Bonfire -- Flutter RPG Game Engine -- Free & Open Source

Today we are checking out the Bonfire game engine, designed for creating 2D RPG (and other 2D games) built on top of the Flutter framework using the FLAME game engine. Bonfire is free and open source under the MIT license and runs on all platforms Flutter support (which is most of them....)

Links
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[robbylebotha]

Never heard any developer sound so enthusiastic. In all my 2 decades of experience. The sales and project management guys who over promise to clients and overwhelm developers are the guys that have this voice.

I could be wrong 😂

[Sylfa]

"Mixins, which is sort of like an extensiony system so you can add new behaviour, sort of like inheritance"
Eye twitching intensifies… If inheritance is a tree graph then mixins allow you to add behaviour across branches. Closer to composition than inheritance. At least in general, not used Bonfire so can't say if it's something else in this specific case. Though if it is then it should probably be named differently to reduce confusion.

[prosfilaes]

I find that Visual Studio Code and the standard Flutter layout that's auto-enforced takes a lot of the pain from the bracket soup. It automatically keeps it in line.

[UTTheLaw]

I don't know if I can handle that "bracket soup", but it definitely seems a interesting project! Thanks for sharing it!

[kiyasuihito]

I definitely understand the bracket soup sentiment. To me, I just don't like deep nested code in general. I like Dart's syntax a lot though.

[Aeroxima]

I've been learning even in english to try to use parentheses at the end of the sentence, rather than a few words from the end (like this).
I've been learning even in english to try to use parentheses at the end (not like this) of the sentence, rather than a few words from the end.
I've been learning even in english to try to use parentheses at the end of the sentence (not like this either but it's less bad), rather than a few words from the end.
It just makes it easier to read. Finishing a complete thought before starting another, not just interrupting and unnecessarily adding to the stack.

[Hyruleearth]

I’d consider using it for hobby projects because it sounds like it has more modern/better features than rpg maker.
What are some of your complaints with the engine (besides the brackets)?

[themichaelconnor]

Hey, can you cover Butano? It's an open-source, in-development GBA sdk.

[SarahAndreaRoycesChannel]

The Dart brackets would just be fine if it weren't for them opening in the current line instead of the next one. That is what makes you search all the time. But if you want to enforce your own style and only ever open them in a new line every supported editor while reformat it under certain (regular) circumstances.

[holdthetruthhostage]

As long as it has some great tutorials will work

[IspyrGameDev]

Hiya Mike do you have any links/resources on how to create a FLame widget? I've been looking to create a widget for Flutterflow but information seems hard to come by. Keep rocking!

[gricchastain]

Ok as every time Im looking for nothing else to do left it's all only implementation of how many ever projects together together so as I could say multiplayer widgets on same device ... Could widgets go to sleep and while wake other widgets up also. Guell is me implement of new implementations. Sorry if my statements don't make complete thoughts. I know .. I don't know how my minds seperate thoughts together.

[caynebyron]

The bracket soup is only bad if you've never used Flutter and don't know what you're looking at

[Theraot]

Flutter/Dart prefers an immutable system, which is not a bad thing per-se, but it leads to making structures in a declarative way, which leads to many levels nesting. It is often possible to refactor it to some degree… by making custom widgets, which also makes it harder to manage their state…So the incentive is on nesting.

I'm not a fan of the way it auto-formats the code (which, as far as I can tell, cannot be fully disabled), it goes for the Egyptian braces style, which makes it harder to spot where braces open (if the opening brace was always on the same column as the closing brace it would be easy to find). Plus indentation is inconsistent. Sometimes it is 4 spaces, sometimes it is 2 spaces, sometimes the closing brace is further to the right than the start of the line where it opens. Furthermore, it bunches together closing braces, parenthesis and brackets... you end up with this kind of stuff everywhere: })); - in exchange we use these IDE with add colors to the braces, parenthesis and brackets, the fact that it exists is evidence that it is a problem… And color blind people have my condolences. And no, I don't want to find it by clicking, I want to see it at a glance.

However, my biggest gripe with Flutter are the plugins. It is npm madness. For example, I could not use the OpenGL plugin with the notifications plugin because they both require FFI, but different versions of FFI. Every other feature I want to add is one more plugin, and the more plugins I have the higher the chances that the next plugin will cause some hard - if not impossible - to resolve compatibility problem.

It seems that most plugin systems out there end up in something like that… I had similar issues with Apache Cordova, Unity, React Native… Using Nuget in .NET had me believing things were good. I suppose the .NET community has the right dose of Not-invented-here syndrome, so the dependencies do not get as crazy. The way it is in Flutter the libraries (without being frameworks) are dictating the design of the application, and the developer has to adapt to the differences between versions and the compatibility issues among them, it is a tail wagging the dog situation.

Yes, we should reuse, making code designed to be reused is good. But dependency hell is hell.

[juanmacias]

Hunting down missing brackets, and commas? Any modern code editor does that for you. xD

[Aeroxima]

I'm a bit uncomfortable with building something with something built on something that's built on something that's built on something, on top of how much of that's already going on with computers and software in general to start with. Such a house of cards.

[assakurayoh]

I love bonfire !


"It is something called dart". It's funny how you describe it as something. AHAHAHAHA

[devatsdb]

flutter and their whole wacky and messy code structures..nah

[AutMouseLabs]

I am not a fan of the damn bracket soup. I prefer languages that have an end keyword better. That way brackets can mean specific things instead of being a code block deliminator .

[patlecat]

Flutter really is all about messy coding.