I have an idea for an iphone game, but I'm not sure where to start with the code. The concept is a fast-paced platformer where the player needs to complete levels without mistake over and over to increase their score. The player character would move from left to right on it's own, and switch directions when it bumped into a wall or another obstacle. The player would be able to make the character jump by tapping(clicking) anywhere on the screen. The challenge would be for the player to visualize the correct path fast enough to follow it through without running out of time. The reason I'm unsure where to start is that I'm not sure whether to start with the level generator or other objects first. The generator feels like it'll be really complicated, and I don't really know how to code something like that. I have pygame and kivy installed on my computer. Any feedback is appreciated.
Help Starting on Code for an iOS Game
The problem with starting with the generator is that you won't really know what you need until you're coding the game itself. You'll need a good guess to avoid having to redo a big part of the generator once you start to see any possible problems in it when coding the game.
The opposite approach also have a downside, as you'll need to create one or two maps by hand, what isn't that much of a problem, but your game will have just these test cases and you can then have some nasty bugs that for a random reason don't appear on your hand-made maps.
Another possible approach is to code the generator and the game "simultaneously". Whenever you add a given feature to the game that affects your levels you add support for it to your generator. This is a safer approach, but it will probably take some rework now and then; you'll do a little rework to guarantee you won't do a lot of it. Now, if by generator you mean editor you'll need to create new maps whenever you make significant changes to your level system. If you really mean generator (as in a procedural generator) this wouldn't be a problem at all.
Personally I would start off by making a game design. Plan out what features your game will have.
Then create a prototype of the game design. Create some levels by hand and test to see if the game is "fun'.
When building the prototype build it up gradually. If you are making an iPhone game then the first task might be to draw a simple sprite to the screen....
After you have a working prototype and you are happy with the mechanics, then you have the option of modifying it to add randomly generated levels or starting "over" and designing the same game to use randomly generated levels.
I don't think you should work on random levels until you are fairly confident that you have the core game mechanics worked out.
