JetLag is a framework for making 2D games that run in desktop and mobile browsers. It is the evolution of LibLOL, and at a high level, it is faithful to the spirit of LibLOL. In particular:
- JetLag is designed for beginners
- JetLag strives to put all of the code for a level of the game in a single section of a single file
As an HTML5 project, JetLag differs from LibLOL in a few ways:
- It uses PIXI.js and Howler.js, and a different version of Box2D than LibGDX, so some names and features are a little bit different
- It uses TypeScript instead of Java, which leads to simpler, cleaner code
Note that JetLag still is a mobile-first framework. It uses Hammer.js for multi-touch and gesture support, and also enables accelerometer by default.
Once you have downloaded JetLag, enter the JetLag directory and type npm install to fetch all of the supporting code for JetLag. Once you have done
that, you can run npm start to compile your code. JetLag uses esbuild
for compilation, so every time you make a change, the code will recompile.
To test your game, open a browser and navigate to http://localhost:7000.
To develop a game, we recommend that you start by reading the code in
src/game/game.ts, to understand how JetLag works. Then edit the first level
of that file to start creating your game. An extensive set of tutorials are
under development. More information will be available soon. For now, you will
want to look at the v3-dev branch for examples.
To add images and sounds to JetLag, follow these steps:
- Copy the image or sound file into the assets folder
- Add the name of the file to the appropriate list in
src/game/game.ts
That's it. Once you follow those two steps, you can refer to the asset by its filename in your code.
This is the "Entity-Component-System" (ECS) version of the JetLag game development framework. Older versions are available in branches, but will not be maintained. We reserve the right to change any and all APIs and interfaces.
Documentation for JetLag is available on GitHub Pages
JetLag is supposed to be a library that its users will hack for their own
purposes. Consequently, we prefer that programmers preserve the structure we
have in the repository, where both jetlag and game are sub-folders of the
src folder.
The following people have contributed to JetLag and its predecessors, LibLOL and ALE. If you contributed, and we missed your name, please send a note reminding us to give you credit!
- Mike Spear
- Dan Spear
- Greyson Parrelli
- Jennifer Bayzick
- Rachel Santangelo
- Micah Carlisle
- Maximilian Hasselbusch
- Jimmy Johnson
- Marc Soda
- Égide Ntwari
- Nana Nyanor
- Sebastian Chavarro