GameFontMaker

July 9th Update: GamefontMaker is now at 1.0.0 beta 2 and it’s also been released under the GPLv2. You can find the latest version and source over here!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything to the blog, so I figured I’d do something a bit special to try and get into the swing of things. So, I present to you what I think may be the first native Cocoa bitmap font creation tool for games, GameFontMaker!

At least, I think it is… Maybe… I didn’t do a lot of research, but I have seen a lot of fellow iOS devs wishing something like this existed for OS X, as the only other alternative runs under Windows.

Even if it isn’t, I was getting sick and tired of my really awful bitmap font creation tool that used FTGL, SDL and duct tape and generally produced hideous bitmaps without a lot of fudging of numbers. This is much, much better than that.

Anyway, GameFontMaker is currently in “beta” so don’t come crying to me if your computer explodes or anything. Though in my defense it hasn’t caused my MacBook to explode, and it was way less stable when I started it about 12 hours ago!

This is also my first Cocoa app, so forgive me if it’s a bit rough around the edges.

That being said, if you do find a bug or have a suggestion you could always drop me an email at: colin[at]celsiusgs[dot]com.

So, you’re itching to create some decent bitmap fonts for your game? Well, GameFontMaker is pretty easy to use. From the main window:

GameFontMaker Main Window

You can select the font by clicking on the “Fonts” toolbar button, doing so updates the preview. Once you’re satisfied with your selection, click “Export Font” which opens a file dialog. Choose the file name here, it will automatically choose a .png extension. Once you make sure you’re not overwriting an important system file or your taxes or what have you, click “Save”. This will invoke an ancient spell designed to end the world (and generate fonts) and will cause GFM to spit out a PNG file with all the printable ASCII characters in a line, also it will produce <filename>.png.xml which is an XML file that describes all the character dimensions. It has the following format:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<fontdata>
	<glyph>
		<character> </character>
		<width>7</width>
		<height>25</height>
		<offset>0</offset>
	</glyph>
...
</fontdata>

Right now the output isn’t ideal for using directly as a texture atlas, but hopefully the PNG plus the XML file can be put to some good use. Once I get some more time I will add support for defining the PNG size and altering the XML output.

Anyway, GameFontMaker is free to use for all sorts of purposes, however if you do find it useful you could always have a look at my games or maybe follow me on The Twitters. Enjoy!

The Genesis Centre

I just wanted to make a quick post saying that I am very pleased (and excited!) to announce that Celsius Game Studios is the latest client of The Genesis Centre. The centre is a technology start-up incubator run by Memorial University and seems to be a pretty awesome place to get my bearings as I try to develop and grow CGS as a company.

Also Chromodyne HD had a nice positive review from Simple Reviews last month, which is pretty cool! Thanks Parth!

In the meantime, my next mini-project is coming along nicely. I don’t want to say too much at this point as it’s very prototype-y but let’s just say it will involve shooting hot plasma death at evil aliens and blowing them the hell up. Oh yes.

I may have some screenshots by the weekend depending on how quickly I can finish these last few art assets to make it sexy and awesome.

For shits and giggles I decided to try and emulate the opening of 2001: A Space Odyssey in Blender. I present to you Chromodyne: A Match-3 Odyssey. I think I did a pretty good job, don’t you?

With (many) apologies to Mr. Kubrick.

In other, more serious news not related to me cocking about making movies, I submitted Chromodyne Lite to Apple for approval in the wee hours of the morning. Here’s hoping it won’t be stuck there for long!

They call it the “Race to the Bottom” on the App store, where everyone tends to price their app towards 99 cents because they feel that will compel people to buy their app because it’s so cheap. Well, I’m not so sure that is working anymore. Also with the new finish line apparently being set at $0, I think I’m going to pull out of this race.

Put a big “Did Not Finish” next to Celsius Game Studios in the Great Race to the Bottom as even if we reached the finish line, nobody is winning.

Partially inspired by this Gamasutra article “The 0.99 Problem” by Canabalt Co-creator Adam Saltsman, the huge amount of noise at the 99 cent level, and by the fact that if people want to play my games they’ll also more than likely pay a reasonable price for it, CGS games going forward will not be priced permanently at $0.99. To prevent future cries of hypocrisy I’ll state now that you may see a sale at $0.99, but at the very least that’s the new Free for a Day as far as I’m concerned.

On my part I promise I’ll continue to deliver games that are worth more than 99 cents to you, my wonderful audience.

To that end, the $0.99 “introductory sale” on Chromodyne for the iPhone and iPod Touch will be ending this weekend and as of Monday, April 12th, it will be priced at the still inexpensive $1.99.

Mark it in your calendar. Or not.

Thank you for your continued support

So, it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything to ye old blag. I just wanted to let anyone concerned that yes, I am still alive!

Since I last wrote to you, Chromodyne has gotten two more positive reviews from TruthBombers and AppGirl Reviews, which is always very encouraging.

My Real Job(tm) has been rather hectic as of late, so I’m a bit behind on the first update for Chromodyne, but most of the madness has passed so I’m getting back into the swing of things there.

Speaking of madness, and my Real Job(tm), after quite a lot of deliberation I’ve finally decided that I’m going to follow my dream and try and make Celsius Game Studios into my Real Job(tm)! I have a lot of work ahead of me in the coming months, but I think I have some great ideas to work on that could only be realized by a creative effort with more than just myself working at it. Luckily I’ve got the support of my family, friends and current employer so I think this might lead to some amazing things. Stay tuned for more exciting news as time permits

More shameless horn tooting lies ahead! *toot toot*

DIY Gamer implores the world to “Buy Chromodyne, Now!” I couldn’t agree more!

Touch iPhone Games gets so addicted to Chromodyne that they kill their iPod battery after playing it for longer than expected!

And finally, Keri Honea from Examiner.com says “Fans of this sort of puzzle game should all give Chromodyne a try.” Difficult to argue with, I say.

I’m so excited that people seem to have mostly good things to say about Chromodyne, and that the few negative points will eventually be dealt with as I continue to hone Chromodyne into the best puzzle game I can deliver.

Woohoo! “Our Rating: ★★★½☆ :: WORTH A LOOK”

Another review from another iPhone site, this time it’s 148Apps.com. Some very positive comments about the game, graphics and sounds. A respectable 3.5/5 stars, and they basically say that the game can only get better. Which is true, and I’m making it better right now! :O

The 1.1 update should be ready in the next week or two, I hope. The primary focus is to bring Leaderboards and some social networking integration into the mix, plus some other fun things that will hopefully make it in for 1.1, if not 1.2.

Thanks to we play iPhone for posting my first review! Some good feedback and nice things said about Chromodyne for sure.

From the summary:

“Grade – C, Good

At times it may be a little fiddly, but overall it’s worth the effort. It’s a pick up and play puzzler with a lot of heart.”

So apparently Chromodyne took less than 2 weeks to make it through the approval process O_o

I just spent the last few hours sending out press releases and all that good stuff. I still need to finish up Chromodyne Lite, but don’t let that stop you from buying Chromodyne if it tickles your fancy

Anyway, I’ll post more when it’s not 3 in the morning.

I suppose people might actually be reading this thing, at least after PocketGamer.biz oh so graciously interviewed me for a feature on one-man/woman iPhone developers, so I should probably update a little more often!

I’m about… oh… 98% done Chromodyne so that’s pretty exciting! Once that’s done, it’s time to start The Next Big Thing™ and work on some stuff I’d like to see in v1.1 of Chromodyne.

I’d kinda like to do one of those “Questions for the Developer” things infrequently… so if you’re out there and have questions about iPhone development, I’d love to hear them

’til next time!