Book Image

Learning AndEngine

By : Varga
Book Image

Learning AndEngine

By: Varga

Overview of this book

AndEngine is a very popular open source OpenGL (open graphics library) Android game engine, used to create mobile games quickly while maintaining the ability to fully customize them. This book will guide you through the whole development process of creating a mobile game for the Android platform using one of the most popular and easy-to-use game engines available today. Beginning with the very basics, you will learn how to install AndEngine, gather graphics, add sound and music assets, and design game rules. You will first design an example game and enhance it by adding various features over the course of the book. Each chapter adds more colors, enhances the game, and takes it to the next level. You will also learn how to work with Box2D, a popular 2D physics engine that forms an integral part of some of the most successful mobile games. By the end of the book, you will be able to create a complete, interactive, and fully featured mobile game for Android and publish it to Google Play.
Table of Contents (13 chapters)
12
Index

Shaders


Shaders are little programs that can be run on the prepared geometry (vertices) or rendered fragments just before they get rendered on screen. Fragments are like pixels before they get thrown on the screen.

Shaders can create amazing effects by displacing vertices, coloring fragments, and so on. It's the most advanced topic that appears in this book, but every game developer should know that they exist.

Every entity, in fact, already uses a very simple vertex and fragment shader program that doesn't do anything than to display the correct geometry with the correct color. The shapes use a single color and the sprites use texture coordinates.

We are going to create a very simple shader program that will turn our platforms black and white.

The code for the shader programs is long and it contains low level OpenGL calls. We will use the basic shader program available in AndEngine and modify it a little. The new program class is called BWShaderProgram. It contains a simple vertex shader that...