[HN Gopher] Show HN: Kaboom.js is a zero-dependency declarative ... ___________________________________________________________________ Show HN: Kaboom.js is a zero-dependency declarative JavaScript game library Author : slmjkdbtl Score : 103 points Date : 2021-04-07 18:19 UTC (4 hours ago) (HTM) web link (kaboomjs.com) (TXT) w3m dump (kaboomjs.com) | sebringj wrote: | This is the first time I've seen a dev-made musical intro video | for a game platform and it was great! | searchableguy wrote: | Yup, totally awesome. | slmjkdbtl wrote: | Thank you! Had fun working on that hh | matsemann wrote: | The video, song, logo. Everything so fun and cool, made me | laugh. Really looks like the author went the extra mile. | [deleted] | gremlinsinc wrote: | Looks cool, can this work on mobile? Via react native or | something? | slmjkdbtl wrote: | It's not on mobile yet, but I'm thinking using QuickJS + | platform native APIs to enable them run on native platforms | (like React Native but only care about getting window with | graphics / audio context, thinking about using sokol for that). | But yeah you can always just put a webview and run it. | tpetry wrote: | None of the demos seems to work on mobile. Which is kind of | expected as they depend on a spacebar. But even the buttons | example does not work as there is no mouse click on mobile? | slmjkdbtl wrote: | yeah, the click ones should be trivial I'll add support now | abalaji wrote: | honestly that could be huge. Imagine a repl.it arcade on iOS, | kids would go wild to make stuff their friends could play on | their phones. | | At least middle school me would have. | Mobleysoft wrote: | Should be possible with Apache Cordova. | tpetry wrote: | That looks like really nice concept for very quick game | prototypes. | | Is there something similar? | slmjkdbtl wrote: | You mean quick game making tools? Yeah there're some good | alternatives like love2d, pico8, compared to these kaboom | provide more abstractions and helpers and runs natively on web, | but it's also less mature than these since it's much younger | spicybright wrote: | TIC-80 is also another fantasy console like pico8, same idea. | slmjkdbtl wrote: | yea! TIC-80 is probably the best open source one it's | written in taste | pipnonsense wrote: | That's interesting. As side-projects I just created two sibling | games using JavaScript: | | https://www.gameofpainting.com | | https://www.paintingpuzzles.com | | I optimized for the "fasted path to ship", so I used React only, | as it is what I know. The games reflect the limitations of the | tools of course. They are just tapping games with simple game | logic. | | It would be nice to have something more powerful but still in a | language that I know (I have no intention of going full game- | developer). I'll take a look at it. | slmjkdbtl wrote: | Hi! My name is tga and I'm the author of kaboom.js. I'm working | at replit and this is part of the effort of us trying to make | game dev more accessible to beginners & intermediate programmers. | | Kaboom is like a summary of me trying to learn game dev. There're | a lot of tools and most of them tend to get bloaty as they go on, | they often require complicated setups and hard to really for | beginners to really get started, one goal of kaboom is to allow | beginners to get a game up and running with no effort and start | enjoying the game dev fun right away. | | Using Js is because I want it to run natively on browser, also it | seems like the "go-to" beginner language right now, but I'm also | thinking about making Kaboom Native where it uses QuickJS + | platform native APIs (thinking sokol for that) to run on native | platforms, so you can write your game in Js once and run on every | platform natively (so unlike other cross platform engines, it | doesn't require emscripten / WASM on web) | | Inspired by fantasy consoles, there's also a special editor on | replit that enables you code and manage / create assets in the | same environment, check it out! https://replit.com/kaboom (still | in early dev) | | Ask me anything! | dvfjsdhgfv wrote: | I just wanted to say thank you, it looks superfun! | shuding wrote: | Wow great work tga, love it!! | slmjkdbtl wrote: | hh thank you shu! | amasad wrote: | Worth noting that while Kaboom.js is aimed at novices, it | turned out to be super fun for developers too. Our team is | having a lot of fun with it -- you can have an idea write a | game in 30 minutes to an hour in typically less than 100 LoC. | Some examples from our team and community: | | - ReplJewled https://replit.com/@ConnorBrewster/ReplJeweled | | - Flappy Mark https://replit.com/@slmjkdbtl/flappymark | | - Bamboo Ninja https://replit.com/@RoBlockHead/KaboomJam | | - Cookie Vs Oreo https://replit.com/@Coder100/COOKIE-VS-OREOS- | KABOOMJS-BOOMOM... | ngokevin wrote: | Cool! Not currently working on it personally anymore but I co- | created A-Frame which is also declarative gamedev library | (using HTML). Seemed successful at getting non-gamedevs and | webdevs to build 3D/VR for the first time, and was popular with | educators and kids. An HTML interface at the top level made it | much more friendly for people even intimidated by JS. | | We were heavily relying on Glitch and driving bunch of traffic | to them at first, but now featuring a replit as one of the | starter playground examples. | slmjkdbtl wrote: | Hi! A-Frame is super interesting and I love how it has an | innovative markup style and have a customizable entity | component system at the same time. I've always known about it | but never really dived in myself but looks like there's tons | of good stuff and inspiration! Will definitely take a closer | look. Thanks for replying and creating A-Frame! | basicallysteve wrote: | Hey! So I discovered kaboom.js yesterday and I think it's | really cool! I'd like to starting building some games, but I | was thinking about maybe making them multiplayer, running | commands through websockets or something. I don't see any ways | to control character outside of key pressing or clicks. Do you | think this would be possible? | slmjkdbtl wrote: | It definitely possible if you build your own networking | stack, but native multiplayer support is planned! Also you | can control characters through any events, like | socket.on("msg", () => { player.move(...) }) | Mobleysoft wrote: | This is very cool. What was your inspiration for this? | slmjkdbtl wrote: | Hi! It's mainly a summary of me trying to learn game dev and | reflection on current tools, also Scratch kinda inspired the | "blocky declarative" style because we hope kids can make games | with kaboom with "real code" just after they completed learning | Scratch. Also a lot of softwares I like e.g love2d, PICO8, | sokol, Amulet, Klik & Play | MaxLeiter wrote: | They didn't create it, this was made by the team at repl.it. In | case a mod sees this, it would be great to be able to provide a | reason for flagging a submission | | Edit: assumptions bad | amasad wrote: | @slmjkdbtl works at Replit and he designed and lead this | project :) | MaxLeiter wrote: | Ah my mistake! Awesome to see. Thanks for all the great | work | abalaji wrote: | I wasn't alive for the web in the '90s but I really dig the retro | vibe | | Super neat project! | evo_9 wrote: | I expected to see an example of this game written in this | library. That would be an added clever bonus to the name of the | project: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaboom!_(video_game) ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-04-07 23:01 UTC)