Which is better for building a game, Corona SDK or Xcode?
I recently looked at Bubble Ball's website, and it says Built With Corona SDK. I've never heard of Corona, and, from what I read, it lets you create games for devices with very little code. I'm not convinced. Which should I go with? Xcode or Corona SDK?
EDIT: To clarify, I would like to know which is better for building a good, solid iPhone game.
Answer
Which is better for creating a good, solid iPhone game?
That's not a question anybody can answer for you. What may be better for you isn't necessarily better for the next guy.
Last fall after more than two decades as a programmer I decided to learn Objective-C and Xcode and start making iPhone apps. After a few weeks going through tutorials in a couple books and slowly getting up to speed I stumbled across Corona SDK.
I was pissed.
Because I don't want to CODE, I want to write games. And here was an SDK, that, while still required coding, cut such a huge chunk off the learning curve that for me and what I wanted to do it made perfect sense. (I was pissed that I'd "wasted" time because Ansca Mobile didn't do enough advertising for me to know about Corona SDK ahead of that time.)
The games I want to write are 2D puzzle games, adventure/RPG, and arcade games. If you want to do something that requires all the power you can pull from the device you'll probably NOT want to use Corona -- you give up some power in exchange for faster/easier development.
Corona SDK uses Lua as the language that ties it all together and even if you have no experience with it, Lua is pretty easy to pick up.
With Xcode/Obj-C you can do anything your heart desires -- with Corona SDK you are limited to what it has available. For example, in the past, while AdMob could be used in Corona-based apps, iAds could not. Enabling OpenFeint is a 1-liner, but GameCenter wasn't available except via OpenFeint.
Those two examples are things I expect Corona to support sooner rather than later. Ansca Mobile has been very good about releasing regular updates with new functionality and better performance.
So while there are some limitations with a tool like Corona SDK, there are advantages you just don't get when you "roll your own."
Hard-core racing games? First-person shooters? Anything 3-D based? Corona SDK is probably not for you.
But most other game genres? I wouldn't use anything else but Corona SDK.
Yes, I am a fanboi.
Jay