objective c - What is a better way to create a game loop on the iPhone other than using NSTimer?

Question

I am programming a game on the iPhone. I am currently using NSTimer to trigger my game update/render. The problem with this is that (after profiling) I appear to lose a lot of time between updates/renders and this seems to be mostly to do with the time interval that I plug into NSTimer.

So my question is what is the best alternative to using NSTimer?

One alternative per answer please.

Answer 1

You can get a better performance with threads, try something like this:

- (void) gameLoop
{
    while (running)
    {
        NSAutoreleasePool *pool = [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init];
        [self renderFrame];
        [pool release];
    }
}

- (void) startLoop
{
    running = YES;
#ifdef THREADED_ANIMATION
    [NSThread detachNewThreadSelector:@selector(gameLoop)
    toTarget:self withObject:nil];
#else
    timer = [NSTimer scheduledTimerWithTimeInterval:1.0f/60
    target:self selector:@selector(renderFrame) userInfo:nil repeats:YES];
#endif
}

- (void) stopLoop
{
    [timer invalidate];
    running = NO;
}

In the renderFrame method You prepare the framebuffer, draw frame and present the framebuffer on screen. (P.S. There is a great article on various types of game loops and their pros and cons.)