Black Rabbit's Forum Posts

  • I am trying to set the main character idle animation to pick from several, so a breathing one, a looking around one and a twitchy one.

    What I have done is having the character while on the ground and when not moving to start the "idle", that works.

    Then I searched the forums and found a possible solution to randomize and I tried the fucntion on set the antimation "choose("a_idle","a_idle2","a_idle2"). At first it did not work and it just froze my character, then I set it it to "trigger once" it works, but it only chooses one of the three animations only after doing something else like running or jumping, so once the random has been chosen it keeps playing that animation on loop.

    Any ideas, I think the solution would be to re trigger the event over and over but I am not sure how.

    Cheers

  • It has more animations/functions than Alucard and Samus combined :D

    That includes rotating animations while running, events which allows the character to play an animation when it lands from a certain speed while doing a different animation from another speed. Difference in jumps depending if you are running or standing still, same with falling and so on.

    Also, key down and what not are useless when you give the player the freedom to remap every control. I have actually found a way to make this work with the keyboard no problem, now I only need to find a solution for the game pad which seems not to have a functionality to call a key press based on a number.

    Edit: Solved it with controller too, the only thing I have noticed is that both the analog sticks have key codes for +X and +Y but do not have key codes for the opposite directions (I am using a key call function to identify each button code), I wonder why.

  • Hello!

    So I am making a platformer and the complexity of it is pretty absurd right now, what I mean by it, the main character has about 20 animations, each with 20+ frames and whatnot. I am trying to do some stunning pixel art, and so far I am quite happy everything is a smooth as you'd expect in a professionally done game. I have achieved this with the use of 120+ events just for the main character, and I have done my best to keep the the events as clean as possible, with a few nasty exceptions I felt I had to do because I could not see any solution, but I feel that after having gone through all that (and learned new things on the way), I am confident I can make it ever simpler.

    I would like to start from scratch to see if I can make the events structure even smoother and avoid the massive headaches I encounter whenever a bug arises.

    First of all I want to ask if the use of variables for input controls is the best way of doing this, so I write a list of events which determines each control state (up:0, Up:1, Left:0 Left:1 and so on), then I map each individual keyboard or joypad button to those variable events, that way I can control the movement and character interaction events using only variables instead of "key pressing" functions. I am asking if this is the best way because I have noticed that variables sometimes seems to react a little slower than direct input controls, I remember finding an issue which was caused by a variable not switching fast enough, then when I I changed it to a direct keyboard control the issue was gone.

    I am also asking this because I am not sure how would I simulate "on press" with variables, I mean "is down" is pretty simple, the variable is either 0 or 1, but how do you register through variable "the moment they variable is switching to 1 from 0"?

    I think this is all, thanks in advance and sorry about the long wall of text!

  • I have managed to make the trail work with some of the suggestions here.

    There is an issue though, and that is the trail does not flip with the character, and if you set it to mirror the same as the main character, the whole trail flips every time the character turn.

    Any idea how to solve this?

  • >

    > The problem remains, when I I hold Right+Left, and release either, it starts moonwalking. I do not want that, but I do want it to keep the fluidity of movement when I switch from left to right on the fly (rather than having to stop then turn).

    >

    That's why I started using the keyboard setup I linked, for this can be easily avoided..

    Yes but then I get the problem that if the character is running left and I press right quickly while releasing left, it stops dead still and I have to click right again to make it move, making it feel very clunky and sluggish.

  • Nope it's not working, if I follow the exact same steps written here, literally nothing happens.

    I have tried to tweak them a little but what happens is that it flips the last frame of the Turning animation before going to idle.

    Update: I have done it in a slightly different way by making sure the the Turn animation sprites were flipped backward, then on key press setting the "mirrored" first then tell it to play the turning animation, that worked.

    The problem remains, when I I hold Right+Left, and release either, it starts moonwalking. I do not want that, but I do want it to keep the fluidity of movement when I switch from left to right on the fly (rather than having to stop then turn).

  • >

    > > I'd rather not use the is mirrored and set an instance variable for the direction the player is facing, but yeah, that sounds about right..

    > >

    > > The if not mirrored should be a sub-event so the else event would only react to the "if not mirrored" condition.

    > > Else doesn't need another condition attached, just right click and select add "else"

    > >

    >

    > I thought you could only do the flipped animation with mirror, are you saying there is another way of setting mirrored? (which is the only way I know how to tell if a sprite is facing left or right).

    >

    Flipping the animation is done with "set mirrored"

    That doesn't mean you can't have instance variables deciding over if the animation should be "set mirrored"

    I prefer using instance variables for this for it makes my events much easier to read..

    player.facing = "Left" VS. player is mirrored

    It's a personal thing, I guess..

    Ah fair enough, I though there was another way to detected the facing of the character.

    I am guessing you would set the variable "facing right" true when you mirror and false when you do not set mirror, so you can reference this true or false elsewhere. But is there a real advantage in creating an extra thing on top?

  • I'd rather not use the is mirrored and set an instance variable for the direction the player is facing, but yeah, that sounds about right..

    The if not mirrored should be a sub-event so the else event would only react to the "if not mirrored" condition.

    Else doesn't need another condition attached, just right click and select add "else"

    I thought you could only do the flipped animation with mirror, are you saying there is another way of setting mirrored? (which is the only way I know how to tell if a sprite is facing left or right).

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  • It's actually not that hard to implement..

    Something like:

    on pressed left

    -- player is facing right

    > play turning animation

    -- player is facing left

    > player simulate pressing left

    on turning animation finished

    --player is facing right

    > player set facing to left

    -- else

    > player set facing to right

    should be a good start..

    I like using this for registering keyboard input:

    Thanks I will try this once I get home, so let me get this right:

    Event:

    On key pressed right

    If not mirrorred > Set Animation Turn

    Sub Event:

    If Mirrored > Player simulates press Right

    Event:

    On Turning Animation Finished

    If not mirrorred > Player Is mirrored

    ELSE

    ????

    Did I get the whole thing right? (except the last part I am not sure how to turn that into event since ELSE usually needs first a condition to trigger an action.

  • I do not feel too confident sharing assets online, so can someone just tell me how can this be done without messing up the mirrored stuff or the idle/run animations?

    I have done it in several ways, but none of them really worked, when playing with a keyboard is so easy to press left/right and break the system by making it do something like moonwalking and things which would not be possible if using a joystick.

    Ideally I am trying to create something that I remember Symphony of the Night to have.

    You move right, then press left, your character does not stop but rotates in that direction then starts playing the run animation in the opposite direction. And if you press left and right quickly, the character will always stop playing first what's currently playing (without messing up the mirror).

  • >

    > Some friends also suggested Unity Playmaker, but with being a 3D camera I wonder if the pixels gets approximated/bled and if working in general on a pixel art based platformer is a lot more complicated than here.

    >

    If you're interested in node-based programming, try (as I suggested before) Unreal Engine 4 with blueprints (it's free). Only if it fits your needs and you prefer Unity, go buy Playmaker. But in my opinion it's a bit harder to use than C2.

    I really love how C2 handles the coding aspect, it is the closest thing as verbally telling to a program what you want to do, and I doubt there is anything easier (from an artist point of view).

    But I hear the node system of Unity is pretty easy too, especially with playmaker, but there is a rendering issue with pixels which can be corrected by buying another cheap $10 module called Pixel Perfect which rectify the rendering issues. The problem is that there is no free version of playmaker, so I would be committing to something I do not even know it will work.

  • Black Rabbit

    Mine expiriences are like this:

    working in C2 is awesome and support from community is excellent but publishing is total mess.

    C2 dont suply their own publishing solution but it relys on others, 3rd party services, wich means a whole lot of problems and non compatibility issues that you will encounter.

    BR

    Thanks, I have been a bit worried about stuff like that, because obviously I would never be able to solve those if they happen (unlike other issues which happens in-engine).

    Some friends also suggested Unity Playmaker, but with being a 3D camera I wonder if the pixels gets approximated/bled and if working in general on a pixel art based platformer is a lot more complicated than here.

  • This one seems quite a simple one to resolve but I have spent hours trying to make it work and failed, so maybe some of you can help.

    The main player in this game can move left to right (using the mirror), jump and all that.

    While on the ground I want the character to turn around before start moving in the opposite direction so what I did was using "on pressed Right, play the turn animation" then on another Event, I did "once the Turn animation is over, do mirror". This works if I keep pushing in the same direction so the guy turns and starts running, but if I just tap the key to the right, he will do the turn animation, then do the first frame of the turn animation before mirroring, can you tell me how do I solve this?

    Also I have noticed a strange behavior with a few things every now and then, but the most recent example is actually with the turning: If I am moving Left, then release, and press right immediately, the character does not turn as if there was some kind of lag that did not make him register I pressed down the key, but if I do not use the turn (so the character just flips immediately) this is not an issue. It almost feels as if press down key "left" is not working because I am doing it at the same time as "release key right" but I do not think it's that.

    Cheers

  • Cool, thanks, my main concern is hitting a wall with something I cannot implement because of lack of understanding.

    If anything at least I would be able to make a good demo to use as example.

    If anyone else has more to add, please do!

  • Hi everyone, I am a digital artist, been working on AAA games for almost 10 years now, but now I want to start doing my own things, and what better way than to make a super polished pixel art platformer inspired by the game that made me want to join a career in video games.

    The dilemma being that I have a very artistic brain and no matter how much you explain coding and scripting to me, I will never get it, so I decided to use a simple ready editor. I gave a shot at first with fusion 2.5, but I could not get very far, so a colleague suggested construct 2 and I am finding it a lot easier but I have reached the limit on what the free version can offer in terms of events and later numbers.

    Before I commit to a purchase i want to check your honest opinions on a few things.

    1. I noticed most of the stuff runs in web browser, likewise can only export to web, which worries me because it limits my future publishing options. Can project be easily exported as PC executables or compatible for hand held or consoles?

    2. If the engine code is written in Java, a language even I know as a non-coder to be horribly sluggish and full of issues, doesn't that mean any game I make will have serious performance issues? Especially because I love to do massive levels and lots of parallax, like 10+ layers or so.

    3. I am trying to create a metroidvania, so think of all the stuff a game like that needs, like save States, huge maps, rpg features and the likes, so can all this be achieved with c2?

    4. If you could suggest another engine for someone like me with my game needs, what should it be?

    Thanks a lot!