kittiewan's Forum Posts

  • Unfortunately, just because you shouldn't NEED to do something doesn't mean you won't! (I speak from unfortunate experience here!)

    I should have made it clear in my previous post that Cut and Paste will work to move items, including global variables, from one sheet to another. Copy and Paste is where the danger lurks.

    If you copy and paste, rather than cut and paste global variables, and then make the mistake of deleting the original globals, you'll essentially trash any events that used those original global variables.

    Many people tend to avoid Cut and Paste, considering it more dangerous than Copy and Paste followed by delete, but in this case the reverse is true.

    I've reported as a bug that you can delete global variables without any warning that the conditions, actions and expressions that reference it will also be deleted. EDIT: Ashley says this will be fixed in the next build.

  • When you delete an object type <objectname> from a project you receive the warning:

    Deleting this object type will remove all actions, conditions and expressions relating to it, as well as all of its instances. Are you sure you want to delete the object type "<objectname>"? Yes/No

    However, when you delete a global variable you receive no similar warning. All of the conditions and expressions related to it are deleted. You can undo if you notice in time, but if you don't you are hosed.

    Please consider displaying the same type of warning for global variables.

  • You can copy and paste between two existing event sheets but keep two things in mind:

    1) Minor, but there must be something in the target event sheet because you have to right click on that something in order to be able to access the paste option. EDIT: Sorry. My mistake. You can paste into an empty event sheet if you use the paste option on the tool bar.

    2) Much more serious, if you copy and paste global variables between two event sheets in the same project, the variables created in the target event sheet will be renamed (for example, globalvariable becomes globalvariable2. Here's the problem. If you then go back and delete the original variables, you'll delete all of the events and actions that reference those variables! This is a side effect of the work Construct 2 does to keep your game always runnable.

    To get around that you can save the game as a project, and then replace the event sheet (which are XML files) with the desired event sheet.

    It goes without saying that you should make a backup copy before you do this!

  • Thanks. I was still struggling to get something done by tonight. Good to know I have a few extra days. I was reluctant to try the new version with so little time to go, but now I can.

  • So thrilled you stopped by, Adam. Sounds like you've got a great lineup in store for us. I'm actually thinking about a game tutorial that could make good use of just the topics you list. I may have to coordinate my releases with yours...

  • Wow! I didn't know you stopped by here, Chris. I am a big fan on your art and tutorials. Can't wait to see what you come up with next.

  • I tried it in Chrome, Internet Explorer and Safari. The character is just black in Internet Explorer and Safari. I couldn't see his eyes, for example.

    I like the character (in Chrome) and the subtle environment.

    I don't have much patience, so for me the game got hard too fast. I got through the perfect jump level after many tries, but gave up in the next level when I kept impaling my head on the ceiling.

    You might want to make the levels easier at the start, but keep the player's interest with enemies, pickups or interesting things to explore.

    I hope that is helpful.

  • Try Construct 3

    Develop games in your browser. Powerful, performant & highly capable.

    Try Now Construct 3 users don't see these ads

  • Randomly generating an angle is okay if all you want is the answer, but if you want to show the wheel rotating, you could take an approach like this one. I randomly generate an angle (number of degrees, then rotate the wheel that number of degrees and check to see what wedge on the wheel the needle overlaps.

    I'm sure it could be made much better with lerps and things. It isn't 100% accurate, but it may help you.

    WheelOfMisfortune.capx

  • Thank you for looking into it. This game was really just for learning, so I am not worried too much about it. However, I do want to use the pathfinding for another project. It is easy and fun to use.

  • Okay. I guess I've been lurking long enough and ought to introduce myself. My name is Kim, and I live in the US. I'm old enough to have used punch cards (but just once) which may make me old enough to be your mother. Professionally I've been a developer, project manager, technical writer, QA manager, marketing director and jack-of-all-trades. I've worked in both commercial software development and pharmaceutical equipment manufacturing fields. I have too many interests to list, and am thus not really good at any of them. I've wanted to learn to develop games for a long time, and decided to finally just do it. Hopefully Construct 2 will provide the means to do so.

  • It depends a lot on what kind of game you are making, or rather, what kind of art you need.

    But regardless, don't get bogged down by the art. If your game is fun to play with "programmer art" (aka "placeholder art") you can then spend time on the graphics -- either doing it yourself, buying pre-made art, hiring someone to do it or getting volunteers who want to be involved with your project (which is a lot easier to do when you have a finished except for the art project.)

    If you spend a lot of time on graphics before you have a game that is fun to play, you may totally waste that time because you may discard the game. (Unfortunately, I learned this the hard way. Several times.)

    Okay, I've said my piece. Now here are some excellent resources for learning to make 2D game art.

    Chris Hildenbrand's 2D Game Art For Programmers Tutorials on Gamasutra

    AWESOME! Uses free tools and assumes you know how to do basic things, like make circles and gradients. Not step by step, but enough if you have any idea of how to use the tools. Concepts applicable to Illustrator/Photoshop too. Don't miss the link to part 2!

    Chris Hildenbrand's 2D Game Art For Programmer's Blogspot

    EVEN MORE AWESOME! Continues on where the original Gamasutra tutorials left off. In fact, if you go back to the earliest posts, you'll find the Gamasutra tutorials. Chris also has some assets for sale here--eg., his Block Buddy packs of animated characters. "Life is too short to make bad art."

    Creating 3D Sprites and Using Them In Construct 2

    Short tutorial by Construct 2 user Martin on using Google Sketchup to make buildings for game scenes. If you like this approach, there are tons of resources out there for how to use Sketchup.

    (Alternatively, you can use other 3D tools like Daz Studio and Bryce, which are currently available for FREE at daz3d.com to render 3D models into royalty free 2D game art. Lots of tutorials for using them, too. Lots of models for purchase at daz, renderosity.com, etc.)

    insertcode.co.uk 2D Game Art Tutorials

    This is a new blog (started at the end of January.) So far there are eight tutorials on using illustrator and photoshop to create game art.

    Igor Sinkovec's Walking and Running Animation Tutorials

    Short lesson on animation theory.

    That's all for now. As I remember or come across others, I'll post. Hope it helps!

    EDIT: As promised, I'm adding more tutorials as I find them. Just one to start, but there will be more, I promise.

    More Tutorials

    ==============

    Pixel Art Tutorials

    These are by Scirra community member Noise. So far there are 8 or so, but it looks like a great series on pixel art. I found the lessons on color, contrast and light very helpful.

  • These are some links I've saved off for music and sound resources. Other than incompetech.com, I have no personal experience with them, but they are a starting point. Comments are what they say about themselves [unless in brackets.]

    Has anyone else used any of these? Does anyone have any others?

    incompetech.com

    Royalty free music. [free with attribution; purchase if you don't want to attribute..]

    partnersinrhyme.com

    "Royalty Free Music and Sound Effects

    plus free music loops, free sound effects, free midi files and free audio software."

    soundsnap.com

    "140,000 sound effects and loops. Unlimited Downloads for $249/year! [Note: various plans, starting with 5 sounds for $9 up to unlimited for $249 a year.]

    Now featuring Premium Sound Effects from the sound designers of:

    Batman Begins, Million Dollar Baby, Ali, Happy Feet, Star Trek, The Addams Family, Tron, The Hunt for Red October and more."

    "You are Free:

    • To remix or transform the sounds in any way
    • To copy and transmit the sounds- but not resell them as they are originally downloaded from Soundsnap
    • To use the sounds in any music, film, video game, website etc. whether commercial or not, without paying addiotional royalties or other fees beyond the initial membership cost (if any)"

    musicloops.com

    Royalty free music loops and full length tracks for preview and immediate download. Full resolution stereo WAV files, no cue sheet, no hassles.

    soundloopstudio.com

    Our collection of background music loops is made especially for use with flash and websites. Royalty Free music loops are also suitable for games, PowerPoint, presentations, video, films, etc. All our music is 100% original, produced in our studio by professional musicians.

    soughtaftersounds.com

    Soughtafter Sounds provides professional music & sound design to independent game developers, as well as film makers, advertising teams and organisations looking to include an originally composed audio architecture within their development.

    [Free commercial music requires that you provide credit, let them use your project name in promoting their music or something like that...?]

    Audio Micro

    Music loops starting at $4 a track, Sound FX starting at $1 a track. Also free music and SFX.

  • Shucks. I was afraid the performance bottleneck was the pathfinding. I still really like the pathfinder plugin, but I guess it isn't right for this game.

    Thanks for the suggestions, Mercy. I have a version where the ghost switches to a random angle at the intersections. I'll try doctoring it up by implementing your ideas.

  • This plugin was very easy to get started with. I like it a lot--especially the example with the smooth and stepped movement.

    However, when trying to make a pacman clone, I ran into a few problems that are probably due to my ignorance. If I can get the game working reasonably well, I'd like to make an in depth C2 tutorial using it.

    pathfinderPMan.capx

    1) Cannot get the ghosts to start where I put them (in the "corral" in center of the board.) They keep starting at somewhere around 0,0.

    2) Performance was really slow. Is this because there are 4 ghosts using the pathfinding plugin? Or is it because my obstacles are all kinds of weird sizes? (see 3)

    3) I wasn't sure what you meant by saying that the obstacles had to follow the grid size we set. Do you mean the sprite dimensions have to be evenly divisible by that size, or do you mean they have to line up with the grid? Because mine don't. The pathfinding seems to work okay, but it does get slow. Is this why?

    4) I created my game by modifying your path following example, but there is something in it that causes the objects to quit following the path and go back to the first point in the queue when the iteration is > self.PathFinder.getPathListLength. When I tried to rip it out, the ghosts stopped moving. How can I make them stop where they are until they start the next pathfinding loop? Possibly related, is there a way to limit/unlimit the maximum number of steps allowed in the path?

    That's enough for now! Any help would be appreciated.

  • If it will help you, I have a "pacman" learning exercise that I'm putting on hold for now. It incorporates Kyatric's pathfinding behavior (which actually makes it simpler, rather than more difficult!) Anyway, if you want it, here it is:

    PathfinderPman.capx

    I took one of the pathfinder examples that shows how to move an object, gutted it and grafted on the pacman stuff. There are performance problems and lots of bugs. The worst is that the enemies just will not start out where they should! But it may help you getting things going.