Well here we are at the end of another month. I'm glad to say that it was a productive month indeed. I fixed more leaks than a plumber, more issues and a magazine, and more glitches than a B movie. So many new things to talk about.
New Collision Setup
Slope Walking
Re-purposed Beach Balls
Timed Switches
Shootable Switches
More Responsive Running
New Temple Graphics
The collision in the past was handled by setting the tiles themselves to have the physical properties. Since the game has many layers of tiles, Stencyl has no idea how to order the colission bounds properly, nor if they are in any sort of order could I figure out how it worked in the hierarchy. I created an invisible layer that holds all of the collision data using simple orange blocks. This frees up the graphics to be anything, and the player will always have reliable and smooth physics versus the walls and slopes.In addition to that, because of the physics, the player could never have enough walking or running force to walk up a 45 degree slope you see in classic platformers. Thanks to some simple modification, the player can now do that easily, freeing up more of the motion, and not having to bunny-hop up the sharp inclines.
Beach balls have been in SMJ since the first night it was conceived. They have sat on the sidelines for quite some times, several months actually. However, they have been re-purposed to serve as a spring bouncy object that can throw the player high into the air. They can also be rolled around as you push them.
Something that is planned to be done in the near future is Timed Switches. Enough said with that. I hope to put more modern spin on how they are used and all that. Same with shootable switches.I have cleaned up the running a lot. The run key when it is press and held, the player runs immediately. There is not charge up to the run like in Super Mario. There's no need for the charge up stuff because there are no advantages to needing it. No super capes or anything. It's smoother now and responds better when in a tight situation that involves lots of dodging.
Last but certainly not least, new graphics for the field temple area. Since its the first major area of the game that has a lot of opposition and exposes the story so much more, I figured I'd dress it up compared to the previous graphics that simply did not do it that much justice.
On top of all of that, I ran what I had to the end of the playable areas. When I checked back on the timer in the status screen, it read 19 minutes, and that is not including the extent of the demo, the mini games, or reading any of the story elements or dialog. It's going to be a long demo with lots to do and check out. I do have a set location I want things to end in the demo, and I want everything before that to be perfect. Also, all content in the demo is subject to change and whats in the demo may change when the game is released.
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