RPGDX > RPG Makers and Engines

Tiled

Posted by	Bjorn
Prog. language	C++
Last update	20-01-2013
Links	Website;

Description:

Tiled is a generic tiled map editor. It uses an XML based map and tileset format that should be fairly straightforward to use in almost any language, and flexible enough to be used by multiple independent engines. Tiled is released under GPL, the source is available on the website.

Latest version: 0.9.0

Reviews

Review by Nephilim on 15-08-2004

This is a great little Java app! I really like the XML output scheme with the layers and the incremental tilesets. Should be very easy to parse these files into whatever internal map architecture you have. The only thing it doesn't cover, really, is attaching textual or object data to locations, but you can easily work around this.

Basically, you'd just create tilesets for yourself that represent numerical data or special meta-information for map locations. For instance, create a tileset of just numbers. Then you can load that tileset in to associate numerical data with tile locations visually. For instance, you could name a layer "scripts", and place number tiles on locations that map into a list of scripts for the map. Similarly, you could make a small tileset of "walkability" icons, and visually define the walkability of locations.

Some interface tweaks that would make it easier to use include the following (apologies if these are already in there and I just couldn't find them):

* Key commands to switch between tools
* Key command to hide and show the tileset palette (tab)
* Key commands to switch between layers (control-1 for first layer, etc.)
* Hold down the space bar and drag to scroll the map around
* Modifier key (option) to eyedrop for single-button mice
* Ability to set the background color for the tileset palette (since you can't tell the difference between an all-black tile and a transparent tile)
* Ability to rearrange the tileset order for a map.
* Disallow drawing if you can't see the currently selected layer.
* Ability to lock layers so you don't accidentally change them.

Anyway, this is a great little app - very useful. The organization scheme is well-thought-out and should be portable to just about any RPG project. Kudos on a job well done.