I've been looking for a robust method of pathfinding for a platformer based game I'm developing and A* looks like it's the best method available. I noticed there is a demo for the AStar implementation in Godot. However, it is written for a grid/tile based game and I'm having trouble adapting that to a platformer where the Y axis is limited by gravity.
I found a really good answer that describes how A* can be applied to platformers in Unity. My question is... Is it possible to use AStar in Godot to achieve the same thing described in the above answer? Is it possible this could be done better without using the built in AStar framework? What is a really simple example of how it would work (with or without AStar) in GDscript?
Though I have already posted a 100 point bounty (and it has expired), I would still be willing to post another 100 point bounty and award it, pending an answer to this question.
you could repurpose the Navigation2D node for platformer purposes. The picture below shows an example usage. The Navigation2D node makes it possible to navigate the shortest path between two point that lie within the combined navigation polygon (this is the union of all NavigationPolygonInstances).
You can use the get_simple_path method to get a vector2 array that describes the points your agent/character should try to reach (or get close to, by using some predefined margin) in sequence. Place each point in a queue, and move the character towards the different points by moving it horizontally. Whenever your agent's next point in the queue is too high up to reach, then you can make the agent jump.
I hope this makes sense!
The grey/dark-blue rectangles are platforms with collision whereas the green shapes are NavigationPolygonInstance nodes
This approach is by no means perfect. If you were to implement slopes into your game then the agent may jump up the slope instead of ascending it normally. It is also pretty tedious to create all the shapes needed.
A more robust solution would be to have a custom graph system that you could place in the scene and position its vertices. This opens up the possibility to make one-way paths and have certain edges/connections between vertices marked as "jumpable" only. This is a lot more work though if you can not find any such solution online.
I'm making an online billiard game. I've finished all the mechanics for single player, online account system, online inventory system etc. Everything's fine but I've gotten to the hardest part now, the multiplayer. I tried syncing the position of each ball every frame but the movement wasn't smooth at all, the balls would move back and forth and it looked "bad" in general. Does anyone have any solution for this ? How do other billiard games like the one in Miniclip do it, I'm honestly stuck here and frustrated as it took me a while to learn Photon networking then to find out it's not that good at handling the physics synchronization.
Would uNet be a better choice here ?
I appreciate any help you give me. Thank you!
This is done with PUN already: https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/15802
You can try to play with synchronization settings or implement custom OnPhotonSerializeView (see DemoSynchronization in PUN package). Make sure that physic simulation disabled on synchronized clients. See DemoBoxes for physics simulation sample.
Or, if balls can move along lines only, do not send all positions every frame. Send positions and velocities only when balls colliding and do simple velocity simulation between. This can work even with more comprehensive physics but general rule is the same: synchronize it at key points. Of course this is not as simple as automatic synchronization.
Also note that classic billiard is turnbased game and you do not have all the complexity of players interaction. In worst case you can 'record' simulation on current player client and 'playback' it on others.
I have a simulation I am running where I would like to test for the collision of 2D objects. I am not interested in the physics simulation portion of Box2D but would like to leverage its collision detection features.
My initial thought was to make a bunch of static bodies but after reading the documentation I got the impression they were not included in collision testing and therefore don't make sense.
Is it worthwhile using Box2D to evaluate collision detection in my system, where the position of the elements is driven by a separate system, or does it make more sense to look elsewhere for a collision detection solution? If so, how would I start down that path with Box2D?
Although I have not tried it myself, I guess you could do it by using dynamic bodies, with the world gravity set to zero, and all bodies linear velocity set to zero (so they do not move in world Step call) and then position them using SetTransform. The regular BeginContact/EndContact events should still be sent to your contact listener.
Yes, use Box2D. Box2D has the best collision detection system I've used, compared to Chipmunk and Bullet.
I agree with iforce2d, you should use dynamic bodies with a world whose gravity is set to zero.
Good luck and happy coding.
Can anyone explain what is the math/physics behind this popular PSP game Locoroco. My understanding about this game collision mechanism is , the whole world is made with bezier curves? If yes - my question is how to build a such a huge endless level , character of these game I guess its blob physics?
Is it tile based level? Please help where to start the research on this topic.
http://www.gotoandplay.it/_articles/2003/12/bezierCollision.php
Vertex level/specific physics with some optimized triangulation algorithm would be my approach.
If you are looking into making a similar game as Locoroco I'd use google to get my answers. A fast search gave me this.
http://www.allegro.cc/forums/thread/587860
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I would like to know How to create a fps-game with SDL lib?
Are there any books that explain with examples?
this wins for most open ended question. You could literally write a book. But lets settle for pointing in the right direction...
Step one, you will need good debugging skills for a project like this. Pick up Code Complete by Steve McConnell. Read the whole thing. The time invested will pay for itself more than anything else you could read/experiment with.
Get your hands on some source code of some game. ANY game. Make sure you see something simple before you see something big and complex, and keep in mind when you look at any game code that they may have had a combined team put WAY more time into it than you will ever have. The point in this is to see code structure.
Get a reference for 3D math, doesn't have to be THAT in depth, but you will need to know stuff like dot products backwards and forwards, be able to figure out how to create the matrix for your camera in the world etc. (even if your writing 0% of the rendering code)
(edit) Here's a great book on 3D mathMathematics for 3D Game Programming and Computer Graphics, Second Edition (Game Development Series) This isn't the kind you learn in college, it's more like a cross between trig and more advanced practical concepts: How to create a toolbox for yourself of simple physics, efficient collision detection, etc.
You will need to know something about rendering, and pipelines. SDL gives you a leg up, but make sure you understand the concepts of what it's doing.
Read up about practical system design. Your various systems will have to interlock. Think it out well. Your system can be just a good in C or in C++, it's the THOUGHT that is put into how your data/control will flow that will count, NOT how perfectly you emulate design patterns (though these are very useful as well of coarse)
Fundamentals of AI, not "real" AI, but functional AI; there is a big difference. State machines are great to start with, and sufficient for a simple FPS.
Learn a little about estimation and planning. You will not have time to do everything you would want to do to properly make an FPS. You will have to both triage AND learn how to triage; they are 2 separate things, the latter being mroe difficult. Experience is the best teacher here of coarse. (though the legendary McConnell has book on this as well)
Have a system to insert your gameplay into your level. If it is JUST you as a programmer, then your best bet is to write a plug in for an already existing editing program such as 3DS Max. I would highly recommend Max over Maya for a programmer. Maya script is nice, but it is more geared toward clever non-programmers. I find 3DS Max to think more along the lines of how a programmer would about creating and editing your world.
You can spend YEARS making tools to let you do this right, so you want to do things in such a way that you can edit fast and accurately
If you making your own editor, incorporate it into your game world.
If your world is not TRULY 3D and you want to make lots of level fast you can save your level data as something like this, which will save you a lot of time
Where X is a wall, the other letters are game objects which a dirt simple parser can translate into game objects and world coordinates
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xx..........P..........x
xxxxxxx...........I....x
xR....xxx...........E..x
xx.................0xxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
But it all depends on your game. My point is that you will need to resort to "ghetto coding" how you get your gameplay data into your world is very important and you need to think of something that is both fast for you to implement AND fast with you to work with.
And what it comes down to is what is your goal here? If it's to learn to code something the absolute right way, expect to spend most of your time iterating on code that seemed decent a month ago, but now that you realize what your requirements are, it could really use another pass. Do not be afraid to rewrite, you learn a lot by doing that, but if you goal is functionality, you will probably need to figure out where to hack some things in (like embedding gameplay data nad coordinates into code files) It IS ok to hack as long as you KNOW where you have hacked, and have carefully kept it separate from your good code so you can go back and properly write the code when you get the chance.
The bottom line is, you need to decide what your goal in this is, learning, or functionality and find the happy medium between.
Download the quake 3 sources at fileshack and learn from them.
Although the very long post is valueable in the long run, I feel it doesn't give the proper instant motivation of getting things on screen. Here's some facts, along with my opinion
-SDL is a 2D graphics library, you can't write an FPS in 2D, therefore you have to go with a 3D library, either DirectX, or openGL
-SDL has the ability to "sync" with openGL, using it for graphics, but there's not a whole lot of help online for that topic
I suggest you go to Lazyfoo.net, which is an absolutly amazing beginner's resource for game programming with SDL, it shows you how to draw to the screen, but also teaches you how to apply this to programming games. After going through this, you'll be able to make a tetris clone, or most other 2D type games
After this, you'll be ready for 3D(it's a lot more complex, requires a better grasp of math, and takes a lot more code to do simpler things) if you go with openGL, check out NeHe's Tutorials , they're currently working on a new set, using SDL with openGL, because the older tutorials, although valueable, are coded rather badly and use the windows(win32) API
keep in mind, game development is one of the most demanding, and rewarding programming you'll come across, so good luck
While not SDL specific, the NeHe OpenGL tutorials are an excellent place to start for learning about how to do 3D.
If this is your first game, you'll probably want to aim lower than an FPS. Writing a simple 2D Tetris game using SDL will teach you everything you'll need to know about that library.
Pretty much anything that says in the TItle the "Tricks of the Game Programming Gurus" is going to show you how to make a FPS game. LeMothe loves them.
Edit : forgot those titles.