Universal App

So far I've just been making Android games. Now I want to try building for iOS, but the different aspect ratios are making a mess of things. The Android builds have been at a 16:9 ratio, which is fine for iPhone 5, but how do I get everything to look right at other ratios? Is there a reasonably simple way? The UI elements seem to be fine, but the camera crops the gameplay elements in unfortunate ways.

 

It depends on the type of game, but a typical method is to design everything important for 4:3, where anything extra on the sides in wider aspect ratios is just "fluff", and anchor GUI elements to corners of the screen.

--Eric

 

Makes sense. Since I started with 16:9, 4:3 was the worst offender.
Thanks @Eric5h5 , I'll give it a try.

Edit:
Just to clarify, I have to set things up so it works at 4:3, but I build at 16:9, right? Would that build be considered universal (just cropping the sides for different devices)?

 

No, you use a 4:3 game view in the editor (plus switch to other aspect ratios occasionally for testing to make sure you didn't hard-code something), and then you just build. You don't build for any particular screen; the game runs on whatever aspect ratio the device has.

--Eric

 

BTW how did you manage it with Android cause there is a lot more aspect ratio combinations than with iOS devices? if you used 16:9 for all then it already went wrong there