Massive Cocos2D Extension Project For Easier Cocos2D Game Development

A few months ago I made a brief mention of the Kobold2D project when it was first released.

At that time I was not able to give the project an in-depth look because of issues at the time with the iOS 5 SDK.

Fortunately those issues have been resolved – so here is a much more in-depth look.

So What Is Kobold2D?

For those who haven’t heard of Kobold2D before, Kobold2D is an MIT licensed free and open source game engine project created by Steffen Itterheim that includes an automatic installer of Cocos2D, Cocos3D, Box2D, Chipmunk, CocosDenshion, and the Kobold2D extension classes.

Another thing that’s really cool about Kobold2D is that you are still using Cocos2D as your game engine. This means that any Cocos2D books or tools that you might have can be used with Kobold2D.

Included Game Templates

One of the ways Kobold2D extends upon Cocos2D is by including a number of game templates including a Pinball game, an accelerometer game, a side scrolling game, isometric and orthogonal tilemap games and more. If you have Steffen Itterheim’s Cocos2D book then some of these templates will look very familiar.

The Kobold2D Extension Classes

The Kobold2D extension classes are a godsend providing for easy setup using Lua (you can even implement iADs by simply changing one variable from NO to YES) helpers for touch handling, GameKit, and more.

The Kobold2D extension classes cover functionality that you will be wanting into a game time and time again.

The Role Of Lua With Kobold2D

In my previous post about Kobold2D I mentioned that Lua scripting through Wax was included. That was erroneous and you do not need to use Lua for scripting game logic. Lua is simply used for setting up the game configuration.

Automatic Installation

If you’ve gone through the process of installing Cocos2D, it’s templates, and adding in other libraries you’ll be happy to know that installation of Kobold2D is done through an automatic installer.

You simply run the installer, then run the Kobold2D app and choose which template you’d like to use.

Conclusion

I would have to say there really is very little reason not to use Kobold2D if you are looking to build a game with Cocos2D or you are looking to learn Cocos2D development.

You save yourself from all the installation headaches, and you get a number of game templates, and examples to learn from, modify and make your own – and best of all you are still working with Cocos2D.

You can download Kobold2D on the Kobold2D website.

I’ll be writing up a tutorial in the future where I take a Kobold2D template, and quickly tweak it into a different game so watch for it!