Problems with defining walkable areas

[Powerless Newbie]

I ran into two issues defining walkable and walk-behind areas in AGS, and was wondering if there's anything I can do about it.

1. The undo function seems to only work one item back, so what kept happening to me is I'd define a walk-behind area, and then when I went to test it with the character, I noticed that I got the walk-behind area a little off. But, I couldn't undo the last 4 or 5 lines I'd drawn, so to fix it I was stuck having to reload the entire screen. This becomes a problem on screens that have 4-5 different walkbehind areas. Anything I can do short of getting really good at walk-behinds on the first try?

2. I find that using my mouse to define walkable areas isn't as precise as I'd like. I have the same problem in PSP, but at least there I can magnify the image and trace pixels really closely. I was wondering: Is there any way to magnify the image in the AGS room editor to allow for more precision in tracing lines? Or, is there a way to use a writing tablet or something to trace them that way?

[Gilbert]

1. Why? Just draw over the areas to fix it, note if you set the area to 0, it's actually erasing the aread.

2. In that case, just draw that walkable areas in PSP (or whatever graphic programmes you want to use) and save it as a 256 colour BMP (make sure that the mask pic contains flat colours, no antialiasing and the colours for the areas use only the first 16 colours of the palette, I never used PSP so I cant tell you how to do this), and click "import mask..." in agsedit.

[Powerless Newbie]

Just draw over the areas to fix it, note if you set the area to 0, it's actually erasing the aread.

Oh, I get it. Duh. That makes much more sense. Thanks.

In that case, just draw that walkable areas in PSP (or whatever graphic programmes you want to use) and save it as a 256 colour BMP (make sure that the mask pic contains flat colours, no antialiasing and the colours for the areas use only the first 16 colours of the palette, I never used PSP so I cant tell you how to do this), and click "import mask..." in agsedit.

Even if I'm using true-color 32-bit format?

[Gilbert]

Yes you can use whatever acceptable colour depth for the imported bgs (provided you had set up the game correctly), but the masks must be 256 colours.

One suggestion is that if you're using  a "layer-enabled" graphics package, just draw the mask on a new layer and then convert that layer into a 256 colour BMP for importing. Also notice that if your game is set to run in hires (640x400,640x480 or 800x600), with an exception on the walkbehind mask, the other masks must be drawn in half the res of teh bg (eg, if your game runs at 640x400, the masks should be 320x200, this is because it's the internal game coordinates the game is using), a better way to draw these mask is to shrink your bg image in your graphic package first and then draw the masks into new layers.

[Scummbuddy]

you can use the windows magnify little program... near the disabliites applications, to zoom in within ags.  if you dont have it, there are free renditions of it all over the web.

After looking around my start menu, its just called plain "Magnifier"

[Anarcho]

Wait, so let me get this straight.  If i have a background drawn in 640x400, and i have masks that were originally drawn in 640x400...you're supposed to shrink it down to 320x200 and import it...and it will still fix in the picture i.e. be the proper size?  I didn't know all this and drew my backgrounds and walk behind areas together in high color.

I spent more hours than i can bear on this couch and tv, and the character has to walk behind them, but i don't want to have to scratch them cause they're hi color.

[Scummbuddy]

Straight from the manual:
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Importing a file as the walkable area mask
AGS has the ability to import an external BMP or PCX file to use as the walkable-area, hotspot or walk-behind area mask. If you don't like the way you have to draw these in the editor itsself, you can draw them in another program and then import them. This is also useful if you are converting a game you were making with another game-creation system into AGS.
To use the feature, click the "Import Mask" button in the relevant mode of the Areas editor. There are some restrictions to how this file must be drawn: it must be the exact same size as the background scene, and it must be in 16-colour (4-bit) or 256-colour (8-bit). Then, colour 0 on the bitmap signifies transparency and colours 1-15 are used as the respective hotspot/walk-behind/walkable area numbers.

NOTE: For hotspots and walkable areas, the mask must be the same size as the background, but at 320x200 resolution. So, if you had a normal sized 640x400 room, the mask should be 320x200. For walk-behind areas, the mask is the exact same size as the background image.

IMPORTANT: Do NOT use any colour numbers above 15 on the mask bitmap. Use only palette indexes 0 to 15.