Admittedly, online Documentation of ludiloom is a continuous work in progress, but we are trying hard to put together some step by step tutorials and there are a few example projects that you can experiment by yourself...
Just getting started and have a question? For the moment, we suggest some basic readmes and references to better understand the project and get going.
We are also working on video tutorials and planning to have a new one on a weekly basis, so You definitely should stay tunned for the latest news and updates.
Plus, the ludiloom Forum is a great resource for both new and experienced users. Go ahead, ask your toughest questions! ludiloom Team and Community are more then willing to help on the process.
Still not seeing what you are looking for?
Documentation is pretty much evolving through a participatory process. If you want to help, feel free to contribute and join the Documentation Team, relating to the practical use of ludiloom to game design and development.
Please post your details, examples, recomendations of usage, good practices on the User Documentation Forum.
last updated on 2009, April 20th
ludiloom Vision
We envision a scenario of distributed collaborative game authoring where gameplay and game editing will be indistinguishable, or just one click away. Complex game environments will become a genre of hypermedia where game scenarios - arenas - are the basic contextual units for building games.
Arenas are analogous to web pages where as a complex game would be analogous to a web site. A multitude of hyperlinked arenas will make a new and pervasive hypermedia virtual environment.
About ludiloom Website
In this website, activity occurs in three main areas:
- PLAY: has a catalog of Game titles that you can play.
- CREATE: where new Projects are under-construction and where several arenas are available for (collaborative) editing;
- BAZAAR: a marketplace for you to find libraries of art and media elements to use and reuse on your own games. You must subscribe them BEFORE being able to use them inside an arena.
The FORUM is a great resource for both new and experienced Members. Just go there and check the dedicated threads to get help & support, to get to know the current projects and members or to suggest and recommend bug fixes, usability improvements or show good practices and examples.
Plus, You should always check the COMMUNITY section, for brief updates and news related to ludiloom technology, happenings and Community's creations.
How to install ludiloom?
Just click that great big green "download button", on the homepage of ludiloom.com, and download the most recent updated version. We will try to figure out your Operating System and serve the correct version. If you run into any problem, check this page to manually choose your operating system and download the correct version.
Once downloaded, just run it to start the installation process. Follow the steps, be sure to read the Terms & Conditions and once installation is finished, you'll be prompted to launch ludiloom right away.
For full details on the installation processes check out the Forum.
Interface & Navigation
After registering yourself and login - either on the website or after launching ludiloom application - you need to learn how to control your new power to create games. These are the basics you should train and learn to use. Soon we'll be placing here some videos and tutorials to further help you manage these.
General KeysOnce you run the ludiloom application and you are inside an arena, on the EDIT/Create mode, there are a few set of very important keys:
|
Camera ControlThe mouse wheel alone, allows you to zoom in and zoom out from the scene. You may also press the mouse wheel/middle button to "grab" the landscape and drag it around. You can rotate the landscape/camera by using the right ALT key with mouse wheel/middle button. Basically, you can ALT+mouse wheel to drag and control the landscape/camera movement on several directions (see a video). Manipulating and Changing Objects
|
Playing & Having Fun
In this early phase of ludiloom, there aren't many games for you to play. There are a few current projects that soon will be releasing new titles for You to enjoy. For the moment, we recommend "Back to the Yard", a small, unpretensious little game were you can race car or design a track ... in a backyard scenery.
Inside the game, you can either play (up to 8 players can race together) or you can build your own track and challenge others to race on your own track.
Check out what others are doing by playing some of the arenas that others are making available on the Play section of the website. Just give "Back to the Yard" a try! Or two ... and be sure to let us know what are your comments and suggestions!
Making Games
Game Worlds and Projects
All game projects in ludiloom are developed in a game "World".
The game World establishes the basic infrastructure and rules for all game scenarios in that world. To build a new world you need to create a new project and edit the Rulebook. Coding a rulebook can become quite complex as it will affect all future work on the games made in that project so, while in alfa/beta stage we will provide a set of ready-made, out-of-the-box, game worlds while developers get familiar with the infrastruture.
To build games you will have the possibility of designing 3D virtual environments, with landscape, environment effects, and any kind of scenery you can build from 3D object components. Additionaly you'll be able to design a 2D graphical interface you can "overlay" in front of the 3D view to provide game controls and feedback, and otherwise manage communication with players. Both 3D scene and 2D overlay interface can be edited by drag&drop from palettes and property panels.
Creating a new Arena
An "Arena" is the basic 3D scenario unit for creating or changing a game.
To create an Arena, you go to the desired project page and hit "create new arena" or clone an existing one (if it's allowed). Give it a name and small, yet meaningful, description. This is the name your Arena will be known. You can change it later, if you want, but a carefully choosen name can help you browsing your list of ongoing work.
Your Arena can be:
- Private = only you can edit it;
- Protected = enables you to delegate editing on group members;
- Public = anyone can enter an edit your arena.
You can change these settings later on, if you want.
To enter your new Arena, just click on the "edit image" (the first Pencil icon) and ludiloom will start, driving you inside your newly created scene.
Creating a new Project
For the moment, the creation of new Projects is closed. You can create any number of arenas on the project "Free4All" or in any of the existing ones, that give you a not-that-empty arena to start your work.
But ludiloom is planning to shortly opens the creation of new projects to Community Members willing to take the challenge to create a new game from scratch! If this is your case, just contact ludiloom Team, briefly describe your project and plans or, if it's not a private project, you can launch the repto on the Forum. Maybe you'll find Members willing to help you and a new project can be born...
Getting the help you need
Subscribing to media libraries
Media Libraries are like portfolios to help organize media items (3D meshes, textures, sound, video, code, etc.). When subscribed to, the contents of media libraries will appear on editing interfaces and can be used for creating or changing your game arenas. Browse the ludiloom Bazaar and subscribe to those libraries that you intend to use in your project.
Uploading your own stuff
If you do not see what you need or you have your own media items you would like to use, you may upload them into a new or existing media library in order to be able to use these elements on your projects or share then. The "upload" is made through an applet that requires Java and will only run on a regular browser outside ludiloom application.
As a general recommendation, we suggest that you create a "myProjectName library" to load the art you want to use only in your project. That way you can also share it with an editing team. Don't forget to subscribe to your own project library...
Managing libraries- A "project library" is a portfolio where you create to manage your stuff
- keeping it together and avoiding confusion with other content;
- sharing it with other members of a project. - To create a project library go to the "bazaar" page and ...
- Select "new library", give it a short but descriptive name - Select the "upload" option and use the applet to upload your stuff
- Publish the library if you want to make it available for others to subscribe
- Start ludiloom and enter the project
- Items from libraries just subscribed will appear in the media explorer as they are downloaded in the background
- Use the refresh/reload button at the botton if you think the interface might not be showing everything you would expect
Artist Portfolios
If you are an artist doing game related art you might want to consider registering in ludiloom and using libraries as portfolios to promote your creations. Just follow the applicable directions above for uploading and create arenas as 3D galleries to demo your stuff.
Please refrain from uploading any content whose Intelectual Property might be debatable or simply not under your own control. Any content raising issues will simply be quarantined or deleted, regardless of the consequences for derived work (e.g. arenas where it is being used).
We have gone to great lenghts to provide a service to leverage individual self-expression and creativity, and we firmly believe in respecting other people's intellectual rights to do what they want with their own creations. Including requiring licensing and payment for their efforts. Please do not use ludiloom in any way that would disrespect that right. We believe there is an untackled creative potential out there waiting for a chance to express itself in a fair medium. If you feel you are part of that potential then we are working for you.
ludiloom Scripting
About Scripting
The scripting language to use in ludiloom is based on Lua,a small and efficient scripting language commonly used in game systems. LUA is an extension programming language designed to support general procedural programming with data description facilities.
ludiloom scripting uses Lua's functions to drive the ludiloom API. You use it to access and modify ludiloom's data model, by programming interactions associated to the objects composing your game. Interactions are associated to objects so that players can interact with them and are similar to methods that are called as a result of events being generated by listeners that are installed on object representations and overlays. This is an adaptation of the Model-View-Controller (MVC) software design pattern commom on interactive system architectures.
Lua is free software, and is provided as usual with no guarantees, as stated in its license. The manual for the Lua implementation used in ludiloom is available at Lua's official web site, http://www.lua.org. Like any other reference manual, this document can be dry sometimes. For a discussion of the decisions behind the design of Lua, see the technical papers available at Lua's web site. For a detailed introduction to programming in Lua, see Roberto's book, Programming in Lua (Second Edition).
ludiloom API
API index
In the table bellow you can find a quick index for the ludiloom API. For convenience we defined a number of "object templates" (similar to OO classes) that enable object -based game programming to control the game scene, represent game state, compose and manage game interfaces, and dynamicaly manage listeners to drive the gameplay.
|
Base Concepts Arena Object ObjectTemplate Presence PresenceTemplate RuleBook System |
Scene Objects BillBoard Camera Effect HighlightDecal Light Material MeshDecal |
Model Plane River Road Sound StaticFlora Terrain Tree |
Data Interface Hashtable InterModel Matrix MediaItem Vector |
GUI Overlays Button Checkbox CodeEditbox ComboBox Editbox Listbox MenuBar |
MenuItem MenuPopup MultiColumn MultilineEditbox ProgressBar RadioButton ScrollBar |
ScrollPane SliderBar StaticImage StaticText TabPane ToggleButton Window System |
Tutorials
During the next weeks we will develop tutorials to present game programming examples and templates that will jumpstart your game production.
Stay tunned!
