Path: chuka.playstation.co.uk!news From: Robert Swan Newsgroups: scee.yaroze.freetalk.english Subject: Re: collaboration work? Date: Fri, 25 Sep 1998 13:51:51 +0100 Organization: I wish! Lines: 56 Message-ID: <360B91E7.757B@mdx.ac.uk> References: <360B5147.2358@mdx.ac.uk> <1dfwxzf.1lgwp9lxu5h3uN@th-pm07-37.ndirect.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: nova.mdx.ac.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.01 (X11; I; SunOS 5.5 sun4u) Paul Harvey wrote: > Then, you talked about bezier curves as 'the way forward'. Well, I know > what a bezier curve is (use them everyday at work with vector drawing > packages etc), but how on earth would you create a track using them? > > It's just a thought, and i know I would be really grateful for someone > to share how various concepts can be coded. Heck, I'd even PAY for this > kind of knowledge!! (wanna make some money?!) > Typical tasks include creating a static background for a game (using two > srites is a method I believe). What about scrolling backgrounds (a la > Zelda on SNES). There's loadsa things like this that could go into a > "Games Programmer's Almanac". Its cool, I do remember you, and hi btw. In regards bezier curves for a track, I dont want people to laugh at me saying 'bezier curves' are the way forward. The best results come from hundreds of custom built models for the track using lots of graphic artists. In yaroze terms though noone here has time/resources for that, so a simple way of creating the track (but still looking cool) is required. Race game 1 was made up of seperate pieces of track, but was limited to 90 degree corners. Using dynamic tmds allowed me to have smoother curves in race game 2, but if you look at one of the files, I had to specify all the track pieces and course explicitly. using bezier curves gives simple editing and mathematically correct models (even in race game 2 I guess a bit, eg end of track != start of track). The best (only?) example so far is by Lars Barstad who did the cool rollercoaster demo (see 'top ten games' or his web page). it shows that with a simple set of calculations you get the most realistic and smooth track yet seen. What Im learning from the yaroze is how to prepare the programming to allow easy, fast, effective and adaptable code. Which is what we all aim for. (i think) As for making money, its what allegedly Ive been doing so far. Static backgrounds have been covered a few times. main methods are 1) Using loadimage to transfer a 32k colour image to the video ram, or 2) using 2 sprites (each max size of 256x256) for other colour depths. This is covered elsewhere but I can help you if you need it. Scrolling backgrounds can be done by using the bgmap command, but funnily enough, writing your own sprite routines to draw lots of tiles on screen can be effective and allows greater semitransparency control. See shooting game on my downloads, which has three layers of scrolling. One using bgmap the others not. Best place to go is to see James Shaugnessys page, as it has a few programs + demos to do with scrolling. I still havent check out all of George bains demos but I would be surprised if there isnt a scrolling demo there. I cant help too much until after I return from holiday, but one thing that is really rewarding is helping people past problems, be it ideas, code or yaroze specific stuff. If people post up here with their problems then maybe we can encourage the happy sharing helping community which has been dissappearing of late. Not that it hasnt been entertaining :) Rob