So, in the project I'm currently working on, the latter stages are snow levels.
Trying out different methods of simulating falling snowflakes, I found the particle system was ideal - I can set snowflake sprites as the different particles, set the rate and angle just right to give the feeling of falling snow, and set the particles to be destroyed once they're out of sight.
Once the game is running and the snowflakes are falling, they look perfect. The only problem is that once the layout starts running, you have to wait 5-10 seconds for the snow to appear, as the particle creator only starts sending out particles once the layout itself has started running.
Is there any way to set the particle simulation so that the layout begins with a number of particles having already been precalculated and loaded. So essentially, rather than beginning the layout and the number of particles being 0, beginning the layout and the number of particles being 40 and already on screen?
Any thoughts on this would be grand, as I'm a bit flummoxed.