The Starling Handbook
Isn’t the Starling framework awesome! It’s as much a part of the Flash/AIR platform as the native APIs themselves. In my opinion, it’s single handedly responsible for so many developers sticking with Adobe’s platform over the past few years. With Starling you can create 2D games that are every bit as impressive as games written […]
Starling 1.6 and Sprite3D
Starling 1.6 is on the horizon and there’s one feature in particular that I’m really looking forward to: 3D Sprites. When I first read about Starling’s new Sprite3D class I wasn’t too sure what all the fuss was about but Starling’s author, Daniel Sperl, recently released a video showing it in action and now I’m […]
Endless Runner AS3 Source Code
So that’s the ActionScript 3 version of my endless runner on GitHub. The JavaScript and TypeScript versions both used PixiJS as the 2D renderer, but of course, for the AS3 version I’m using the excellent Starling Framework. If you’ve been reading my blog for a few years you’ll know that my endless runner actually started […]
Starling, PixiJS, and CreateJS
There’s been quite a lot happening in the world of 2D frameworks. Here’s some news regarding a few that I personally use on a regular basis both commercially and for personal projects. New Starling Book The Starling Framework is the most significant thing to happen in the world of Flash for years and has done […]
Starling 1.4 Released
I’m a huge fan of the Starling framework, so it’s great to see that Gamua has just released Starling 1.4. And hot on its heels is version 1.1.1 of the Feathers UI framework, which sits on top of Starling and allows developers to create lightweight, skinnable and extensible UI controls for their mobile and desktop […]
ActionScript 3: The New Bottleneck?
NOTE: If you read this post then please also read the comment at the end from sHTiF (creator of Genome2D) who details some poor assumptions/misunderstandings on my part. When writing my Monster Dash clone, I opted to start by using Flash’s classic display list. Although my intention was to eventually swap over to the Starling […]
60fps gameplay with Box2D and Starling
My post from a few weeks back may have piqued your curiosity. It showed the bare bones of a scrolling platform game built on top of Box2D and running with debug graphics. Since then I’ve been busy adding proper visuals to it using the Starling framework and can now reveal what the heck I’ve actually […]
Flash Player Success Stories
Recently I wrote about several Adobe AIR success stories for iOS. For today’s post I thought I’d focus on the Flash Player and point out just how advanced Flash gaming in the browser has become. Just over a year ago, Adobe introduced access to the GPU via the Stage3D API. Let’s take a look at […]
An Introduction to Starling and Sprite Sheets
The April issue of Flash & Flex Developer’s magazine is now available and includes my second Starling framework tutorial. It covers some of Starling’s display list basics and demonstrates how to create animation with the use of sprite sheets. Just head over to the magazine’s offical website where you can download the latest issue for […]
Improving Starling’s Performance with Blend Modes
I’ve been impressed by the Starling framework but like many I’ve struggled to get a solid 60fps on some of the older mobile devices out there. For example, my recent parallax scrolling demo was capped at 30fps on iPad 1 whereas the iPad 2 was easily capable of running it at a full 60fps without […]