PICOLOVEPOTION

This project is no longer in development. Consider using https://github.com/jtothebell/fake-08 to play Pico 8 games on the Switch.

A fork of the gamax92's fork of PICOLOVE, an implementation of PICO-8's API for the Löve Potion implementation of the LÖVE2D game engine

Original PICOLOVE is on github at: https://github.com/picolove/picolove
gamax92's fork is on github at: https://github.com/gamax92/picolove
Requires a homebrew cabaple Nintendo Switch

PICO-8: http://www.lexaloffle.com/pico-8.php
Löve Potion: https://github.com/TurtleP/LovePotion LÖVE: https://love2d.org/

What it is:

• An implementation of PICO-8's api for Löve Potion

Current status:

• Incomplete
• Able to parse the cart's sprite sheet and set it to canvas for drawing
• Switch gamepad input is able to be detected and should be usable by PICO-8 btn() calls
• Basics of graphics API is working

How to use

• Get a homebrew capable switch (I can't offher help on this, but you can start here: https://nh-server.github.io/switch-guide/)
• Download the latest LovePotion build (see the releases page: https://github.com/TurtleP/LovePotion/releases. Currently latest build is 1.1.0)
• put the LovePotion build in the "switch" folder of you Switch's SD card, and then PicoLovePotion (all files from this repo) in the "switch/LovePotion/game" directory
• add your own *.p8 cart and change the name of the in main.lua
• cross your fingers

If you want to build a standalone game, use the above instructions but follow the directions for distribution in the LovePotion wiki (https://turtlep.github.io/LovePotion/wiki/#/packaging)

Basic Roadmap:

• Fix bugs
• optimize slowness (palette shifting, other places to combine pixel setting calls)
• add png cart support? (may need image data support from LovePotion for this)
• Add SFX and music support (may need support for creating in memory sound objects from LovePotion)
• 3ds support?

Why:

• For a fun challenge!
• Allow standalone publishing of PICO-8 games on (Homebrew capable) Nintendo Switch (and maybe later 3ds)
• Open source

What it isn't:

• Fully functional
• A replacement for PICO-8
• A perfect replica
• No dev tools, no image editor, map editor, sfx editor, music editor
• No modifying or saving carts
• No GIF recording
• Not memory compatible with PICO-8

Differences/Known issues:

• pget() does not work (will require an update to LovePotion or a very big refactor to graphics)
• pal() and palt() are very slow on initial use, and screen palette shifting is not supported
• Based on Lua 5.1, so GOTO (and possible other pico 8 supported features) not working
• memory functions (peek(), poke(), memcpy(), memset(), etc) not implemented
• floating point, not fixed point numbers
• no audio