Is there an easy way to use 8 Direction behaviors with Mobile devices? For example, swiping left causing the 8 Direction to behave as if a left arrow were pressed.
I have found that the easiest and most intuitive way to do 8-direction on mobile is to just use a 3x3 grid of invisible buttons:
upleft / up / upright
left / stop / right
downleft / down / downright
Logic:
Is Touching Object (upleft) -> simulate 8-direction "up", simulate 8-direction "left"
Visuals:
-Make each of the buttons in the 3x3 grid invisible.
-Overlay a joystick background (a large colored circle will work) that is stationary and covers all 9 of the invisible buttons.
-Overlay a joystick (a smaller colored circle) that starts at the location of the background, and changes its location by about 10 pixels toward the direction of whatever button you are pressing.
I have had less luck with more complicated joysticks. Dragging/swiping controls have always seemed a bit finicky to me.