Messages

[What is Shooting Gallery]

I am really not sure if it is right to post this here, I remember Calin Leafshade posted his Platform Arcade demo in this subforum. Maybe I should have post this in "Modules" forum, but my module is not ready for public release yet: there are many features that must be implemented and it lacks documentation greatly.
On other hand it is not a demo of actual game.

What is Shooting Gallery:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooter_game#Shooting_gallery
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=088y5VDQFzA

Current demo version:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/jamm30qmmxm/ShootingGallery_Demo2.zip

Current module features:
+ It uses monkey_05_06's Stack Module
+ Can be used either for making minigame inside bigger game, or whole game in this genre;
+ Any number of enemies in play; Enemies are represented by characters;
+ Any number of "rails", lines along which enemies move around; Rail is defined by room Y value;
+ Command to set new enemy in play running either from left or right side of the screen;
+ Simple enemy AI: walk along the rail, change rail in any direction, melee attack when on the fist rail (closest to player); Missile attacks not implemented yet;
+ Easily programmed scrolling along the room;

Demo features
+ Silly graphics and animation
+ 3 enemies with melee attack;
+ "Slow" moving crosshair;
+ Player can't die and gathers no score yet;
+ Music, ripped from "Golden Axe 3", sound ripped from "Doom", "Heretic" and "Carmaggeddon" games
+ Mouse controls crosshair, hold or click LMB to fire; Use left/right cursor keys to move player character.

Well, basically, I would be glad to know what you think about how it works, and also hear any suggestions. Just remember that this is only the beginning

What does this do in "Hints and Tips" forum?  
Barefoot, this subforum is for hints and tips about solving game puzzles, as far as I know.

[String]

Another way of doing it would be to simply push/pop each individual property, but as you can see scripting up a couple of quick conversion functions makes it much easier to push/pop custom structs.

Yes, actually this was really useful tip!

Couple of notes though

Code: ags

// Stack.ash
enum StackDataType {
  // all of our other types
  eStackDataCharacterStat = 'x' // we must add a new key to our enum to extend it to a new type
};

I guess it isn't actually important to edit Stack.ash, you can just put this new definition in your own script either in a new enum or as #define

Code: ags

// CharacterStats.asc
import StackDataFormat; // grab this from Stack.asc (it is exported, but not globally imported)
// we need to use this for our data conversion

It should be import String StackDataFormat, otherwise error is given.

I was also wondering how would I pronounce the title... I can't choose between "Egh!" or "Mmm!!!" 

How do I phone people? I don't understand what to do

Low spoiler hint first:

Spoiler

Remember the name that soda girl gave you. Better write it somewhere and keep before your eyes.
Start calling random numbers. Observe people names. This may give you some clue

[close]

High spoiler hint:

Spoiler

Each phone key match certain letter of alphabet.

[close]

Killer spoiler:

Spoiler

2-4-3-1

[close]

It reminded me of the Shivah!

Spoiler

It had the same technique.. but with another punctuation mark... ?!

[close]

Same here
This can't be coincidence. I feel a schema behind this.

[true]

Checking "if (player.InventoryQuantity[iLamp.ID] == true)" is technically comparable to checking "if (player.InventoryQuantity[iLamp.ID] == 1)"

Oh no, that's not what I expected to hear from guy who wrote a number of modules for AGS 

I got stuck on the final puzzle for about fifteen minutes before I suddenly clicked and realised how to solve it haha

heheh, that one did work out well Ben  

Actually

Spoiler

this one reminded me final "Shivah" scene

[close]

Okay, I want to say, I am stuck in this game

Spoiler

I think I was supposed to visit library, and guy named Sticks gave me voucher, but when I use library's door character keep saying he lost his library ticket 2000 years ago. Now I have no idea what to do.

[close]

Finally! Cool game, I really loved bottom-left and top-right puzzles

I tried to use it in the AGS 3.2 RC project and it gave me a compiler error:

Stack.asc(50): Error (line 50): undefined symbol 'inventory'

BTW, do I understand correctly that it allows to push different types in one stack? Because I would like to use it to store custom structs and I'll have to push all the struct data in there, which consists of different types of variables.


EDIT: Yearg, heh, funny. It looks like I have to create at least 1 inventory item and 1 gui item (and maybe somethng else) for those inventory/gui arrays to work in scripts.
Looks rather like AGS bug.

In any game its all about fantasy and imagination...

as well as when reading manual sometimes
Khris can be rude, but... seriously, use some imagination! How I would seek a solution in this case? I already know that character has parameter such as ActiveInventory and function such as AddInventory. So, I open Help Index and type in "character" and see "Character functions and properties" topic. Open that. There's a list of all functions and properties. I scan it down reading each line...
Blast! there's "HasInventory" function! I already guess what it does, but just in case I click on the link and make sure it is what I want.
That's how I was studying AGS... and everything else, by the way.
Just small advice, to save your own time (seriosly, using this method DOES save time)

There's also this stupid joke that makes CD/DVD player tray eject and close over and over again. I read about that, scanned WinAPI documentation, found needed functions and wrote a small console app that did that. Never made a prank with this though,but I guess its possible if you make an inviisble window and put executable to Windows autorun folder 

Just one small comment: technically, her upper body should bend a little towards axe blade as she raises and swings it, because it's heavy and intertion will pull her upper torso towards it, like, I dunno, joystick is pulled by hand. If you think it will be too much headache to animate like that, then you may ignore this, because animation is good enough already; it's just that now she looks terribly strong to be able to strike like that
PS. Same goes to the guy in the video, he's just inhumanly strong to just swing the axe like that
(which is possibly OK for computer game)

I can do funny voice with terrible russian accent even without audacity. Yeah, I am that bad.

Seriously, I am not a pro and I do not give a s**t about good result, so why not. It may be fun.  

Heheh, an old one but never gets too old, I guess

I remember a much more evil trick we made in school. A friend of mine told me one guy really bored him by asking for some game. So we decided to have fun. I wrote a simple DOS program on QBasic (yeah, these were DOS times) that displayed a sort of utility application window with text like "Your hard drive is being formatted, please don't reset or turn off your computer, or your HDD may receive damage", and a really slow progress bar... It even displayed a small window "Restoring system files" after completion.
Idea was friend of mine was going to change game's exe with this QBasic program.
Unfortunately I never knew what happened when he gave this to the annoing guy.

Normally you'd want to bring the axe up and swing in a chopping motion, but to simulate the effect you wanted (a horizontal rather than vertical swing) I made a quick and dirty edit.

He said he wanted a swing to the side like chopping a tree so I accommodated.  Note that I also said a vertical chopping motion would be better.  Please read.

Well, I understood that you wanted to show how his own vision of strike would look like, however, even chopping a tree from a side would involve slightly different technique.
I mean, she has to at least grasp the axe closer to the end of the axe handle, that's all.

ProgZMax, sorry, but on your animation her fighting style totally defeats the sense of having a long pole

What I want to say, nobody would fight with heavy battle axe like that.


Something to illustrate my last note in the previous post:

I am not sure what you mean by left/right swing, is it a "horizontal" strike?
Well, I draw this "schema" trying to show how man starts a strike by raising axe from the right side more detailed. If you need him/her to make a horizontal or diagonal strike (sorry, no idea how these things called) simply stop axe rising earlier, then swing.

Green parts are right, Blue are left.



This may be rather rude; anyway, basically rising such heavy thing while holding a handle is better performed when you do so along the spiral, not just straight half-circle.

Also! If you want to strike from the side diagonally (not just straight from above) sometimes it is better to rise the axe from opposite side, - in this case you won't need to fight with your own inertion, but use it for you benefit.
In other words - rise axe from left along a spiral to strike from right side, and vice versa.

A small note, just remembering myself using an axe to cut trees:
When you are idle, you can hold the axe like heroine is holding it on that sprite above, with large distance between hands to make its weight balanced. However, when you strike, you have to bring both hands together to create a single pivot, otherwise your strike will be terribly awkward and weak.

O well, forgive my lame drawings, but here's how I see this:



Possibly I should have made guy's hands be even closer to the lower handle end.