Xgame - An X11 game programming library

CVS and discussion forums now hosted at

Project started: Spring 1995
Latest stable version: 1.0 (28 may 1999)
Last page update: 27 jun 2000

Stop the Europe software patent law!

I've found that X is quite able to display graphics fluidly, and is, in fact, well-suited as a gaming platform for classical games. I have written a small (but growing) widget which is able to create windows, read the keymap, display transparent sprites, do buffering, etc. using simple calls. It relies on Xlib and Xpm only, and has been successfully tested on several different X servers on SunOS, FreeBSD, NetBSD and Linux. It's meant to work on as many X servers as possible; for example, it works on a Hercules mono card and yields high frame rates on remote X servers. It may be useful for anyone who likes to experiment with X without having to rely on bloated, buggy or commercial widgets, or having to plod through the official seven-volume guide first. I still plan to include a section on some of the principles of Xlib functionality on this page.

Features

For an explanation of Xgame, you can read the Xgame readme file The text also includes version update history.

Here are some screengrabs of the games and demos featured in Xgame:

Coming soon! Xbitstorm (rough prototype), an X11 version of bitstorm.
ifs demo: Animated IFS fractal.
cubes demo: Animated cubes, can be rotated using f,g,h,j,k,l keys
scroll demo: Demonstration of tile-map scrolling.
wormdemo: 3D moving worm.
bounce demo: Bouncing balls demo, illustrating xgamet.
X-plode grab 1 grab 2: Blow op everything on screen, preferably by creating chain reactions.
Zooi, a Zoop clone for X
Ureum grab 1 grab 2: Keep the massive onslaught of kamikaze troops under control using your super-rapid-fire gun (70 bullets per second!).
Dodgem: an attempt at re-engineering the original (see also my game design page)
Xcircuits: A Zenji clone (largely unfinished).

A couple of things you might find useful but I forgot to mention in the documentation: Press 'q' to quit most programs. If you think they run too slow, try decreasing the screen depth (contrary to popular belief, this does make a lot of difference!).

... but where's the sound??

No, there's no sound in Xgame yet... It seems best to me to use the Network Audio Server as a basis, but I still have to install it first (I'll have to ask the sysop). Anyway, I was planning to have sound as a fully separate module (perhaps even use an already existing one?) The minimal functionality I'd like to see is:

Play a sample (with optional loop) with configurable frequency and volume.
Change a sample's frequency and volume while it is playing (to be really useful, this operation would have to be timed precisely, with less than 1/50th of a second delay variation.
Play music (MOD files would be cool!)

If you have additions to this list, or ideas about what existing sound software to use, don't hesitate to mail me.

The software

Get the newest (unstable) version at SourceForge

XGame version 1.0 (28 may 99) (newest release)

HP-UX port of Xgame 1.0

Changes: added game logic toolkit, added man pages, 3 new example games, 1 new demo.

Older releases

XGame version 0.95 (30 oct 98)

Unified diff file to patch mouse position bug. The bug causes the mouse position to have the wrong offset in full-screen and root-window modes. (5 nov 1998)

NEW unified diff file to add new function XgameDrawSpriteArea (by popular demand) There was a bug in 17 november's patch 2: the srcx and srcy weren't scaled properly. Thanks to Dante Lorenso for finding that one! The new function allows drawing only a part of a sprite pixmap, for example enabling you to put in multiple animation frames in a single XPM file. The patch has to be patched on top of patch 1. (18 nov 1998).

XGame version 0.9 (22 mar 98)

HP-UX port of Xgame 0.9

XGame version 0.8 (9 mar 98)

XGame version 0.7 (22 feb 98)

Coming Soon

I am checking out some sound+music libraries: mikmod