Does anyone here have any experience using it? http://www.madewithmarmalade.com/ Strikes me a great solution - what attracts me is the fact that I can develop ios apps on cheap Windows hardware for less than the price of the cheapest Mac AND I get to port to *any* platform at the press of a button.
It used to be Airplay and the licensing a lot friendlier for indies. The licensing was changed with 30 days notice. Airplay's API was ok, I'd be a little concerned about licensing changes, 30 days isn't a lot of notice.
They have appeared to back down slightly on their license terms. Current users get a years license, enough to get their game down you'd hope. Also the loading screen requirement was for theirs to go first, I believe they're relenting on that now and it can come after the developer's.
I'd say has better than Monkey also the fact that you can use C and not a made up language also seems quite stable, differently from the current Monkey situation (last time I checked forums there were still plenty of issues).
But who would want to use C this days? Don't you value your productivity? That made up language is pretty cool. Not as easy as BlitzMax, but therevills already made a game in it and we have the game done too (not published yet, because we're adding support for 9 other languages). As for issues, I made a game in it and those issues didn't stop me (not to mention I did notice them).
No, indeed I am not using C anymore and I think Mark should have used python Seriously, at least would be a well known, already cross-platform, opensource, language. Instead of that blitzthing language.
I'm bidding for games as well as application contracts, for me Monkey is not the right solution and it is just not far enough along. Besides, this bit of kit allows me to develop and deploy to all platforms (including iOS) from my Windows development box - that's more than worth the license fee.
I thought it looked interesting but it seems very complex compared to frameworks like Cocos2d For building the actual app I believe it uses similar methods to the Flash for Iphone compiler
could you point me to the link where they explain the procedure to upload to the appstore within a windows box ? because i know that you can deploy to jailbroken device in airplay sdk for testing but to put your app on the appstore requires the app loader which is available only with a mac computer (that is in the faq). from the marmalade FAQ : Do I need a Mac to build, deploy and submit iOS apps? You can fully build, deploy and install standard Marmalade apps for iOS using a Windows PC, with no need for a Mac. This includes all stages of app signing for both development and app store submission (generating certificate requests, obtaining certificates/profiles, signing apps). However, a Mac is currently required to upload final app builds to the App Store due to the store's dependency on the Mac App Loader. This may be improved in a future release. A Mac is also required if you want to *build* EDK extensions for iOS. Note that a Mac is not required if you simply wish to include pre-compiled EDK extension libraries for iOS.
Sure you need access to a Mac for the submission to App Store but you don't for 99.999% of the development process. My plan is to develop my first app for a client using the cheap license and by the time the app is finished there will be more than enough funds to purchase the full license and as many Macs as I could ever need. Anyway - I've downloaded the 90 day evaluation and having a great time using it. In my opinion this is what Monkey should have been.
I installed Visual Studio Express, GCC ARM compiler and the Android SDK - I was then able to compile to Windows, Android and iOS.