AGS 2.56 Pre-final - Mittens edition

[Robert Eric]

By the way, Chris, could you briefly explain the regions to me?

[RickJ]

The property thing is really cool.  Being able to change property values at run-time is really way cool.  Also, would it make sense to have Game Properties as well?    

[TerranRich]

CJ: I didn't think of that. If I put in a face-location command on the on_mouse_click function, wouldn't it occur before the character walked to the hotpot's walk-to point? If so, I was thinking of a way to have the character face that location after the walk-to was performed.

I dunno, I just thought it would be an easy suggestion, but it might clutter things up a bit and might not even be necessary. Sorry.

[RickJ]

Custom Properties - possible bug

CJ are custom properties supposed to be specific to each entity?  If so I found a problem.  I defined some properties for a room but when I look at a character's or inventory item's custom properties they are the same as the ones defined for the room.  Is this how it is supposed to work?

[Joseph DiPerla]

Hey Chris, I dont know if this is a bug or a feature that needs to be implemented, but hopefully its a bug, as you have already asked us not to post suggestions during beta releases.

My bug/suggestion is that when ever you do a right click and you try and display lets say a GUI, everything in the game stops. Only the GUI works. Is there anyway you can fix it or atleast give an option that if the GUI is turned on during gameplay, that it wont stop the gameplay?

Is there a code workaround to this?

JD

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

Now, I don't want to sound rude, Joseph, but have you read the manual? A GUI that's defined as a Popup modal (a.k.a. script only) always pauses the game. It's normal. If you want your GUI not to do that, try using GUIOn and GUIOff and leaving it's property as "normal."

[SSH]

Maybe the bug is that "script only" must be the most misleading option name since "National Socialist" appeared on German ballot papers.  

[deltamatrix]

SUGGESTION

Can you add SetScreenTransition to the interaction editor, please!?

It'd be easier because I want to change them often depending on what kind of room your at.

[Joseph DiPerla]

NO RedruM you dont sound rude. Yes you are right, I should read the manual. Only problem though is, I did read the manual, OVer and over and over etc... I have been experienced with AGS for a long time, but even programmers with long programming experiences have trouble with the simplest things. Your right that a manual does exist, but it is large, thus some words and topics slip from right under my eye. Even the more simpler things. So I do ask for your patience (Sorry if I upset you) on this. Thanks

But thank you so so so so so so so so so so much for posting your solution. I appreciate it. I will try and be more careful for further times. I will use Normal mode then in my games. Thanks.

JD

[Pumaman]

CJ: I didn't think of that. If I put in a face-location command on the on_mouse_click function, wouldn't it occur before the character walked to the hotpot's walk-to point? If so, I was thinking of a way to have the character face that location after the walk-to was performed.

Hmm ah I see what you mean, I'll have a think.

CJ are custom properties supposed to be specific to each entity?

The property values are specific to each, the schema is not. As I'm not sure exactly what you mean to be the problem, let me attempt both:

* if you mean that you set a Room property 'Jibble' to 5, and then a character's 'Jibble' property is also changed to 5, that's a bug but I haven't been able to duplicate it myself.

* if you mean can you have a different schema for different types of thing, the answer is no not currently - there are enough properties to go round that even if one is only applicable to rooms, for example, you can just leave it blank in other types of thing.

Maybe the bug is that "script only" must be the most misleading option name since "National Socialist" appeared on German ballot papers

Which is why it was renamed to "popup modal" a couple of versions ago

SUGGESTION

Can you add SetScreenTransition to the interaction editor, please!?

I don't normally accept suggestions in beta threads, but I'll add this one to my list, it doesn't sound like too much work.

[TerranRich]

I really should've started a new topic regarding my suggestion, but this is actually a suggestion to improve a new feature... I want to use GetHotspotProperty() in the on_mouse_click event to check if a certain hotspot in a certain room is one where the player normally walks to and then looks at. Only problem is, you really can't access any hotspots from a global function. Maybe you could add another parameter in that function (and the others too, I suppose, to keep things similar) to get a certain hotspot in a certain room. As it is, you can only access it from within the room itself apparently. Is this possible?

Sorry if I'm cluttering up this thread.  

[Scummbuddy]

Wow.  I leave for a week and expect just a couple boards with many posts to read when I get back, but no, I miss an update.  A large one at that.  Bueno job Chris Jones.

[CiacioZ]

WoW! The custom properties! I'm very happy that my suggestion is implemented yet! I'll test it as soon as possible

I'm proud to be useful for the development of this engine

Greetings CiacioZ

[Raggit]

Man, CJ's a machine!!!

He's so very fast a mass-producing this awseom engine!

Guess I give it a try.  Oh, by the way Chris, have you considered adding a night and day transition timer to the engine? You know, like the user could check something in the big main menu thingy where you select all that other stuff like speech style stuff.  It could just be global timer and after some many minutes or whatever amount of time the player chooses the screen tints black or blue or whatever.

Just a suggestion!

Thanks for the new engine!  

[RickJ]

Custom Properties

* if you mean can you have a different schema for different types of thing, the answer is no not currently - there are enough properties to go round that even if one is only applicable to rooms, for example, you can just leave it blank in other types of thing.

I guess intuitively, I thought that there would be different schema for different types of things.  In my mind properties used for rooms mostly wouldn't be applicable to characters, hotspots, etc, and vise versa.   IMHO having seperate schema would be better.

I also managed to confuse myself as well.  The default values showed up everwhere as they should.  It just game me the impression that changing a value in one place would be carried over to other places.  

In addition having game properties would be useful as well, IMHO.   Please consider adding this in a future version.

I really like the idea of custom properties and expect to make great use of them.  Please take the above comments as my review/evaluation of this new feature and make use of them as you will.  Thanks for implementing such a great idea.  

Cheers
Rick

[Scorpiorus]

Chris, I was playing with palettes in 256-colour mode and encountered the strange thing with the animated backgrounds. While animating it seems that the frame number 0 (main background) always uses the palette of the previous frame. For example, I have two identical backgrounds but with the different palettes. I import the first background as the main one (without remapping the slots). Then import the second but as an animation frame (frame 1). The second one maintains it's slots as well (use exact palette slots is ticked) but uses it's own palette (share palette is not ticked). While I expected alternation between two backgrounds it showed me only one (actually they were two different using the same palette). SetBackgrooundFrame() function behaves itself the similar way. If I pass 0 as parameter it changes the frame but leaves the old palette.
The stuff occurs only for frame 0. Btw, I found the solution by calling UpdatePalette() just after frame 0 has been displayed. A little test game: pal_test(220kb) for AGS256beta3

I got it with AGS256beta3 but think it was there before.

-Cheers

[Pumaman]

I guess intuitively, I thought that there would be different schema for different types of things.

To begin with, I was going to have a different schema for each different type of thing. But then, I thought that you'd probably want to use a "default interaction type" property for hotspots, objects, characters and inventory - and therefore it made more sense to share the schema.

I did consider making the room one different, but thought that would cause too much confusion with people wondering why options were showing up in some but not in others.

I do see your point, but I'm not really sure at the moment what the best solution to this is.

Chris, I was playing with palettes in 256-colour mode and encountered the strange thing with the animated backgrounds. While animating it seems that the frame number 0 (main background) always uses the palette of the previous frame

Thanks for the report, I think I see what's happened - there seems to be a bug where if you import a background with it set to share the palette, the first frame in that room then gets stuck on "share palette" and you can't revert it even if you later import a non-sharing background. I'll work on a fix.

[Scorpiorus]

Aha, CJ, you are right. I just have tried to start from scratch and it works. Actually I had tried to create a new room but it didn't help. Now I think I understand why: I used a new room option from the AGS main menu but it seems the editor doesn't erase that frame0 shared pal setting when creating a blank room. So since the old room had that bug the new one inherits it as well.


-Cheers

[undergroundling]

EDIT: Sorry, didn't see the bit about no requests here  

Great engine, I really like the new improvements.

[RickJ]

To begin with, I was going to have a different schema for each different type of thing.

hehe... If you did I probably would have said the following ...

But then, I thought that you'd probably want to use a "default interaction type" property for hotspots, objects, characters and inventory - and therefore it made more sense to share the schema.

:)