This will be the first public display of The Game Conference Game.  It’s our upcoming game that we’re donating to charity.  In it, you’ll try to get a job in the game industry by telling everyone about your cool game ideas.

Also, it looks like Nethack.  I’ll have a more comprehensive announcement up soon.

The Good Points

You will be less reliant on .FLA files

There are big problems with Fla files. Unless you shell out for an expensive Adobe tool, Fla files are not mergable.  This means that you can’t have two people working on a fla file at the same time – plus everything has to be in one fla. ( If you’re using source control, you need to make sure your fla files are locked) With SWC importation, you can break up your art into as many fla files as you want.  You could have one for your main character, one for your enemies, one for the UI. However you want.  This keeps your artists from being blocked while someone else is working in your main Fla file.

Greatly reduced compile times

When you compile your game in the Flash IDE, it builds all the assets that you have  everytime you do it.  The amount of time it takes may not be so bad when you first start, but what happens as you keep adding assets? Each one you add will slow you down!  The IDE likes to do dumb things as well. If you have a compile error in your code, the IDE will still build the assets and then launch your game even though it’s not going to work.

When using Flex, you don’t have to rebuild assets every time, and you only compile the code that has changed.  I can’t stress how much time is lost waiting for things to compile.  If you don’t believe me, time it yourself – then do it again once you start to add a lot of assets.

You keep the great parts of the flash IDE

The Flash IDE is one of the best WYSIWYG editors and animation tools out there.  ScaleForm, which makes UI tools used in games like Mass Effect, uses the Flash IDE for this reason.  Using Flex and Flash, you keep all the great parts of the Flash IDE, while getting rid of problems it brings to the table.

My Personal Experience

I’ve done games both ways.  Hover Taxi was with the Flash IDE, while The Game Conference, Collide Reactor and an unannounced one use Flash and Flex.  Flash and Flex is the only way that I’ll continue to do game development.

The Downsides

There are some downsides to this approach.  The good news is that they are pretty mild and easily overcome.

You need to roll your own Preloader

Yes, you’ll need to code a new preloader. Urban Squall has the best article I’ve found to do this.  They’ve been kind enough to provide you with source code and a walk through on how to integrate it. (You will need to play with a compiler setting)

You can’t use the timeline anymore

Most people use the main timeline to keep track of the different states in their games – the Main Menu State, HighScores Sate, Game State, etc.  You won’t be able to do that anymore.  Instead, you’ll need to whip up a state machine to manage these. They’re easy to make and you’ll have more control over what happens when you switch between different states. (8-bit rocket has a good tutorial, so does Cheezeworld)  This will cost you some time now, but you’ll have a state machine ready to go for the future.

Conclusion

With Flash and Flex, you’re less reliant on fla files and have better compile times? The upfront cost of switching is small and I recommend it.  Just try it out. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

Setup

For the this article, I’ll be using Flash Develop 3.0.2 (Instructions on installing it) and Flash CS3.

Flex

Flex is best described as the programmer version of Flash.  It allows you to create SWF files using the flex compiler.  This means that you can create working SWF files without using the Flash IDE.  We’ll be using FlashDevelop to create our code and compile our projects.  Open up FlashDevelop and choose Project-> New Project. On the popup, select “AS3 Project” and set the name to “FlexProject”.

Now choose  Flash Project->Test Movie.  Once it has finished compiling, you will get a swf file that displays a blank white screen.  Not very interesting, but you’ve created a swf without the Flash IDE.

Flash CS3 and SWC importation

Now that we are not relying on the Flash IDE, how do we get animation and graphics made in it into our code?  This is where SWC Importation comes in. SWCs are like libraries that can be included into a project – They can contain animation, graphics, etc.

Download FlexProject.fla, put it into your project directory and then open it with the Flash IDE.  This fla file contains just one movieclip called “swcSquare” which is a square that changes color over 5 frames.

Before we create the swc, we need to set some values so that swcSquare can be seen and imported into the code.  Go to the library, right click the entry for swcSquare and chose “linkage”.  Check the box that says “Export for Actionscript” and make sure the class text box says “swcSquare”.  We are telling the IDE that we want this movieclip to be accessible from our actionscript and that we can reference it by the name swcSquare.

Now we need to change the project settings so that we get a SWC file instead of a swf. Choose File->Publish Settings and then Click on the Flash Tab. Click the box marked “Export SWC”

Now go to File->Publish.  If you look at your project directory, there should be a FlexProject.swc file when the program is done.

Getting the SWC in your code

Now need to tell our project to include the FlexProject.swc file that was just created. Flip back to FlashDevelop, choose Project -> Properties. Click on the Compiler Options tab.  In the list that appear, click on the one labeled “SWC Include Libraries”. A button with ellipses will appear.  Click that and in the resulting popup, put “FlexProject.swc”. Hit ok. Note that FlashDevelop will not give you an error if it cannot find the file that you typed in!

If FlashDevelop has found the swc file, then it’s contents will now start to appear in your code completion.  Now let’s display swcSquare.  To do that, add “stage.addChild(new swcSquare());” to the init function in your main.as file.  After building, a square that changes color should appear in the top left.

The End Product

Conclusion

This was a simple example where you learned how separate your code from the Flash IDE using Flex.  This will help keep programmers sane and make you less reliant on the Flash IDE.  I’ve used this approach on two games already and I would never  go back to the old way of doing things.

In a future article, I’ll look at how you can use SWC Importing to create the User Interface for your game and how to wire it up.

Final Project

Edit: As a quick addition, this approach also leaves you less dependent on FLA files.  There are big issues with them, the least of which is that they are not  mergable – You need to be careful if you are using source control because only one person can edit it at a time.  using flex, you can break up your graphics into as many FLA files as you want.   It should also help out with your compile time.

Caveats

The data FGL has given only covers the past year.  That’s not a very long time as far as statistics go.  I’m going to compare the last half of 2008 (July to December) to the first half of 2009 (January to June).  When I say 2008 or 2009, this is what I’m referring to.  Other forums of revenue like ads, micro-payments, as well as money not spent using Flash Game License etc. are not included.  According to this MochiMedia article, about 50% of flash developers utilize sponsorships and 40% use licensing.  This is the audience this data pertains to.

Sponsorship Data

The number of sponsorships given in 2008 was 421 and went up to 526 in 2009.  The average price of a sponsored game rose 20% to $1,397 in 2009 from $1,166 in 2008.  Sponsors are spending more on game sponsorships and sponsoring more games.  This is good, but it should be mentioned that it seems that the amount of work required to make a sponsorable game is also going up.

Licenses

In contract to Sponsorships, The average price of Game Shop Sales has gone up, but the amount bought has gone down.  156 Sales were made in 2008 vs. 118 in 2009, a drop of 25%.  But, the amount spent on licenses has risen 43% from an average buy of $294 in 2008 to $420 in 2009. The total amount spent on Licenses was $33.5k in 2008 and $49.5k in 2009, a 48% increase – this stays in line with the with the increases in sponsorship.

While this is a large increase, it’s mostly caused by January 2009 which had close to $20k in sales before dropping back to normal. I don’t know who went on a spending spree, but they were paying top dollar.

I need to point out that many of the bigger portals do not use Flash Game License to buy licenses.  Big Fish Games licenses a new flash game every day.  They pay a flat rate of $400, which is $73,000 every 6 months.  That’s more than all the license sales on FGL just from one major portal.  This is because many portals either have the clout where they can rely on developers submitting their game directly or they only license games that have become popular on other websites and can contact the developers directly.

Sponsorship vs. Licenses

The percentage of money spent on Licenses vs. Sponsorships on Flash Game License remains about the same during both periods. 94% is spent in sponsorships, 6% in licenses.  As stated above, the amount of money in licenses is much more than just what goes through Flash Game License, so the money to be made  is not as lethargic as it first seems.

Also, did you notice that whenever there is a drop in sponsorships, there is bump in licenses?

Flash Game License

Flash Game License asks for a donation of 10% of the sales made on their site.  This means they’ve raked in $150k in the past year.  Before asking if you can dive into their Scrooge McDuck money vault, this is before taxes.  After that, bandwidth costs, staff, credit card fees, and people who don’t pay their 10% all take their cut.

Things are looking good in the long term for them. Some big names have started to use the service like Hero Interactive, King, and Gaming Your Way. Plus, the amount of money spent on FGL is up about 50% in just six months.  If you’re selling FGL stock, I’m looking to buy!

What next

A big problem with the two sets of data I’m comparing in this post is that they are from different times in the year.  Events like Christmas only show up in one of the data sets  and that limits how I can compare them.  After the next six months of data comes in, this should be easier.  I’d love to see how spread out the distribution of sponsorship money is, but that would require numbers that Flash Game License is unlikely to provide. There is also data that is broken down into different genres – I may take a look at it, but don’t expect anything in depth.

Thanks go out to Flash Game License.  It’s very rare for a company to release this kind of information and I wish I had it a year ago.

Here’s the Excel File I created for this.  worksheet