Best toolchain for flash (ActionScript 3) game development wanted?

Question

Hi, all!

I'm new to flash and web development too. But I have some background in c#/c++/Qt/python. So, I want to know, what is the best toolchain for quickest dive into.

My task is to write a game for facebook.com/vkontakte.ru. I already have the design doc, great artist and game-designer, so, the coding is the only stumbling block we met. There are no significant obstacles at server-side, but, since we have not much time, I decided to ask some help on suitable toolchain definition.

I think, that web-services (maybe WCF) are perfect for the backend, so, some of them should transfer JSON-ed data from/to client, incapsulate game-logic, and... here is the place I stuck. What next, what should I learn, what tools/toolsets will provide learing/productivity curve that meat least action principle.

Maybe I'm on the wrong way and missing some basic and obvious (for web-devs) things... I do not know, so, any advices will be highly appreciated.

Answer 1

Do these existing questions help you?

• What is the best IDE for actionscript3 development
• What are some good Flash game frameworks?

Edit:
You might be asking about the Flex SDK. That is what the three main IDEs use.

• http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=flex4sdk

The closest thing to an alternative that I'm aware of is haXe.

Answer 2

In terms of tools there's a variety of IDEs available such as:

• FDT

• Flash Develop

• Flash Builder (formerly Flex Builder)

Frameworks you might like to get started on:

• Flixel

• Push Button Engine

Services you might want to look at:

• GamerSafe (mtx)

• Mochi Media (ads, social, mtx)

• Player IO (multiplayer + highly scalable user databases and file storage)

• Playtomic (analytics mostly ... disclaimer: it's mine)

I have personally produced about 20 games now in Flash and also come from a .NET background (although I was using Flash first, just .NET most). I mostly use:

• Adobe Fireworks

• Adobe Flash (this is the least-programmer like IDE but the most visually creative one, it's difficult to wean yourself off of after a decade of the alternatives not existing)

• Adobe Flash Builder for the CPU/memory profiling is an invaluable component

• Kindisoft SecureSWF, I don't use this very much but depending on the nature of your game you might want to encrpyt/obfuscate your code since SWF files are very easy decoded / reconstructed into FLAs