From NME to OpenFL with FlashDevelop

Right now OpenFL already up on the haxelib  so I could say that it's safe to use it now. For some , the migration process wouldn't be as smooth as one expect. Some problem like different build file type (NME use .nmml while OpenFL use .xml) and the support of OpenFL on FlashDevelop would cause a problem.

I've sucessfully migrated my NME project into OpenFL, it's not a big deal but maybe it can help they who don't know how to migrate :) 

First here's how to install OpenFL and FlashDevelop :

1. Install haxe 3 from and the official site
2. open the newly installed haxelib and install these libs: openfl, openfl-compatibility, openfl-tools,openfl-native,openfl-html5
3. after those libs installed, run this command : haxelib run openfl setup 
4. run additional setup command to setup each platform : openfl setup android, openfl setup blackberry, etc . If you already run nme setup [platform] previously , the setting would be saved in OpenFL
5. The current release build of FlashDevelop doesn't support OpenFL project, so you need to install the dev build version of FlashDevelop. you can download it here
6. if you select New Project in FlashDevelop you can see the OpenFL project can be created there.

Migrating NME Project to OpenFL Project

Using the new FlashDevelop we can migrate NME Project to OpenFL, but it need some configuration changes in .nmml file to do so.

• change .nmml file extension in your NME project into .xml 
• change <haxelib="nme"/> into <haxelib="openfl"/>
• add <haxelib="openfl-compatibility"/> so OpenFL will recognize all the old nme package
• looks like <haxelib="actuate"/> is necessary in OpenFL so don't forget to add that (Edit: turns out It's not really necessary if you don't use actuate)
• I'm not sure if this one necessary or not but you can delete all <ndll/> tags without problem (except your own ndll of course)
• This one too , delete the old <haxeflag/> tag and change with this one <haxeflag name="-dce std" if="haxe3" />
• Last, we need to tell FlashDevelop to use the .xml file as the build file. Right click Project -> Properties . On the output file, change the application.nmml extension to application.xml
• Try to run the project. It should be no problem now.

Other notes

• check the haxe 3 migration  for some feature changes like Maps and properties
• haxe 3 use different haxelib repo than haxe 2. so make sure that your lib that you use is  exist in lib.haxe.org 
• some library like spritesheet changes it's package name so you need to be careful about that.

for the end note, OpenFL is a great framework with so many potential. so don't hestitate to use it and keep creating awesome things . Cheers! :)

JKT48 Fanmade Game

So I create a fanmade game for all JKT48 out there. this is a small example, if the feedback is good I would consider to add more :)
try to get as highest as you can, Enjoy!

note : I could make the android version if there's anyone want to download :p

Resolving NME Android build fail after upgrading SDK to version 22

I just met a problem with NME deployment to android after I upgraded the SDK to v22. The problem would look something like this


BUILD FAILED
D:\Programming\SDKs\android-sdk-windows\tools\ant\build.xml:479: SDK does not have any Build Tools installed.

After going for a googling for a while I found out from this stackoverflow question that now android separate the platform-tools and build-tools. you can check on android sdk folder that now there is build-tools folder inside. To resolve this problem we need to open the SDK Manager and install the missing build tools. 

At first when I update the sdk to v22 this Android SDK build-tool doesn't exist, but after updating the  list it showed up on the list. Install it and the problem can be solved. have fun :)

Animated Sprite using Bitmap Spritesheet with Haxe NME/OpenFL Spritesheet Library

NME comes with great spritesheet lib which can be installed with haxelib install spritesheet command on commandline. Unfortunately it lacks documentation and how to example tutorial. The only spritesheet tutorial available is the singmajesty's tutorial which also doesn't give a clue about how to work with bitmap spritesheet. So I tried to figured it out myself. And turns out it's not that hard, so I'll tell you how in a fast and effective way.

The first thing needed to create animated sprite of course is the spritesheet itself. I will use the spritesheet I took from opengameart as example.

also don't forget to add  spritesheet lib to nmml with haxelib tag

<haxelib name="spritesheet" />

to load the bitmap and parse it as animation frames we can use BitmapImporter class inside com.ecleticdesignstudio.spritesheet.importers package. this class is really simple because it's only contain one static function called create(). as the input parameter it ask for the BitmapData , column count, row count, frame width, frame height, and some additional parameter which I'm not sure what it is so I'll leave it like that for now. The create() methods gives output a Spritesheet class, we need to create a variable to hold this output.

var spritesheet:Spritesheet = BitmapImporter.create(Assets.getBitmapData("img/kit_from_firefox.png"), 3, 9, 56, 80);

we can (and must) assign BehaviourData this Spritesheet object. BehaviourData required to define how the spritesheet should be used, which frame should be played at what speed(fps) and should it be looped or not.
for this example I create 9 behaviour for the spritesheet and assigns it to each row of frames, and I give different parameter for each behaviour. What's important for this BehaviourData input parameter is the name and frame number.

spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("stand", [0, 1, 2], true));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("down", [3, 4, 5], false,15));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("jump", [6, 7, 8], false,15));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("hit", [9, 10, 11], false,15));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("punch", [12, 13, 14], false,5));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("kick", [15, 16, 17], false,15));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("flypunch", [18, 19, 20], false,10));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("flykick", [21, 22, 23], false,10));
spritesheet.addBehavior(new BehaviorData("dizzy", [24, 25, 26], true));

The spritesheet itself is ready, but we can't use it directly. spritesheet library has their own sprite class for animation called AnimatedSprite. We can use this AnimatedSprite to animate the spritesheet created before. to use it simply input the spritesheet into the constructor parameter.

var animated:AnimatedSprite = new AnimatedSprite(spritesheet, true)

AnimatedSprite need to update itself for animation, so we must call it's update() method on each update cycle

 public function onEnterFrame(e:Event):Void
 {
  var delta = Lib.getTimer()- lastTime;
  animated.update(delta);
  lastTime = Lib.getTimer();
 }

To play animation we can call behaviour names from spritesheet using showBehaviour() method or showBehaviours() if we want to call a list of behaviour consecutively. We can also queue behaviour using queueBehaviour(), the method will queue behaviour and animate it after the current animation finished. Remember that a looping behaviour will loop forever and so it should not be used inside the behaviour queue (if we use showBehaviours() or queueBehaviour())

animated.showBehavior("stand");
animated.showBehaviors(["down","jump","hit","punch"]);

So that's what I know about how to use spritesheet library . I hope it could help as the a simple tutorial of how to use Haxe NME spritesheet library because spritesheet is a fundamental thing in game. and spritesheet lib is a neat library for a playing animation. :)

Here is the result: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/27073998/BitmapSpritesheet.swf
you could find the example source here .

Cheers! :)

Update : Dealing with Haxe 3 Change

if you switch to haxe 3 you may deal with error saying that package not found. that's happen because spritesheet library on haxe 3 use different package name. The solution is to change the package name

From

1 2 3 4

import com.eclecticdesignstudio.spritesheet.AnimatedSprite; import com.eclecticdesignstudio.spritesheet.data.BehaviorData; import com.eclecticdesignstudio.spritesheet.importers.BitmapImporter; import com.eclecticdesignstudio.spritesheet.Spritesheet;

to

1 2 3 4

import spritesheet.AnimatedSprite; import spritesheet.data.BehaviorData; import spritesheet.importers.BitmapImporter; import spritesheet.Spritesheet;

there you go. now it will run without any problems . Good luck! :)