Lordcyber's assistance progress

[lordcyber]

Hello guys,
In the moment, I'm a coder assistant to SC3.From times a times I will post some progress that doesn't involving strong spoilers.

In the moment. I'm helping Laslunders with a simpler music system,because the actual one have some bugs that can't be solve without Obreck assistance(these sounds swxm drivers aren't my speciality).
Don't worry,the project is far from death.In fact,it has many stuff that just need be tweaked and connected with proper codes.

And I helping in the boss coding, like remaking the Sir Grakul DRD code (><) from the GM6 times(in the time that existed image_single) and investigating some problems with Skull Knight.

[Del]

How much has been done since the last demo release? People have been asking about the game in YouTube, is there a chance to do a new beta or will you keep it secret until it's all done? The game wasn't going to be very big I believe, only like 15 stages.

[lordcyber]

I talked with Laslunders and we think that we can launch a second demo with more levels.We just need choose the levels that has bosses and check if that the bosses/enemies are working properly.
No release date will be defined,because it depends in my code work and I still learning the little details of engine(that isn't hard) to tweak and code better.But you will receive more news with the time and ,in the worst case,weekly.
I don't know how to measure the progress,but the source has a big variety of sprites,sounds , objects and rooms(16 levels layouts), so I guess that is above than 50%.
Anyway,we need help to know how convert the music and sound effects to -0.1q ogg.I know a online site that converts to ogg,but I never hear  about -0.1q (that JS talk in another topic).It is very important eliminate 13 MB in game to reduce the loading time when debug it.

[Laslunder]

Yeah loading time is where the biggest problem seems to be. I dunno maybe with that game start code or something. The error we were having seemed to be when you load the game. Their were also slowdowns in certain areas in rooms due to excessive tile use. This doesn't exactly make sense to me and i'm not sure why it happens. It appears i have much more luck making rooms much faster and playable when i make full tile rooms. Not block by block tiles. Every once in a while i run into an issue with an object that slows things down but, this was actually the case with only one object thus far. I made a decoration spider in a dungeon using obreck's gremlin code. Things ran super slow at half spped,when i pulled it out of the level,everything ran fine. Besides the initial loading error we get,their is one more glitch in game as of late. When you play for a split second the game almost seems to freeze(glitch) and the same with the music, i'm not sure why it happens or what causes it,but it'd be nice to locate the problem and try to fix it. As for a new music system, i think it's inevitable at this point, something is just plain slowing things down and im' totally thinking its the music scripts or soemthing. I agree with lordcyber that we should try.ogg files. THey take up  less space and quality is pretty much the same.  As for other issues in the engine,well they'll have to be sought out in time. I suppose in a sense both lord cyber and I know a great deal about the engine but not as much as Obreck so in some cases we are guessing what he did.

[Del]

It doesn't make sense that you guys are having slowdowns in such a small game compared with MKF which runs fine on strong computer as of now, lol. If you're having slowdowns in specific rooms, it's either because you put too many objects (in which case you need to optimize the solid platforms), too many individual 1x1 tiles (try to use bigger sets instead), or bad coding in certain objects that are probably spawning more objects endlessly or they never deactivate and are persistant.

Bad music coding also contributes to slowdowns. Externalize everything on that end.

[lordcyber]

Sir Grakul code complete,sacrificing one day of my life.Cleaning other code messy from other coder is very tiresome(even watching  videos from SC4 several times to study his motion),but It is very interesting to learn some stuff.No need pics because he plays very similar from SC4.
My next step is check the problems with Skull Knight and Akmodon.

[lordcyber]

I discovered what means "-0.1q".When I installed Winamp and try used it to convert it shows a slide bar that you change the quality factor.So -0.1 means 62kbps.

Anyway,today I was surprised for "Error defining an external function" that appears to me first time,without a motvie and that was torment Laslunder for several weeks.After a search, the problem involve aborting the game when not having a important error,and it mess up with the Dlls.The basic solution is reboot the PC>This issue still isn't fully explained and annoy many users,but the only thing that I know is that is GM issue,and not the plugin.

I fixed some Akmodon  issues and I'm thinking in adding a extra attack,because his AI from C3 is too simple(walk randomly and shoot bandages).Maybe I add a bullet pattern to turn it more interesting.

[lordcyber]

All the sounds effects were converted to ogg format.The transition between the first and second form of Death is fixed.And delete some big animate sprites 320x240 which effect can be done by code.The cleaning still continues.

[Del]

Sounds great, if you guys want to release a new demo or upload any videos with the new stuff, just record something and send it to a dev so we can upload it to the main account so people know this is still alive.

[lordcyber]

Here https://www.youtube.com/user/LaslundLazaro?feature=CCQQwRs%3D has some videos of the level WIPs in the Las's playlist.Due the lack of a a better tittle name and tags,I think that can be a little more difficult to find them.
The videos are mute, because of the sound problem that Laslunders had.And one of them spoiler the Dracula battle and his forms.
Anyway,if someone can help fix his third form sprite,It can be very welcomed.

[Fosterkmas]

Hey lordcyber,

Nice work on this title so far. It looks to be coming along and with any luck we'll get to see more of a completed and polished version in the near future.

And one of them spoiler the Dracula battle and his forms. Anyway,if someone can help fix his third form sprite,It can be very welcomed.

I'm assuming you mean the great demon bat thingy.

Hmm...I do sprites often.

Yeah, If you can upload the sprite on this thread or PM it to me, i'll fix him up a little bit.

Best

[lordcyber]

For now, the hazard spining blade was fixed (with a proper angular motion) and rooms transition between doors is fixed.
A weird issue is the snd_rain.ogg is mute when try play it,but the wav version works fine.
Anyway, the possible plan is add 3 levels in the demo,having bosses battles with Frankstein,Skull Knight and Sir Grakul(maybe Akmodon too).No possible release date and no tolerance with impatiente people.Try play Castle Crashers to PC to waste time.
I'm helper, not a lead coder.Maybe Sylpha and Grant will be in the demo,too(if I figure out her issue with fall after try use a stair).

[lordcyber]

Time to slash sound bugs one bye by one.And that same time,grouping objects that have the same codes(8-10 objects with almost identical code can be optimize).Is really a chore open every object and check theirs events,but in the end, will be worth.
And the parallax system of SMFR was implemented in source.Now just do some tweaks to the rooms and see the smooth backgrounds's motion.

[lordcyber]

The transition effect when you open a door was expanded in the cases where you use a stair to go to a next room.