Scott and I are leaving for GDC in just two days. If you’re going to be in the area and would like to meet up, please give us an email!
Introduction
Howling Moon Software is proud to announce an update to Chipmunk Physics, the powerful 2D physics engine used in many hit iPhone, Mac, PSP, and even Nintendo DS games. Version 5.2.0 includes several major optimizations, a few small fixes, and includes the new Objective-C wrapper and utility functions.
What’s New?
Objective-Chipmunk provides native integration with the Objective-C’s memory management model and also provides many convenience methods for common setup tasks. It includes the Chipmunk Object Protocol which facilitates the easy addition of Chipmunk bodies and joints to the space. It also lets you easily create compound objects and keep your physics code organized. The binding also has numerous helpful iPhone features which allow you to easily interact with the Cocoa Touch libraries. A full and complete published iPhone game is included with the binding, so you have a great set of examples and a starting point for your program.
Changes Since 5.1.0:
- OPTIMIZATION: Chipmunk structs used within the solver are now allocated linearly in large blocks. This is much more CPU cache friendly. Programs have seen up to 50% performance improvements though 15-20% should be expected.
- FIX: separate() callbacks are called before shapes are removed from the space to prevent dangling pointers.
- API: Shape references in cpArbiter structs changed to private_a and private_b to discourage accessing the fields directly and getting them out of order. You should be using cpArbiterGetShapes() or CP_ARBITER_GET_SHAPES() to access the shapes in the correct order.
- API: Added assertion error messages as well as warnings and covered many new assertion cases.
- NEW: Added convenience functions for creating box shapes and calculating moments.
The Objective-Chipmunk wrapper is free to use on Mac OS X as well as the iPhone simulator. Access to the iPhone optimized build of the library costs $200 per title to license. Purchase Objective-Chipmunk via paypal or contact us at admin (at) howlingmoonsoftware.com for more information or other purchasing options.
Getting Started with Chipmunk
More information is available on the Objective-Chipmunk page. To get started, download Chipmunk from google code. The binding is included in the latest version.
Once you have grabbed and decompressed the latest version of Chipmunk, the best way to get started is to take a look at the examples. Fortunately, everything will build very easily and is ready to go. I’m going to start with the iPhone examples, since there’s so much interest with the iPhone (and iPad!). I’m going to assume you’ve already installed the developer tools and iPhone SDK. If not, head over to Apple’s Developer site and grab them. This short introduction doesn’t require you to sign up for the iPhone program!
Open up “Objective-Chipmunk/iPhoneChipmunk”, and launch the xCode project. Just click the “Build and Run” button and the demo app will launch in the simulator! From there, you can get a sense of what is possible with chipmunk, and then you can take a look at the corresponding source code file to see how it’s done! For example “Demos/OneWay.m” demonstrates oneway platforms, as you’d find in many platform games. This is one of the new features that was made possible by the solver changes in Chipmunk 5.0- so if you’re new to Chipmunk or even a Chipmunk veteran, there’s something for you to learn in the included tutorials.
Hi everyone. Once again it’s been too long since an update. We’ve done a few contracts since the last post, but we’ve also been working on a Mac utility called Upshot.
Basically it’s a very easy way to take a screenshot and send it to a friend, coworker, or client. This kind of thing comes up pretty often for us. Scott and I are constantly sending work-in-progress images to each other of whatever we’re working on. We wrote a script to help us out with this, but we figured the average non-programmer would have a use for it too!
So without further ado, check out Upshot!
Scott had a fairly free day today so he figured he’d get some of the trunk changes/fixes out into the wild.
Changes Since 5.0.0:
- FIX: fixed a NaN issue that was causing raycasts for horizontal or vertical lines to end up in an infinite loop
- FIX: fixed a number of memory leaks
- FIX: fixed warnings for various compiler/OS combinations
- API: Rejecting a collision from a begin() callback permanently rejects the collision until separation
- API: Erroneous collision type parameterns removed from cpSpaceDefaulteCollisionHandler()
- MOVE: FFI declarations of inlined functions into their own header
- MOVE: Rearranged the project structure to separate out the header files into a separate include/ directory.
- NEW: Added a static library target for the iPhone.
- NEW: Type changes when building on the iPhone to make it friendlier to other iPhone APIs
- NEW: Added an AABB query to complement point and segment queries
- NEW: CP_NO_GROUP and CP_ALL_LAYERS constants
We stay in touch with a lot of different developers both around Minnesota and the world, and one of our buddies is BravoBug Software. BravoBug specializes in Mac software, especially handy little utilities. They have a lot of great freeware apps that are worth checking out.
But, we’re writing to point out a special sale at BravoBug: the Funbox bundle! It’s six piece apps for $29.99, so check it out!
Chipmunk 5.0.0 is finally ready for general consumption! Head on over to the Google Code Project to get the latest source.
New features in no particular order:
- New joints/constraints system. Much more flexible and programable than before. Joints have adjustable parameters now so you can use them like servos and the like.
- Raycasting. Actually just line segment queries, but should be about as useful and is implemented very efficiently.
- New collision callback API. You now can register callbacks for collision begin/separate events among other useful things.
- Sensor shapes. Collision shapes that call callbacks but don’t generate collisions, like sensors in Box2D or triggers in Unity.
- API for safely removing objects from the space from callbacks.
Twilight Golf was released overnight, and we searched through the new releases lists on the App Store for our game. Alas, we’re on page 7 due to a reported release date of October 7th, two weeks in the past.
Unfortunately, this is a pretty big deal. Although Touch Arcade posters have been really excited and saying favorable things about the game, the simple fact is that most app buyers are only looking at the App Store. We’ve know first hand how App Store exposure helps; Crayon Ball was featured before, and that made a big bump in sales… And this isn’t the first time we’ve missed the recently-released list.
So what’s the problem here, Apple? In order to organize any sort of a release, you have to be able to have a set release date. In spite of all the many problems with the App Store review process, you could argue Apple is doing their best with the reviews. It’s a lot of apps for them to sort through, and approval isn’t always black and white.
However, if you provide the ability to set a release date for an application, make sure it works. Setting a future date so you can coordinate advertisements and promotions with the app’s release should NOT start you weeks back in the new release list. This should be a black and white issue.
Worst of all, I don’t really have any recourse for this. The “Contact Us” section on iTunes Connect doesn’t actually let you contact people- it’s just a faq. Apple has made it clear they don’t want to hear from developers, unless you’re Google and the FCC is involved. Simply put, being on the new releases list in the App Store is key, and I think we were screwed out of that list. We miss the new releases list, we risk missing the exposure needed to get in the top 100 lists. It’s tough trying to make a living when seemingly small problems with the App Store can really throw you.
Contact us admin at howlingmoonsoftware.com.
UPDATE: We’re definitely not the only ones affected by this same issue. The same thing happened with Paul Smith’s most recent app, Ask The Hoff. Likewise, there’s a at least two threads on the topic at Touch Arcade about the problem (mine and an older thread).
Get a free pre-release copy of Twilight Golf; we’re giving out promo codes for Twilight Golf- one day before the big release on October 21st!
We need your help to get the word out about our new iPhone game. So we’re asking you to Twitter about Twilight Golf or to join our Facebook group. In exchange, we’re going to give promo codes out a day before the game is released. You can use them immediately and get the game before it even appears in the App Store (yeah, we tested it).
On October 20th, we’ll go through the list of fans and choose 10 randomly and send them promo codes- easy!
Or, twitter about us and include the hashtag #twilightgolf. On October 20th, we’ll search for that hashtag, make a list of names, and give out another 10 promo codes randomly. Feel free to link to this thread, or whatever.
You can enter the drawing twice, but if the same person wins we’ll give the second prize to someone new.
You can find out more from our webpage:
http://howlingmoonsoftware.com/twilightGolf.php
Finally, we’re also looking for more reviews. We’ve got some press resources on our webpage at http://howlingmoonsoftware.com/twilightGolfPress.php and we’d be happy to give out promo codes to reviewers. Email us at admin at howlingmoonsoftware.com and be sure to include the name of the site you represent.
Finally, a huge thanks to everyone participating in this giveaway and helping get the word out. We can’t make it as indie game developers without your support, so it’s really appreciated!
Andy and Scott
Howling Moon Software
Finished editing the gameplay teaser for our upcoming Twilight Golf game. Check it out!
Sorry for those who did not make it in the beta, but we have more than enough testers at this point. Thanks for your interest!
Twilight golf is feature complete and is ready for some public beta testing! Please contact us at admin at howlingmoonsoftware.com for more information. Spots in our beta testing program are limited- be sure to mention what type of device you have. Our artist also finished up the last round of fantastic artwork for the game. Check out some of our final screenshots:
