gbdk-2020 VS ZGB

If you want to program the Gameboy or Gameboy color with C or C++ the SDCC compiler is typically used: https://sdcc.sourceforge.net/ There's a ton of good info and dev tools here: https://github.com/gbdk-2020/gbdk-2020

This is a game jam where you make a Game Boy game in three months. If you don't know a lot of programming you can use GB Studio, you can learn the nitty gritty of how the Game Boy works by using assembly programming with RGBDS, or you can use C with GBDK or ZGB.

I was messing around with GBDK just last night, so I'm in no position to poke fun at you ;)

There is a c library for this. https://github.com/gbdk-2020/gbdk-2020

If you have some programming experience, you can make your game using languages ​​like C and assembly. However, you don’t need to know how to code to start making your own game. There’s a free and open source game creator named GB Studio, that allows you to create your own title using a drag and drop tool. In this case, I decided to use C with the GBDK 2020 library for my project, as it gave me adequate flexibility without the need to dive into a low-level language like assembly to do so. You can read this guide to choose which tool suits you best.

Last year i got started making Gameboy homebrew games. As a way to better learn the process, i decided to try re-making some classic games. In addition, i would post a tutorial. They say "In learning you teach, and in teaching you learn". This rings true for me, as in writing these tutorials it forces me to really analyze what aspects of game development i understand and what aspects i do not. Most recently i remade Space Invaders using GBDK-2020 and C. All source code and assets are available for free on GitHub.

To fix this, some very recent communities are working on updated versions of the library without these issues: GBDK-N and GBDK 2020. I've personally moved on to the latter, but any tutorials for the original GBDK are still valid, such as the rudimentary ones on the GBDK wiki, or most notably Gaming Monsters' Youtube chanel (which sadly didn't exist when I got into GB development lol).

This is a game jam where you make a Game Boy game in three months. If you don't know a lot of programming you can use GB Studio, you can learn the nitty gritty of how the Game Boy works by using assembly programming with RGBDS, or you can use C with GBDK or ZGB.

As of right now, I'm using the ZGB because it seemed simple enough, and I like C. And I'm using Gameboy Tile Designer for my sprites. I know that my player sprite's collision box is defined in the .gbr.meta file, and I figured out how to adjust the collision box dimensions like so:

If you'd like to learn to code (and I totally understand if that seems daunting or you just don't) there are some options short of coding it all yourself - for one, there are other, possibly more flexible engines. One I considered for a bit before rolling my own was https://github.com/Zal0/ZGB - he has several games with source available to help people get started.