2DMapEditor

2DMapEditor

Single-layer 2D map editor using a .png tileset.

It features map resizing, drawing, erasing, filling…

Export maps to txt, json or lua format.

Built with love2d it runs on Windows, macOS and Linux.

Preview

Tileset from https://ansimuz.itch.io/grotto-escape-game-art-pack

Features

• Edition:
  • Resize
  • Draw
  • Erase
  • Fill
  • Tile Picker
  • Clear
• Movement:
  • Move
  • Zoom
• Display:
  • Toggle grid
  • Reset
• Import:
  • .txt
  • .json
  • .lua
• Export:
  • .txt
  • .json
  • .lua
• Set settings from editor.txt
• Tiles display as drawing palette

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Usage Instructions

This minimalist software does not provide any integrated tips or documentation, you should refer to this section if you need help.

Get started

• Linux/MacOS install love2d v11.
• Download the map editor.
• Unzip it.
• Add at least one tileset in the tileset/ directory.
• Edit the “editor.txt” file next to the map editor and change some settings to fit your need.
• Run the map editor (on Linux/MacOS either double click on the .love file or use $ love 2d_map_editor.love from the command prompt).
• Create a map.
• Export your map.
• Your exported map should now appear in the map/ directory.

Shortcuts

Keys	Description
D	Draw
E	Erase
F	Fill
Alt	Tile picker
Mouse Right	Tile picker
←↑→↓	Move
Spacebar + Mouse Left	Move
Mouse Wheel	Zoom

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Input/Output Format

A 2d map is encoded as a 2d array of numbers. Each number matches a tile from the tileset.

Considering the following tileset:

And this 2d array of number:

{
	{19, 19,  1,  4, 19},
	{21, 19,  9, 19, 19},
	{19, 19, 19, 19, 19},
	{16, 16,  6, 15, 16},
	{13, 13, 13, 13, 13}
}

We get the following map:

Importing a Map to Your Project

With Lua (5.1)

If your using the lua programming language, just require the map in your project:

local map = require("path/to/my/map")

Without Lua

Create/find a parser for the file format you want your map to be in.

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Building

Builds are done using the “Release” script that itself uses boon. Running ./Release will create a folder named “release”, using ./Release -z will zip the folders contained in the release folder.

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Project Status

The project is currently finished, however feel free to open an issue if you encounter one. No features will be added.

Why this Project & more…

Initialy I wanted to be able to create maps for my 2d games, I tried tiled but it’s a big editor with tons of features and it was exporting maps in the json format, so I should have learned how to use the editor and use a library to parse json files.

Since I only needed single layers maps I started this little project. It was one of my first desktop application so it was very interesting on many points.

I created the map editor 2+ years ago but I never finished some features/polish but used it in multiple projects like It Alive. It’s why I came back on it with the desire to make the initial idea come true. I find the project/code structure really bad now and that’s a good thing, it means that my programming practices/skills have improved since. If I had to do it again now, I would do it in a much different maner. Thanks for reading.