AGS 2.56a RC1 available for testing

[Pumaman]

While there weren't any major problems with 2.56 Final, there were a few minor yet irritating issues, which I decided it was worthwhile to fix.

So, here's v2.56a. I'm releasing this as a Release Candidate first just to make sure I haven't managed to break anything. If no new bugs are found, I'll release it as the Final Final this week

ONLY COMMENTS AND BUG REPORTS ABOUT THIS RELEASE IN THIS THREAD. PLEASE DO NOT POST SUGGESTIONS IN THIS THREAD.

Changes since v2.56 Final:
* Changed the way region tints work, to make them more useful.
* Added RawDrawRectangle text script function.
* Added game.anim_background_speed to allow you to modify the speed at which the animated backgrounds rotate.
* DisplaySpeechAt with Sierra-style speech doesn't shrink text box.
* FaceLocation with "turn to face" now works in Enters Screen event.
* Increased max fonts to 15.
* Fixed region tint in 15-bit colour.
* Fixed crash if the player typed [ or ] into the text parser.
* Fixed region tints not being saved in save games.
* Documented custom properties.


Full changelog since v2.55:
* Added GetCharacterProperty, GetCharacterPropertyText, GetHotspotProperty, GetHotspotPropertyText, GetInvProperty, GetInvPropertyText, GetObjectProperty, GetObjectPropertyText, GetRoomProperty, GetRoomPropertyText, ListBoxRemove, SetCharacterBlinkView, SetGUIObjectPosition, SetGUISize, SetRegionTint and StrContains script functions.
* Added Custom Properties to allow you to easily specify options for hotspots, characters, rooms, objects and inventory.
* Added option for characters speed to be adjusted in line with their scaling level.
* Added option to display multiple inventory items multiple times.
* Added option to have the text parser with dialog options, so that the player can either select an option or type something in.
* Added RGB tint option for regions as an alternative to light level.
* Added "Quick Import FLC frames" to import all frames from a FLC file in one go to the current sprite folder.
* Implemented multiple select for dragging and deleting sprites in the sprite manager.
* Added "Update translation file" option, to add new lines from the game to the translation source, whilst leaving currently translated bits intact.
* Added options to translation files, to allow changing font and  text direction on a per-translation basis.
* Added preliminary support for right-to-left text writing.
* Added ability to delete sprite folders (USE WITH CARE!!)
* Added "Lock objects in position" checkbox to the GUI editor, to stop you accidentally moving objects when trying to select them.
* Added extra "Blinking" view to draw an extra animation on top of the character's speech animation intermittently while they are talking. Currently Sierra-style speech only.
* Added 'goto-previous' dialog script command to return to previous topic, and 'lose-inv' command to lose the player inventory.
* Added new "Box out" and "Crossfade" screen transitions.
* Added option for characters to turn to face their new direction when using FaceLocation/FaceCharacter.
* Added "Persistent" GUI display option, to not remove it during a cutscene with "GUIs turn off when disabled".
* Added "Auto number speech lines" to automatically give a number  to all speech lines in the game.
* Added feature to detect hung scripts and abort the game (for example, scripts like  while (1) { }  )
* Added ability to export/import the text parser word list.
* Added MIDI controller event support, so that MIDI commands such as sustain will now work.
* Sierra-style speech now shrinks the width of the text window if the text is narrower than the screen width.
* Text parser now accepts ' and - characters, and automatically accepts plurals of all words (ie. an 's' on the end).
* Added ability to change sprite numbers in the Sprite Manager.
* Increased max sprite folders to 500.
* Increased max sprites to 15000.
* Increased max dialog topics to 500.
* Increased max cursors to 20 (though the new ones will only activate the Any Click event at present).
* Script editor is no longer a modal window (but only if it's not opened from the interaction editor).
* Changing a hotspot name now correctly marks the room as modified.
* Sprite manager now remembers which folder you were in before when selecting new item graphics.
* SetPlayerCharacter now changes the mouse cursor if an inventory item of the old character was active.
* Disabled auto-complete in the dialog script editor.
* Fixed Enters Screen Before Fadein not being run if the NewRoom was launched from an inventory interaction.
* Fixed normal mouse cursor flashing up in between messages when Always Display As Speech was being used.
* Fixed Sierra-style speech box overrunning the face if it had wide borders.
* Fixed set-speech-view dialog command not working.
* Fixed buttons in default inventory screen being drawn without transparency.
* Fixed dialog bullet getting set even if you pressed ESC.
* Fixed animated backgrounds sharing the palette, even when you told them not to. You'll need to re-import the main background in any problem rooms for this fix to take effect.
* Fixed thinking view not being exported with character.
* Fixed RunAGSGame not resetting game paused flags.
* Fixed RunAGSGame not working if mode was passed as 1.
* Fixed Rebuild VOX Files to delete the music.vox if there were previously music files, but no longer are any.
* Fixed SetSoundVolume not taking effect with footstep sounds.
* Fixed editor crash if "function" was the last word in a script.
* Fixed "player.inv[index]--;" also decrementing inv[index+1]
* Fixed SetPlayerCharacter crashing if called from game_start.
* Fixed dialog options moving across the screen in non-GUI mode.
* Fixed editor crash typing >200 characters into a label.
* Fixed text window GUI being used for dialog options instead of the specified Dialog Options GUI.
* Fixed GUI button text not being translated if the button also had an image.
* Fixed HideMouseCursor not hiding cursor while message displayed.
* Fixed FollowCharacter crash when stopping char from following.
* Fixed problem with translations where \" had been used in a string.
* Fixed dividing by zero in the script causing a fatal exception.
* You are now always prompted to save changes to a room when loading another one - the Preferences setting only affects the prompt when you choose the "Save Room" option on the menu.


http://www.agsforums.com/ags256arc1.zip

[Vel]

Thank you for the outstanding things you do, Chris.

[Jimi]

w00t. Extra transitions!  

[Ben]

Nice   .  The new properties thing is a great, as are the new dialog options and the character scaling.

I found a small bug, though. Not sure if I should post it here, since it's not really 2.56-specific, but here it is anyway:

If you check "characters turn to face direction" and use FaceLocation in the "before room fades in" event or the global "Enter Room" evend, the game crashes with a message saying you can't use blocking commands before the screen fades in. I guess having the characters turn instantly in these events would fix that problem.

[Gregjazz]

Woohoo!

[auhsor]

W00t... Now if only i had time to make a game... Well school is almost over for me..

[Fuzzpilz]

MIRROR'D!

[Erica McLane]

Hmmm. If you make so many changes in a minor release I can`t imagine the changelog for version 2.6

[deltamatrix]

cool punaman

[Trapezoid]

Why do people keep calling Pumaman "Punaman"?
Anyway. Excellent work, Pumaman. Donald Pleasance will be most displeased.

[Spyros]

Don't call pumaman "munopan" it's an evil Greek word.
Excellent work again

[Minimi]

Pumaman! Your a tiger!! You are really the best! Thank you soo much for your work! I appreciate it really really alot! This version is really awesome. I can't actually believe right now with my mind, that your actually going to make an updated version of AGS one day! This is already soooooooo great *kisses puma right at the mouth, inserts his tongue into his mouth... and starts to licking to lovely face of chris!*

no im not gay... I just love pumaman

[Scummbuddy]

-|    |---------    

       ^the line_____^ Minimi


Minimi officially crossed the non-scary line with that post....

Thank you Chris, and I'm glad to see that there don't seem to be any Earth-shattering bugs for you to have to deal with this time.  Good Luck on future versions, we'll all be here for you.

[Alex Lowes]

YEY !!

[Timosity]

I just found one little thing when converting my game from 2.55, not sure if it's a bug or a difference in the way it now works.

this is with DisplaySpeechAt using "sierra-style w/background"
also using a 1 by 1 transparent sprite for the talking view so it doesn't show one.

This is what I used

DisplaySpeechAt(5,20,300,EGO,"blah, blah");
Wait(80);
DisplaySpeechAt(5,20,300,EGO,"blah blah etc");
Wait(80);
DisplaySpeechAt(5,150,300,EGO,"blah, more etc");

It originally had an x coordinate of 1 in 2.55 and with the width 300 centred it perfectly

I changed it to 5 in 2.56 cause it pushed it right over to the left (which I thought it would in 2.55, but by trial and error it didn't, and I found the perfect centreing)

What seems to happen is it starts at the right x coordinate now but depending on the text wrapping and how many characters fill up the end of the line, it cuts it off to the smallest fit, which in turn makes the width irrelevent, which screws around all the alignments throughout the game.

I hope it makes sense

~Tim

[Necro]

Also minor bug here...

After selecting the funky new crossfade, i tested my game and in the first room the crossfade didnt work correctly, back in the editor some warnings were generated.

Warning Wait() was used in player enters screen - use after fade in.

Well thats all fine and dandy , but there are no Wait commands in there at all, the thing that is making this error is a call to a global function...
FaceRight(CharacterID) <- - And that simply hosts a facelocation command, no wait() commands anywhere.

---

function room_e() {
 // script for room: Player enters screen (before fadein)

// Set initial position of PC
character[BOB].x=0;
character[BOB].y=150;
// Set other characters facing directions
FaceRight(FB);
}

---

[Pumaman]

What seems to happen is it starts at the right x coordinate now but depending on the text wrapping and how many characters fill up the end of the line, it cuts it off to the smallest fit, which in turn makes the width irrelevent, which screws around all the alignments throughout the game.

Yes, this is due to a new feature which shrinks the Sierra-style speech text box width to that of the shortest line, to avoid it looking silly with a huge empty area to the right of the text.

Are you using Centred text alignment? Is that what the problem is?

Warning Wait() was used in player enters screen - use after fade in.

Well thats all fine and dandy , but there are no Wait commands in there at all, the thing that is makeing this error is a call to a global function...
FaceRight(CharacterID) <- - And that simply host a facelocation command, no wait() commands anywhere.

Did you turn on "Characters turn to face direction"? If so, FaceLocation is a blocking call which will cause this error.
This has already been reported and I appreciate it's rather annoying, so for the next version I'll disable turning in FAceLocation if it's used from within Player Enters Screen.

[Necro]

This has already been reported and I appreciate it's rather annoying, so for the next version I'll disable turning in FAceLocation if it's used from within Player Enters Screen.

Damn, that IS rather annoying so Until the next version I'll disable "Characters turn to face direction". What doesnt kill the game makes it stronger...

[Timosity]

Are you using Centred text alignment? Is that what the problem is?

No I'm not using centered text, It's actually a good feature for some areas of my game, but some areas need the old standard, where you specify your own width.

It looks silly with the start of the text box on the left of screen, then varying  distances from the right edge of the speech text box to the right edge of screen.

it would be nice to be able to turn the feature on and off in the script, as it can be handy in some circumstances.

eg. SetSierraSpeechShrink(int shrink) 1 for shrink, 0 for no shrink

anyway, there are some pretty neat new features, well done CJ, but I have no reason to use 2.56 for my game at this stage, I think 2.55 has all the features I need, I'd only be updating for the sake of it, rather than the need to, but I like to try to keep up to date with the latest versions, and new features, keep up the incredible work.

[Pumaman]

I see what you mean - when you use DisplaySpeechAt, it should really use the full width. I'll get that fixed for the next version.