I''m working on a tile engine, it''s in the planning stages right now. I''m going to use DirectDraw (screw MS and their D3D). So far I have been designing with a top down engine in mind. Seeing as this engine is more for games like PacMan and those cave hunting games than for stuff like RPGs, this made sense. However as I continue to plan, I can''t help but realize what a versatile system I have and how well it COULD be used for old style RPGs and such. However, I feel I would be wasting a lot of time and effort by limiting this engine to top down, when game graphics are so much more interesting in isometric (imo at least). So here''s my question: How difficult would it be to take a well-built object oriented 2D top down tile engine and convert it to an isometric viewpoint? Is there anything special that needs to be done OTHER than changing how graphics are rendered and keeping the view angle in mind when the user is clicking stuff/moving around? I need an estimate of difficulty here, since I have never looked into isometric engines and i wanna know if it is worth my time to read up on them when i have so much other stuff to do.

Well, my old Direct Draw engine was overhead. And now I''m making an OpenGL Isometric engine, and there are a couple of things that I''ve noticed increased difficulty with.

Collision detection (physics) is a little weirder. I can no longer do perpixel checking, but I''m using a radius based check now.

Making the map editor was a lot harder with diamond shaped tiles, but it looks pretty cool =P. My map editor is going to be remade _with_ the engine (it uses the GDI at the moment) as soon as my engine is done having Windows like controls added (listboxes, buttons, et cetera).

But, 3D API''s make rendering Isometric tiles so much easier. You can do diamonds (2 Triangles, 1 Quad, same thing) without having to worry about intersection of graphical edges or other such annoyances.

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If I turn this into a 3D project, it will NEVER get done UNLESS i dont have to learn too much 3D stuff. This is supposed to be a 2D tile engine. Changing it to 3D changes the way so much stuff is done. I just want to know if I can make pacman isometric with x amount of effort. No 3D, that will be the death of me.

I''ll do 3D next year.


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If you take a look at SDL it can handle OpenGL in 2D pretty easily, while maintaining the ability to instantly (no code changed at all) port code to Linux, BeOS, and Macs.

You''re right though, Direct Draw is probably easier to use than OpenGL for purely 2D graphics. You can''t do rotation, blending, or other cool things though, heh.

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Original post by Null and Void

You''re right though, Direct Draw is probably easier to use than OpenGL for purely 2D graphics. You can''t do rotation, blending, or other cool things though, heh.

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Yes and no. Rotation can be coded in, don''t think I''ll need anything that starts with b, well maybe alpha blending, but that can be handled too. Though you are of course right it''s nicer when the code is already there for you. But do I really need those things? Seems like I would be taking a rather large performance hit to accomadate stuff i dont really need...





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