By John Moore

Mobile game developers are beating a path to Corona SDK, a development platform built upon such components as OpenGL, OpenAL and the Lua cross-platform programming language. Corona Labs Inc. (formerly Ansca Mobile) lists games including Blast Monkeys, The Lost City, Cannon Cat, Dabble and The Secret of Grisly Manor as recent app store hits created with Corona. I recently talked to Don-Duong Quach, a programmer and co-founder of Cannon Cat developer Loqheart, about his use of Corona SDK.

The Corona website notes that developers can build apps ten times faster using Lua. Has that been your experience?

Don Quach: We were able to rapidly prototype lots of ideas for Cannon Cat with

Corona. Lua is a great programming language that lets you get a lot done with minimal syntax. Compared to Objective-C, the learning curve is a lot lower. The Corona simulator makes it very fast to iterate on your code, and Corona’s API gets you up and running very quickly with just a couple lines of code to add graphics, physics, sound, etcetera.

 

 

NetDevil, based in Louisville, Colo., is one of those fairy-tale software developer stories: guys who love games start company in basement; work hard; move upstairs to spare bedroom; attempt to save the universe. That would be LEGO Universe, the online game the company recently released in collaboration with the LEGO Group of Billund, Denmark, and NetDevil’s parent company, Gazillion Entertainment.

 

 

By John Gaudiosi

With over 11 million subscribers worldwide, Blizzard Entertainment keeps online gamers coming back for more World of Warcraft (WoW) by consistently adding to the virtual world of Azeroth. Cataclysm is the most ambitious expansion to date for the massively multiplayer online (MMO) fantasy role-playing game. While most of the attention has been focused on the new 3D facelift that the game has undergone, Cataclysm is pushing the linear aspect of interactive entertainment forward with its Hollywood-inspired, in-game cinematics.

We are computing in the past. Every chipset and microprocessor we use today is the product of five to 10 years of development and design. For a technology company to be successful, it must be able to not only deliver cutting-edge products, but also tailor those products for a marketplace and consumer demand that doesn’t yet necessarily exist. It’s enough to make you want to break out the crystal ball. By Stu Horvath

 

By John Moore

Real-time strategy (RTS) games have had lasting appeal on PCs, and now the genre is moving to mobile devices. Needless to say, the shift from large displays to much smaller ones creates design challenges for RTS game makers. Kukouri Mobile Entertainment, however, has soldiered on with Tiny Troopers, available in the App Store and headed for other platforms. Kim Soares, chief executive officer of Finland-based Kukouri, recently discussed the company’s approach to miniaturized RTS.

Jun Takeuchi has gained a prominent voice in the gaming industry in the last few years, urging Japanese game designers to catch up with North American producers, adding co-op gaming to a refresh of Resident Evil, and pushing Capcom to embrace global gaming. Capcom uses the MT Framework engine to bring games to multiple platforms, and the company works hard to build support for threading and multicore hardware.

Garrett Romaine recently caught up with Mr. Takeuchi (and his interpreter) to discuss his start in gaming and his thoughts on the industry’s future.

 

There is so much talk about games these days. With the advent of tablets and smartphones, the platforms available to play games on are ever increasing. With the runaway success of social games like Farmville, the types of games available to play have also exploded, and with them a new genre of game players who I call “social gamers.”

At the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this year, a tablet won the Best of Show award, and the thought crossed my mind: I wonder what this means to the different gaming platforms? Is there a compelling proposition for PC or non-console game developers?

By Matt Ployhar

Over the past few blogs, I touched on two of the four biggest game-changers I see hitting the gaming ecosystem simultaneously. First, we covered the trends and impact of mobile platforms. Second, we covered the trends and impacts occurring at the format and business levels. For this discussion, we’ll cover what I think is another enormous trend impacting the games market: globalization.

I cannot emphasize the importance of the globalization trend enough. By percentage of market share, as other geographies begin to mature and disposable income rates increase abroad, the U.S. and other traditional gaming geos become smaller as an overall percentage of market share. The primary reasoning behind this is that most of the industrialized nations’ markets have already been saturated with game systems.

Makes sense, but why should we care? There are several reasons why the entire gaming ecosystem should pay heed: source of revenue, more choices, fierce competition, and innovation and growth shifts.

By Stu Horvath

Last year, we investigated the game development program at the NYU Game Center. Founded in 2008, the center specializes in games-focused study for undergrads and grad students, but so far has only offered an undergraduate minor. Late last year, the center announced it will launch a master’s program starting in fall 2012. We spoke with director Frank Lantz about the now even-more-promising future of gaming at NYU.

By John Tyrrell

Emotions have been running high in the HTML5 application development space in recent months. With the current worldwide explosion of mobile and web app use currently underway, many feel HMTL5 is the bright future of cross-platform development.

The vision is simple: one single, straightforward web programming language that allows the creation of anything from a basic service app to a complex game that works across any platform without the need for native development. In theory, HTML5 is a developer’s dream, reducing costs, leveling the playing field and, for app and game studios in particular, opening the floodgates to a wealth of new potential development talent. But in practice, as is often the case when disruptive new technologies enter the marketplace, the road ahead for HTML5 has some twists and turns.

One of the hottest HTML5 debates centers around game development. Games are complex beasts that generally require specialized coding and the creation of native versions for each platform they are deployed on. The idea that HTML5 could eliminate these hurdles is exciting to the countless coders around the world who are working to embrace the emerging technology.