Weekly Update #1

We decided to pop out a weekly update on each Sunday. There will be weeks where we don’t have much to tell but at least you know we still alive!

Map System

For maps we use the impact.js 2D Map Editor Weltmeister.
The editor is awesome, but the type of the map (e.g. a collision map, background map) was specified via the name of the map, which is kinda hacked.
We rewrote the map system to store the actual type of the map. Now layers have different types like collision, entities etc:
mapeditor

You can see the basic UI from the weltmeister editor (and also the first map of the Tech Demo!). In the top right you can see the layer menu with the little icons next to them indicating the type of the map. Each type has its own menu (compared to the global layer menu we used previously) which makes it easier for us to create maps and work with them.

There is also a new terrain editor where we can set IDs for each tile on a tileset. The main reason for this was to implement steps sounds based on the terrain, but we might use it for other things as well:
terraineditor

Gamepad

We started integrating gamepad support! Currently only for Chrome but at least Firefox should follow fast since they ship the feature in the nightlies already. The other browser hopefully follow so no matter which browser you are on, you can play the game with your gamepad! Sadly not all pads are supported (devices with X-Input work farily well while testing with a Logitech F310).
We will use the left stick for moving and the right one for aiming. Shooting balls can be executed via the right shoulder button.

5 Comments

  • Oh yes, GamePad Support! I tried that also in my game, still a must have for action packed gameplay in my opinion :)

  • Did you code the ‘new terrain editor’ from scratch? What was the process behind it?

    • The terrain editor reuses parts of the weltmeister code base, so it’s not entirely from scratch. The editor is also fairly simple compared to weltmeister. Before creating the terrain editor, we restructured weltmeister by separating general purpose code (e.g. evented-input.js) from code specific to a map editor (e.g. edit-entities.js), then we created the terrain editor using the general purpose code of weltmeister.

  • Your custom level editor looks like a great conceptual improvement. Could you guys share that on Github?

    • The editor is part of the impact.js engine and called “weltmeister”. Since impact.js is not free the editor is not free to (even if we changed a lot to make it work for us).
      So sadly we can’t share this, but you could have a look at the impact.js engine :)

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