Plan for Melv May
by Melv May · 07/21/2004 (12:10 pm) · 21 comments
... continued from previous plan.
Okay, I've been really quiet the last week or so and I guess you think I've been slacking-off. How wrong you'd be thinking that....
I've almost completed the tile-map functionality!
I've kept a link of all my previous plans on the how/what I was going to implement so I'm not going to go into lots of details about this work here. I know the art-work isn't that attractive but it's not supposed to be pretty because I'm not an artist but it is designed to thrash the tile-map to death!
To sum-up, you've got unlimited layers, each having an unlimited number of tiles and size. As you'll find in my previous post (see above), each tile can be either a static-image, animated-image, script-commands or active-tile (custom class for gun-turrets etc). All the layers are generated from a fxTileMap2D object and you can also have as many of these as you require as well!
Each layer that's created is a core-object which means that it has all the functionality that all the objects have such as rotation, physics, mounting etc.
A complete new feature is the ability to change any objects blending options. You can control all objects this way giving you the ability to create some pretty cool (and sometimes crazy) effects. The tilemaps are no different and you could render any of the tiles using all the src/dst blending options of OpenGL.
All this, of course, is driven by the scripts, as in this demo. The tiles come with full-collision detection using an identical system as before which works extremely well and is very fast!
The whole tile-map can be dumped to a single file ready to be loaded back using a single script-command. You can swap the tiles on-the-fly by either setting the tiles usings the scripts or changing which datablocks are associated with them and you get an instant change. There are extensions to the C++ side of things to allow for the streaming of tiles from whatever source you want.
You get to choose what layers go where and how they're rendered. It can all be saved to disk for instant retrieval. The great thing here is that everything is script-driven and paves the way for an internal editor within the TGE. You can hook into popular formats such as those created by 'Mappy' or 'TileStudio' easily. An importer would read the files such as FMAPS and drive the configuration of the fxTileMap2D either by scripts or C++. You'll probably not want to do this on the fly but rather allow the fxTileMap2D to save the map in its native format but it's your choice.
Okay, here it is, bring the questions on.... :)
All the best,
- Melv.
Windows .WMV Movies
.WMV Movie #1
.WMV Movie #2 (Rotation)
.WMV Movie #3 (Blending Modes)
Animated LEDs with Checkers!
Different Layers, complete different tile-size support!
Layer Rotation with full-collision support; note the FPS!
Fully integrated with camera zoom system
Okay, I've been really quiet the last week or so and I guess you think I've been slacking-off. How wrong you'd be thinking that....
I've almost completed the tile-map functionality!
I've kept a link of all my previous plans on the how/what I was going to implement so I'm not going to go into lots of details about this work here. I know the art-work isn't that attractive but it's not supposed to be pretty because I'm not an artist but it is designed to thrash the tile-map to death!
To sum-up, you've got unlimited layers, each having an unlimited number of tiles and size. As you'll find in my previous post (see above), each tile can be either a static-image, animated-image, script-commands or active-tile (custom class for gun-turrets etc). All the layers are generated from a fxTileMap2D object and you can also have as many of these as you require as well!
Each layer that's created is a core-object which means that it has all the functionality that all the objects have such as rotation, physics, mounting etc.
A complete new feature is the ability to change any objects blending options. You can control all objects this way giving you the ability to create some pretty cool (and sometimes crazy) effects. The tilemaps are no different and you could render any of the tiles using all the src/dst blending options of OpenGL.
All this, of course, is driven by the scripts, as in this demo. The tiles come with full-collision detection using an identical system as before which works extremely well and is very fast!
The whole tile-map can be dumped to a single file ready to be loaded back using a single script-command. You can swap the tiles on-the-fly by either setting the tiles usings the scripts or changing which datablocks are associated with them and you get an instant change. There are extensions to the C++ side of things to allow for the streaming of tiles from whatever source you want.
You get to choose what layers go where and how they're rendered. It can all be saved to disk for instant retrieval. The great thing here is that everything is script-driven and paves the way for an internal editor within the TGE. You can hook into popular formats such as those created by 'Mappy' or 'TileStudio' easily. An importer would read the files such as FMAPS and drive the configuration of the fxTileMap2D either by scripts or C++. You'll probably not want to do this on the fly but rather allow the fxTileMap2D to save the map in its native format but it's your choice.
Okay, here it is, bring the questions on.... :)
All the best,
- Melv.
Windows .WMV Movies
.WMV Movie #1
.WMV Movie #2 (Rotation)
.WMV Movie #3 (Blending Modes)
Animated LEDs with Checkers!
Different Layers, complete different tile-size support!
Layer Rotation with full-collision support; note the FPS!
Fully integrated with camera zoom system
About the author
Associate Melv May
- Melv.