Darkwind Media Blog

In another update on the progress of the next version of Luster I thought we should mention the main reason for the time it is taking to complete: mac support. When I first started creating the Luster runtime I made a decision that I would not use any technologies or systems that could only run on a single platform. I didn’t want to close off Mac or Linux support when starting out because I knew the time would come when I would want those platforms supported. However, using cross-platform libraries and tools doesn’t automatically mean you can run something on multiple platforms.

So, after deciding that the time was right to support the Mac, we started the porting process. After a few months of learning how to develop for the Mac, the first Mac-enabled version of Luster is nearing completion. Most of Luster’s functionality is ported and I can run the majority of Luster applications in the standalone player. Look for a brand new release of Luster on both Windows and Mac in the coming weeks!

With the new version of Luster will come a whole new collection of demos. I’m most excited about Blocks, which I’ve posted about several times now. Progress on this simple game is almost complete. We’re carefully crafting the first few levels that we will release and I am working on the shadowing system that we will be using for it. So far the game has proven to be fun to make and to play. We will do some final playtesting and gameplay tweaking just before release.