July 17th, 2011 iPad RPG BattleMap editor in Corona

Step 1: Be an awesome artist like the guys over at www.cartographersguild.com and make an awesome map.

Uh…..OK, well I’m still a beginner as far as mapmaking goes, so for rapid prototyping I asked Jon Roberts of fantasticmaps if I could use one of his. He said it was OK to use the Stormwatch Inn, so I did.

Step 2: Code the basic editor for physics object placement for shapes like circles and squares……done!

Step 3: Make a video demo of the basic interface…..which is pretty basic

Step 4: Get drag and drop working for data extraction of your map’s info to work through iTunes…….um……guess that’s a no-go in Corona for now, so I had to code up some PHP to receive the data directly from my app and write it to a database on the server-side. Which means in the finished game, you can get updated new maps directly from the game server, which is pretty damned cool I must say.

But I digress…here’s a video of the editor so far:

Battlemap editor for physics objects from mroberti on Vimeo.

NOTE: I wanted to concentrate on single screen, static battlemaps so I could workon simple, casual-esque combat on a small scale. No sweeping RPG storylines here, just the plain, good ol’ fighting.

Next, placement of objects like furniture, monster spawn points, and fog of war for multiple roomed engagements.

Stay tuned!