Recently, we decided to put some resources into learning how to create games and apps for the iPhone OS. As an agency we have no shortage of games developed in Flash. For that reason, it was a logical next step to try making a game, more as a proof of concept and applied learning than anything else.

While Interface Builder is great for aiding in iPhone interfaces, its application is limited in the creation of games. To really get a game off the ground one needs to dive into OpenGL to render graphics on screen. This was a bit daunting at first, but after some a little poking around I stumbled upon a library that promised to ease the process.

The library, cocos2d for iPhone, is a full on two-dimensional graphics engine. They describe it as:

cocos2d for iPhone is a framework for building 2D games, demos, and other graphical/interactive applications. It is based on the cocos2d design: it uses the same API, but instead of using python it uses objective-c.

As an added bonus, cocos2d also includes with it the Chipmunk physics engine. So, with this single package I was able to hit the ground running building a game that employed both custom graphics and physics gameplay. Not bad for a single download.

Stay tuned, as I’ll be sure to post more iPhone tidbits as progress on the game develops.