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Message: 4778

Author: andrewbroad

Date: 24/04/2005

Subject: Re: God Bless JSW and its pixel-oriented collision detection!

 

Alexandra wrote:

I mean, in a lot of games and engines, you create screens where you
must "not go near" the enemies because they will "zap" you. In JSW
you can make screens where you must "weave in and out of" the
enemies, taking into account even which frame they're displaying.

Yes indeed. I love MM/JSW for their precision: you know exactly
where you stand - literally!

For example, I discovered Miniclip.com this year - a great source of
free PC games which can be played online or downloaded (Roll On
being particularly addictive - a modern equivalent of Marble Madness,
but in freescape rather than isometric 3D).

But the platform-games that I have downloaded from Miniclip.com are
woefully imprecise. In Red Beard, for example, and in the Manic-
Mineresque _Panik in Chocoland_, you slide along the platforms in a
most inelegant manner, making it difficult to time jumps that need
precision, while Cable Capers is actually inconsistent in how far
over the edge of a platform you have to be standing before you fall
off.

(And don't get me started on the martial-arts games, which are simply
a test of how fast you can keep pressing keys, rather than a
flairsome test of genuine fighting-prowess as in the Spectrum's
Renegade trilogy.)

The four Miniclip games I mentioned above have one thing in common:
you can control the player's non-vertical motion during a jump or
fall - which is sometimes a blessing, sometimes an annoyance. I
might consider patching the JSW-engine to do likewise, once I have
the time to make a proper start on Afrikaan (which will be July at
the earliest, if my non-MM/JSW commitments turn out as expected).

It also makes the engine very flexible in terms of changing the
player's character. The PDG is very good but the collision is
always in a 16x16 block. Not so very useful if you like creating
dainty characters as I do.

Kari Krišníková is dainty enough even to walk through ropes and
arrows sometimes! :-)

--
Dr. Andrew Broad
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/spectrum/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/spectrum/willy/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/spectrum/download/

 

 

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