cargo-devcade is a helper for building and deploying devcade games with Rust!

Installing

Installation is simple:

cargo install cargo-devcade

Psst! Make sure you also have cross installed and working too!

Getting started with cargo-devcade and bevy!

Though it's not required, I recommend you use bevy and devcaders to put stuff on the screen.

Project setup

Once you have cargo-devcade installed, we can make a new project:

cargo new ferris-spinner
cd ferris-spinner

Now, let's add some dependencies we'll need:

cargo add bevy devcaders

Mary Note:

• Bevy is a game engine for Rust.
• devcaders is a library for adding Devcade functionality to your Bevy game!

Oh, and don't forget the icons! icon.png and banner.png should exist in the store_icons folder of your crate root:

mkdir store_icons
curl https://placehold.it/800x450.png -Lo store_icons/banner.png
curl https://placehold.it/512x512.png -Lo store_icons/icon.png

Building

Before we do anything else, let's do a test build to make our project is set up properly:

cargo devcade package

This should run a build, and package your app for production.

If it didn't work, maybe you hit a bug... Or more likely you set it up wrong!

Now, write some freaking code

Bevy is pretty neat, here's a tiny game we can try with:

use bevy::{prelude::*, window::WindowMode};

fn main() {
  App::new()
    .add_plugins(DefaultPlugins.set(WindowPlugin {
      primary_window: Some(Window {
        mode: WindowMode::Fullscreen,
        ..default()
      }),
      ..default()
    }))
    .add_startup_system(setup_system)
    .add_system(hello_world_system)
    .run();
}

fn setup_system() {
  println!("Welcome to ferris spin!");
}

fn hello_world_system() {
  println!("hello world");
}

Cool, let's give it a run:

cargo run

It does... nothing! ...Except print 'hello world' a bunch of times and make a window.

That's because we're not drawing anything yet!

Grey is boring

Let's grab some pictures from the interwebz to use in our game:

mkdir assets
curl https://rustacean.net/assets/rustacean-flat-happy.png -o assets/ferris.png

Cool! Now let's make a camera and a ferris at startup:

#[derive(Component)]
struct Ferris {}

fn setup_system(mut commands: Commands, asset_server: Res<AssetServer>) {
  println!("Welcome to ferris spin!");
  // Add a camera so we can see stuff:
  commands.spawn(Camera2dBundle::default());
  // Draw a ferris in the middle of the screen
  commands.spawn((
    Ferris {},
    SpriteBundle {
      texture: asset_server.load("ferris.png"),
      transform: Transform::from_xyz(100., 0., 0.),
      ..default()
    },
  ));
}

And now:

cargo run

You should see a crab on your screen. If you don't and got some kind of error... Open an issue?

An interesting bevy pattern showed up here, did you spot it?

Markers

In bevy, sometimes we link a dummy component (in this case Ferris) so it can be looked-up later. We'll see some of that syntax in the next step

What if the crab actually... Did something?

Hey, this is cool, but what if we could move the crab around?

fn hello_world_system(mut sprite_position: Query<(&mut Ferris, &mut Transform)>) {
  for (_, mut transform) in &mut sprite_position {
    transform.translation.x -= 1.0;
  }
  println!("hello world");
}

But uh... What if we could actually control it?

Hmm... But how? Maybe that devcaders library we added earlier could help us...

use devcaders::{DevcadeControls, Player, Button};

fn hello_world_system(
  time: Res<Time>,
  mut sprite_position: Query<(&mut Ferris, &mut Transform)>,
  devcade_controls: DevcadeControls,
) {
  for (_, mut transform) in &mut sprite_position {
    if devcade_controls.pressed(Player::P1, Button::StickLeft) {
      transform.translation.x -= 5.0 * time.delta_seconds();
    }
    if devcade_controls.pressed(Player::P1, Button::StickRight) {
      transform.translation.x += 5.0 * time.delta_seconds();
    }
  }
  println!("hello world");
}

Cool! Now our crab moves when we move the joystick.

For a full list of controls and their meanings, check devcaders' Button enum

If you don't have a controller attached, you can use the V and N keys instead!

For more information, or to learn more, visit bevyengine.org!

One last thing

So... We should make it possible to exit.

Add these lines to our system to exit on menu button press (by either player!):

if devcade_controls.pressed(Player::P1, Button::Menu)
  || devcade_controls.pressed(Player::P2, Button::Menu)
{
  std::process::exit(0);
}

Publishing

Publishing to devcade is easy:

1. Run cargo devcade package
2. Upload the zip to the devcade upload portal, making sure to set the title to the name of your crate
3. Profit?