Game Development

Almo

12:08 AM

HAY

OSX RL started working properlyu

@jon

Free Internet Points

1:04 AM

2

Q: Unity Asset Store Tools Problem

So I downloaded Asset Store Tools in the Unity Asset Store. When I upload my asset to my package, I get this popup: Wrong project path The path selected must be inside the currently active project. Note that the AssetStoreTools folder is removed automatically before the package enters the ...

Stack Exchange

2:09 AM

0

Q: Edit an old closed question vs. create a new question

I came across this question as a suggested question from SE: What are the basic game activities? It's been closed as off-topic, though I would expect that the core question of "what are the basic activities we can provide in games?" as a very important and relevant question for Game Design. Th...

discussion

MickLH

7:16 AM

@jgallant sploid.gizmodo.com/…

jgallant

9:03 AM

@micklh I wouldn't call it smart but it is cool

Leggy7

@ChrisMcFarland I didnt forget about you. I'm almost done with your translation. just a 200 lines left

jgallant

9:36 AM

Mama Mia thatsa spicy tranlatiob

user92578

10:51 AM

why'd you change your name @jgallant???

jgallant

Too many jons

Leggy7

11:21 AM

you pussy

you should have had other to change their names

you are THE jon

user92578

^

Leggy7

@Tyyppi_77, can't remember if I already asked you.. why 77?

user92578

no idea, just looks cool

Leggy7

approved.

<-- same for 7 :)

user92578

:P

Alexandre Vaillancourt

11:27 AM

That guy sure likes to write!

1

A: Edit an old closed question vs. create a new question

In context of the exact question you refer to, I would personally vote for neither. That said, your best course of action is to edit the original question, and let others decide whether it should be reopened. Ultimately, if you wish to make your case for reopening the question, you must do bette...

And good morning :)

user92578

yeah he does :P morning!

user92578

I got the preliminary results for my Swedish final today, and I did really well

user92578

just on the edge between the best and the second best grade though, so I'll have to wait 'till the final scores until I find out the grade I got

Alexandre Vaillancourt

Nice!

user92578

yeah I'm super happy, partly because now mom won't be asking about the scores daily

Alexandre Vaillancourt

11:32 AM

Haha mom worries :P

user92578

:)

Alexandre Vaillancourt

It's expected; parents want the best for their children.. well most of them... :P

user92578

11:59 AM

user92578

So today I've been writing a cutscene script for the introduction to bomb levels

user92578

I might have to think about changing the bomb mechanics to "defuse" instead of "shoot"

jgallant

Nice.

user92578

As I feel like shooting a bomb to not make it explode might be a little weird

5

jgallant

Solution. Shoot with water gun or water balloon

Alexandre Vaillancourt

12:06 PM

Throw a kamikaze over it to absorb the impact!

Or a cow to get an instant cooked steak!

user92578

yeaaaaah... I think I might just go with "Press X to defuse"

jgallant

Well that is pretty boring. Instead give player a cell phone and he can call the bomb squad. They come in and quarantine the area, then safely detonate the bomb allowing you to continue

user92578

haha lol

user92578

like a 30 minute cutscene of them setting up the fences and stuff

jgallant

Unskippable.

user92578

12:12 PM

obviously

jgallant

Then have a second bomb right after

user92578

yeah I mean I will make I think five levels with the bomb now

jgallant

Then Albert Einstein shows up and says "you use my science wrong! Then does some crazy gravitational wave manipulation and the bomb just disintegrates into its most basic elements

user92578

and then the game changes to a physics puzzler

user92578

I just had this original idea of maybe like these shapes, in different colours with eyes

jgallant

12:15 PM

I sincerely think that is the true underlying game you are making

Alexandre Vaillancourt

@Tyyppi_77 :P

user92578

watermelon hotdog — jgallant 2 hours ago

Bálint

12:30 PM

@Tyyppi_77 What does that mean BTW?

DH.

Nothing probably

You can't expect everything that Jon says to make sense, really

13

Bálint

@DH. True

Almo

@jgallant kotaku.com/…

@Tyyppi_77 really subtle english bit here "to not make it explode" sounds like "i have to shoot it or i will make it explode. while "to make it not explode" sounds like "i have to shoot it to prevent it from exploding

officially, "not" shouldn't go between "to" and "make" as that's a "split infinitive" but people are pretty well divided about whether or not that matters. :)

user92578

oh, aight, thanks

Almo

few people would notice or care, but I know you're pretty picky about your use of english

ok gotta head to werk talk later :)

user92578

12:51 PM

wtf I have an extra key in tallowmere

DH.

Maybe you didn't open a shop

jgallant

Unlock lady tallowmeres heart with it

user92578

oh yeah, maybe I just missed a shop

user92578

good point

Chris McFarland

1:10 PM

@Leggy7 Cool thanks, sounds like you're ripping through it!

Bálint

I probably made my silliest bit of code last night

(new Function(
    "var f = " + str + "['" + func + "'];" +
    str + "['" + func + "'] = new Function(" +
    "'var func = ' + f + ';' +" +
    "'var callback = " + (callback + "").replace(/\s/g, "").replace(/\'/g, "\"") + ";' +" +
    "'func.apply(undefined, arguments);' +" +
    "'callback.apply(undefined, arguments);'" +
    ");"
))();

Yes, this makes a new function out of the provided string, which makes a new function out of a string

user92578

I have a browser plugin that allows burning chat messages, just for this reason

Chris McFarland

@Bálint Fun and dangerous ;)

user92578

Chris McFarland

rofl

Bálint

1:26 PM

Why is it that no one answers trigonometry questions?

Lasse

ejsy

whoops

hands were misaligned on keyboard

I was supposed to type "what's the question?"

Bálint

I already answered it, but it was pretty much "if I have a bullet with an angle, how can I calculate it's velocity components"

@Lasse

Lasse

okay

Bálint

A lot of people asked on stackoverflow how he can listen to a native JS function, so I made a lib for it

Lasse

meh, js

Bálint

1:44 PM

@Lasse meh, unity

I agree

++

+++

the crap I have to go through every day because our project is using unity

sigh

Chris McFarland

I'm on day 4 of writing a network system on top of LiteNetLib... Going through the joy of letting the developer define their own messages with params of various Types, assembling the array of bytes as efficient as I can, and then parsing the bytes on the receiving end ._.

@Lasse hahahaha :)

Almo

1:51 PM

@Lasse Unity and Android together sucks.

Chris McFarland

If you think Unity and Android sucks

you should try Unity and Xbox One :|

Almo

oh shit

Alexandre Vaillancourt

@Almo Lunch today?

Almo

I was going to ask you the same thing

Alexandre Vaillancourt

All right, wanna go to that soup place in centre eaton?

Almo

1:56 PM

my friends keep wanting to go there. must be good ;)

sure that would be fine

Alexandre Vaillancourt

All right, what time?

Almo

meet at 12?

Alexandre Vaillancourt

In front of the A&W?

Almo

sure

Alexandre Vaillancourt

All right!

Lasse

2:11 PM

we've had less problems with android than we've had with ios

Almo

you guys are weird

we've spent probably 5x the time fucking with android

with marshmallow permissions, Adreno GPUs fucking things up in our shaders

Lasse

for example the game runs smoothly on android whereas on ios it lags as hell, all because we're trying to play two compressed sounds at once

Almo

iOS problem we had was the need for square POT textures for compression

are you in unity?

Lasse

yep

Almo

I don't have trouble playing multiple compressed sounds... that's weird

Lasse

2:13 PM

we have ipad4 and the game runs smooth on my less powerful android tablet

Almo

there's some other issue then

it shouldn't be doing that

Lasse

profiler says it's the sound and it runs good if we disable one of the two sounds

Almo

Cognizer performs fine on iPhone 4

and it plays background compressed audio plus sound effects that are compressed.

I wish I knew more about this to help

Chris McFarland

@Lasse do you have the DSP Buffer Size set to "Best latency"? Editor > Project Settings > Audio

find it helps reduce lag for me

Lasse

no idea, I'm not at the office now

user92578

2:17 PM

I have nothing but my own incompetency to blame for bad sound quality <3

DH.

See? That's why we use engines, we can blame someone else!

user92578

Yeah

user92578

On the other hand I can just open the AudioDevice.cpp file and check if I'm initializing the audio device poorly

Lasse

I don't want to blame the engine, which is why I am working on my own. Then I have nobody else to blame but myself

Chris McFarland

:D

Lasse

2:22 PM

"I don't want to blame the engine" can also be read as "I do not want to depend on unrealiable closed source software"

for example! Unity 5.4.0 broke backwards-compatibility with networking, but we had to move on to the version to fix other performance related issues and use our own network implementation

Chris McFarland

yup

Lasse

now the server does not need to depend on unity's networking to work, which is way more reliable

DH.

One can only hope that the 2D features in experimental don't break backwards compability, because I'm really interested in those although they won't come so soon

user92578

@Lasse just keep doing this, and bit by bit you won't soon need Unity anymore :P

user92578

"we had to upgrade for new profiler functionality, but that broke rendering, so we use our own rendering now"

Lasse

2:27 PM

yeah well I've already implemented custom colliders too since we have no use for the physics engine which you just can not turn off

user92578

"the new build fixes all the sound bugs, but breaks UI, so we now use our own UI"

user92578

and now you're already at custom networking, rendering and UI

user92578

yeah physics too :P

Lasse

also we don't use unity gameobjects any more that much, which helps with networking

so i guess what is left is the rendering part on the unity now

oh and the UI, we still haven't switched out of UGUI

Pichi Wuana

I have many scripts in my Unity video-game. Where should I save user/client's information (e.g. first name)? Moreover, I chose a random script but the problem is that I didn't succeed to access the information of that script from another script.

user92578

2:29 PM

Thoughts? gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/130706/… stackoverflow.com/questions/39770924/…

user92578

@PichiWuana I don't know Unity at all, but maybe an object at the top of the hierarchy?

user92578

Then there's always the singleton

DH.

Duplicated cross sites...

I have no idea how to deal with it

Pichi Wuana

@Tyyppi_77 You mean to create a class for the object?

user92578

Yeah

user92578

2:31 PM

class ClientInfo { public string FirstName; public string EmailAddress; }

Lasse

@PichiWuana you can use docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/PlayerPrefs.html

Also what exactly are you doing? I didn't quite understand.

user92578

But I guess that mouse direction dude is kinda asking a follow-up...

Pichi Wuana

I have a character that is composed of a camera and a box. The camera follows the box to where I move. So I have a script for the camera rotation and a script for the user movement (i.e. W A S D keys). I want that if I press the letter P the game stops. You can't move the camera or the box. So what I thought about is to put in one of the scripts the boolean and access that boolean from the other script.

Lasse

Ah I completely misunderstood

Pichi Wuana

The boolean to check if the game is paused or not so it knows if it can move or not

user92578

2:36 PM

Well that's very different from what you asked

Pichi Wuana

Oh sorry

Lasse

You can just set the boolean as static, like this:
class pausescript : MonoBehaviour { public static bool GamePaused; }

then you can access it from anywhere by using pausescript.GamePaused

you can set it to true or false, and then in the movement script check if it's true and not move

Pichi Wuana

Ooooooh so the important part is static!

Alexandre Vaillancourt

@Tyyppi_77 @DH flag for moderator attention stating that it's a cross post and add the link to the original post..

user92578

Yeah I just did that actually

Alexandre Vaillancourt

2:38 PM

That's the most appropriate thing to do :)

Pichi Wuana

I thought that the important reserved keyword is public. It allows me to access the object from anywhere because it is public for other classes.

Lasse

Yeah public makes it public but you need to know the reference to the object, static fields do not belong to any spesific object

user92578

^

Pichi Wuana

What do you mean by I need to know the reference to the object?

Lasse

NormalObject obj = new NormalObject();
obj.GamePaused = true; // Normal field access
StaticObject.GamePaused = true; // Static field access

user92578

2:41 PM

you don't need an instance if you use static

Almo

Make sure you've been on at least 3 dates with the reference.

user92578

ROFL

Lasse

then for all other scripts to use that spesific value of GamePaused on the NormalObject, you need to pass around the obj reference so everyone can use it to access the field

@PichiWuana Read this for instance objects: msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/x9afc042.aspx

Pichi Wuana

@Lasse What is in this case StaticObject?

Lasse

it's just normal class with static field GamePaused

Pichi Wuana

2:43 PM

Ooh

I learned OOP but it was always hard for me to understand the meaning of static

Even though I used it a lot

user92578

That doesn't sound very good

Lasse

yeah static stuff should be avoided, especially in unity it will cause problems

but a simple static boolean field does no harm

the problems arise when you set gameobject instances to static variables and forget they are around

I'd also avoid singletons in unity if at all possible

Pichi Wuana

So in one class I will write public static bool moving = true; and in the other class that I want to access public static bool moving = CameraRotation.moving? (My first class is CameraRotation).

Lasse

no you do not have to redeclare it in the other class

you just reference the original field by using TheFirstClass.moving

Pichi Wuana

oooooh

Lasse

2:48 PM

if( TheFirstClass.moving ) { Move(); }

Pichi Wuana

And If I write TheFirstClass.moving = !TheFirstClass.moving, will it also change the value?

user92578

Yup

Lasse

yeah that will swap it

Pichi Wuana

Oooh

Much more easy

user92578

please don't start abusing this though

user92578

2:49 PM

statics can be dangerous because they can be accessed anywhere

user92578

so even some remote piece of code that's only supposed to play audio, but you decided to patch a bug, can change the value

Lasse

well they still play well with namespaces and all, but yeah it's pretty high risk if the programmer is just using statics for the sake of it

using more statics will make your code spaghetti code and hard to debug and maintain

Pichi Wuana

You mean that I need to have a track of the static variables if I abuse it

Lasse

it's hard to follow what changes what variables and where when you are trying to read linear code that uses statics heavily

Pichi Wuana

Yeah I can understand that

Thank you for your help

Lasse

2:58 PM

No problem, you're welcome to ask for help any time :)

Pichi Wuana

If I want a name for a client/user

I shouldn't use static

user92578

Well that kinda depends

user92578

I personally would like to believe that not a lot of things need the client name

user92578

And so you could either provide the name to those things, either as a value or a component or something

user92578

Maybe an Unity user should just take the wheel?

user92578

3:03 PM

a Unity user?

Pichi Wuana

But if I do a multiplayer I need name, or at least username

user92578

yeah I didn't say anywhere that you won't need this

user92578

However if you do multiplayer, then static is definitely not the way to go

Pichi Wuana

That's what I assumed

user92578

That's actually in general one of the good reasons to avoid static

user92578

3:07 PM

"What if one day I need more of these things?"

user92578

Also a good reason to avoid the Player player; thing in the Level class

Pichi Wuana

You mean to use another name for the variable?

user92578

no

user92578

the point is that if you don't assume that there is only one played from the start, you'll have much easier time adding in local multiplayer

Almo

^

networking is really, really hard to add later

Pichi Wuana

3:16 PM

Oooh I understand what you mean

user92578

@Almo didn't really even talk about networking

user92578

just local coop

Lasse

It applies to both

Almo

^

user92578

but yeah networking later on, hard if not impossible

user92578

3:36 PM

thought about implementing a behaviour tree, decided that it was way OP for my game

Almo

Flying Spaghetti Monster?

I know :)

Lasse

3:51 PM

I shouldn't be on computer this evening it seems, too hasty to answer questions without properly reading them

I feel stupid now :D well whatever

Almo

hahah :)

Alexandre Vaillancourt

@Almo I'm there :p

Almo

@AlexandreVaillancourt you're where

outside?

probably, late response seems to indicate phone

Alexandre Vaillancourt

In front of the a&w!

Almo

ok be there very soonm

Alexandre Vaillancourt

3:57 PM

All right!

@ton.yeung the restaurant tha produces it, yes!

@ton.yeung Well it's a fast food chain :p

Bálint

0

Q: 2D Lighting From Sun

I have been developing a game for over a year now and I have successfully implemented the basic foundation for lighting, but there are still a few things I'm struggling with. The biggest issue right now is the lighting that should be cast from the "sun". The sun should technically light up any bl...

java 2d lighting

Another terraria/minecraft copy

user92578

so what? a game like that is a great way to learn various concepts

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 See, almost any game is good to learn some game developement concepts and techniques

It's fine, but some people thinks he can put it only without any problems

> I have been developing a game for over a year now

THat's not just learning

user92578

Damn right it is learning

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 I don't think I understand what this sentence means

user92578

4:12 PM

@Bálint "It is learning"

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 There's a difference between learning and starting a game without knowledge of how you can make it

user92578

@Bálint Umm, not really

user92578

Back when I was starting I was mainly just working on a large sandbox game, where nothing worked together, but I got small components/game features working on their own

user92578

Later came GunHero

user92578

I had no idea how to program a 2D platformer

user92578

4:14 PM

I've been learning as I go, day by day

user92578

And besides, I don't think knowing vaguely how to make something rules out learning

user92578

Like seriously?

user92578

4:30 PM

I think GunHero currently uses like 600MB of RAM, which to me feels like a lot. My content loading approach is extremely naive, and I need to change the soon. However, I'm really not sure what kind of figures I should aim for. Any input?

user92578

Does 200MB sound reasonable?

user4704

600MB doesn't seem that bad at all.

user4704

See if you can cut 200MB.

user4704

That's probably more achievable.

user92578

Oh, all right. My current approach however is incredibly primitive: I load all the PNG files I can find inside the Resource directory at startup.

user4704

4:33 PM

Regardless of whether or not they are referenced?

user92578

Yeah.

user4704

Do you actually reference them all?

user92578

Most likely not. Probably most of them, but not everyone.

user4704

If so that doesn't seem naive. If not it seems a few deletes would make an easy fix :D

user92578

Well I guess that's true :P

user92578

4:34 PM

So is this actually a viable approach?

user4704

Sure.

user92578

My main concern is actually the level thumbnails. Each one is 1920x1080, and there currently are ~50 of those, but at release I want to have atleast 125 levels.

user92578

I need to display all of them when the level selection menu is open, but keeping all that loaded all the time does seem a little unnecessary.

user92578

TBH I've always thought that most games use like reference counting or something similar.

user92578

Between levels is not an issue, since all the entity images and the tileset are already loaded.

user92578

4:38 PM

However I know that the current approach won't be sustainable at launch.

user92578

Mainly, yeah.

user92578

Loading levels has not been an issue

user92578

Well the thing is that most of the stuff in the levels, will be in all of the levels.

user92578

Tileset is one texture. Entities have their own textures, but there are a lot of entities that appear in all of the levels. Sure, I introduce some entities later in the game, or stop using some later in the game, but still, the base is all there.

user92578

So I guess a way to improve this would be to add some sort of timer for assets. Unload textures that haven't been requested in a long time.

user92578

4:42 PM

But that would also require reference counting the sprite instances.

Kevin van der Velden

The main thing seems to be the size of the thumbnails, why not load smaller (atlassed?) images for the thumbnails and then load the bigger ones as needed

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 Is Gunhero moddable?

user92578

@Bálint You can tweak the XML files for weapons, but that's pretty much it.

user92578

@KevinvanderVelden Hmm, this could work I guess.

user92578

I need to overhaul the thumbnail system anyways actually.

Bálint

4:43 PM

Do you use entity comoponent systems, and 8f yes, then wich type?

user92578

No.

user92578

I use a monolithic entity architecture.

user4704

Yes, and the type that makes sense.

Bálint

Is there any chance you add it? That would make it really moddable

Kevin van der Velden

@JoshPetrie not a fan of ECS? =p

user4704

4:44 PM

I like it fine.

Kevin van der Velden

@Bálint oh yes, just let him rewrite everything, no big deal

user92578

@Bálint These two aren't actually related at all.

user92578

And no, I won't.

user4704

I'm not a fan of the attempt to force everything into it or aggressively apply taxonomical classification.

Bálint

@KevinvanderVelden that's why I asked

user4704

4:45 PM

e.g., "how do I everything in my ECS?"

user92578

Please someone explain to me how components make modding easier?

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 They kind of are, at least for how I like to implement it

Kevin van der Velden

@Tyyppi_77 It makes some things easier to make data-driven

user4704

@Tyyppi_77 They are a way to factor out things (usually data or behavior) into isolated parts.

user4704

Making replacing those parts easier.

Kevin van der Velden

4:46 PM

And data-driven easily leads to moddable

Bálint

If you have a certain type of ECS, then the modders can write custom components like plugins

user4704

They do not, per se make modding easier.

user4704

Factoring out and data-driving things makes modding easier.

user92578

Oh, I see. But the modders would still need full access to my source code and have their complication setups set-up.

Kevin van der Velden

Not if you make it data driven

Bálint

4:47 PM

Then ECS done right makes modding easier

user4704

Components are one way to achieve that, and in particular a currently common approach due to the reaction to silly game developments making silly OO choices like extremely deep nested classes with obscene MI overuse, etc.

Kevin van der Velden

@Bálint No.

user92578

I'm a silly game developer making ~~extremely~~ quite deep nested classes.

user4704

I doubt anything you're doing fits into the same category of things I'm thinking of.

Kevin van der Velden

If you have it sufficiently data driven you can make it so that you can add, make an enemy that spawns entities. Those entities have no motion component and a suicide-bomber AI/abillity. Tada mine layer

Things like that can be done with datadriven ECS designs quite easily, but it requires a bunch of work to get to that point

user92578

4:48 PM

So basically defining entities in content files?

user4704

You already have a level editor. Between that and the ability to tweak the weapon data you probably have a sufficient modding platform and certainly shouldn't worry about it.

user4704

imo

Kevin van der Velden

@Tyyppi_77 that's the data-driven bit yeah =p

And the difference between data-driven and modable is not obfuscating the datafiles =p

user92578

Yeah I don't really care about modding :P And that's a great point, level editor is and will be enough. And if some script-kid wants to change the firerate to an insane number, and show their friends, that's cool too.

Bálint

@Tyyppi_77 My system allows you to make custom components, every comoponent has an id and the components can reference each ither based on their id-s. Also, by just using a simple text file you can create a new entity with custom components

user4704

4:50 PM

I expect the time will come when you start GunHero 2 or whatever you make on this codebase next where you'll realize you want to make a ton of sweeping changes to something but you'll have to write a bunch of code to do it.

user92578

Yeah there will be a time like that. I want GunHero 2 or whatever the next project to have networking.

user4704

At that point you should probably consider driving more stuff about your game object/entity system composable and data driven, because at that point you'll see real benefits.

user4704

This close to shipping it would be a Bad Idea.

user92578

Exactly.

user92578

So, we arrived at "take lower resolution thumbnails"?

user4704

4:52 PM

I think that's a good place to start.

user4704

Load low-res ones immediately.

Bálint

Gunhero 2: return of the broforce ripoff

user4704

Load high-res ones in the background.

Kevin van der Velden

@JoshPetrie And possibly the option to not do that

user92578

I actually need to try if I could move the image loading back to the loading thread.

user4704

4:53 PM

And/or dump them when you leave the level select screen.

user92578

Yeah I do want to probably try that too.

user4704

Basically if you think it's mainly the images for thumbnails that bloat memory usage, just focus on that

Bálint

How much time it is to load 1 thumbnail?

user92578

Again: loading times aren't an issue. It's the RAM footprint I'm concerned here about.

user92578

And then if I find out that something else is an issue, I'll focus on that, after the thumbnails.

user92578

4:54 PM

Oh, also, there is no reason for me to take thumbnails at 1920x1080

Bálint

I ask it because if not too much, then you could load it when you show the level select screen

user92578

I mean the game is essentially always 480x270, but with scaling.

Kevin van der Velden

I mean, they'd only be thumbnails on 4320p screens

DH.

If it's thumbnail you can probably cut that by half and still have a good thumbnail

Kevin van der Velden

Which don't yet exist

user92578

4:55 PM

So I could just take a screenshot at 480x270 from a render texture or something, and then scale the image.

Bálint

I just wanted to ask that if you have a pixel-art game, then why the hell do you need them to be that huge

user92578

Lightmaps, mainly.

user92578

Those are actually incredibly small textures that are rendered with interpolation.

user92578

So I'll either need to apply those to the thumbnails separately, at the rendering stage, or think about if they are even an issue.

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