Scorpion Engine

[earok]

No worries.

Checked in a fix - directly up is not really a valid direction for platformers, they're always facing either left or right even when moving up and down, so it probably confused it just setting a direct up speed (eg, it doesn't know if it's supposed to face left or right when it's commanded just to move up). Fix was just to add a line to set the looking direction to upleft.

[foleyjo]

Hi
Just started playing around with scorpion and impressed with how easy it is to use.
Just have a couple or questions.
Is it possible to change the zoom level of the camera so you can see more of the level?

I'm trying to create custom movement, I set to cpu move one direction and in the startup block I put to stop movement. Then I set up a conditional block which says if control1_x > 0 player movements right but nothing happens. What am I doing wrong?

[earok]

Welcome foleyjo!

There's not any ability to change the zoom level at the moment, such a thing would pretty hard to pull off. In future, it might be possible to do "Zerosphere" type zoom effects, but there's no support for that just yet.

I don't quite follow what you're attempting to do with custom movement, are you able to post some screenshots of what you're trying to do?

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Latest version (2022.3) has been soft launched. If there's no breaking bugs reported in the next day or two, I'll make it official and start work on major features for the next version.

https://github.com/earok/scorpion-editor-demos

[acidbottle]

Thanks earok, it was indeed quite a simple fix, though embarrassingly wouldn't have thought of that! Works like a charm

[Mixel]

Congrats on the soft launch this is another big update.

@foleyjo - the Amiga is very weak when it comes to things like zooming and effects like that. A pixel is a pixel, etc.. Depending on what effects you need in the game you may be able to set the screen to be wider than 256px though at least?

[foleyjo]

Thanks for the replies @earok and @mixel.

With the movement I mean you press a direction and the actor continues to move in that direction till it hits an obstacle or another direction has been pressed with only 4 directions available.
Basically simalar to the snake demo.
So I assume for the actor movement I select cpu move continuously in one direction rather than control - 8 direction or platform.

Then in the code block, after examining the code for the snake demo I thought I might need
1 if control1_x>0 then...
2 Set direction for Player to move_right
3 End condition

I know if I do Set direction for Player to move_right in the level startup code it works so I'm guessing my problem is with the if command either being wrong or not being triggered.


I figured out the movement after examining all the demos.
I have created a codeblock for checking which control was pressed and then setting the relevant movement, then in the actor I call the code using the timer expired.

With the zooming I think I might of asked the question wrong, I don't mean a zooming effect in the game I just mean in general can you have it so you see more of the level so you canhave single screen levels rather than scrolling ones.

Thanks again for the replies.

[griffon]

Originally Posted by foleyjo

Thanks for the replies @earok and @mixel.

With the movement I mean you press a direction and the actor continues to move in that direction till it hits an obstacle or another direction has been pressed with only 4 directions available.
Basically simalar to the snake demo.
So I assume for the actor movement I select cpu move continuously in one direction rather than control - 8 direction or platform.

Then in the code block, after examining the code for the snake demo I thought I might need
1 if control1_x>0 then...
2 Set direction for Player to move_right
3 End condition

I know if I do Set direction for Player to move_right in the level startup code it works so I'm guessing my problem is with the if command either being wrong or not being triggered.


I figured out the movement after examining all the demos.
I have created a codeblock for checking which control was pressed and then setting the relevant movement, then in the actor I call the code using the timer expired.

So you want to do a control movement where you keep going in one direction even if you set back the controller to neutral, kinda like pacman? Yeah, in that case the use of on Timer Expired is probably the easiest way to do it.

Originally Posted by foleyjo

With the zooming I think I might of asked the question wrong, I don't mean a zooming effect in the game I just mean in general can you have it so you see more of the level so you canhave single screen levels rather than scrolling ones.

I still am not sure what you mean with that... could you give an example of an already existing game that feature what you're talking about? Thanks!

[foleyjo]

Basically the demos I've looked at the view looks close to the player and the sprites are large .
I'm just wondering if you can have it so everything is similar in size to games like Benefactor and lemmings

[Mixel]

Originally Posted by foleyjo

Basically the demos I've looked at the view looks close to the player and the sprites are large .
I'm just wondering if you can have it so everything is similar in size to games like Benefactor and lemmings

You could definitely use tiny actors/sprites... *technically* the map has to be on a 16pixel grid but depending on your game and what sort of logic is involved, you build it from 8px tiles.. Though it really does depend on a lot of factors as to whether that'd work in game.


Benefactor seems pretty doable. I don't think you could make lemmings as I don't think you could have that many little guys on screen. And the destructable (pixel by pixel) scenery is outside of Scorpion's doability.

[gimbal]

Originally Posted by Mixel

And the destructable (pixel by pixel) scenery is outside of Scorpion's doability.

I heard someone shouting "hold my beer!" from somewhere in the distance.

[Mixel]

Originally Posted by gimbal

I heard someone shouting "hold my beer!" from somewhere in the distance.

Haha! In this case, I don't think so.. It has no ability to plot individual pixels. Only way i can imagine it working is if you premade all of the different destructable block patterns as blocks somehow, but all the lemmings would only be able to interact on a 16px grid then, so.. not much like lemmings.

[foleyjo]

I definitely wouldn't be making lemmings or benefactor. Those were just the 2 games with the art style that I thought best described it.
So the best way to get a smaller view is to go for smaller images. Makes sense.

I'm not actually making a game at the moment. Just at the learning stages and seeing what different techniques can be done. I am really impressed with how good Scorpion is.

[Mixel]

Aha, yes! I didn't mean literally, I meant, "a game like", hehe. I have some enemies in CMO that are 5x3px size. It's worth looking for Duckstroma and Super Delivery boy, they both have small characters.. (Super Delivery Boy: Holiday shift is a single screen game too, like bubble bobble etc)

You could definitely make something like Alien Fish Finger too.

[griffon]

Ah, gotcha. Sure, a game with smaller guys is totally doable and actually probably can be faster/less memory hungry than the opposite. The only limit is making it visually appealing despite the small size

[earok]

Cheers foleyjo! Good luck with your Scorpion Engine projects!

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Forgot to mention, Scorpion Engine 2022.3 is out officially now. To recap:

* Custom splash screens for Patreon backers.
* Improved AGA support, including "GothicVania" triple parallax demo.
* One click export to Win/Mac (FS-UAE), AmiBerry/A500 mini, Workbench.
* Improved code and animation editing.

Update was sponsored by BitBeamCannon and our generous patreon backers.

Download: https://github.com/earok/scorpion-ed...ads/master.zip



First experimental build of 2022.4 will be tomorrow.

[earok]

First initial check in on experimental. Not much to report so far, basically just getting the new version up and running, the new licence keys up there, and one minor bug fix for Lemming880 (issue where running down slopes could cause the player to jump)

[flibble42]

@earok Has the idea of including an infinite scroll routine for horizontal/ vertical shooters ever been mentioned or something you have thought about?


I do have a reason for asking, i noticed when trying to setup the screen for Spy Hunter i could not get the full 256 pixel screen height, I guess as a side effect of your 8 way scrolling system (I did manually set YRES to 256 which gave the correct height but with nasty side effects).


I just figure that if someone wants to create a game that only ever scrolls in one direction and never goes backwards it could be a usefull feature (and maybe allow for a larger play area).


Interested in your thoughts, thanks.

[Samurai_Crow]

@flibble42
The algorithm for an infinite horizontal scroller is different from corkscrew wraparound but vertical should be simpler.

[flibble42]

I forgot about the Corkscrew

[acidbottle]

idea for the next earok stream .. using vertical sprite parallax

Did kinda get it working but had issues when moving left and right at the same time (play area larger than camera area)