Suggestion for Wizard View Creation

[redspark]

I know that this idea will only be useful to some and not all view creation will benefit.  However, please hear me out.  The game that I'm making uses 3D pre-rendered sprites.  Each character sprite has 15 frames for each of the 8 loops as well as 15 frames per loop for speech.  I have quite a few characters and I'm getting tired of generating the views for each character.

Since each character has the exact same number of frames in the exact same order, it would stand to reason I should be able to automate view creation easier than the Assign View loop by loop.  The idea is that you select a range of frames that represents the entire view, right click and start the wizard (just like we do with Assign View..).  The first page of the wizard takes the number of frames per loop (it should be able to tell from the number of frames per loop and the number of frames selected whether you have enough for 4 or 8 loops) as well as the view number that you want to assign the loops to and whether you want to Add or Overwrite the current frames.  Then the next screen should show the first frame from each of the loops and a dropdown box to name the direction of each loop.

I think this form of view creation would be faster and more productive, if your character has a constant order and frames as mine do.  Most of my characters are asymmetrical so I don't use flipped sprites.  However, I'm sure with some cleverness, that too could be handled with an option on the first page to handle flipped sprites and another on the second page to say which loop gets flipped.  Thanks.

James

[Pumaman]

I can see how this could be useful, would anyone else use a feature like this?

Also, judging by your other thread it sounds like you're considering automatically generating character files to import, which would be another approach to this.

[redspark]

Yes, I thought I'd make a quickie character import tool for my project just to tide me over until the AGS editor supports something like this.  My aching wrists would be appreciative of any kind of View Wizard type thing that is less intensive than what it is now.   Thank you!

[Trent R]

Based on what I've seen of SpacePaw's excellent Gif To View Importer plugin, I would bet that a Wizard for Views could also be created with a Editor Plugin.

Unfortunately, I don't have those skills.. (yet)

~Trent

[Ghost]

An in-IDE wizard would still make sense. As soon as you're making anything that's a bit above your one-room-one-character starter game, you'll often find yourself sticking to certain frame numbers/setups for your characters. I think redspark's idea is worth thinking about.

I'd use it.

[Charity]

One of my current projects is planned to have a large number of characters as well, and I'm keen for any feature that will let me cut corners anywhere in the drawing and importing process.  If I ever get this project, or one of similar scope off the ground, I would definitely use a feature like this.  (Being able to also specify flipped sprites would be a must for me, since I do plan on using symmetrical characters as another work saver.)