thomasmahler's Forum Posts

  • That looks cool already!

    So, about the behavior thingy - I only see 2 ways of how people could use the interface. With a controller / keyboard, so that the controls are sorta like in every Zelda title or through the mouse, so it's probably a bit Diablo'ish. So, it'd have to be linked to the input system. Like newt already said, it'd make sense to have it in there as an object and as a behavior at once.

    One idea is that we could set it to 'Grid' (typical keyboard / controller way like Zelda), 'Mouse' (like Diablo) or 'Combined' (so that both works and so that we can set up the controls accordingly).

    I think it'd be the smartest thing to probably directly set up the appropriate settings the moment you use the inventory object in your scene. So, say for a Zelda-like inventory, if I pop up my inventory, I'd immediately expect that I could move along the grid using the same inputs that I'd use for moving my player around, right? So, Move Up / Down / Left / Right should directly be used without us having to setup control schemes. Otherwise, we'd have to create a whole Inventory Event Sheet with inputs like these:

    if player presses 'Move up" - Inventory: Move up

    If player presses 'Move right" - Inventroy: Move right

    etc

    Which still could be nice for whatever as an option. So we could override the defaults, but I think 90% of the users would settle for a Zelda or Diablo like Control Scheme. If I look at all the Inventory systems out there, they're all either like Zelda / Final Fantasy / Diablo, really.

    Also, if we pop up the inventory, as long as the inventory is active, it'd probably be smart to give the user the option to freeze any inputs on other layouts. Imagine a Zelda game where you're running around on a cliff and quickly need to switch to an item, you pop up the inventory, press 'Move Right' 3 times and boom, you fall down the cliff, but at least you're at the right item spot in your inventory. So, if Inventory is active: Ignore all user input on all other layouts.

    Same thing with the mouse. You'd want to have stuff in there like: If mouse hovers over an item spot, do whatever. Like, change the backdrop, add an effect to the item spot or something, so that you'd always get an input what you're currently hovering over. And the option for: if inventory is active: Ignore Mouse input on all other layouts.

    Then we'd still have to setup how we'd control the inventory, cause that'd probably be a little different for everybody:

    If player presses 'Tab' - Inventory: Show Inventory

    If inventory is active + If player presses 'Tab' - Inventory: Hide Inventory

    • easy.

    And now it's about interacting with the inventory:

    If player presses 'Action' + Inventory is active - Inventory: Use item

    For keyboard only. Or:

    If player presses 'Action' OR if player right clicks + Inventory is active - Inventory: Use item.

    For 'Combined'.

    Then we'd still have to find out what kinda options we'd need.

    Use Item? Drop Item? Equip Item? etc.

    Now that I'm thinking about it, it'd also make a LOT of sense to have a 'Menu' Object too, right?

  • The dialogue stuff from the previous page is still biting me in the ass, but I had another cool idea.

    27) Wouldn't it be cool if we could have a custom 'Character Sheet'? Whereas a 'Character' could be anything. It'd just be a container where a Character and all it's attributes and everything that has to do with it is listed and linked to the 'real' settings, so as an example:

    Say we have an RPG with a Party - I could throw all the party members into a Custom Character Sheet and would directly see and be able to edit all their attributes, variables, access their animation sheets, etc. etc.

    Right now, characters really aren't more than sprites with animations. And to make changes, we sometimes have to hunt down longer lists of data and so on - it'd be nice to have one simple place where the characters and all that has to do with them is stored and can directly be access in one simple, nice, streamlined place.

  • Just lemme clear this up, it makes sense now.

    I thought if I set an object to global that it'll be loaded in globally whenever we start the runtime.

    So I have a couple of layouts and created a new title screen, where I can let people set options, like full-screen, moBlur, save / load, etc.

    I put that title screen on top of the level 1 layout. So the KeyboardMouse object was still on level 1, I just thought because it's set to global it'll be loaded anyway.

    It didn't. Now I've cut and pasted the audio and keyboard events to the title screen layout and - boom - it works.

    Not sure if that's the perfect way though. Wouldn't it make more sense to load the objects that are set to global to load them in any layout?

  • [quote:1equw4lc]It's been reintroduce to keep you on your toes. Just put it on the tracker.

    Way ahead of ya

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  • There still seems to be a bug in there that keeps me from swapping out placeholders with the real sprites.

    I have a character placeholder in there (just a sprite-box) and there's an event coupled with it (Character / Dialogue) - If I then go ahead and double click the box to change the sprite, load up another one and exit the sprite editor to save my changes, I get an instant crash, reproducable every time.

    Thought these bugs were gone by now.

  • I just ran a quick test, creating a M&K object in layout 1, marking it global, and making several new layouts and extra event sheets, and it shows up in all of them. So I don't know what's going on.

    Bug report?

    What version are you running?

    If I create a new direct x game, create a M&K object in layout 1 and set it to global and create a new layout, the M&K still will only show up in layout 1 and not in layout 2.

    I'll put it into the bug tracker.

  • Just a quick question cause I don't know if it's a bug.

    If I set an object to 'global', like my mouse / keyboard object, then I should automatically see them whenever I create a new event, right?

    I just created a new 'Title Screen' Layout and don't have any of the global objects in the new layout. If I copy and paste the object from another layout, it won't work either.

  • Hey guys,

    Thought a thread like this would make sense to showcase solutions for problems that most likely all Construct users will go through at one point or another.

    1.) Pause Function:

    Let's start with something simple, a 'Pause' function for the game, which - if the 'Pause' variable is at 1 will freeze the game, show a 'Pause' image and pause the music. If it's at 0, it'll unfreeze the game, hide the 'Pause' image and resume the music. Pretty simple:

    <img src="http://thomasmahler.com/files/construct/images/PE%20-%20Pause_01.jpg">

    Then, in your controls event sheet, you'd simply set up an event that'd drive the 'Pause' global variable like this:

    <img src="http://thomasmahler.com/files/construct/images/PE%20-%20Pause_02.jpg">

    Et voila.

  • 26) Could we also get an update for the progress bar? So that we could set our own graphics for it?

    Say, we wanna have an experience bar or a health bar for enemies. Typically, you'd have a left side of the bar and a right side of the bar - and then you'd have a graphic that'd scale from 0% to 100% or vice versa based on values that are based on what the player does. Could be as simple as a 1px black line that scales form 0% of the bar to 100% based on the exp the player collects.

    Right now, I can't even change the color of the inside bar. That'd be a cool thing to have.

  • Thanks for the advice guys. I haven't yet found the perfect way for starting, advancing (like, making it faster by pressing a button) and ending dialogue, but I'll write up the solution once I got it.

    25) What I'm thinking right now, reading the other thread about the text object...

    Wouldn't it be cool if we'd have a couple more options in it? Like, imagine your typical adventure game. Right now, I invoke dialogue like everyone else I guess.

    If character overlaps another character and keys is pressed - make text fields visible, write text: "Blabla" at 1 letter per 30ms

    Now, firstly:

    what if my character has multiple dialog boxes?

    Wouldn't it be a lot better if we'd extend the parameters dialog box for the write text action so that we could:

    a) have bigger dialogues - right now, it's sorta constrained to 2 lines, which is a bit limiting, so the dialogue field should adjust to the text I put into them.

    b) have an option to add multiple text fields into one 'write text' action - same thing as with the timeline. So we could have a simple event with a single 'write text' action and the character could still tell me a whole story, spanning multiple dialog boxes?

    c) Couldn't we somehow add a 'is finished?' option to the Text Object? Also, it'd be cool if we could have an option so that we could automatically change the '1 letter per XX ms' option. So we could set it globally: If global variable 'Dialogue' is 1 and action button is pressed: Set Write Speed to 90ms (default would be 30). Then we could add a: If text is finished and action button is pressed - either go to next dialogue box or if there isn't one, finish dialogue.

    I know I haven't completely thought it through at the moment, but maybe it'll still help. Try to follow me here, my way of setting a dialogue up would be like that:

    a) Character overlaps another character.

    b) Character presses the action button to start the dialogue. The dialogue consists of two dialogue boxes.

    b.2) Character can press the action button again to speed up the write speed.

    c) Dialogue 1 is finished - Character presses the action button to start the next dialogue box.

    d) Dialogue 2 is finished - Character pressed the action button to complete dialogue.

    So if we could set this directly in the WriteText action, it'd be awesome. We could set a characters dialogue with multiple dialogue boxes and add a: "At the completion of the previous Dialogue Box, send a 'is finished' call." at the bottom, so we could set a: If Write Text is finished and player presses the action button, set global variable dialogue to 0.

    And with the global variable 'Dialogue' we could set it to display Text Boxes if it's set to 1 and kill them if it's set to 0.

    I'm a bit tired right now and I know that I haven't thought it through completely, but I hope that made sense. It's a bit of a pain right now to organize dialogues and it'd be cool if that could be simplified and streamlined. Dialogue is freaking important for a lot of genres.

  • I think this is one of the best Construct Creations I've seen so far. It's real fun. Could need a little more gameplay though, maybe extras or other things you can shoot or build up in order to get through a level. Maybe you could add an option where there'd be a limit of boxes you could use in a level to get through it - right now you can simply blast away boxes and getting throgh the level is a safe bet that way. It's no challenge.

    Also, the drawings are sometimes really off - like, in the first cutscene, when you suddenly see the guys eye - that looked really weird.

    Other than that, this is really cool.

    Maybe we should create a thread where all the finished Construct Games are listed and sorted / updated dynamically?

  • 12) Here's a video explaining my problem:

    http://www.thomasmahler.com/files/const ... veling.avi

    I used the Wonderboy Test thingy for it.

    I'm pretty sure this is a simple hotspot / spacing issue, but I can't seem to figure it out - what's the problem here? I set the hotspot to be centered in the import frames dialog box and tried to lign it up in the sprite editor - but no avail. If my character attacks, he automatically travels back a few pixels all the time.

  • Man, Construct has already improved so much during the short time I've been using it, it's really getting better and better.

    Hope you guys settle the misscommunication issues and the power-play shit - for a project like this to work you guys have to work together as a team and believe in the product. Construct is already pretty doggone powerful and I'm sure with the community you have here it could quickly become the most powerful (if it isn't already) 2d game-creator engine out there.

    Keep pushing, guys, I'm pretty confident that we'll see some very cool results in the upcoming weeks / months.

  • I love the concept of it. I'm currently working with couple of buddies on a mod that's a mix between horde and desktop tower defense and class based teamplay.

    I think the problem is that they just put it in as an extra, saw how good of an idea it was, but didn't have the time to really push it further. You have the 10 waves in all the multiplayer maps, but it grows old pretty soon'ish. Every player in the team is just doing the same, killing enemies. You can help one another, but there's not lot of variety in the end. The enemies are also not that different from one another, they're just the same enemies that you know from the single player game, so a little variety would've been neat.

    And from a level design point of view, you'd have to design the maps so that the floods can really take away your space if you let them swarm out - say you have different sections and they can 'flood' a section so that you can't get your ammo there anymore, etc., they'd really have to be designed with Horde in mind.

    But that's what Gears 3 is for. Epic is really good at taking a simple concept and fine-tuning it while packing it full of extreme details and graphic extravaganza.

    All in all, Horde was probably the best new addition in Gears 2, but it could've been pushed much further, I think.

  • 24) For the platform behavior, wouldn't it be cool if we'd have the option to freeze the players position temporarily? So for cutscenes, we'd not have to use a couple of actions, but just this one. It'd freeze the players position to where he's currently standing and once the cutscene is over, we'd use an 'unfreeze players position' action.

    Simple.

    Would also be useful for dialogs, etc.