AmpedRobot's Recent Forum Activity

    This wasn't meant to be a troll thread even though a discussion of this type typically invites trolls, either through lack of experience or dummy Ashley accounts.

    Look, C2 is great prototyping software, but it has a HUGE way to go in terms of user friendliness and founder attitude.

    Anybody who has used C2 for a few years or has tried to make anything but the simplest of games will inevitably know this and run into these issues.

    I'm just very upset a lot of these things weren't widely advertised up front.

    C2 has HUGE limitations in terms of being a final product.

    And as far as there being successful games using C2, I HIGHLY doubt that.

    Millions of free downloads means nothing in terms of ad revenue and click farms.

    Just Google C2 "sound not working" as an example and see what pops up.

    I could list a ton of other unresolved issues that would make everybody scratch their heads as to why they even bothered with this software to begin with.

    But ask anybody. C is the way to go for video games because it's as close as it gets to machine language in terms of stability.

    You try to make even more than 4 layouts in C2, the 4th layout will glitch, frequently, doesn't matter how many times you recode it from scratch using different functions names, etc.

    This guy is extremely blaze because he's never truly done a complex game (except for the silly examples) and he wants to brush all the issues under the carpet or wants to prey on inexperienced dreamers or most likely both.

    Google "Construct 2 is a scam", you will find a lot of useful information, a lot of which I agree with because it;s just true.

    People, if indeed these are real people, who "jump" to C2's rescue typically do not have enough experience with using all of its so called features.

    You can't even have more than 1 music track. Where is that advertised?

    You can't use expansion files for Google Play and the packaging/load with the browser wrapper eats up most of the 100 megs allowed. Where is that advertised?

    There are vritually NO CODE examples for the really useful stuff like Xbox exporting which the company would dare stand by and virtually no code examples for anything else. "Oh, yeah. The founder is too busy. You guys just do it on your own. Huh!"

    You can't make an Xbox game because the Xbox login does not work. There is a Javascript equivalent but the founder in his wisdom can't make it work and the additions should properly be done in C.

    In my opinion (and many others), the founder is very dishonest which is why there is a huge lashback against this "product" now.

    Well, yeah, that's what I said, this is basically restating my statement.

    My point is, not every game starts as a platformer, so you position your sprites facing up.

    It would be nice to be able to set the sprite up w/ 1 click, so you DON'T have any rude awakenings in later programming, if you've done a zillion animations for each sprite before going to step 2.

    And lerp is what lerp is, I was commenting on ease of use and lack of documentation. This program purports to be easy to use and unless someone gets really brainy, they will not discover these things and they WILL have shitty code.

    This is a very blaze attitude on the part of the founder. No coding experience needed? Ha! If he really wanted to make this user friendly, something would be written up on this decimal nonsense or it would be automatically taken care of, with a more advanced option for other users. Otherwise, why would someone with no coding experience even bother to test this w/ text boxes? They'd just program this away and then wonder: "Gee, C2 is friggin slow. I wonder why."

    It's not a feeling about C. It's a fact. Check out my Xbox Live Publishing thread and a zillion other threads on similar issues. Somehow the words "Prototyping Software - Not Meant To be A Final Product for Anything, But the Simplest of Browser Games" seem to have gotten lost.

    And if you start making exporters, you are really implying C2 can be a final product for a lot of things, which is a blatant falsehood considering how unstable it is and how many bugs it has, many of which the founder in his blaze attitude refuses to investigate. I wonder how much of a user base C2 still has judging the activity on the forums (next to none, not counting the fake downloads, etc.)

    Sure design your software in whatever, but make sure it compiles properly to some type of C for the end game (and not "interpret to C" which the founder himself has admitted only sporadically worked in Construct Classic.)

    I'm running into ridiculous issues while using this software, but I just accepted them for now because I got so much time invested into learning this product.

    Is there a way to change official sprite angle (the little arrow on the sprite) to 270 degrees without having to flip the sprite in the animation so one object rotates properly to another?

    No idea why the default is not 270 degrees and it makes me and probably a lot of newbes go through all this nonsense.

    If there isn't, now I have to adjust like 6 different sprite animations because they won't properly rotate towards an object. How is that for ease of use?

    Also, if you are a nebe and haven't tested this, everything that uses lerp for movement or angle rotation goes through a ridiculous number of decimals even when the sprite has ostensibly stopped, so you need test in between conditions to shortcircuit that or you wind up with sloppy ridiculously and needlessly slow code. How is that for ease of use?

    In my opinion this product is written remarkably sloppy without almost any regard for the end user or his troubles.

    And P.S. All video game software should be written in C, C#, or C++. Everything else is garbage and will always run into a ton of trouble.

    Stuck with it for now!

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  • Shame, Scirra won't comment on this at all.

    What have we gotten ourselves into?

    I say again, what reputable company out there DOES NOT post code examples that are supposed to work?

    And expects someone else to do it via some tutorial or whatever.

    Every reputable company on the planet posts code examples, including Google.

  • Oh, hi there.

    I gave up on this!

    What can I say.

    Been bored, so I revisited this thread.

    I'll take a look.

    Thanks very much for posting.

    Is the exact C2 code you used in any of those links?

    It'll be hard for me to get an actual Xbox One at the moment. Drained myself to the bone believe it or not and I am currently living in limbo (even though my resume technically qualifies me for $150,000/year jobs), so might be a while before I can even try this, but I'll read it.

    As it is, the 2D game could probably use another year of full time work to make it truly what I envisaged, at least for starters, even though it is a fully functional game now.

    Every kid/adult out there expects an $80m production and there's just no market for 2D retro games.

    Lumberyard is the way to go from Amazon (I have all the skills to make it happen, if not the time/money for 1 year of full time work estimated to make the first 3D multiplayer map).

    Anyone wanna team up?

    And then there's the issue of getting the word out without $6k for a booth at PAX, but if I return to my regular profession, maybe not such a big issue (assuming I stick around).

    I've had a breakthrough also, actually designed a 3rd race for the universe (besides the tigers and the eagles), which is unbelievably cool and I never thought I'd be able to do it, so I have like 10 specialties of those guys worked out with weapons.

    If I get this to work (your solution above), might lower the price on Xbox to $0.99.

  • Ashley

    Tom

    After switching back to the retail sandbox, the sign in does work with a test account, but when you click the "let's play" feature from the Microsoft pop-up box, it goes back to "can't sign in" and the same error code.

    Also, the gamertag is NOT displayed in the test capx, even after a successful sign in via the Microsoft pop-up and this is what Microsoft requires.

    And to advance, you seem to have to click the "let's play" button in there.

    What is going on here and when are we going to get some help with this from the creators of the software?

    This should work in the simulator via PC right? I mean there's no way to test on an actual Xbox without publishing first? Not without a development kit? And you obviously don't get one via the Creators Program.

  • studio Mercato

    Studio, do you have a sample sign in capx without obviously the Creators or higher Program info?

    I'm guessing you must have gone through this too with the Microsoft audits.

    Not sure what I'm doing wrong.

    What's supposed to happen when you activate the C2 sign in feature? Is a login box supposed to pop up for putting in the Xbox Live profile sign in info?

    It doesn't with me. It immediately tries an auto sign in? But no idea with what login and password and then states "can't sign in" and there's a "use a different account login" link on bottom.

    Is the sign in supposed to work with test accounts only or non-test accounts?

    I authorized my main publishing account as a test account and added another one.

    But I just noticed from that link you sent, "Test accounts can only sign in to development sandboxes."

    So maybe the sign in feature is supposed to work only with non-test accounts?

    Haven't tested this yet.

    But I'm guessing I might have made a simple mistake somewhere in there in the process, which is why this isn't working.

    Again, this is why step-by-step tutorials are so helpful.

    Also, I was a bit hasty on the Xbox traffic. So far it's been about 800 people, which is still pretty pitiful supposedly considering a 50m audience out there (unless everyone is playing PS4 right now). It was highest on December 23, if anyone is interested, about 112 people.

    Also, Studio, how do I do an at you? You have a space in your name and an never formats properly in the post, plus there seem to be 2 similar lookalike profiles for you out there, one even using the same avatar, but with no space in the name.

    Also, am I supposed to switch my PC to the retail sandbox when testing the sign in feature?

    --

    This is the error code I'm getting, even after switching to the retail sandbox (like a typical user out there?) when trying to sign in with no associated Microsoft articles on it.

    "Sorry! No Support articles were found for "0x80860003"

  • Thank you, Studio.

    That's very helpful.

    And yes, you are absolutely right.

    The interest among the Xbox audience for the Creators' Collection is absolutely dismal.

    What was supposed to be the busiest play Saturday before Christmas generated only 81 page views for my listing.

    The perception must be that these are mostly unfinished "garbage" games, so apparently we are in the garbage pile again.

    In retrospect, it seems obvious, but hindsight is always 20/20.

    So, I did everything right, but still lost.

    1) They tell you the indie game scene is exploding, so you decide to make a game.

    2) They tell you, make a simple 2D game for starters because 3D games are too hard, so you'll never get anywhere. And I did exactly that.

    3) My thinking was that people are always hungry for new games, but that is not the case. People are mostly playing what's "in" right now. And what is in? Star Wars Battlefront. And even super big budget titles with millions in advertising are having trouble competing with that.

    4) Maybe I could push my game on Google Play someday, but I don't have money for AdWords and Google will not give you any visibility. Everybody has to pay for advertising space.

    So? People like you and me are stuck in the water.

    And if you give away the game for free, yeah you might get millions of downloads, but you will not make any money, not significant money, not with adds anyway, and you are severely limited by the 100mb cap with Google Play as there is no way to integrate expansion files with C2 currently. So?

    There we are.

    And then there are the technical issues.

    Thank you for the link, but I alrwady followed that to the T.

    My first 2 submissions to Microsoft went through fine, and, as you said, apparently, that submission is still listed.

    I also figured out why the keyboard controls were slow in simulator: 3 exclusive, but simultaneous control systems, which work fine in the browser, but fail for PC after Xbox translation.

    So for my third submission, I expanded game availability to PC, but only with an Xbox One or an Xbox 360 controller because the game would just be too easy, not as much fun with keyboard controls and then Microsoft started requiring Xbox live authentication and they won't let this submission go through otherwise (I think they were just being kind before to see if the game would sell over Christmas).

    And this is the link they just e-mailed me that I have to follow, which is exactly the link I found and the C++ code I posted before.

    "Hello,

    Thank you for contacting us. For additional assistance with this issue, please refer to the following link: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/window ... p-projects

    If you need any additional assistance with Xbox features, please contact Developer Support via your Dev Center or here: http://aka.ms/storesupport.

    Thank you,

    Sarah

    Microsoft Store Team"

    So, the C2 Xbox exporter is now broken.

    So, we now need to integrate C++ authentication code into projects unless our creators from on high come up with an equivalent.

    And the "sign in" feature with C2 is broken.

    I can't even change 2 screenshots because Microsoft won't let it through.

  • Found this in Xbox live docs:

    "Test accounts have some other benefits also. They can sign into your Development Sandbox, whereas a regular MSA cannot due to security restrictions." So apparently you have to do this with a test account.

    I was misled by this Scirra tutorial:

    https://www.scirra.com/tutorials/9540/u ... n-uwp-apps

    "(Your real account may also work in the Creators Program..."

    But...

    Can't log in with the test account either.

    And the Sign In Xbox Live feature is really buggy. Often you have to press a key twice (if you have it hooked up to a key) for the login window to come up and it immediately goes to can't sign in.

    Also, how would I associate my game with my gamertag/Xbox Live display name/account? Something required by Microsoft.

    Can't even find my game under search even though it has been officially published and it has been more than 3 business days.

    This is really disappointing on the back end of so much work and still no help from Scirra or anybody else.

    There is this code for signing in silently supposedly:

    Windows::Foundation::IAsyncOperation<SignInResult^>^ XboxLiveUser::SignInSilentlyAsync(Platform::Object^ coreDispatcher)

    And this one for creating the XboxLiveUser object:

    XboxLiveUser user = ref new XboxLiveUser(Windows::System::User^ windowsSystemUser);

    Per WinRT (supposedly the Xbox Live package we installed?) and https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/window ... p-projects.

    But no idea how to integrate it with the built VS package/build.

    It only calls the C2runtime.js.

    Where and how would one stick it in?

  • Ashley

    Tom

    studio Mercato

    Alright, I did a sample capx for Xbox Live login testing, and the login window does come up.

    It states "Can't sign you in."

    But if you sign in via "another account" link on the bottom, you can sign in, but the capx/xbox live VS build does not detect sign in success.

    RIght off the bat, even before sign in, there is an error.

    0x80860003

    The link Microsoft has on the error has no info.

    https://support.xbox.com/en-US/error-co ... 0x80860003

    I used the dev account, not some separate test account to test this, but that's not supposed to be an issue.

    What now?

    The code I used was:

    On Start of Layout -> Sign in Silently

    On key pressed -> Xbox Live Sign In

    On Sign In Success-> Request Profile Info

    On Profile Info Success->set a text object and a variable to XboxLive.gamertag

    Am I missing something?

    Can't really provide the capx because it has my Xbox Live Creators Program unique identifiers?

    I'll try a next build without an attempt to sign in silently in the beginning.

  • Ashley

    Tom

    studio Mercato

    Does anybody have sample code, tested and working for testing if Xbox Live is available, logging in, and getting the gamertag to display properly? I'm going to be playing with this today, but I don't know how much is needed and what the procedure is, so if somebody's done it, it would help not to reinvent the wheel.

    Not sure if you have to build in some delay on layout start, then test for Xbox Live presence, then do the login prompt.

    Again, this is very time consuming if you have to do separate capxs just to experiment with code WITHOUT ANY EXAMPLES AT ALL (even Microsoft and Google provide code examples) and keep reinstalling the Xbox Live package in VS and making new builds.

    ??

    Also, the help link on Xbox Live functions in C2 is not working. You have to Google it and go to the C3 page, which is pretty sparse as usual. I know you guys said you would be moving everything to the new web site, but apparently that means help links in C2 will be discontinued, even though there was a promise to maintain?

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AmpedRobot

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