Aura

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Wed 12 Jan, 2005 1:09 am

Trust me, it's actually much more visible on-calc, except for the blurring when the sprite is in motion (can't be helped, it's because of the masking.)
As to how I did the masking, I used Omnicalc to OR the mask to the screen, then XORed an inverted sprit, so then the sprite is inverted over the mask and comes out looking right. Works just as well as masking with AND and XOR. I'm currently reworking some of my background sprites to reduce the level of noise, an I'll try enlarging the white border around the character. I decided to go with a very high detail approach as I wanted to give the sense of a sprawling, less conforming- more alien- world. I can have as many types of sprites as I want, and they don't have to conform to a grid, because my maps are actually stored in pic files. Collision detction is done with lists that hold the coordiantes of each corner of an object as well as the type of object and what action to take when the character is nearby.
Anyways, I really appreciate all the enthusiasm. If ever I regain interest in asm, this WILL go greyscale- and I had greyscale in mind when originally designing these sprites, but I just can't see that happening in the near future. I'm too involved with C++ and Java to spend the time with z80.

CrimsonCasio · Post by **CrimsonCasio** » Wed 12 Jan, 2005 1:09 am

heh,
in fact the character has a border around him, but its not greatly effective...

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Sun 16 Jan, 2005 5:46 pm

I revamped the collision detection engine, the screenshots didnt show it in effect but it was fairly slow before. Now it's about three-quarters as fast as the screenshots, whereas before i was about a quarter as fast. Now I'm beginning work on the biggest eye-candy yet; overhead sprite masking. This will allow objects such as tree branches, doorways, arches, etc. to be masked over the character as he walks under them.

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Mon 31 Jan, 2005 10:37 pm

I worked out all the bugs in the collision detection, and have got the second layer masked sprites working. Now I just need to write the algorithmn to detect whether you're approaching from in front or behind the object. I also set up Zelda-style scrolling, where it smooth-scrols the entire screen when you reach the edge (not sure if I'm gonna keep it, though- it requires the pic vars for the map to be held in RAM, and s I need 4 pics total for the char sprites and more for masked environment sprites, I can only fit 4 or so in pics 1-10. However, without scrolling I can just store all my map pics as pics 11-256 with the 256 Pic program).

Madskillz · Post by **Madskillz** » Tue 01 Feb, 2005 4:23 am

Sweet sounds awesome man. Keep us posted! I cant wait to see more of this game!

DJ_O · Post by **DJ_O** » Tue 01 Feb, 2005 1:45 pm

dysfunction wrote:I worked out all the bugs in the collision detection, and have got the second layer masked sprites working. Now I just need to write the algorithmn to detect whether you're approaching from in front or behind the object. I also set up Zelda-style scrolling, where it smooth-scrols the entire screen when you reach the edge (not sure if I'm gonna keep it, though- it requires the pic vars for the map to be held in RAM, and s I need 4 pics total for the char sprites and more for masked environment sprites, I can only fit 4 or so in pics 1-10. However, without scrolling I can just store all my map pics as pics 11-256 with the 256 Pic program).

Nice! I was thinking about adding that kind of scrolling (vertical only) in my platform game but the memory and speed might be a pb. However I don't recommend using the 255 pic program to store your maps because some of them get corrupted with some calc OS. The picture 40 program would work but I recommend using xLIB to store your maps in matrices so they are twice smaller and you can easyli change them if some special events occur in the game. I have a map editor in my grayscale package that you could use but it's very slow

merthsoft · Post by **merthsoft** » Tue 01 Feb, 2005 9:42 pm

I too have a map editor, if you wanna do a comparison, just ask, and I'll put mine online.

DJ_O · Post by **DJ_O** » Tue 01 Feb, 2005 10:58 pm

Does it edit from a matrix with xLIB sprites?

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Wed 02 Feb, 2005 1:03 pm

I could write my own map editor for XLIb, but while what I'm doing requires more memory its the only way to have as much sprites as I need- with XLIB you only get what you can store in a pic file. This is the way it's going to be, and I've coded too much of the engine to change now.

merthsoft · Post by **merthsoft** » Wed 02 Feb, 2005 9:24 pm

@Kevin: Yes, it does, you want me to send it to you, so you can see what you think?
@dys: How does your work now?

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Sun 06 Feb, 2005 10:37 pm

Ok, I scrapped the whole Zelda-style scrolling idea (however I'll file it away for use in future projects). I AM going to use XLIB in the battle engine so I can have scrolling. I've got double-layer masked sprites up and running, I'll post a screen as soon as I get my calc back from my mom (she took it away because I hadn't done enough work on scholarship essays). The overhead sprite masking is a litle slow. Well, not really slow, just you can actually see the object you're walking under flicker, which unfortunately reduces the illusion that you're actually walking under stuff.Should look better on an SE though. The speed is roughly as fast as Kevin's older ASCII rpgs (which is impressive considering it's rerendering the entire screen, then two character sprites, then two overhead objects sprites, every time you walk, as opposed to one ascii character).

Post by **tr1p1ea** » Mon 07 Feb, 2005 2:23 am

She took your calc away!?!?!

Oh well, good to see you are still thinking about this project ... even though you cant work on it.

And good luck with your scholarship!

DJ_O · Post by **DJ_O** » Mon 07 Feb, 2005 3:20 am

dysfunction wrote:just you can actually see the object you're walking under flicker, which unfortunately reduces the illusion that you're actually walking under stuff.Should look better on an SE though.

Omnicalc have an option (like Zapi) that allow you to save your sprite into the graph buffer and display it later so it wont flicker and it would be faster.

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Mon 07 Feb, 2005 10:59 pm

Kevin wrote:
dysfunction wrote:just you can actually see the object you're walking under flicker, which unfortunately reduces the illusion that you're actually walking under stuff.Should look better on an SE though.
Omnicalc have an option (like Zapi) that allow you to save your sprite into the graph buffer and display it later so it wont flicker and it would be faster.

Ok, I'll look into that.

dysfunction · Post by **dysfunction** » Tue 15 Feb, 2005 1:28 pm

Finaly came up with a ruse to get my calc back (said I needed it for compsci class), but she can't find out where she left it. Hopefully I'll get it back soon so I can post some oh so sweet screens (I hadn't backed up the latest improvments to my comp yet when she took it away).