Instant HTML5 2D Platformer

Learn how to develop a 2D HTML5 platformer that is capable of running in modern browsers

Overview

• Learn something new in an Instant! A short, fast, focused guide delivering immediate results
• Learn about HTML5 2D game development and how to create your own HTML5 games
• Embed your game within a webpage and share it with friends
• Create enhanced games and publish to the Apple app store, Google Play, Windows Marketplace, or Facebook

In Detail

Game development has traditionally only been accessible to those with experience in computer science and access to the best or most expensive development tools. However, with the advent of technologies such as HTML5 and the ability to self-publish, web-based games such as those on Facebook and smartphones are becoming more attractive to develop than ever before. Through the use of open technologies such as HTML5, anyone with even a basic understanding of games development can begin to develop video games in their spare time and publish them to the Web or as an application for mobile devices.

Instant HTML5 2D Platformer is a practical, hands-on guide that provides you with a number of clear, step-by-step, task-based exercises, which are used to discuss game development and put into practice development techniques through the use of HTML5 and JavaScript. This book looks at the creation of a 2D platform-based game using the HTML5 canvas element.

Instant HTML5 2D Platformer introduces you to HTML5 canvas through a number of exercises, which show what the canvas is capable of. The book contains a number of clear, practical, hands-on tasks that incrementally build on the concepts of game creation and result in a 2D HTML5 platform-based game.

By undertaking the tasks within this book, you will learn how to develop your own 2D HTML5 game framework that you can use in the creation of your own video games, not just the game developed within this book. Alongside this framework you will learn how to develop and understand 2D animation, game logic, and how to handle user input devices.

What you will learn from this book

• Develop a multi-browser-compatible HTML5 game
• Implement a JavaScript-based games framework
• Handle user input devices
• Create a game object management system that will be used to represent the player, enemy units, and collectible items
• Implement your own 2D animation manager system
• Add sound effects to an HTML5 game
• Monitor game statistics and reflect this through an HTML5-canvas-based graphical interface

Approach

Filled with practical, step-by-step instructions and clear explanations for the most important and useful tasks. The step-by-step approach taken by this book will show you how to develop a 2D HTML5 platformer-based game that you will be able to publish to multiple devices.

Who this book is written for

This book is great for anyone who has an interest in HTML5 games development, and who already has a basic to intermediate grasp on both the HTML markup and JavaScript programming languages. Therefore, due to this requirement, the book will not discuss the inner workings of either of these languages but will instead attempt to describe the functionality of the code present within this book.

Aidan Temple

Aidan Temple is a software engineer and lead developer at Nanotek, an independent video game studio. He has recently graduated with honors from Glasgow Caledonian University where he studied BSc Computer Games Software Development.

During his time at university Aidan also undertook a research degree which outlined the possible benefits of implementing a GUI-based games framework by means of massively parallel processing through the utilization of Nvidia's CUDA architecture, which in turn successfully demonstrated the benefits of towards games development.He also received one of the International Game Developers Associations most prestigious awards, an IGDA Scholarship which are awarded to exceptional students within the field of video games development.

Prior to his time at Glasgow Caledonian University, Aidan studied Computer Games Development at James Watt College of Further and Higher Education. Due to excellent understanding and demonstration of games development and design methodologies within a practical manner Aidan graduated from James Watt College with a distinction in his chosen field.