Sphere

Sphere is a cross-platform, open-source computer program designed primarily to make and play role-playing games (RPGs) similar to those found on the SNES and Sega Genesis consoles. Sphere was created by Chad Austin and over the years many programmers have contributed to its progressive development and succession. Very early versions of the engine used a proprietary programming language "Spherescript" Chad created as the scripting language for the engine; by 2000 this was soon replaced by JavaScript and the Sphere engine therefore has the distinction of being the first open-source, as well as first cross-platform, game engine that utilizes JavaScript as a scripting language.

The Sphere engine uses proprietary, open file formats created primarily for the engine for game-related resources such as maps and their tile sets, sprite sets, and bitmap fonts, and can load universally supported image formats like PNG, JPG, and GIF, as well as audio formats like MP3, OGG, and IT. Sphere's engine-specific JavaScript API also allows for loading and manipulation of these formats.

Though Sphere was originally designed to make RPGs, because of the flexibility of embedding a scripting language it can be used to make almost any other type of game. Platforming adventure games, auto-scrolling shoot-em-ups, and even ports of popular mobile games are among many non-RPG games that have been written for the Sphere engine.

Certain experimental versions of Sphere also support basic 3D graphics functions using the OpenGL video driver. However, it is more complicated to use than the 2D graphics functions and was never officially folded back into Sphere.

Notice

The current officially recommended Sphere-compatible engine to use is the cross-platform MiniSphere and can be found in the official Sphere downloads repository, as well as compiled from source.

Screenshots

updated screenshots to come

Download

Official downloads repository

You may find all official Sphere downloads here, including Windows binaries for the engines and editors and officially recommended supporting scripts and libraries!

External links

• https://github.com/sphere-group - Sphere development on GitHub
• https://github.com/fatcerberus/minisphere - MiniSphere development on GitHub
• http://sphere.sourceforge.net/ - The original official Sphere website (needs maintenance)
• http://developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/Core_JavaScript_1.5_Reference - Mozilla's official JavaScript reference
• http://developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/Core_JavaScript_1.5_Guide - Mozilla's JavaScript guide

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