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DragonRuby Game Toolkit, a cross-platform way to make games with Ruby

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Now for something a little different! Ryan "Icculus" Gordon, a name known for many Linux ports and SDL2 teamed up with indie developer Amir Rajan to create a new cross-platform toolkit.

Why was it created? Well, in a nutshell they both "hate the complexity of today's engines" and this toolkit was actually made to help ship A Dark Room for the Nintendo Switch, which shows how versatile it is.

Feature Highlight:

  • Dirt simple apis capable of creating complex 2D games.
  • Fast as hell. Powered by highly optimized C code written by Ryan C. Gordon himself.
  • Battle tested by Amir Rajan. A Dark Room for the Nintendo Switch was built with DragonRuby GTK.
  • Tiny. Like really tiny. The entire engine is a few megabytes.
  • Hot loaded, realtime coding, optimized to provide constant feedback to the dev. Productive and an absolute joy to use.
  • Turn key builds for Windows, MacOS, and Linux with seamless publishing to Itch.io.
  • Built in modding support. You don't have to do anything. It just works.
  • Cross platform: iOS, Android, PC, Mac, Linux, Nintendo Switch, XBOX One, and PS4. 

Ryan Gordon even did a video to demonstrate how easy it can be:

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To me, as someone who doesn't make games I find tools like this fascinating. Especially how seemingly quickly, as shown in the video, you can get something running with it on Linux, Mac and Windows.

Hopefully highlighting it might be helpful to some actual game developers who follow our news.

You can check it out here on itch.io and the original announcement from Ryan Gordon on Twitter.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Tags: Game Dev, Toolkit
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About the author -
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I am the owner of GamingOnLinux. After discovering Linux back in the days of Mandrake in 2003, I constantly came back to check on the progress of Linux until Ubuntu appeared on the scene and it helped me to really love it. You can reach me easily by emailing GamingOnLinux directly. Find me on Mastodon.
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BielFPs Apr 19, 2019
Ruby... the most criminally underrated programming language in the market. Very nice to see a project like that, hope they can also add 3d support in a near future.
DerpFox Apr 19, 2019
Quoting: BielFPsRuby... the most criminally underrated programming language in the market. Very nice to see a project like that, hope they can also add 3d support in a near future.
I personally love Ruby, way more that Python for exemple. But compared to python it look like its in a semi state of abandonment. Most of the Gems have not been update in years. And the final blow is RoR that have stained Ruby reputation, every single devs I know despise RoR and each time Ruby is mentioned they push it away because of RoR.

Compared to the very lively Python community Ruby look in a very sad state.


Last edited by DerpFox on 19 April 2019 at 11:44 pm UTC
BielFPs Apr 20, 2019
Quoting: DerpFoxI personally love Ruby, way more that Python for exemple. But compared to python it look like its in a semi state of abandonment. Most of the Gems have not been update in years. And the final blow is RoR that have stained Ruby reputation, every single devs I know despise RoR and each time Ruby is mentioned they push it away because of RoR.

Compared to the very lively Python community Ruby look in a very sad state.

While Python is more used since it's very similar to shell script, Ruby Sadly isn't used very often because RoR and because most developers have difficulty to use a fully OO language I think.
Scoopta Apr 20, 2019
Quoting: BielFPs
Quoting: DerpFoxI personally love Ruby, way more that Python for exemple. But compared to python it look like its in a semi state of abandonment. Most of the Gems have not been update in years. And the final blow is RoR that have stained Ruby reputation, every single devs I know despise RoR and each time Ruby is mentioned they push it away because of RoR.

Compared to the very lively Python community Ruby look in a very sad state.

While Python is more used since it's very similar to shell script, Ruby Sadly isn't used very often because RoR and because most developers have difficulty to use a fully OO language I think.
How is python similar to Shell script?
Ananace Apr 20, 2019
Ruby actually has its' niches where it's really quite heavily used as it turns out.

My job as a Linux sysadmin deals almost exclusively in Ruby development, because all our major tooling uses Ruby in one way or another. From Foreman - our server orchestration and lifecycle-management tool - which is a RoR application, to Puppet - our configuration management tool - which is regular Ruby, as well as smaller things like the set of fog gems that abstract away cloud service communication.
trawzified Apr 20, 2019
I'm learning some Ruby at the moment to develop a website with Rails, coming from some C# ASP.NET MVC 5 experience it's pretty good and much more Linux-friendly so far. Game development with it also sounds Interesting to say the least!


Last edited by trawzified on 20 April 2019 at 6:31 pm UTC
Hazelnut Apr 20, 2019
I found an article that looks like the carbon copy of yours: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.vgamezone.com/2019/04/20/dragonruby-game-toolkit-a-cross-platform-way-to-make-games-with-ruby/%3Famp&ved=2ahUKEwibkN23vN_hAhXD0qQKHQWfD68QFjAEegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw3tLENmTXI21GsyGkOp0Cu_&ampcf=1&cshid=1555790987356

Now, I don't if you published it there or not, but I thought that I'd rather look like a fool than risk not helping gamingOnLinux out.
Liam Dawe Apr 20, 2019
Quoting: HazelnutI found an article that looks like the carbon copy of yours: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.vgamezone.com/2019/04/20/dragonruby-game-toolkit-a-cross-platform-way-to-make-games-with-ruby/%3Famp&ved=2ahUKEwibkN23vN_hAhXD0qQKHQWfD68QFjAEegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw3tLENmTXI21GsyGkOp0Cu_&ampcf=1&cshid=1555790987356

Now, I don't if you published it there or not, but I thought that I'd rather look like a fool than risk not helping gamingOnLinux out.
Their entire Linux section is basically a rip of our content. I am aware of it, not a huge amount I can do but try to get to their webhost which isn't easy when their info is hidden.
Klaas Apr 20, 2019
Quoting: liamdaweTheir entire Linux section is basically a rip of our content. I am aware of it, not a huge amount I can do but try to get to their webhost which isn't easy when their info is hidden.

It's like a pupil copying an essay from Wikipedia changing some words to claim that it is an original work.

E.g. their Forager article ends with “It was alleged to have a Linux model on GOG too however it's now solely displaying for Windows weirdly.” while your original is “It was supposed to have a Linux version on GOG too but it's now only showing for Windows weirdly.”. Also your “grab” became “seize”.

Shameless.
Spoiler, click me
At least they use your affiliate links for GOG and Humble.
Skully Apr 20, 2019
Quoting: liamdawe
Quoting: HazelnutI found an article that looks like the carbon copy of yours: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.vgamezone.com/2019/04/20/dragonruby-game-toolkit-a-cross-platform-way-to-make-games-with-ruby/%3Famp&ved=2ahUKEwibkN23vN_hAhXD0qQKHQWfD68QFjAEegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw3tLENmTXI21GsyGkOp0Cu_&ampcf=1&cshid=1555790987356

Now, I don't if you published it there or not, but I thought that I'd rather look like a fool than risk not helping gamingOnLinux out.
Their entire Linux section is basically a rip of our content. I am aware of it, not a huge amount I can do but try to get to their webhost which isn't easy when their info is hidden.

Looks like there is all the info you should need to track them down is on this lookup of them https://vgamezone.com.cutestat.com/
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