When comparing Phaser.io vs Codea, the Slant community recommends Phaser.io for most people. In the question“What are the best 2D game engines?” Phaser.io is ranked 10th while Codea is ranked 100th. The most important reason people chose Phaser.io is:
There are plenty of great learning resources available for Phaser.io.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Good tutorials, courses and books
There are plenty of great learning resources available for Phaser.io.
Pro Super-simple loading of assets
Pro Excellent tools for sprites
Pro Very fast to develop with
If you're browsing Slant, you probably already have a JavaScript enabled browser, which is most of what you need to get started learning JavaScript. The requirement to run a server locally on your computer while developing might make things a little more difficult
Pro Animating is easy
Pro Support for Arcade Physics, Ninja Physics and p2.js
Pro Great community resources
Pro Easy to learn
Pro Built-in Arcade Particle system
Pro WebGL and Canvas rendering modes
You can choose WebGL or classic HTML canvas element for game rendering.
Pro Very active development
This is one of the most developed frameworks right now.
Pro No install required
All you need to do is attach Phaser script to a HTML page even without installing any extensions.
Pro Easy to understand if you have used flash
Phaser provides a similar approach as to that of Flash games, where you can load assets and place them on a stage, and even improves upon the shortcomings of actionscript. It is very easy to shift from flash to HTML5 development because of this approach.
Pro Has separate versions maintained by developer and the community
The creator of phaser(photonstorm) has given the older(Phaser 2.0) source code to the community for their own maintenance, and has made Phaser 3.0 with a different style and approach, trying to make it easier for beginners to learn.
Pro Helpful code editor
Errors show up live, as you type. Smarter autocompletion picks up your local and global variables, including nested types. Everything else is just plain smarter, from indentation to highlighting.
Pro Ships with music and sound packs
Codea ships with three great music and sound packs, composed just for Codea and free for you to use in whatever you create.
Pro You can code on an iPad and easily distribute the game
Pro Location library
Location library lets you make use of the GPS inside your iPad. Get your latitude, longitude, altitude and more with a dead-simple API designed specifically for Codea.
Cons
Con Poor performance
As long as your map is not larger than 600*400px, everything is fine.
Con Developer ignores community needs