Kain

Very interesting. Looks like everything I wanted back when I was spriting now if only I was still spriting. (also, arg, another GTK+ program. now I gotta go find the fix for my tablet again)

Spriting requires two things: a non anti-aliasing pencil tool and a sufficient zoom level (4x is good, but it's nice to have an 8x). Of course, layers, palette saving, animation viewing, color-preserving rough rotation, and duplicate viewing at different zooms are all nice things to have to speed things up and see the results quicker. I don't know of any program that have every one of the functions mentioned, though, but as long as it has the two main things.

But it took me forever to appreciate goal-oriented direction. I was finally starting to make a habit of looking for and going for what the designer intended instead of frustrating myself over all the lack of freedoms imposed by the directed design. And now you're telling me all that time, I was just losing my childhood? ;_;

A genuine palette change is impossible (without creating tons of extra sprites) since Game Maker uses bitmap-based images, not palette-based. However if you just want to create a color-adding effect, then it's not too hard. The following code draws a sprite and then draws a silhouette of that sprite in a certain color on top of it (with a certain alpha so that it still maintains some of it's old color). You do this in your character's draw event however you need to draw that character and make sure the arguments for both of them sync up (except for the alpha): draw_sprite_ext( sprite_index, image_index, x, y, image_xscale, image_yscale, image_angle, c_white, 1); draw_set_blend_mode(bm_add); d3d_set_fog(1, glow_color, 0, 0); draw_sprite_ext( sprite_index, image_index, x, y, image_xscale, image_yscale, image_angle, c_white, 0.9); d3d_set_fog(0, c_white, 0, 0); draw_set_blend_mode(bm_normal); Set glow color to be the color you want him to glow in (green, yellow, blue, something in between; it's easy to interpolate colors). Also, don't be afraid of that "d3d_"; Game Maker runs in Direct3D even while in 2D mode, so 3D functions work. This is just a little trick to draw in silhouette. To get the full Megaman Charge effect where his face isn't glowing, then you'll probably have to draw the face as a separate sprite. Alternately, you could just use image_blend, but that doesn't have additive effects (meaning you can only use it to darken, not to brighten).

Thing is lots of people work at IGN. You got good writers, bad writers, reasonable reviewers, shock reviewers, high-profile bloggers, and the dregs who they throw at games no one wants to play and where no one but a few die-hard, already-disenfranchised fans will care about the review. In particular, this guy follows a very rigid and cliche writing formula which is actually quite ironic considering the content.

The wavy fire effect really isn't any different from the wavy water effect. Just probably bigger wavelength and lower amplitude maybe less speed. Here's an old topic describing the wavy water effect: http://www.sonicfangameshq.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3646

Not if you'll grant me the same liberty. No, wait, I was two days late. I let you down... Thanks again. Got a bunch of clothes (which I needed) and a very belated Mario Kart Wii. And the new Futurama movie.

Ah! Too many birthday topics! All this for a little old lurker like me? ::checks post log:: Oh. I guess that's not so bad.

Ignition alone does not a catastrophic bushfire make. Look to policy change regarding the maintenance of bush (also weather control machines), not scapegoats. Granted there were a lot of less-than-controllable factors that came into play to create this scenario including worst drought in a century and record high temperatures and big winds (potentially influenced by climate change, maybe, who knows). And for clarity, there are over 30 separate fires under varying degrees of control and I believe there has only been an arsonist arrested for one (which caused some 30 or so deaths). No single person could have possibly ignited them all, much less fueled and spread them. It's not "murder on a grand scale", it's natural disaster exacerbated by human carelessness and a few sporadic accounts of malicious intent (which should be dealt with with due severity). But more important than who's at fault is what can be done for the future. You can't do too much to prevent eventual ignition, but there are numerous things you can attempt to do to control its source of fuel (the most common of which is initiating controlled burns, which is something the Australian government seems to have been quite reluctant to do).

Yea, that Shamwow spokesman, he's something else. Like a used car salesman, a medieval rat-faced mugger, a 19th century mob sycophant, and a carnie barker all rolled into one. Headphone set, spiked Mohawk, hunched-over neck. I have no idea how he pulls it off, but he does.

So does it do anything other than just propagate itself? Oh well, any excuse to run windowsupdate for the first time in nearly a year. Edit: Whoa. There's a service pack 3?

No matter how many times I try to convince myself that it's a good idea to listen to an important politician, political speeches are boring. Not because they're stuff I don't care about but because they take forever to say nothing. It also confuses me how commentators still manage maintain a sense of disbelief when he was elected two months ago. Did they expect his election to be overturned by now? Too much pomp and circumstance and too much reverence for my taste. Anyway, the posturing in this topic is a little dense, so I don't want to spend too much time in it. One last comment, though. Sure Obama has none of the traditional American black character or background, but the color of his skin would have prevented him from running for any governmental office not that long ago. And the fact that we don't see it as a big deal is evidence of the growth and success (albeit inevitable) of past movements; as the extreme bigots of past days die out to the new generation's ignorance. But Obama is still a straight male Christian with a white mother and no historical ties to American slavery. It's not like prejudice is dead, just certain levels of bigotry. And they didn't die because we elected Obama, but vice versa.

Try setting Spring to 0 when you land. Just a "if( on_ground) Spring = 0;" in the Step Event or something will do.

Third one fits the skin best, but it's a little diffused for my taste, so I say Type 1.

Sure enough, it's a timing issue, but it's a little more complicated than I thought. If you create a 100% duplicate object, objPlayer2, then you will see that the error occurs in this object as well. This happens because the Step events are performed in the order of their object ID (i.e. the first object ever created will perform all its step code first; note: I do mean object, not instance). Messed up, I know. You could quick-fix this by duplicating objScrewBolt, deleting the old one and using the new one, but that's not recommended since then you'd have to do that (including placing re-placing the objects on their respective maps) every time you added a new character. A more permanent solution eludes me. If I get rid of the code "scrPlayerHandleObjectsMovingPlatform();" from the Step Event and put it in the Begin Step Event, it works for objSonic (and all objects created after objScrewBolt), but doesn't work for objPlayer (and all objects created before). If I did this and then got rid of objPlayer, replacing it with a duplicate (which can have the same name after you get rid of the old one), it will permanently fix the problem objScrewBolt, but if you add any other moving platform objects, you will have to repeat the process of deleting all the old Player objects and replacing them with duplicates (not in that order, of course). Regrettably, that's the best solution I can come up with without intensely studying the specifics of this engine. Edit: Another thing that worries me is that I wonder if it only works because the object moves in a relatively fixed speed and direction. Come to think of it, I never got Pendulum-swinging platforms to work perfectly in my game for this very reason.

Phooey. I hate being graduated.

Using the tile_layer_hide( depth) and tile_layer_show( depth) functions along with the instance instance_deactivate_object( obj) and instance_activate_object(obj) functions, it's very simple to switch between time zones (you'd just have four or six layers of tiles and objects: foreground and background for each of past, present, future, etc). The hard part is designing a level with multiple time zones. Game Maker's level editor is not designed for making multi-layered levels. That's one of Game Maker's level editor's many falling points.

My abysmal IMAGINATION prevents me from understanding that diagram. Do you mean those things on the Cyberwhatsit level of SAdv 2 that move when you land on them (with you locked in place on top of them until you jump or it stops, at which point your momentum is maintained)?

I could be wrong, but this looks much more like a timing problem than a collision problem (which means it should be pretty hard to fix), though I'm somewhat confused with why it works with objParent if it doesn't work with objSonic. Usually something like this happens whenever Sonic and the gimmick he's on preform their code at different times and thus the Draw Event happens in between the time the Gimmick moves and the time Sonic moves in response to the gimmick. What engine are you using? How do the parents work (i.e. does objSonic ever call "event_inherited()" or is the code just copy-pasted, with perhaps a bit of change)? Also, you can try drawing the objParent mask sprite with objSonic using just the simple draw_sprite command and seeing if the problem is, indeed, with position or it is with animation. Edit: whoops, I missed the part where you said you were using the X-Mas engine. I'll check it out and see if I come up with something. Edit2: OK, looking at the Sonic Dash engine at aerogp.ae.funpic.org, it only has the objPlayer object and does not have the Sonic object, thus I'm limited in what I can look at. However, I'm pretty sure it is a difference in timing between objPlayer and objSonic which is causing the problem. If you are not using event_inherited, but instead have copy-pasted the code from objPlayer into objSonic, then make sure you have copied it in the exact order it was from the objPlayer object. You might even consider using event_inherited unless you absolutely need to put code in the middle of the objPlayer code. If you are using event_inherited or do not have any code in the Step event for the objSonic object, then look in objSonic for code that is not in objPlayer which might change Sonic's position.

Sonic Edge Wobbles happen when he's on the edge, thus you're looking for a lack of collision. if (hsp == 0 && collision_sensor_right_line( x, y, angle, obj_walls ) == false && ground == true) { animation=19; } if (hsp == 0 && collision_sensor_left_line( x, y, angle, obj_walls ) == false && ground == true) { animation=19; } Or you could try Sponick's method and put it in the End Step event (or really anywhere in a step event) rather than the Draw event. The reason Sonic disappears (I'm guessing) is because you use the default drawing functionality, and putting code in the Draw event disables that functionality.

Beta works great. No need to download the new version. I use Chrome so I don't have to update. Also because it crashes well and generally doesn't take crap down with it.

As a kid, I had a neighbor for a year who had a Genesis (myself being a Nintendo kid) which I went over and played a few times. Nothing stands a chance against the powers of nostalgia laced with a dash of scarcity. My fondest memories lie with ToeJam & Earl.

Now I'm not a stickler on technical accuracy of various conversion movies, and I actually would prefer that they not sacrifice too much for faithfulness to the imagery and plot devices. I didn't see too much in this trailer that is either particularly absurd or particularly great. But why the heck is everyone talking so softly in the trailer? Of course, it's fate is already written. It'll be another watered-down nostalgia flick that caters to neither the hardcore fans nor to people unfamiliar with the franchise, but instead hits an awkward middle probably prompted simultaneously by their fear that it won't reach a big enough audience no matter how much they pump into it and by their desire to make a relatively-effortless profit. Plot will be utterly bland, production value will be decent, acting and writing will be mediocre.

I open source 'cause I'm not going to end up doing anything with my engines, so maybe someone else can learn something from them. Plus like Dami, I learned a lot about engine methods and such from open source engines and love seeing different methods of doing things.

Dude looks like a lady. Happy Birthday, Dude Woman.