Last week I could complete the main planned tasks :
- get a running version (swing and android), just displaying the game board. (android snapshot, hope it works)
I delayed the other task to this week (it has been done this early morning :
- Create the title picture (just a simple text using a fancy font)
Instead, I consolidated the scripts that I use to generate the graphic files and to copy them in each app project. So, I will give more details about that.
I use several tools to produce the source file : GIMP, Blender, and lately Inkscape. But then, I want to support several screen definition. For this game, I want to support Quarter HD (540x960), HD (720x1280), Full HD (1080x1920) and Quad HD (1440x2560) -orientation is portrait-.
For Blender and Gimp files, I first export from the tool a PNG file (or a set of PNG for an animation) at the highest definition. For a svg file created with Inkscape, I do a PNG export only if rsvg cannot render the file properly.
Then I write a shell script, using imagemagick to resize (convert), and assemble them if appliable (montage). These scripts produce a set of files for each supported screen definition. I also found how to use shell scripting to generate some description files I use to define my sprites. To save time, I now use make to process only updated source files.
Finally, each application (swing, android) must have the graphic and data files, so I wrote a script that copy the generated files.
So now, the schedule of this week will be tight, since I still have 2 tasks that are not so simple :
- Write the various screens of the game (main menu, about screen, promotionnal screen and player stats). I will base this work on what I did on my previous game. However, my previous game was displayed on a landscape oriented screen, so I will have to rework some button, and I didn't scheduled that.
- start coding the game mechanics. I guess this one will slip to next week.
