Pocketeers Limited Mobile Developer

Need a mobile game or app developed across multiple platforms (iPhone, iPad, Andriod,Bada, PlayBook etc..) at little extra cost? Or maybe you need a rapid prototype of your next game or app idea creating as proof of concept?

Pocketeers Limited a UK based mobile app and game developer (established in 2002) responsible for the creation of the IwGame Engine are looking to take on additional gaming and app projects. Pocketeers will consider any size project, but will favour those projects that utilise the IwGame engine / Marmalade SDK. Pocketeers have worked with clients large and small including the likes of Electronic Arts, Destination Software, Ideaworks, Honey Badger Studios, Tournay Software, and others.  Pocketeers provide a full range of services including design, coding, art work, audio and testing at very competitive prices.

For more details you can contact Pocketeers Limited via the web at http://www.pocketeers.co.uk/?page_id=8

So you are a smart phone or tablet developer (or at least want to be) and you want to have your next hit game or app run across a huge range of smart phones and tablets. Well, you have come to the right place to find out how to do just that.

No matter whether you are a professional games developer, part time hobbyist coder or the technical director of a large corporation researching how to support you work force across a huge range of varied phones and tablets, the basic principles remain the same. By choosing to develop your products across multiple platforms:

• You benefit from a much wider audience for your apps and games
• You save a lot of money and time on development, testing and updating
• You can perform updates to your existing apps quickly and easily
• You can share the same unified C / C++ code base across all devices and platforms
• No need to learn (or hire professionals that know) multiple languages, UI’s or SDK’s
• Regularly updated SDK with new platforms and features
• Some of the smaller app stores offer increased visibility and more stable long term sales

And by choosing the Marmalade SDK you also get:

• Amazing support, including the apps program and device loan program to aid testing
• A simulator that lets you test across an unlimited set of screen resolutions and simulated access to Accelerometer, GPS, Camera, Audio, Multi-touch screen, SMS, Compass and more
• Test actual ARM code without even deploying to an ARM based device
• Support for iOS specific features such as App Store Billing, iAd, Game Center etc..
• Support for Android specific features such as Android Market Billing
• Access to a large collection of open API’s such as Box2D, AdMob, Flurry, Chipmunk,SVG, Python, LUA and tonnes of other cool stuff (Full list available at http://github.com/marmalade)

Marmalade is also partnered with the likes of Shiva3D, Scoreloop, Tapjoy, Raknet and many others, so you know this is an SDK that’s here to stay

Ok so what platforms does Marmalade actually support? The list to date is as follows:

• iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad
• Android
• Samsung Bada
• Blackberry Playbook
• Symbian
• webOS
• Windows
• OSX
• Mobile Linux

I know what you are thinking, can I really write my code once and run it across all of these platforms? The straight answer is “absolutely!” as we at Pocketeers have proven. We have already released BattleBallz Chaos (Arcade action game) across iOS, Android, Bada and Blackberry Playbook using the Marmalade SDK, as well as Funky Cam 3D (a fun photography app) across iOS, Android and Bada.

Ok, so if you can write your code once and deploy to so many platforms then why is your BattleBallz Chaos not available on the likes of Symbian or webOS? The simple answer is that some of those platform markets are not currently where we want to go for a variety of reasons, but none of those reasons relate to the Marmalade SDK. We may choose to support them in the future and we may not.

Righty ho, you’ve decided that you quite like the sound of this Marmalade SDK and you’re considering saving yourself a boat load of time and money developing your cross platform games and apps, but what does code look like with this SDK?

Well here’s a basic game loop:

#include “IwGx.h”

int main()
{
    // Initialise Marmalade graphics system
    IwGxInit();

    // Main Game Loop
    while (!s3eDeviceCheckQuitRequest())
    {
        // Clear the screen and depth buffer
        IwGxClear(IW_GX_COLOUR_BUFFER_F | IW_GX_DEPTH_BUFFER_F);

        // Update my awesome game
        PleaseUpdateMyGame();

        // Render my awesome games view
        RenderMyGameViewThankyou();

        // Flush graphics system
        IwGxFlush();

        // Display the rendered frame
        IwGxSwapBuffers();

        // Yield to the operating system
        s3eDeviceYield(0);
    }

    // Shut down Marmalade graphics system
    IwGxTerminate();

    return 0;
}

You will find that the graphical system in Marmalade is similar to Open GL, which for me makes the SDK very simple to use. All other sub systems are equally as easy to use for example:

To create a texture from a bitmap file and upload it to the GPU:

CIwTexture* texture = new CIwTexture();
texture->LoadFromFile(“AwesomeSpriteAtlas.png”)
texture->Upload();

As you can see the code is ultra simple and very easy to use but most of all “cross platform compatible!”. Imagine having to do this on iOS using XCode / Objective C and then again using Java on Android and then again using Flash on Playbook, the list goes on.

So unless you enjoy self punishment, lots of extra work and the pain of tracking the same bugs across multiple SDK’s, languages and platforms, I suggest you take a short trip over to Marmalade’s SDK home page at http://www.madewithmarmalade.com. Take a look at the SDK, its features, read some tutorials and even sneak a peek in the forums (I bite but not many of the other developers do!)

Over the coming weeks / months I will be writing a number of tutorials covering various aspects of the Marmalade SDK, associated tools and extensions, so keep an eye out.

Publishing digital media content to smart phone platforms such as Apple iPhone, iPad, Google Android and Windows Phone 7 may appear to be a daunting task and can be quite expensive. However, using Print2app’s (www.print2app.co.uk) new online service, publishing digital / print media content to smart phone platforms is easy, quick and very cost effective. You simply supply your content in either Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF format and Print2App build you your very own application (usually within 24 hours) that can be sold (or even given away) on the Apple iPhone, iPad, iPod store.

Print2App are working hard to produce readers for the Android and Windows Phone 7 platforms further increasing the potential exposure of your content.

If your business publishes content in any of the following areas then don’t hesitate to get in touch with Print2App at http://www.print2app.co.uk

• Magazines, print, electronic or interactive magazine
• Books, print, e-book or interactive book
• Comics, print, e-comic or interactive comic
• Newspapers, electronic or interactive
• Content driven web sites
• Most other types of media including 2D and 3D games

If you do not currently publish your content to a digital platform then Print2App will help you monetise your content. If you already publish your content via a digital publishing platform then still get in touch as Print2App can publish content from as little as £499 and in many cases waiver production costs for a percentage of royalties