Löve (game framework)
| LÖVE | |
|---|---|
| Release | January 13, 2008[1] |
| Stable release | 11.5[2]
/ December 3, 2023 |
| Written in | C++ |
| Platform | |
| Type | Application framework |
| License | zlib license |
| Website | love2d |
| Repository | |
Löve (stylized in all caps) is a free, open-source, cross-platform framework released under the zlib license for developing video games. The framework is written in C++ and uses Lua as its scripting language, is still maintained by its original developers, and supports Microsoft Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS.
The framework's API accesses the host machine's video and sound functions through the libraries SDL and OpenGL, or since version 0.10 also OpenGL ES 2 and 3.[3] Fonts render via the FreeType engine.[4] A port called piLöve targets the Raspberry Pi.[5]
The framework is frequently used in video game development competitions such as Ludum Dare.[6] In July 2018, it was the 10th most popular game development software used by independent game developers on the site Itch.io,[7] holding a 1.97% share.
The 2024 roguelike deck-building game Balatro, built with LÖVE, became a commercial hit without a mainstream engine such as Unity, Unreal Engine, or Godot.[8]
Version history
[edit]| Version | Code name | Added | Release date |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0.1.1 | Santa-Power |
|
January 13, 2008 |
| 0.2.0 | Mini-Moose |
|
February 6, 2008 |
| 0.2.1 | Impending Doom |
|
March 29, 2008 |
| 0.3.0 | Mutant Vermin |
|
June 17, 2008 |
| 0.3.1 | Meat Space |
|
June 21, 2008 |
| 0.3.2 | Lemony Fresh |
|
July 4, 2008 |
| 0.4.0 | Taco Beam |
|
August 29, 2008 |
| 0.5.0 | Salted Nuts |
|
January 2, 2009 |
| 0.6.0 | Jiggly Juice |
|
December 24, 2009 |
| 0.6.1 | Jiggly Juice | February 7, 2010 | |
| 0.6.2 | Jiggly Juice |
|
March 6, 2010 |
| 0.7.0 | Game Slave |
|
December 5, 2010 |
| 0.7.1 | Game Slave |
|
February 14, 2011 |
| 0.7.2 | Game Slave |
|
May 4, 2011 |
| 0.8.0 | Rubber Piggy |
|
April 2, 2012 |
| 0.9.0 | Baby Inspector |
|
December 13, 2013 |
| 0.9.1 | Baby Inspector |
|
April 1, 2014 |
| 0.9.2 | Baby Inspector |
|
February 14, 2015 |
| 0.10.0 | Super Toast | December 22, 2015 | |
| 0.10.1 | Super Toast |
|
February 14, 2016 |
| 0.10.2 | Super Toast |
|
October 31, 2016 |
| 11.0 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
April 1, 2018 |
| 11.1 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
April 15, 2018 |
| 11.2 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
November 25, 2018 |
| 11.3 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
October 27, 2019 |
| 11.4 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
January 22, 2022 |
| 11.5 | Mysterious Mysteries |
|
December 3, 2023 |
| 12.0 | Bestest Friend | In development |
Features
[edit]Features include:
- OpenGL pixel shaders GLSL.
- Touchscreen for mobile devices.[11]
- Joysticks by providing interface for connected joysticks.[12]
- UTF-8.[13]
- Image formats: PNG, JPEG, GIF, TGA and BMP.[14]
- Audio formats: WAV, OGG, and MP3.[15]
- Video formats: OGV.[16]
- The physics engine Box2D, which can be disabled to lighten the library.[17]
- LuaSocket library for network communications TCP/UDP.[18]
- Lua-enet library, implementing the reliable Enet protocol over UDP.[19]
Notable games
[edit]Games made with LÖVE include:
- Kingdom Rush (2011)[20]
- Mari0 (2012)[21]
- Oh My Giraffe (2014)[22]
- Blue Revolver (2016)[23][20]
- Move or Die (2016)[20]
- Warlock's Tower (2017)[24]
- Aeon of Sands - The Trail (2018)[25]
- BYTEPATH (2018)[26][27]
- Metanet Hunter G4 (2020)[28]
- Intravenous series (2021-2024)[29]
- Gravity Circuit (2023)[30][31]
- Moonring (2023)[32]
- Balatro (2024)[20]
- Arco (2024)
Libraries and implementations
[edit]There are various libraries and forks of LÖVE that add OOP with inheritance and overloading, interpolations, cameras, gamestates, and more. Notable examples include:
- The Simple Tiled Implementation library lets users load levels as tiles, edit them using Tiled[33] and display them in games, working with Box2D for collision management.[34]
- The anim8 library loads animations, such as for characters, from an image grid into a PNG or JPEG bitmap file.[35][36]
- LIKO-12 is a free platform inspired by the PICO-8 fantasy console and uses LÖVE. It lets users develop applications in a limited resolution, save and load them in a modified PNG format, and export them to HTML5 or to systems supported by LÖVE.[37]
- Lutro is a Lua game framework for libretro, a partial port of the LÖVE[38] API. ChaiLove offers a similar implementation in ChaiScript, an embedded, cross-platform scripting language for C++ (C++14).[39]
- love.js is a port that lets LÖVE games run on the web via HTML5, WebGL, and Emscripten.[40]
- g3d is a 3D engine for LÖVE, providing 3D model rendering, .obj file loading, first person movement and camera controls, perspective and orthographic projections, and 3D collisions.[41]
Educational use
[edit]LÖVE is used in Harvard University's CS50's Introduction to 2D Game Development course[42] and is the subject of Packt Publishing's 2013 book LÖVE for Lua Game Programming.[43]
References
[edit]- ↑ "LÖVE version history". Archived from the original on 2019-06-01. Retrieved 2019-06-01.
- ↑ "LÖVE 11.5". Archived from the original on 2023-12-29. Retrieved 2024-01-07.
- ↑ "0.10.0". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 23 July 2016. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "The power of Löve !". Korben.info. January 14, 2011. Archived from the original on May 17, 2019. Retrieved May 25, 2019.
- ↑ "PiLove - LÖVE on RaspberryPI". mitako.eu. Archived from the original on 2019-05-14. Retrieved 2019-05-25.
- ↑ "Posts Tagged'love2d'". Ludum Dare. Archived from the original on 2019-05-17. Retrieved 2019-05-25.
- ↑ Rob Beschizza (July 17, 2018). "The most popular engines for indie games". Boingboing. Archived from the original on May 17, 2019. Retrieved May 25, 2019.
- ↑ "Balatro Made with Love... Love2D That is". GameFromScratch.com. March 25, 2024. Retrieved 2026-07-14.
- ↑ Florent Zara (September 1, 2008). "Release of Löve 0.4.0, a free 2D game engine". LinuxFr. Archived from the original on April 2, 2023. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
- ↑ Christian Nutt (December 22, 2015). "New version of free LÖVE 2D game framework adds mobile support". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on December 25, 2015.
- ↑ "love.touch". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 5 August 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "love.joystick". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 14 October 2017. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "utf8". love2d.org. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "Image Formats". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 11 July 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "Audio Formats". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 11 July 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "love.video". love2d.org. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "love.physics". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 14 October 2017. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "socket". love2d.org. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "lua-enet". love2d.org. Archived from the original on 5 August 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- 1 2 3 4 "Love2d Engine SteamDB". steamdb.info. "SteamDB". Retrieved 2026-07-14.
- ↑ "Mari0 Source". github.com. Archived from the original on 24 March 2024. Retrieved 26 March 2024.
- ↑ "oh my giraffe · a delightful game of survival". www.ohmygiraffe.com. Archived from the original on 7 August 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "BLUE REVOLVER DOUBLE ACTION presskit". danboland.net. Archived from the original on 13 August 2025. Retrieved 11 December 2025.
- ↑ "Warlock's Tower on Steam". store.steampowered.com. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "Aeon of Sands - The Trail on Steam". store.steampowered.com. Archived from the original on 9 August 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "BYTEPATH on Steam". store.steampowered.com. Archived from the original on 11 July 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "BYTEPATH development tutorial". github.com. Retrieved 26 March 2024.
- ↑ "Metanet Hunter G4 by NIGHT KAWATA". itch.io. Archived from the original on 24 July 2023. Retrieved 7 August 2023.
- ↑ "Intravenous' IGDB bio". www.igdb.com. Retrieved August 21, 2024.
- ↑ "Gravity Circuit's IGDB bio". www.igdb.com. Archived from the original on August 22, 2024. Retrieved August 22, 2024.
- ↑ "Gravity Circuit". www.love2d.org. Archived from the original on 2024-12-11. Retrieved 2024-12-02.
- ↑ "Moonring". itch.io. Retrieved 12 January 2024.
- ↑ "Tiled". mapeditor.org.
- ↑ "Simple Tiled Implementation". github.com. 8 April 2022. Archived from the original on 11 June 2018. Retrieved 25 May 2019.
- ↑ "Anim8". love2d.org.
- ↑ "An animation library for LÖVE". github. 8 April 2022.
- ↑ "[LIKO-12 V0.0.5 PRE] An open-source pico-8-inspired game dev environment for love2d". love2d.org. September 18, 2016. Archived from the original on April 6, 2019. Retrieved May 25, 2019.
- ↑ "Lutro". github. 2 March 2022.
- ↑ RobLoach (December 26, 2017). "ChaiLove - Another Take on 2D Game Development". libretro.
- ↑ "love.js". github.com. Archived from the original on 2021-12-09. Retrieved 2021-12-09.
- ↑ "g3d". github.com. Archived from the original on 2023-01-12. Retrieved 2023-01-12.
- ↑ Colton Ogden. "CS50's Introduction to 2D Game Development". Harvard University, Division of Continuing Education. Retrieved 2026-07-14.
- ↑ Darmie Akinlaja (2013). LÖVE for Lua Game Programming. Packt Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78216-160-8.
External links
[edit]- Official website

- "LÖVE GitHub repository". on GitHub. 10 April 2022.
- "Chart of LÖVE engine games on itch.io. 2000+ titles, circa 2024". on itch.io. Retrieved August 21, 2024.