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My mistake ,  i thought that AGS was already handling overlapping areas of the same type  . As walkbehind , hotspot , walkable areas do overlap between each type , i  basically had in mind that it was the same between areas of the same type .
So as the way ags is working now , it does make sense to have all the maps in one file .


Gilbet V7000a > well in the event of having true overlapping areas , a zOrder system could be set in place , as GUI do it . The hotspot with the biggest zOrder will be only evaluated , unless it's desactivated , then the one with the second biggest zOrder and so on ...


Thanks again for the heads up and the help .

 monkey_05_06  >  i didn't say easier , i've said less complicated , in term of managing , updating .
If you got all your elements separated , it's a bit more flexible .  And then working on hotSpot ID 2 .. won't affect hotSpot ID 12 . 
As for now ( correct me if i'm getting it wrong ) , but if you don't know the order of colors that AGS use to import masks , when you're adding a new element ( new hotspots in your mask ) then it will reorder and reassign all the mask to different ids . That might not be a big issue if you got 5 hotspots , but what about when you got 30 of them ? multiplied by the number of rooms .
See my point ? this function of importing mask is really great idea , as when working on the background you're generally using a third party software that allows you to easily create those mask as well using same selections or whatever.
Regarding backward compatibility , what about ( this is just a thought ) , but instead of completely recode , just add another feature ?  let me explain .
while working in ags , you choose to show your hotspots Areas ... then in the right drop-down menu .. you switch to the first argument in the list ( Room; numberXXX)  ,  at this stage if you import a mask file , it will work as it is now ( 15 colors per mask , reassigning all the stuff ) , but if you specify a particular hotspot , then the mask you'll be applying ( only 2 colors one  ) will just affect the selected hotSpot in that very same drop-down menu .   
That way you still got the old behaviour and could keep backward compatibility , and you'll get more flexibility at the same time .  Does that make sense ?

KhrisMUC  > yeah that's true , but unfortunately it's pretty common to have overlapping areas , when you got a complicated scene .  Or have a general hotspot that will activate another hotpot beneath it once you've first observe it ..
but i'll give it a try , see how it goes .  It's just that , "reassigning IDs" feature that scares me a bit .

also in term of development , i was wondering if you know how hard would it be to .. instead of importing the mask file each time , keeping some kind of active path relationship . Like keeping the mask file path you've used . So you could just hit a reload button if you've updated your maps .. or ags will load the latest version when starting up or loading your game , that way you could get passive updates for free.

Thanks to you all for your help , it's good to see that  people are concerned and can give you a great support .

Thanks a lot GuyAwesome  !!

i knew that i wasn't doing it correctly .... i should have looked more at the help documentation .. :/
but somehow ..  i was so sure that a black and white map per ID ( hotspot or walkbehind )  was possible.

btw wouldn't it be less complicated to do it so ?  as in fact if you're loading a mask you're limited to 15 elements per map right ?

Hi ,

I'm using AGS 3.1 (Build 3.1.2.82), png files with only 2 colors . independently it works fine .
But for some reason , after importing my walk-behind mask ID 1 , i switch to ID 2 to import my second mask . But when doing that .. the import overwrite the ID 1 ...

What am i doing wrong ?

Cheers
John

Thanks a lot Trent , worked like a charm.

My bad , noob ambition trying to go faster than what he can actually understand  .
Only playing around with ags for 2 days now .. so i'm still not really used to the logic and namings .

and a big thanks to SSH for making this module .

Overlays are always behind GUIs, so use a GUI with a high ZOrder instead.

ok that make sense .
somehow it wasn't really clear for me that you could use 2 different system to display your data ( overlay / GUI) .

So i've created an empty gui named gDescriptionWin.

i'm calling it that way in the game_start()  function :
Description.GUIMode(gDescriptionWin);     // line 218

i've got the following error then .
Description.asc(218): Error (line 218): Type mismatch: cannot convert 'GUI*' to 'GUIControl*'

what i am doing wrong ?

When I open inventory screen and move cursor over an item the description text is displayed "behind" the inventory gui.

I got the very same issue  .

I've seen that in Aug 2007 user "magintz" was reporting the same thing.  But i havent found how he sorted that out , as he seemed to jump for another solution .

For now i've got the the overlay description all working fine , with font i want and not displayed while in waiting mode .
Just that inventory thingy , which is a bit annoying .

Just got AGS 2 days ago .. so i'll keep searching as it seems to be also ZOrder related .
If i got anything new i'll keep you posted .