UPDATE: I have now used this Isometric Engine in a live project. Check it out at getoutthere.qld.gov.au.

I decided to try my hand at isometric 3D. I’m developing a basic API called IsoMetrix. It handles all the movement and trig whilst allowing simple adjustments to all axis’.

The company I work for, Cru Digital, has a use for this – and most of the engines me and my colleague Matt looked at were unnecessarily complex. Hopefully, with a some further tweaking, this can do the job we want.

Click to read the nitty gritty bits

Some features:
- Directly set or get X,Y or Z axis’. It does the trig on the fly.
- Automatic depth control.
- Shadows (to be improved and switched to BitmapData)
- Light and easy event based updating. (enterframes to be globalised)
- Simple gravity (to be improved upon)
- Easily extendable classes that allow the setting of an anchor points.

Contains new types IsoSprite and IsoStage. IsoSprite is a sprite with depth and axis information and translation. IsoStage manages the depths, shadows and gravity.

For the example I also created a randomly coloured grid and a series of randomly generated and controlled balls.

Hopefully I’ll switch the gravity and shadows to do more than just replicate the actions of a ball in the coming weeks.