The Platformer Starter Kit (PSK) has been constructed for Torque Game Builder v1.5.0 (TGB) and up. The framework has been developed entirely in TorqueScript to take advantage of the new Behavior system and does not require engine modifications. This means that any TGB user can start to re-create all their favorite classic platform games.

The included source, art, documentation and demo files will enable you to start developing prototypes in a matter of hours, not days. Check out the Japanese learning game that developer Tanoku made with the Platformer Starter Kit:


Click to see a video of Kanji Kansen
The PSK promises to provide a firm foundation for you to create platform games. You don't have to be a TGB pro, a great programmer, or even a great artist! Everything is explained to you bit, by bit and if you still don't understand, the support forum and Torque Developer Network is available to you.

Platforms

One of the most basic features of any platformer is to have platforms! The PSK sports Solid and One-Way, allowing for flat and sloped surfaces. There are also Moving, Bouncing, Falling and Conveyor platforms! The platform system has been set up with expandability in mind, if you can think of a new type, you can add it.

Ladders and Hazards

Most platform games have some kind of ladder or rope which allows characters to climb up and down, the PSK is no different. Included is an area damage hazard that deals periodic damage to your character when inside the trigger (ideal for lava or electricity fields) and will deal damage upon collision if it is a regular scene object (great for spiked floors or crushing doors).

Collectable Items

Objects are collectable by players and have been set up in a similar fashion to platforms. Using a pickup behavior will allow that object to be collected, but what sort of item it is, is up to you! The foundation for an inventory system has been set up which records the items that you've collected in your journey.

Spawn Points and Check Points

In order to improve performance, any type of object can be spawned through a spawn point. You wouldn't want the computer to process the information of the 50 enemies in your scene each frame, so you control how many there are in the scene at any given time. Check points not only record the player's respawn position, but they also record how many objects each spawned has spawned.

Sound and Animation Manager

Using TGB's sound system can be quite daunting at times. The PSK has included a sound manager which handles all of the sounds and music being played in the kit. Characters in the game are animated through the system created in the PSK. It uses a Finite State Machine to handle all of the details when changing states and supports animation transitions!

Object Manager

Conditional collisions are always a tricky aspect of any game. The PSK uses the graph group system in place in TGB, but has made it easy to manage through a new labeling system. Group types are labeled and can have parents and children types. Objects can then be told to collide with objects from specific groups. Here is a small example:

- An object is an Apple and a Fruit.
- An object is an Orange and a Fruit.
- An object is a Fruit (not an Apple or an Orange).

- An object set to collide with Apples will collide with Apples and Fruit, but not Oranges.
- An object set to collide with Oranges will collide with Oranges and Fruit, but not Apples.
- An object set to collide with Fruit will collide with Apples, Oranges and Fruit.

It is a pretty basic system, but it is a very handy tool to help with managing your scene. It means that you can have triggers or objects which affect all characters in your game, or just specific character types.

Basic AI Controller

Through the use of behaviors, characters in the world can act like players. Behaviors allow you to treat a characters body and its brain as two separate objects. This means that all you need to do is script the brain and the body will interact with the world. Included in the PSK is a basic enemy who walks side to side, but has the ability to behave like a player!

Parallax Scrollers

Parallax scrollers create a sense of depth to your game. When the camera moves, your background images can scroll at different rates. All you have to do is add the behavior, set the scroll rate and the kit will do the rest.

Minimum
1.0 GHz processor (or equivalent)
512 MB RAM
Windows XP / Mac OSX
OpenGL or DirectX compatible accelerated 3D video card

Recommended
2.0 GHz processor (or equivalent)
1 GB RAM
Windows XP / Mac OSX
nVidia or ATI accelerated 3D video card

Customer review from Will Zettler, Mar 11, 2008 at 12:24 GMT

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