Omnimaga
Calculator Community => Other Calc-Related Projects and Ideas => TI Z80 => Topic started by: {AP} on November 20, 2009, 11:47:41 pm
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Requires Celtic III/xLIB...
Well, I started working on this months ago and only just now decided to get it running and pretty.
The program is simple, good looking, small, and fairly user-friendly.
All you need to have is a picture containing your sprites and nothing important on matrix A.
From there, pick the picture number, the sprite you want to start with being tiled (or the background sprite), and the width/height.
All sizes supported but only 8x8 sprites can be used.
Also, what I love about this program, is the Quick-Sprite Slots feature. F1-F5 will call stored sprites that you store using 1-5.
So you can easily switch to often used sprites quickly.
Added: Preview map mode, rectangle area filling, and replacing tiles with the background sprite effectively 'deleting' them.
Newly Added: Pen tool. Ability to edit maps.
Controls:
Arrows - Movement
2nd - Place current sprite
Alpha - Next sprite
Math - Previous sprite
1-5 - Store the current sprite to a Quick Sprite Slot
F1-F5 - Recall stored sprites
Del - Replaces current tile with the background one.
Mode - Preview map. Arrows scroll the map. Press Mode again to go back to edit.
X,T,(Theta),n - Rectangle tile filling. Arrows to select the area you fill. 2nd to place the tiles in that area.
Stat - Pen tool. Adds the current sprite to the map as you move. Press Stat again to exit Pen tool.
Clear - Exit program, saving the map to matrix A.
Planned features:
- Way to easily display which sprites are stored to which slot without hitting the button.
- A real menu. (or at least a real start-up screen)
- May Happen: Conversion of map/sprites to hex.
Screenie:
Newest one attached below.
This will show these features in order: New pic selection, Rectangle Filling, Pen Tool, Preview Mode, Saving, Editing a map, small map support, delete key.
OLD:
(http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/4866/mapmaker.gif)
A lot slower than it was on-calc. Might be the 40 programs I have running.
Download:
IMPORTANT: Read the readme.txt, okay? It will save you a bit of grief.
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Nice AP. Very useful and intuitive interface and those quick slots seem pretty nice.
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Looking good! Hmm, that tops my map editor that I use for TBP development easily! I like the quick slots too. The conversion process should be an easy add, are you going to support binstrings if you do add it?
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Yeah, I already have a converter for sprites to hex, just need to do it on a bigger scale.
As for the binstrings... um... no clue what that is. ^^;
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It's for Celtic III, it's stringtile command uses them instead of matrices for tilemaps. It's basically the compressed form of hex numbers. I use it for my maps in TBP.
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Wow, looks very nice. I like the F1-F5 part.
I think Eeems is refering to the "CELTIC III PICARC EXTENDED COMMAND SET" that uses the identity() token.
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With all these map-makers being released, perhaps i should release my Serenity map maker/editor :D
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Yes it is the identity( command set.
@builderboy: you should!
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Yay glad you finally released a demo!
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Not just any demo... a fully functional demo. =D
Everything works great, I just want to have more features soon.
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Oh cool ^^
I made about 5 map editors back in the days, but they were always for personal use and extremly crappy. Very buggy too. When I finished a project I usually just cleared my RAM after backing up the project and uploading on download sites and forgot to backup the editor, so everytime I started a project I had to make a new one x.x
That was, of course, after Spellshaper and Lolje released Draw N Map, which was pretty cool, but unfortunately very large to work with when making a game using loads of RAM, plus it didn't show the entire map at once on screen (only shown 12x7) so it was very misleading when you edited maps. On top of that it didn't have rectangle area filling like the old map editor i had.
Btw you can add it to download section if you want.
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Yeah, but there's really no way to fix the "can't see whole map at once" problem on the calc. You have given me an idea for a new feature though.
I'll get to throwing it in soon. In fact, I'll work on it now.
So, maybe after I get some more work done on this program today I'll throw it in the download section.
(EDIT: Also, mind explaining how the rectangle filling code worked? I can add it into this program if you want.)
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Yeah but still, I mean, the map was 12x8, yet the calc, which can display an entire 12x8 map at once, would only display 12x7 because of the small menu at bottom. So often I had to restart maps from scratch cuz I accidentally put everything one row off and editing the data manually was a pain
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Noting that my map box is 7x7, I'm throwing in a button to preview the map at full size.
Although, I help a good deal with the map coordinates at the top already.
/me goes back to work.
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Aaah sounds cool ^^
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Just finished the map preview function.
Works perfectly for all size maps.
On to the next feature.
(Also, I just set-up the Delete key to automatically change the tile you're on to whatever you set the background tile to.
Which effectively gives you 6 quick slots. Plus I made the program a bit faster by moving things around.)
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this is very nice. Hopefully it should make it quicker to create maps ^^
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Here's a screenie of the new features.
Rectangle area filling and [DEL] to change back to background tile.
(http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/6721/mapmaker2.gif)
(Any slowness is because I'm clicking the arrows and DEL repeatedly.)
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That looks incredibly professional. Very useful.
Great job! Keep up the good work.
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Haha, thanks much for the compliments. ^^
It's this much attention to detail that makes me take FOREVER to release anything. =P
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Ooh nice! It looks cleaner than what I had. There was no border around the cursor for me, it was just a filled square xoring the tile, and it did not even show what tile I was using. Also, your rectangle filling seems faster than mine in overall. Keep up the good work :)
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It looks awesome {AP}, great work! ;D
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Then comes Nyaar II!
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Edited first post to contain the updated program and information.
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Way to easily display which sprites are stored to which slot without hitting the button.
yeah i would kinda like this, else when we forget it becomes trial and error when editing maps x.x
I also like the hex conversion idea
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It's still not that bad actually. Since pressing the F1-5 buttons only changes what sprite you're trying to place instead of actually placing the tile. So, if you just press each button quickly you'll see which is which.
But yeah, I'll throw in that feature still because it'll be more convenient.
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Oh wait yeah yours shows the sprite as you move the cursor x.x, my bad
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Okay, with my computer down, I had some time to get this baby pretty much finished.
Here's what I got now.
This will show these features in order: New pic selection, Rectangle Filling, Pen Tool, Preview Mode, Saving, Editing a map, small map support, delete key.
(http://www.omnimaga.org/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=1215.0;attach=405;image)
The new download is on the first post.
Please, read the readme. It'll help a LOT. At least the General Information section if nothing else.
All that's left is to get someone to design a new menu for this thing. (a pic, no code)
I'm too lazy to do it myself. Once that's done, I can officially get the program in the Download Section.
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(I kind of expected some more progress on something of yours (for calc) ^^)
(I am disappointed Nyaar II is not out yet, though... j/k lol)
It looks nice. Suggestion, though: when you release, you should use a generic name like Omnimaga xLIB Map Maker and I think everyone else here should do, except replace xLIB with ASCII, dual layer, Celtic III depending of their tilemapper compatibilities, that way, it will not get confusing for members to know which are the new tilemappers that got released almost all at once as alternative to the old ones.
Also I don't think a fancy graphical menu is really necessary. Altough it would look more professional, I think it would be better to keep the editor as small as possible, since it should be designed so people won,t need to archive/unarchive everything everytime they need to debug a map x.x
You could always make a Full and Lite edition, though.
Either way keep up the good work :)
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Point taken. I may skip the menu.
Right now, it's sitting at 2128 bytes for the main program, 667 bytes added when you pick to edit a map then it's back to archive by the time you start actually editing the map. Which leaves everything else to the size of the maps themselves.
Which is plenty of space to hold 12x8 maps in all your matrices easily. Of course, that's on 84+SE.
Also, forgot to mention that I added a pen tool (which places the sprites automatically as you move the cursor) as well as the ability to edit maps finally. Plus some tweaks to speed and such.
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Nice :D, not too big
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Hey this looks really nice! Good job! =)
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Nice! I like the size.
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I forgot to add this to downloads section x.x
I was supposed to do so ages ago but forgot as I had a lot going on...
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I like it! You mind if I add it to my existing editor?
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you would need to ask {AP} via private message. If he accepts, I guess it will be the generic rule about giving credits
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No problem at all~
As Omni said, just throw in credit somewhere and I'm completely okay with it.
I'd definitely like people to make use of my (few) programs. =)
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As Omni said, just throw in credit somewhere and I'm completely okay with it.
Thanks! I didn't intend on publishing it, its just that I have my own personal sprite/map editor (who doesn't?) and I like your map portion better than mine. I was hoping to swap them.
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Ah, then of course. No problem at all. =)
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ktkx
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Well, I felt like coding and SirCmpwn and Omni posting in this topic reminded me of this project so... I decided to cross a planned feature off my list.
Planned features:
Way to easily display which sprites are stored to which slot without hitting the button.
- A real menu. (or at least a real start-up screen)
- May Happen: Conversion of map/sprites to hex.
However, I didn't just add that, I also included an unplanned feature.
I was working with the regular Pen tool for drawing of the graph screen and I noticed that sometimes I'll forget whether I'm drawing with it or not which sometimes makes me draw lines through parts of the pic and haveto go back and fix it. I wished there was some sort of indicator of whether the Pen tool was on or not. Unfortunately, I couldn't fix that problem for the regular pen tool, but it gave me an idea for the pen tool in this map maker. So, now, there's an indicator on the left-bottom side of the screen that says "PEN" if pen tool is on, and nothing if it's off.
Oh, and here's a screenie. (Not animated since you've all seen what it can do already.)
(http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/2513/mapmakr2.png)
So, now we have the pen indicator and the visual Quick Slots.
I've attached a new full package because I ended up fixing some bugs along the way.
If anyone sees anything else, just let me know.
(DJ, don't update the file in downloads section until this one has been tested and fixed up a bit more. Thanks. ;P )
EDIT: Okay, re-fixed some bugs and included Nyaar's spritesheet for anyone to use. =)
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wow glad to see an update :D
happy you still do some calc stuff too, and I like the new features btw ^^
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Thanks!
Told ya that I'm not quitting calc stuff, I just needed to get some ideas and to be in the mood.
I'm also still working on that secret project from earlier, just not a whole lot since I lost the notes I spent hours on when my computer Blue Screen of Death'd a while ago. It's my fault though. I didn't save once in that whole time. =(
Anyway, I still plan on finishing this program up completely at some point but it's definitely in better than working condition.
(On that note, I have an idea for a CIII only version of this that will make a program with the map and movement code all done that you can work off of. Might be useful for someone. =P
Of course, there's still other things that need to be done and I'll work on that first.)
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aaah sounds cool :)
It might be useful for those with the new calc OS that won't run xLIB, if your current program version has problems displaying with Celtic III (since xlib compatibility isn't perfect)
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Glad this was finally released :) God knows its difficult to try to type lots of maps by hand, especialy when you're making large maps with lots of tiles. Glad this utility is now open to the public :D
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Well, I have no idea how well this thing runs on xLIB right now. It's only tested in CIII but it only uses xLIB commands at the moment so I'd assume it runs fine on that too. The only difference I'm planning on is the CIII version will be able to make programs.
However, I may think of some others uses for the CIII only version but I'm also trying my best to make this take up as little space as possible so that it can handle large maps better. Personally, I wouldn't try anything above like 50x8 (which are the size of maps for Blockage) which is 400 tiles. Though, if you have nothing on the calc but the editor it should be able to handle even bigger maps no problem. (Although, I'm only assuming this for 84+SE since that's what I have.)
I'm going to have a look at the code some more though. I feel like I can speed it up some more but it may require some sub-programs or CIII commands.
Also, thanks Builderboy. Although I doubt it'll ever be helpful to you with the stuff you're coming out with, I know it'll help SOMEONE. (That is, if Axe doesn't kill CIII/xLIB completely. xP)
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mhmm program making that sounds cool. It would be cool to have a map maker that didnt required us to manually insert the data in programs all the time.
What I think is that the user could set up a range of programs, for example prgmMAP1 through 9. He would be able to dig maps from the code directly (the same way as most xLIB games) and when it's time to save, the map would be loaded back in the program. No need to exit and stuff
Also Axe will not kill xlib/celtic because it is not designed for games like RPGs. It has no subprograms support and the code size is much larger than the source, so you cannot make very large games in overall. The only occasion an Axe game will be smaller is if almost the entire code is sprite data. In Axe, a 8x8 sprite takes 18 bytes in source code format (1 byte for the starting "[" character, 16 bytes for the hex data and 1 byte for the linebreak). In compiled form, it only takes 8 bytes. Axe is meant more for arcade games, altough still freaking awesome considering you practically just take BASIC code and in some case, barely need to modify it to make it Axe compatible. In other words it's almost BASIC to ASM conversion.
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Hm... so you mean a program that just has the map typed out already?
Like, for example:
[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]And that's it?
(Just making sure I'm on the right page.)
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For example, a typical game from me has map data like this from prgmMAP0 to prgmMAP9:
If M=1
[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
If M=2
[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,5,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,0,1,1,0,1]]
If M=3
[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
If the map ID has no assigned map, it would simply display an empty map when trying to open it in your program. When saving, it would save the map at the corresponding ID. If the ID alerady exists, it would replace the corresponding map. If the ID doesn't exist, it would simply add it in the respective area. Deleting a map completly would delete the data and its ID. Idk how hard it would be to code, though...
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Hm, I get the "If M=1:[map data]:If M=2:[map data]" part of the programs but why is it separated between prgmMAP0-prgmMAP9?
Couldn't it all just be in one program if you do it like that?
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Because with hundreds of map it won't fit in RAM in one single prog
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Hm... any idea how many maps should be in each program?
Also, I think I can easily get rid of the "If M=1" stuff because with CIII you can just read the lines and you'd have to be using CIII for the editor to work anyway. So instead of:
:If M=1
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
:If M=2
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,5,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,0,1,1,0,1]]
:If M=3
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
It will just be:
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,5,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,0,1,1,0,1]]
:[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
It'll make the code easier to manage by far.
Also, the code is better this way since you'll never need to unarchive the map programs. (this is how I handled maps in Nyaar) All you need to do is "expr(det(5,"MAP",map#,1→[A]" to load the map.
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oh yeah right, i guess that could work too.
And the maps can be edited directly from archive? If so, I guess program size shouldn't be a problem anymore (unless you want more than 65536 bytes of data). :)
One major issue, though, with programs larger than 24 kilobytes: no more boolean logic in maps :(
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Well, you can load one of the maps to [A], edit it, and save it back in the archived program no problem so size definitely wouldn't be an issue in total but you still can't make like 50x50 size maps without trouble.
Though, what do you mean boolean logic in maps?
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For example:
[[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,9-Li(4)=0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1]
[1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1]]
Where the 8 would design a closed treasure chest and 9 an opened one. Metroid II, Reuben Quest and Illusiat 13 uses this a lot (altough Illusiat doesn't use matrices for maps)
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Hm...
If I can think of a way to allow users to 'script' some tiles that's definitely a good idea.
Only issue would be that I can't think of a way that's both flexible and safe.
For example, I could have a prompt that asks for the tile default and the tile after you changed it, but they'd have to work with the variables/lists I choose. I'll keep thinking of a way to customize that too though.
Another thought is that I could have them type out the exact code they want so for example you choose a spot, hit a button to go to a screen that asks what you want that spot to contain and you could type in "9-Li(4)=0" and it'd appear in that spot in the matrix. The issue with that is that it's not as safe for typos and such. Could crash the program or glitch the map up completely.
Anyway, I'll think it over.
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yeah, what I think is that boolean stuff needs to be edited manually in the matrix data inside the program. However, with the lack of If M=1, 2, etc, this could be extremly hard to find a matrix in the code, and in this case, the map data programs would need to be under 24 KB so they can be unarchived (remember we only have 24389 bytes of RAM, not 65535 :P)
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I'm thinking I may just make it have the second option and tell people that they seriously need to be carefully of what they type in.
I doubt any beginners will be trying to script tiles anyway and more experienced coders should know how to fix it. I'm thinking of a way of testing the code (probably with inString) that will fix some of the common things like missing the closing parenthesis and such. I'll definitely have to experiment though.
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That sounds really cool!
I'm glad you're still working on this {AP}!
Good luck! ;D
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Thanks~
I'm not sure how much I'll get done on this project since I'm trying desperately to learn Axe.
It's hard because I SEE basic code but I can't think like a basic programmer anymore so a lot of things I used to do naturally are causing countless RAM clears. Fortunately, it's not doing anything but making it take longer to get used to Axe and being a little frustrating.
I dunno. If Axe gives me too many more issues, I'll just go back and do some heavy work on this program.
_____________________________________________________________________
EDIT: Well, big issue, I seem to have forgotten that CIII can't write to archived programs. It can read from them fine, but that doesn't help with my saving issue. It's going to be hard to fit a copy of the matrix, the string for the matrix, and the information in the unarchived prgmMAPDATA in the RAM without a huge risk of Err:Memory.
So, it seems like I'm going to have to keep the current set-up which just keeps the map in [A] for the user to manage themselves. Of course, I could also have it save to Str1, but that's not really any more useful. Also, I could have it write to the bottom/top line of whatever program they want, but it still has to be unarchived and I'm not sure how useful that'd be either.
I just don't know anymore. Anyone else have any ideas?
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Mhmm idk x.x
In any case, though, maybe it would be best if the map programs are capped to like 10 KB. If you check Illusiat 13, all maps programs are under that size. It's much easier to handle by basic programmers when it comes to manually editing stuff in x.x
Idk really...