love-android: discussion

[TechnoCat]

I think changing the required version number from 2.2 to 2.1. The main reason for 2.2 was that my phone runs with it.

If I recall, one difference between 2.1 and 2.2 is an entire OpenGL ES version. And then the same thing again for 2.3.

[hagish]

If the difference is gles10 to gles11 then it would be a big issue.

[TechnoCat]

If the difference is gles10 to gles11 then it would be a big issue.

2.1 - > 2.2: New OpenGL ES 2.0 APIs in android.opengl.GLES20

[ghoulsblade]

Heya, i'm working with hagish on this one =)

ES 1.0 is what we currently use, that should work on all newer and older models afaik.
ES 1.1 has vertex-buffers, which might offer performance improvement on never devices using vram, so we might add that as option.
ES 2.0 is all shader based, so a big change for drawing. I'd expect newer devices that support ES 2.0 to also support 1.0 and 1.1.
So for now we'll stick with ES 1.0 to make it work on as many devices as possible.

It's still in a very early stage, still a lot of api functions to port to allow it to run more complex demos than the clouds demo that we used as first test.
Screen resolution is a problem, since many games have hardcoded positions far outside the mobile display, so i'm prolly gonna try and at least squash the coordinate system into the mobile screen unless a special option is set in the conf.lua.

about files etc : i haven't done much with android dev yet, but as far as i've seen there's
a) Resources embedded in the app, and
b) access to sd card
when it comes to using "file", like images and lua scripts.
Our first goal for the prototype is being able to run most existing .love files from sd
even if the games weren't made with awareness of android.
Currently you still have to unpack them, but we'll probably be able to get it working directly with .love files by using existing zip lib stuff.

To use love as engine for a complete app without sd card it shouldn't be hard to allow access to resources for dofile and loading images/sounds,
but the developer making the game will need the android sdk and put the resources in, and set the start script,
then he could make an application without needing an sd card.

We won't be porting Box2d anytime soon, that's low prio for now. Maybe there's something existing we can use, but for now we'll focus on the games not using it.

What's also worth thinking about is the touch-screen interface, there's some additional info there not covered by löve's standard input things,
e.g. multi-touch which could recognize multiple points, some motions, maybe pressure (not sure what the newer devices can report),
and gravity sensors, and accellerometers. So here's a hint what should be added to the default löve api in preparation for future developments =)
We'll try to make it available in some way via custom api tho.

[Taehl]

Hm. Well, I hope it wouldn't be too hard to make it work on Android 2.1. From what I've read, there are a huge number of 2.1 devices out there, and all further versions of Android are backwards-compatible with it. On a more personal note, I have access to some 2.1 handsets, but nothing higher, so if love-android can't work on it, I'm afraid I won't be able to do anything with it.

[TechnoCat]

From what I've read, there are a huge number of 2.1 devices out there, and all further versions of Android are backwards-compatible with it.

Only 11% are still on 2.1.


I bet you thought Android 2.1 was still alive. Nope, Chuck Testa.



More seriously though, targeting 2.1 seems fair enough for now.

[T-Bone]

I really think that the goal should be to make the creation of Android games easier, rather than porting existing games. Computer games typically play with a keyboard, which Android devices usually don't have. Instead, in Andoid games you'd rather have touch buttons or use hardware buttons.

If, on the other hand, you'd some day implement a way to create touch buttons that emulate keyboard presses, then it's a whole other story. Still, I think it might help your development if you assume that the game developer knows that the game will run on Android, and this assumption is fair.

[Jasoco]

My LG Optimus V (Virgin Mobile) is 2.1 and will most likely NEVER be updated. (I hate Fragmentation. Oh how I wish I had an iPhone.) But it plays Angry Birds. So as long as "Android Löve" runs on such a low-end smartphone and I can install my own projects to play around with, I'd be happy. Just make sure it gets proper touch events.

Still hoping for iOS Löve one day though. *sigh* To be able to create a game for my iPad without having to learn Cocoa.

[T-Bone]

My LG Optimus V (Virgin Mobile) is 2.1 and will most likely NEVER be updated. (I hate Fragmentation. Oh how I wish I had an iPhone.) But it plays Angry Birds. So as long as "Android Löve" runs on such a low-end smartphone and I can install my own projects to play around with, I'd be happy. Just make sure it gets proper touch events.

Still hoping for iOS Löve one day though. *sigh* To be able to create a game for my iPad without having to learn Cocoa.

You can always root it and install something better, you know.

But yeah, Android 2.1 is a good place to aim at for now.

[Jasoco]

You can always root it and install something better, you know.

But yeah, Android 2.1 is a good place to aim at for now.

No you can't. The instructions for rooting this phone are impossible to perform because all the links to the required tools are broken. Screw that crap.