Recommended Tools
There are many apps, tools, extensions & services that work very well with Starling. Some of the following vendors are affiliated with us: they support Starling if you purchase their software or service via the links on this page. So if you're picking one of those, you're helping the Starling project at the same time!
What every Starling developer needs

Must-Haves

The Starling Handbook

This book provides you with a one-stop-shop that contains every bit of information a Starling developer needs. Whether you are a raw recruit or you have been around since the very first beta — the Starling Handbook has you covered! The author: Daniel Sperl, the creator of Starling.

Feathers

Starling can be used for more than games. Together with Feathers, Starling becomes a full-fledged solution for business applications! It provides light-weight, skinnable and extensible user interface components that will provide your users with a smooth and responsive experience. Perfect for game menus, too!

Starling Builder

Finally, a visual, WYSIWYG way to create your in-game user interfaces! Starling Builder was built especially for (and with!) Starling and Feathers; it allows simple export of layouts, to be instantianted as standard display objects right in Starling. Free & Open Source!

Citrus Engine

The Citrus Engine is a professional-grade, scalable ActionScript 3 game engine built for industry-quality games using modern programming practices. It offers a nice way to separate logic/physics from art including rendering choice, physics engine and many other options.

Uberspace

If you're looking for a place to host your game's website, Git repository or custom backend, look no further: Uberspace is simply the best hosting service for developers, period. You get full shell access to install your custom tools, and the support is amazing. Powering all of Gamua's websites!

Author stunning animations and display them in Starling

Flash Animation

Generic Animation Format

With the GAF Converter you can create complex animations in Flash Pro and convert them into an open format ready for immediate use with Starling. Sign up with this link to get 500 conversions for free!

DragonBones

The DragonBones plugin adds skeletal animation capabilities directly to Flash Pro, through a design panel that allows you to set up your characters with maximum flexibility. Those animations can then be played back in Starling extremely easily.

Spine

Spine is an animation tool that focuses specifically on 2D animation for games. It aims to have an efficient, streamlined workflow, both for creating animations and for making use of those animations in games. The Starling runtime for Spine allows you to play back those animations with great performance.

Flump

Flump converts Flash keyframe animations into texture atlases and XML or JSON that can be easily integrated into any scene graph-based 2D game engine. Starling and Sparrow are supported out of the box!

Create sprite sheets and bitmap fonts for maximum performance

Texture & Font Generation

TexturePacker

With TexturePacker, making spritesheets is easy and fast. TexturePacker supports many input data formats and exports to a lot of gaming frameworks. It has both GUI and commandline interface and lots of features to help you optimize your sprites to reduce memory usage and improve performance.

Glyph Designer

The ultimate bitmap font tool for OS X and Windows. Create beautiful designs using highly configurable effects, definable backgrounds, zooming & full-screen. Starling and Sparrow will load its font files natively!

ShoeBox

ShoeBox is a free Adobe AIR based app for Windows and OS X with game and ui related tools. Shoebox is extremely versatile: use it to create or extract texture atlases or for creating bitmap fonts. Each tool uses a drag & drop- or clipbord interaction for a quick workflow.

Add polishment to your game with dynamic special effects

Special effects

Sprite Illuminator

Add dynamic lighting effects to your 2D games! Sprite Illuminator allows you to easily create and edit normal maps with powerful tools; Starling can use this information to illuminate your objects in a photo-realistic way. The 'Dynamic Lighting' extension does the trick!

PhysicsEditor

PhysicsEditor is a GUI tool to create collision shapes within seconds! Without specifying any additional options PhysicsEditor already creates very good results, but you also have enough options available to adjust things to your needs.

Particle Designer

The Number one particle effects editor designed specifically for Mac. Choose from a massive user submitted library or design your own unique effects. Use Starlings Particle plugin to integrate those particle systems into your game in no time.

Monetize your apps for kids

Kid-Safe Monetization

KIDOZ

Monetize your apps for kids with KIDOZ COPPA compliant network. The kid-friendly content recommendation units maximize revenue while driving engagement.

Access native iOS, tvOS, Android, Android TV, macOS and Windows functionality directly from ActionScript

Distriqt - Adobe Native Extensions

Master Collection

An all inclusive license giving you access to all the current and future ANEs developed by distriqt. With many years of ANE development, our extensions are highly stable and polished, with detailed documentation.

Game Development Tools

This package is designed to give you a discounted way to get access to the most common extensions used for game development, including services such as game services, notifications, sharing and in-app billing.

Push Notifications

Powerful notifications! Multiple services! One API! Receive and process push notifications using Apple Push Notification Service (APNS), Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM), Azure Notification Hubs and OneSignal.

Notifications

Powerful local notifications! One API! Enable the use of Local Notifications on your device giving you the ability to easily engage your users on their device without having to setup remote notification servers.

Game Services

The Game Services extension allows developers to use a single cross-platform API to interface with many different gaming platforms, including Google Play Games and Game Center.

Adverts

This extension allows you to monetise your application by displaying AdMob advertisements, including banners and interstitials.

Application

This ANE is your device and application toolkit. Access orientation, display modes, unique id, preference saving, status bar, keychain, settings bundle and much more. Essential utilities for any mobile application.

Google Analytics

Understand how your application is being used! This extension enables the use of Google Analytics in your application to measure user activity.

Application Rater

This extension allows you to ask the user for feedback on your application by displaying a native dialog and asking them to rate your application in the appropriate store or via the review controller on iOS 10.3+.

InAppBilling

Monetise your app with simple in-app purchases! This extension provides ability to access the Google Play Store, iOS AppStore + more. Identical code base can be used across all supported platforms.

Firebase

Access Google's Firebase service from your AIR application, including Analytics, Authentication, Storage, Database, Remote Config, Dynamic Links, Invites + we are constantly adding to this ever improving platform.

FacebookAPI

Direct integration with the native Facebook SDKs for iOS and Android, to provide login and sharing functionality. Includes access to deep linking, share dialogs, requests, account kit, graph api, and open graph stories.

Share

Enable the share to menu to send files to other applications. One simple line to display the built-in native share dialogs allowing your user to share files and content with other applications.

Camera

Create advanced Camera applications with low level access to the camera, including image capture abilities. Allows camera control on iOS and Android including: flash, exposure, white balance, focus, and others.

Dialog

The Dialog extension allows developers to display and interact with native alerts, dialogs and messages on both Android and iOS. Includes dialogs such as alerts, pickers, progress, activity and date / time pickers.

Media Player

Media Player extension allows developers to display a native video player or utilise native audio playback in AIR. It also allows interaction with system media controls and notifications.

Native WebView

Fast and advanced WebView! Designed to be a replacement version of the StageWebView, but much more useful with a WebKit implementation allowing seamless rendering of modern html content in your AIR application.

Device Motion

Provides accurate and highly responsive device orientation information in 3D space using native fusion algorithms giving you the building blocks to create VR and AR experiences in AIR.

BluetoothLE

Bluetooth LE with Adobe AIR! Enables the use of Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) or Bluetooth 4.0 to communicate with peripherals and devices from your mobile device.

Beacon

Provide advanced beacon interactions! This allows you to scan for, range to and read the details of iBeacons on both Android and iOS to create interactions with the physical environment.

Access native iOS or Android SDK methods directly from ActionScript

MyFlashLabs - Adobe Native Extensions

Club Membership

Join the MyFlashLabs Club and gain instant access to ALL our current and future ANEs & AS3 Libraries!

AdMob

Earn more from your AIR apps the smart way.

App Badge

Control the app badge right inside your AIR app for iOS.

Augmented Reality

Bring Augmented Reality into your Adobe AIR projects. Provides you with a full variety of AR solutions for different types of projects in any scale.

Barcode Reader

Use the native camera to scan for almost all types of barcodes in your Adobe AIR app.

Facebook

Access all of the official Facebook SDK for Android & iOS!

File Picker

Pick Image / Video files on device right from your AIR app on Android & iOS devices. In addition you can pick ANY file on the Android side.

Firebase

Firebase is a project by Google which helps you develop high-quality apps, grow your user base, and earn more money. Now it's available in Adobe AIR!

Game Services

100% Identical AS3 API with a super easy interface so you can focus on your game logic and easily have access to all the cool features of the Google Game Services on both Android & iOS! Leaderboards, Achievements, Saved games, Multiplayers, Game quests & events, etc...

GCM

Bring Push Notifications supported on Android & iOS with an identical AS3 API.

GPS

Smart GPS solution for Adobe AIR which automatically picks the best available provider for fast location finding. Satellite, Cellular tower, Network.

In-App-Payments

100% Identical AS3 API In-App-Payments Native Extension for both Android & iOS with unique features!

Local Notification

Send local notifications to your users without having to setup a remote notification server.

Package Manager

The first AIR native extension that lets you access details of the other installed apps on device.

PDF Reader

Open PDF files easily right from your AIR app supported on both Android & iOS!

Permission Check

Check and request different permissions such as Microphone, Photos, Contacts, Calendar, and more...

Rate Me

Smart Rate Me ANE knows when is the best time to ask users to rate your app!

Rich Webview

It's a perfect replacement to the classic StageWebView which has covered all its shortcomings and added many more native features plus full communication between AS3 and JS!

Spotlight

Make your AIR app appear in iOS local search results which is known as Spotlight.

Statusbar Manager

Full control over the iOS status bar in your AIR apps!

Surface Video Player

Put video content on your AS3 layout with native performance and full control!

Unique Device ID

Provides you with solutions to identify your AIR app users based on their devices.

Video Player

Play video files using the native player in your AIR apps and Starling projects supported on Android & iOS.

Virtual Reality

Experience viewing 360 degree photos in Google cardboard devices for your AIR app!

Volume Manager Pro

Control volume in your AIR apps and games like a pro! Change volume stream and listen to hardware keys on Android & iOS!

Zip Manager

Zip / Extract the largest zip archives super fast by using native process in threads supporting both Android & iOS without making any lag on your AIR app.