Taking the Sphere video game tools for a (distributed!) test-drive. http://www.spheredev.org/wiki/Main_Page

Currently, this is just a repo for sharing code between my Mac and my PC. Why?

• my Mac is my primary machine, and where I prefer to hack code
• Sphere sports a PC-only IDE for tileset creation, map editing, sprite animation, etc

Sphere is interesting to me because it exposes its API through Javascript (using Spidermonkey). I want to stretch my legs with it a bit, given that Javascript blurs the lines between "data" and "code" so greatly (via meta-programming, DSLs, JSON, etc.)

It also occurs to me that video games are a ripe domain for this kind of approach, as the best games (IMHO) are often architected as data-driven systems (think SimCity, Civilization, RPGs old and new with their endless creatures, items, towns, NPCs, maps, etc). Plus, Sphere drops you right smack into the middle of creating a game, so it's damn fun to play with!

• Loren January, 2010