game creator in the style of bitsy, where you can create a platformer game, by simply drawing stuff on the screen.





It is done 100% with vanilla javascript, without help of 3rd party libraries, or even sprite sheets -> it's all code.
Therefore, it runs in the browser, and the whole game can be exported as a javascript game file.

My next plans for upcoming features are:

• more interactive elements (first some generic things like trampolines, shooting canons, etc.). But i also have some more unique elements in mind, to make this game creator stand out. One general goal is, for the elements to be interactive between each other, and have multiple possible use cases.  
• player mechanics that can be activated/deactivate per game (walljump, double jump, dash..)
• maybe redrawable sprites. which would be a cool feature, and easy to implement, but a concern i have is, that users could redraw the elements in a way, that they are not recognizeable as what they are anymore (trampoline doesn't look like a trampoline anymore, but behaves like one). I'll have to think about that

[oahda]

This is cool! I think people would have a lot of fun messing around with something like this if it's accessible from a browser. Reminds me of some old Flash things I would play way back in the day.

The art is very nice and self-explanatory too (like regular platforms versus ones you can jump through), so I can see the issue you mentioned with customisation. Maybe you could just offer some themes and palette swaps? c:

[l0bster]

thx 

The art is very nice and self-explanatory too (like regular platforms versus ones you can jump through), so I can see the issue you mentioned with customisation. Maybe you could just offer some themes and palette swaps? c:

yeah, i was also thinking about palette swaps, or maybe only allowing to redraw the player. i really don't know yet

[l0bster]

It's been a while since i posted, but i've been working on the game here and there in the after-hours
The most obvious things i added are more game-elements. For now: trampolines and disappearing blocks.



The disappearing blocks work in a way, where they don't reappear as long as the player is in the way, which might lead to some interesting level ideas



I also took care of some game-feel stuff. The hitboxes are more forgiving to your advantage (smaller for spikes, bigger for trampolines), also i implemented coyote-jump. even though it's a minimalistic game, controlling the player should feel good

[l0bster]

Feels a little weird to post updates about the project, as there is still nothing visually impressive about it..and TigSource likes sexy pics  
But there has been a lot of progress on it, mainly surrounding the overall system. You can now create multiple levels, and finally export what you have created as a standalone game  



You can also import it again, to continue working on it.



Also some small tweaks and mechanics, as for example the walljump, which you can see in the GIFs  

[oahda]

It's so cute! Being able to just export a playable HTML is really cool, I think I would've loved something like this when first starting out, especially considering I'd be able to then edit the JS and stuff in the file. You've got something really neat going here.

[l0bster]

It's so cute! Being able to just export a playable HTML is really cool, I think I would've loved something like this when first starting out, especially considering I'd be able to then edit the JS and stuff in the file. You've got something really neat going here.

Thx <3 that's true, you could change the JS to your liking. It might be a bit complicated too enhance it to add new features or something like that, but you could totally change stuff like jump-speed, run-speed etc. 

[airbug]

Thumbs up for doing it in HTML and JS! Sharing demos will be simple.

Watching this.

[l0bster]

Been silently working on my platformer creator for quite a while. Newest obvious addition are ...  
*~* COLORS *~*
.. and also a new UI that hopefully makes it clear how to use the tools.




I underestimated the effort of some things, which i didn't even think of in the beginning, like flipping the sprites depending on the direction they are facing, which is not a built in functionality when working with vanilla javascript and sprites.

Next on my plan are decorational objects, that don't interact with anything, but will make the levels prettier  
and an editable start and ending screen. Once those things are in place, the basic functionality should be done and you will be able to create full platformer games  

As for the direction i want to go with the project in general, i'm leaning torwards giving the players full creative control by allowing them to redraw every object and adding more tiles. My concern was, that players could make some objects unrecognizeable, but then it's their game and their fault  

also: PLEASE HELP ME TO FIND A NAME FOR THIS PROJECT

[l0bster]

As mentioned in the previous post, i've added  decorative elements, and a title and ending screen to the game.
Now, it seems like a real game when you export it 
The start and ending screen are also editable -> you can change the game's name (obviously) and the ending message. You can also add decorative elements there, to make it look more fancy. As later on it will be possible to redraw the game's elements, you could get creative there, and basicly draw whatever you want

[l0bster]

So quite a lot has changed in this project since my last update. I guess i'm just bad at marketing this thing.
Some of the most noteworthy change are: redrawable tiles  now, all the sprites from the game, can be redrawn on the fly, no matter if you are in build or play mode. This has been the most fun feature for me so far

Some of the elements can be rotated, by clicking them again, which changes their behaviour. It becomes apparant for canons f.e.

In general, i worked a lot on the infrastructure of the game. Cleaning up the UI, make the tools easy to use and understandable, fixing bugs. I'd still like to add some more general functionality, like a changeable background, changeable level size. The camera is even already implemented and would work if the level was bigger. But it's only possible to make it bigger manually in the code for now.
I guess soon i'll upload the game to itch.io and give out private links to people who are interested (or people who i will force to test it) 

[mz-one]

Looks like great fun! How do you plan to release it? Will it be a tool that can export HTML/JS that people can send or host on their own, or actually an online platform that would store people's games/levels, so that they can just send out links for other people to play immediately?

[l0bster]

Thx a lot @mz-one
I was planning the first variant. People can export Html/Js that they can host on their own (Maybe again on itch.io - i think the sense of community is pretty great there). Probably i'll put a logo of my tool on the title screen, so other people know where it's coming from, but that's it.
I think the second option would also be really fun, especially as it's a browser based tool. That way people could create and share levels really quickly. But that of course would mean even more work for me, as i'd have to set up a database, and also i would need some sort of menu, where people could search and access other peoples levels. I'm not excluding that option, but maybe it's not something for the first draft.

What is your opinion on this? Which variant would you prefer?

[mz-one]

I think you're thinking about it in the right way: it's more important to focus on the tool itself in the first place and you can always expand into even hosting the creations yourself later. I think that it'd be cool how easy it would make everything for me as the creator, but of course, as you suggest, that's just bought with a lot of work required from you if you'd decide to pursue that direction to the consequences

[l0bster]

Been again a while since the last, but the project is coming along quite well.
What happened since the last update: i showed the project to some friends and got feedback and was busy with bug-fixing a lot
They already created 2 games with the tool and it was really fun to see, what other people come up with. Feels like the tendency is to create hardcore platformers 
But it was great to see, that there was a concensus between the people, which future featues are desired. Feels like my trains of thought were not so wrong during development.

First of all, some prettier default sprites were created, together with multidirectional solid blocks.



A lot of work also went into the draw functionality. An eyedropper tool was added, to select an existing color in the draw board, and also a copy - paste function, that mainly should be used to draw similar sprites. F.e: draw an idle sprite -> go to walk animation sprites -> select the idle sprite as the basis for it, and draw a walking animation. It can also lead to some fun results:



Also, some simple sounds have been added. They are loaded from a cloud, and therefore the output can still be a simple html/js file. In case the user doesn't have an internet connection, the sounds won't play, but let's be honest, who is offline nowerdays.

[brainwipe]

Congrats on testing with friends! Apart from the bugs, what did you learn from it?

[l0bster]

thx tbh, it was a very pleasant experience. the UI seemed to be pretty self - explanatory, and they used this tool pretty much as i expected it (although, to be fair, it's pretty minimalistic). they found even the more hidden functionality, like deleting set elements with the right mouse.
it gave me a motivation boost also of course, but i'm still trying to keep calm and not rush things, to be able to produce clean code, to make it easy to enhance the project more and more.

[l0bster]

Some updates again:
Implemented a camera and a changeable level size



Also added a tooltip for some elements, so that the attributes of individual instances can be changed. Here f.e. the canon:



I guess after around ~1 month, i will post a private link for everybody here, to make the tool accessible for more people. Still not for the public, but i'd like be more open about it

[q1]

this is super cool! the default sprites already look so lovely. i can't wait to see what people make with this. i've seen bitsy games where the creator uses their limited tools in a really creative way to make sidescrollers or scene transitions and such. i have a couple questions. will you be adding programmable npcs? moving enemies? customizable physics?

keep up the great work!

[l0bster]

Thx @warmsundae 
Yes, there will be NPCs. I wouldn't say programmable, but you'll be able to add text they say
Customizable physics - yes, actually one of the features I wanted to work on next
There also will be enemies, but it's going to be harder than it sounds like, because even with small Goomba like enemies a lot of things need to be considered, if I want to keep all possibilities open. They are supposed to interact the same way with the world as the player (f.e. they also need to be catapulted upwards if they land on a Trampolin etc.), therefore the physics code needs to be really clean. Also, a bunch of edge cases, like what happens if you stack enemies on top of each other need to be considered. I'm not even starting with moving platforms   
But it's on the list