Is isometric 2D? If so can you make isometric games in Love?

[Schbaltz]

To create a game with a "game creator" you don't need (in most cases) programming skills. Actually, you just need a little logic skill to create some scripts. Any game designer use scripts (that are easer than PL as Java,C# or, of course, C++) to test new functionalities, behaviors or improvements on projects in progress. I think, for an example, an architect could create a scenario richer of buildings, beautiful places and environments than me, but, could he create artificial intelligence, logics and behavior better than me? May be, but not very often. Programmers can create new game engines, new graphics features and so forth.Think about it.

[Eamonn]

To create a game with a "game creator" you don't need (in most cases) programming skills. Actually, you just need a little logic skill to create some scripts. Any game designer use scripts (that are easer than PL as Java,C# or, of course, C++) to test new functionalities, behaviors or improvements on projects in progress. I think, for an example, an architect could create a scenario richer of buildings, beautiful places and environments than me, but, could he create artificial intelligence, logics and behavior better than me? May be, but not very often. Programmers can create new game engines, new graphics features and so forth.Think about it.

So your saying if I code a game, I'll have more control over graphics, etc?

[Schbaltz]

So your saying if I code a game, I'll have more control over graphics, etc?

Yes, if you code a game, you have more control over anything. But it can cost a lot of time. The fact I'm using love2d is that I'm free to code my game as I want and it's easer than c++. Some people (programmers like me) prefer to create new features (as new maths calc, a new game pattern or improve graphics rendering for example), other guys prefer to focus on the game creation, just using the "drag and drop" feature. These guys usually are called as "Game Designers", not for the "Drag and Drop" (i'm assuming guys like us), but because they want to see the results ASAP (many of my friends are like these guys, and they just want to say what would be good in the game, usually, they have good ideas). it's up to you decide what do you want to work on. Any game company needs professionals of both these abilities. And... Don't worry, programming will never,never, NEVER die, 'cos not, we'd be on atari yet . I hope I have helped you

[Lafolie]

Isometric can be achieved in many ways. There's even some 3D stuff around. This is our isometric rendering (written by my friend/co-developer Joe), done entirely in löve http://cl.ly/image/1z1t26100146.

If you look around on the forums there are some nice examples with textures and slopes too. Our aims are to have smooth rotation and adjustable angles. When 0.9.0 is released we'll switch to textured surfaces. If you don't want these things, and would be happy with a fixed angle, like Tactics Ogre or 'Tactics Advance then it's super easy.

[micha]

If you look around on the forums there are some nice examples with textures and slopes too. Our aims are to have smooth rotation and adjustable angles. When 0.9.0 is released we'll switch to textured surfaces. If you don't want these things, and would be happy with a fixed angle, like Tactics Ogre or 'Tactics Advance then it's super easy.

Just as a side-note: If you are just working with a parallel projection, like shown in your .gif, then you can already do this in löve 0.8.0. The love.graphics.draw as the options for shearing images. The difficult part is to figure out what numbers to put in there, to get an images drawn into the isometric scene correctly. The new functionality in 0.9.0 is about distorting images, so that parallel lines are no longer parallel. This is not needed in a parallel projection.

[Lafolie]

This uses geometry transformation. In 0.9.0 we have geometries (like quads), we can just switch out the poly draws with geometry draws. If we added foreshortening to the rendering this would basically be a 3D game. It has Z-Sort and it sorta uses ray-casting: calculates the centre point of each tile in XYZ world co-ordinates and then runs a calculation to calculate how far into the screen it is based on the current viewing angle.

Code: Select all

function CalculateZDepth(x,y,z,map)
Z = ((z*map.sinA)+(map.cosA*((x*map.sinB)+(-y*map.cosB))))
return Z
end

function worldToScreen(x,y,z,map)
X = (((x - map.origin.x)*map.cosB)-(-(y - map.origin.y)*map.sinB))*64 + map.centreScreenX
Y = ((-(z-map.origin.z)*map.cosA)+(map.sinA*(((x-map.origin.x)*map.sinB)+(-(y-map.origin.y)*map.cosB))))*64 + map.centreScreenY
return X,Y
end

[pielago]

this is what i was looking for great job

[zorg]

Hi! I have heard about the isometric game camera view and I was wondering is it 2D or 3D? I was looking on the internet and some people say it's 3D and some say it's 2D, so I was wondering if someone here could give me a definite answer. I know that Pokémon games for the DS had isometric, so that will give you an idea of what isometric is if you've never heard of it before.

I'd put it that way: An isometric view is a method for displaying 3d objects with 2d techniques. So the display is kind of 2d. Objects further away from the camera do not get smaller (as it would be in proper 3d). But still the content is 3d..

In my opinion, isometric is just how the world is shown to you; the layout can be either 3d or 2d, and the objects/sprites as well, so it really depends on how you code it. in löve, a shifted 2D layout with 2D sprites is the easiest kind of game one could make isometric; you can add "layers" to the world for "2.5D" (an example would be rollercoaster tycoon, with the height of the stuff you could build), and finally, true 3D would probably be better doable with unity or Unreal's engine. (exaples are Hatred (yes, that one) or monster madness)
True 3D games are possible with löve as others already wrote threads about them, but it is harder.

In short, creating a 2(.5)D isometric game is very much doable with löve.

[Roland_Yonaba]

Ortho Robot, dudes! Ortho-freaking-Robot!
There has to be some isometry in this!

[jvdm]

Ortho Robot is an epic game! I quite like the whole 3D/2D mix aesthetic.