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Adrian8891
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Joined: 9th Jul 2016
Location: Szczecin, Poland
Posted: 9th Aug 2016 18:53
Hello Devs.

I'm 10000% sure that 98% of You have more expirience than me in AppGameKit programming.

I got little idea on game. Maybe I will start from this point.

Main idea of game is to make 2d game with camera from above about driving a truck with trailer. Player has to go with truck+trailer to the "loading ramp", then travel some kind of highway to "unloading ramp". Simply after unload he gets score = score +100

My idea is to make whole map in AppGameKit Placement Editor. (road, building etc.)
1st question : is it good idea to make whole map at once?
2nd question (coding...) : how to make logic for trailer to "stick" to the truck part and turning slower than truck. (just like real). ?
3rd question : how to start with tire marks on the road (let's say I can make graphics by myself, or at test part it would be just 2 black bold lines)?
4th question: what is best idea/code to make camera "follow" whole truck while traveling around the map?

Any replies would be appreciated.

Btw. I'm very novice in AGK. So any "noob" language is very nice to see
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Matusiak Adrian, m.Eng
Forex Asset Manager
Cybermind
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21
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Joined: 28th Nov 2002
Location: Denmark
Posted: 10th Aug 2016 10:39
I would advise you to do a lot of tutorials first, learn the basics. Then you could make VERY small games, like just moving a sprite around the screen in top down 2D that has to pick up stuff that appears random and dissappears when you pick them up. I would highly advise to start from the bottom and then work your way up I myself started to make games without proper knowledge of programming, the results were not very good :-P
13/0
Adrian8891
7
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Joined: 9th Jul 2016
Location: Szczecin, Poland
Posted: 10th Aug 2016 10:56 Edited at: 10th Aug 2016 11:13
I have read tutorial provided with Steam version of AppGameKit twice, but I still cannot understand how to handle "types" and "arrays"... There are not a lot of tutorials as I search on the Internet. And of course users mostly doesn't share code in showcase of apps.
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Matusiak Adrian, m.Eng
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Van B
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Joined: 8th Oct 2002
Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 10th Aug 2016 12:01
There's a couple of options, really for the best collision handling, physics would be best - like 2 sprites, one for the cab and one for the trailer, then make a revolute joint to keep them together. That way everything can be physics, you'd be able to bash into cars and knock them out of the way for example.

Anyway, your questions...

1st question : is it good idea to make whole map at once?
Usually it is better to have the whole map, sprites should occlude themselves so performance shouldn't be a big issue. I would suggest making the map tiles as big as you can, means it would be quicker to make the map.

2nd question (coding...) : how to make logic for trailer to "stick" to the truck part and turning slower than truck. (just like real). ?
With the 2D physics, you'd set each part of the truck for the shape - polygonal would be fine, then position the parts where they should be, and add a revolute joint to the cab part, offset where the pivot point should be. Then the trailer will be attached to the cab, and it'll be dragged around - so you'd have to plan your route, as the trailer might try and cut corners otherwise, which might be a big part of the games challenge.

3rd question : how to start with tire marks on the road (let's say I can make graphics by myself, or at test part it would be just 2 black bold lines)?
You could make a straight skid mark image, then make a bank of sprites using this image, then you could position them under the wheels when skidding, rotate them to suit the movement - imagine it as when you have a Skalectrix or train set, and you lay down the track - that's kinda what you'd be doing, except using a set amount of track pieces. This would result in a trail of skid marks, they'd stay in place until they need to be used again.

4th question: what is best idea/code to make camera "follow" whole truck while traveling around the map?
You can set the 2D camera position, so if you use SetSpritePositionByOffset, then SetViewOffset, you can easily scroll around, zoom in/out even. You would set the camera to the trucks cab position, and it would follow it around the map.

As for types and arrays, well I'll try and make a little crash course...

Say you have a player sprite, and want to keep track of the X and Y position, and Angle. You could use standalone variables, globalised for example:
Global Player_x
Global Player_y
Global Player_Ang


And that's ok if you only ever have 1 player and no enemies. It inevitably leads to code that is increasingly cumbersome to use, because it takes more logic to deal with those variables.

Now, you know that you want the X Y and Angle variables in the player, but you also want them on bullets say, and other players, and enemies... so in this case we'd make a type that can be reused.

Type PlayerType
X
Y
Ang
Endtype
Global Player as PlayerType


So now, you have a typed global variable called Player, which has the components X Y and Ang... like Player.X, Player.Y, Player.Ang - and you'd treat these just the same as with the individual variables. A type can be applied to a variable or an array, it might be more likely that you'd use a global Camera variable with that type, and have Camera.X etc. It's much like designing a database, decide what fields you need, and consider how you can re-use the types to make your code more standard.

If you have lots of enemies, then using the same type for an array of enemies is possible - at this point you might consider adding a sprite reference to the type, like...
Type PlayerType
X
Y
Ang
Spr
Endtype


Then you can store the sprite number in the type, and any variables or arrays that use it.

You'd then dimension an array to use that type, lets say you want 32 cars...

Dim Car[32] as PlayerType

Then, to affect car 0, you would use Car[0].X etc

A dimensioned array is just a stack of variables in a convenient chunk, referenced by their index number in square brackets. Typically you'd cycle through the array, updating sprites, checking collision etc, with a for...next loop.

Arrays are really quite straightforward, I suggest experimenting with them and understanding them fully - they are like rocket fuel for a programmer once they're figured out, opens up a whole lot of possibilities and makes it easy to keep your code neat - it's the definition of working smarter, not harder - you will wonder how you managed without them!
The code is dark and full of errors
Adrian8891
7
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Joined: 9th Jul 2016
Location: Szczecin, Poland
Posted: 15th Aug 2016 13:40
Hello Van!

And this seems to be great answer. Once I create graphics for game, then I will start from generate some kind of small map in AppGameKit Placement editor.

After this I will surely get back here for lot of help

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Matusiak Adrian, m.Eng
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Adrian8891
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Joined: 9th Jul 2016
Location: Szczecin, Poland
Posted: 21st Aug 2016 20:46
Hi there,

So, I got problems at early start of develop

I have created graphics for game - roads, connections, highway etc.
I tried to use AppGameKit Placement Editor but there must be something wrong with it. I set new map with 1440x2560px each screen (4 screens at X axis) , place all sprites to create any "single road". Problem is, that I copy export.txt and placement_editor.agc to correct folders and I get only 1 sprite, placed in wrong place, and whole thing seems to lag a bit (I see this becasue of slowly Joystick moving).

Is there any better tool than AppGameKit Placement Editor or just I don't know how to use it properly?

What about graphics ? I try to create game in "HD" so I set virtual resolution on 1440x2560px with single graphic sprite at around 300x150px (png file , around 150kb size). Do I have to create smaller pieces of graphics?

My point is to create a map where player will move his "truck" to depo's for load/unload cargo and get money for it.
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Matusiak Adrian, m.Eng
Forex Asset Manager
Adrian8891
7
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Joined: 9th Jul 2016
Location: Szczecin, Poland
Posted: 28th Aug 2016 11:15
Anyone? How to dig this thing? maybe any other map editor?
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Matusiak Adrian, m.Eng
Forex Asset Manager
CJB
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Joined: 10th Feb 2004
Location: Essex, UK
Posted: 31st Aug 2016 00:01
A Tiled loader here from Clonkex: https://forum.thegamecreators.com/thread/209341
V2 T1 (Mostly)
Phone Tap!
Uzmadesign

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