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Tag: GPL

Game map edition using Tiled

Tiled logo

Tiled is general purpose game map editor, with support of several map formats (XML, JSON), multi plataform and runs installed or from browser, supports plugins to read and write others map formats and all free (under GPL license).

map editor tiles tileset game deveopment

Installing

You can lauch Tiled via Java Web Start or download it’s lastest version zip file. After download it just unzip it and run:

java -jar tiled.jar

Make sure you have at least Java 1.5 installed and configured.

Creating a empty map

After lauching it, open the menu File → New and create a new 10×10 orthogonal map with 32×32 tiles.

Tiled: New Map

Like this one

tiled 10x10 map

Creating a tileset

Now we need to add a tileset to start drawing a map. Let’s use this one

batalhao tileset cc by sa

Save the tileset image above.  Open the menu Tilesets → New Tileset select Reference tileset image and browser to find the tileset image you saved. Keep tile width and height as 32 and tile spacing and margin as 0.

tiled new tileset

Notice a new tab on the Tile palette section.

tiled tileset

Working with layers

Select the first grass tile from the tileset and select the  fill tool (bucket icon) to create a grass field. Use the paint tool (pencil icon) to add some stones and trees at random locations on grass. On the Layers section double click at Layer Name and put a name like “field”.

tiled field

Now let’s create another layer to put the buildings and streets. We can do that by opening the menu Layer → Add Layer or just clicking the new icon on layer’s section. Let’s call it “city”.

Now build your city by selecting tiles on the palette and using the paint tool. There’s tiles for horizontal and vertical street and all kinds of intersection. For the building you can click and drag in the palette to select multiple tiles at once.

tiled city

Saving

You can save the map as tmx (XML Tiled map file) , JSON, LUA, wlk, map (Mappy) or export it as a image. There’s some options accessible on the Edit → Preferences menu like use base-64  gziped encoding.

Thanks to Adam Turk and Bjørn Lindeijer for developing that great project.

In a next post I want to show how to integrate this with a Java/JavaFX game.

My Free Tileset, version 1

Although everything I do is under the license Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike, I’m starting to group my pixelarts works  and release them in single files under the GPL.

Here the first and small release:

In summary: you can use them freely for open source or proprietary, games or prototypes, professionals or beginners developers, for study or for lucrative purposes, whatever you want. You don’t need even ask me for that, just use it (but I appreciate a reference). You can even modify them as long you also maintain the same freedom for the derivative work. For complete details, read the GPL or ask your questions in the commentaries.

If you are looking for a free, big and great tileset, look the wonderfull work of The Mana Word project (both code and art under GPL).

Soon I’ll group others pixel art drawings of others games I made in a single tileset file.

If you have a similar work in a compatible license we can make release of them togheter and create a big free tileset.