Codea Review

General
1

It took a long time to understand this App. A few days ago, I was bored and I looked for something new.
You know very well, my problem with the Codea. I did not want to play with this app because, image import (spritepack) feature is not available yet. However, I insisted to play with Codea out of boredom. Only now I understand the purpose of this App. I can not describe the experience and pleasure in the company of this app. Next I will present my opinion about Codea. Consider this a review. By the way, Only now after 5 months, I am able to explain this app.
Codea Review
Description:
This App is designed in order to create concepts and algorithms in programming. It’s true, you can create programs and games with Codea, but this app was designed for algorithms and programming tricks.

Made with Codea:
CodeaInvaders: developed by frosty

This is a splendid example. But not the last example.

3D Shape Explorer: developed by Andrew_Stacey

A good example to understand that there are no limits. Perhaps there are limits, but here is all about algorithms and programming tricks.

3D rendering on Codea: developed by Xavier

Awesome example! - Honestly, I am not able to do that.
There are other examples, but I was impressed by only these examples.

How about import images?
I wanted this feature, because I wanted to make a mockup of my game. but, finally, I understood that it is difficult to work on a mockup with iPad and Codea. Better, I can make, directly, my game on Mac OS X. This was the first reason. But, the next reason is dubious and dangerous. I asked my brother why he wants to import images in Codea. I was surprised to receive a response for anti iOS game developer. My brother said: “I want to clone games from the App Store to save money.”. As a future developer of iOS games. I understood the problem. It’s about business. Here are two camps: developers and consumers. Consumers wants to implement this features: import images and sounds. BUT, Developers see this as a threat. Why? To understand, I will give a small example: This game: Power of Logic HD - What is unique about this game? Graphics and idea. This is about move, rotation, zoom of pictures and the idea of ??the game. This game could be cloned and improved in Codea with import images and sounds. In these circumstances, many people would clone games and developers would go into bankruptcy. As consumers, it’s true. We feel wronged. @Zoyt , I respect you, I respect your desire / request about custom spritepack. Fight for it, maybe you will succeed, But, as a future developer, I see this as a threat. By the way, Not only developers will be affected. Consumers will be affected, but later. Here I do not want to explain the situation. We have the ability to simulate what would happen.

Future of Codea:
Here is a list of some necessary features:

  • 1. Dark Keyboard
  • 2. Particle System Designer
  • 3. More 3D Features
  • 4. OSC sound maker
  • 5. etc
2

I don’t think professional game developers have any threat from Codea. Even with all the right graphic & audio assets it takes time to get a game up and running and longer to design the levels, test it and tweak the gameplay to ensure it is fun to play.

Someone with the skill set to do all that in a short timeframe is probably a professional programmer, and if they spent the time on a paid programming job could afford to buy thousands of iOS games. It’s just not worth rewriting a game in Codea to avoid paying for it. IOS games are ridiculously cheap.

Much more likely is that people use Codea to experiment with ideas, write simple games for their kids or just have fun learning to write cool stuff.

3

The best way to look at Codea, from a “professional programmers” point of view, is as a rapid prototyping tool. You can, fairly quickly, make and test basic functionality, and then use it as a springboard to a ‘real’ iOS app.

But - Codea’s useful for far more than that. As has been pointed out - for someone learning programming in general, the ease of use and immediate feedback, along with a de-facto open source policy are wonderful. I learned to program by looking at programs others wrote - and hopefully, someone out there can learn to program in part by looking at mine.

Codea’s original target audience was, in theory, the same as those for Processing - people wanting to do graphics effects in code. And it works well for those people as well.

Thing is - in order to provide those tools, you end up pretty quickly providing tools do do nearly anything anyone else wants; and TLL has been extremely responsive in looking at customer suggestions for new features, and implementing what they can with the restrictions that Apple puts on them. One of the awesome things about Codea is that it’s complete enough that it can, and has, been used for things that have surprised TLL, and that’s really cool.

And as for spritepacks - graphic import is actively being worked on; I expect it will show up in some form or another soon. I agree - being able to import graphics from the “real world” is a feature with great potential.

4

I am sure that Codea will grow and develop into an even more fantastic app than it already is.
If you want to play around programming for iPad, but don’t yet own a Mac, it’s a great way to go.
I’m a professional software developer but, alas I don’t get to play around with game coding at work. Gaming and Programming are in my blood, and Codea is my little haven.
And Nat is right. If you have the skills to ‘clone games’ for money, you should be applying for work in that field and just buying the iPad games you want.

Chris