I have been using SKShapeNode extensively to draw quick graphics by filling them with CGPaths for quick visual debugging and making prototypes. For example I can create procedural mountains quickly with SKShapeNode. In early times of spritekit SKShapeNode didn’t have way to render images on it. We have fillTexture available now that allows texture to fill the shape.

let shapeNode = SKShapeNode()
shapeNode.fillTexture = SKTexture(imageNamed: “testImage")

But, Our SKShapeNode is displaying nothing.

Why is that?

The most common culprit causing AVAudioPlayer not playing sound is ARC. When my audio player's scope is just within a function ARC deallocates the memory before playing sound after function is called. Here is an example code:

func playSoundEffect(assetName: string?) {
    if let sound = assetName{
        if let asset = NSDataAsset(name:sound){
            
            do {
                // Use NSDataAsset's data property to access the audio file stored in Sound.
                let soundEffect = try AVAudioPlayer(data:asset.data, fileTypeHint:"wav")
                // Play the above sound file.
                soundEffect?.play()
            } catch let error as NSError {
                print(error.localizedDescription)
            }
        }
    }
}

Right now I am at the stage where I am writing foundation to manage my sound effects and background music for my upcoming game. I found two most popular way to play sound effects in SpriteKit:

• SKAction
• AVAudioPlayer

It's amazing how modern Pixel Art captures the true simplicity yet also expressing creative masterpieces. I find so much solace staring at the world presented by games like Stardew Valley and Kynseed.

In my spare time I am making 2d pixel art game for iOS and macOS for my hobby. I found a free pixel art font called PixelDigivolve to use it for my texts. There was this behaviour that caught my attention where font was being rendered very blurry. The edges were not sharp.

SpriteKit has filtering mode called nearest-neighbour for rendering textures.