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[Kamani]

I guessed the cutscene bit, but I figured that if I faded out the screen, the credits would get blocked out. Are they not affected by flash effects?

Huh. I didn’t think the volume changed, but I’ll test it again tomorrow. Maybe I just missed it.

Okay. Thanks. I guess I am just not very good at finding things.

[IndigoFenix]

Fades occur behind the credits layer (and also the textbox layer).

Volume did in fact have a bug.  It's fixed now.

I found a few platformer tilesets.  Most of them are 16x16, but you can use those now.  (Don't even ask about the meat one, figured it might be cool at some point though.)  Depending on how detailed you want to be, sidescrollers are a bit more forgiving in what you can get away with and still look decent; all you really need is a brick tile for the solid blocks and another tile for the backgrounds.  You can probably manage with existing tilesets anyway.

[Kamani]

Oh, okay. Didn’t realize.

Oh, thanks. I’ll have to adjust the sound volumes in Lusuria now that that works.

Regarding 16x16 tilesets: Thanks. I’ll take a look.
Regarding detailedness of sidescrollers: I guess, but I’d prefer it look pretty nice. You have to sit through it for the whole extent of the dungeon, so it shouldn’t be bland or it will get dull.

Edit: It appears that if you save a world as a draft without publishing world first, you won't be able to load it again. This should probably be fixed before someone loses a lot of work (I lost about two minutes of tile set setting up, so nothing major, but someone could actually lose something significant, so...).

Edit: Note: For purposes of talking about switching sprite control, I'll be referring to the original sprite as the main sprite. Because it'll make more sense for me to keep writing it.

Edit: Think I'll give the main sprite jump 8 (same as the jump boots/spring jump) and slightly reduced gravity (to .46 rather than .5). This way the player won't have to spring jump all the time. Of course, flight using Batelier will be present, but you'll only be able to leave rooms with the main sprite (most rooms anyways. Some rooms can be entered with Batelier, although you can't switch between the main sprite and Batelier if they aren't in the same room). Also, some switches will only be activatable by the main sprite (because bats aren't going to easily manipulate things that need detailed hands).

Edit: While looking for an exterior bit for the castle, I noticed that Whisperling's tilesets can be found here: https://opengameart.org/content/pixel-art-castle-tileset. These aren't... cited, I guess?, so...

[IndigoFenix]

Edit: While looking for an exterior bit for the castle, I noticed that Whisperling's tilesets can be found here: https://opengameart.org/content/pixel-art-castle-tileset. These aren't... cited, I guess?, so...

Hmm, yeah I don't really have a good solution for adding missing credits to files that someone else uploaded.  Not sure if there is one short of making moderator accounts.  Which is what I'll probably end up doing.

I should probably also specify that uploaded files should be made public, unless the uploader created them themselves.

[Kamani]

Makes sense. Inconvenient, but what else can be done in this instance? At least reverse image searching should make the original sources easier to find.
Also, thanks. I couldn't remember the word credited, so I just used cited because it was closeish. Words are hard.

Edit: Somehow, I completely missed the second half of that (or you just edited it, not sure). Makes sense. I have a fair number of non-shared tiles, but they are all either stuff available in other content (I have the a Hyptosis Goblin Cave and Town set because sorting through all four tilesets was getting old) or stuff people wouldn't really need (a blank person sprite from Chara's Project I used for Shadow Mage's art, and a single piece of a Hyptosis tileset reversed because I needed it reversed).

Edit: Not sure if this is a glitch or just a strange setup, using set as avatar and set as camera on a testing Batelier sprite create function caused the main sprite's head to be put on Batelier and follow them around (until they died due to not being flying). Seeing as I need the main sprite around so they can switch between them, this isn't working. Is this a glitch or a design thing (I can work around it, but if it is a glitch, I'll just wait)?
Edit: Actually, it makes the main sprite follow around the testing sprite, not just the head. That was due to some misuse of grass tiles.

Edit: Any good way to add a skill to the player without transforming or items? I'll use items if there is no other way, but having a way to add a skill otherwise would be nice.

[IndigoFenix]

Oh, that's an interesting glitch... well it only seems to happen if you set it on the create event.  I'll work on that.

I've got a basic version of the fear system in place.  Units in combat will evaluate the combined {(_hp / _hp_max) * _threat} of all their nearby allies and enemies, multiply their combined ally's strength (including themselves) by their own individual {_courage}, and then compare the two values; if their own values are less then that of their enemy's then they will attempt to flee from the most significant nearby threat.  This creates some fun and surprisingly realistic emergent behaviors when pitting groups of sprites against each other, like a few less courageous soldiers breaking rank creating a chain reaction that leads to a rout of their army.

There's also a loose framework for drawing aggro and choosing the most appropriate target, but I haven't done much with it yet.  This will become more elaborate once I start working with player allies.

I've decided to make the threat level of the player as 10 by default.  The base threat level is roughly based on the amount of damage the sprite can inflict in a short period of time (which makes more sense than basing it on HP).  It's not really an exact value.

Edit: I'd like to make a system to add a skill using status effects, but there's nothing in place for that yet.  You're talking about the switch ability, I take it?

[Kamani]

Ah, okay. At least it shouldn’t effect the actual Batelier setup, since that won’t work in a create function.

Cool. Probably won’t end up using that in Batelier’s Trial, since that won’t really fit here, but I think it will be relevant for the Trial after that.

Makes sense. Should be neat.

Also makes sense.

Makes sense, and yup, talking about the switch ability. I guess I’ll just use an item. Bright side: I wanted Batelier to give you an item upon victory, so I can just make it (plot wise) the same item (Which will actually be a variable on the core item. It will make Batelier appear in Lusuria too).

Edit: Having the main sprite attached to Batelier sprite issue again, even though I am in an item skill function instead of a create function (the item is gotten from a create function, but I wouldn't think that would make a difference).

Also, another new glitch. Flying up from drop tiles on to tiles that would be solid (example: try to fly all the way up the tower using the Batelier sprite in the map) causes the player to gain an amount of vertical height that, based on some short testing, appears to be based on the distance to the current ground for the flyer.
Also, flying at the side of a solid tile while on drop tiles above topdown tiles acts weird. Kind of jumpy?
I won't have any instances of this besides the initial tower room, but it is impossible to avoid topdown drop flying mix for the first room, and that is probably going to be a source of many bugs.

Working on this is going to be wayyy different than Lusuria. Different gameplay style, different number of NPCs, etc. Well, variety is the spice of life and all that.

Edit: Basic Batelier switch is in. Haven't noticed any new bugs (and the player sticking on seems to have stopped. If you fixed that, thanks), and basic flight is working. Tomorrow I'll get started on the actual dungeon design and all that.

[IndigoFenix]

Drop tiles still have some bugs apparently, but even if they were working correctly the setup you are using would not work - you'll find that once you put a gate inside the door flying "above" it without solid tiles below you will cause you to enter the door.  And using solid tiles will mess things up in other ways.  Mixing geometries beyond the most basic transitions just doesn't really work out nicely.

One option: You can make the entire area a sidescroller, and have the entrance to the tower kind of on the side, with a balcony above it.  Maybe a narrow strip of land surrounded by water or obstacles to make it more reasonable why you can't go "around" it.  It's a bit difficult to explain, so I built a temporary area using a similar setup.  (I also realized while building it you can also add a parallax background that way, which is cool.  Maybe even a short platforming area leading up to the tower would be nice.)

I'd also suggest setting a maximum height for flying, unless you make every area a sidescroller and cap off the top with solid blocks.

Are each of the Trials going to have a "theme"?  I missed the one for Lusuria, if there was one.

[Kamani]

I had a workaround planned for that one actually. Using an object with an if condition in place of a gate, namely, as well as using some tile changers and warping around things to my convenience.

But that should work better anyways. I’ll do a short platforming bit before the tower too.

I thought I had? Although I guess since I’ll be changing the starting room, I won’t really need it, since every room can have roofs.

Nope. The real reason Batelier calls it the Trial of Teamwork is because they don’t want people to know that they are the Trial Guardian until you’ve won. They’ll also refer to themselves (when talking about the Trial Guardian) in third-person, and if you are sufficiently nice, they’ll give you hints towards beating the Trial. Also, Lusuria didn’t really have much of a theme, whereas this one does.

Edit: Going to look at the tower example you made, but I can't seem to load worlds in the world selection. I double click them, and nothing happens. The bottom of the screen says Loading (insert opening room name), but nothing seems to happen. After waiting a few minutes, nothing happens (except the FPS drops for a second).
After some more testing, I can load some worlds (Bottom of the Mountain), but I got a partial loading glitch where one of the tilesets didn't load, the avatar didn't load, and everything was a bit slow (and this never ended or fixed itself like the similar old glitch). After leaving and reentering, things are back to normal.
After running around for a while exploring worlds, everything is loading fine. Still, that wasn't super great, and should probably be fixed.

Edit: Oh, right, checked out the example, trying it out now.

Edit: Any good ways to make a tile be solid from the top but drop from the bottom (besides adding a bunch of invisible _y checkers)? In addition on that, it would also be nice to be able to make it possible to drop through a platform like that (like the platforms in platformers that you can drop through but can be flow up through). Not sure how I could manage that.

[IndigoFenix]

Seems I need to do more testing with slow internet connection.  Apparently the "all required files are loaded" check is not accounting for some things.

Edit: Any good ways to make a tile be solid from the top but drop from the bottom (besides adding a bunch of invisible _y checkers)? In addition on that, it would also be nice to be able to make it possible to drop through a platform like that (like the platforms in platformers that you can drop through but can be flow up through). Not sure how I could manage that.

That is planned eventually, but there's no real good solution for it right now.  The closest you can get, if you're looking to ascend to a higher level by jumping, is using "stairs" of floor tiles alternating with drop tiles, closed off at the sides with solid blocks so you can only jump up or down.  Mostly I would just use solid blocks and ladders.  BW is still lacking a lot of the conveniences of a "true" platforming game.

Also it looks like making the base tile type "drop" has some unintended effects that you don't get when using actual drop tiles...that needs to be fixed too I guess.

By the way, if you uncheck a tilemap's "visible" box it will be semi-transparent when you are editing it but invisible otherwise.  This may be more convenient than changing its opacity.

[Kamani]

Oh, that would explain it. I get pretty bad internet. Bright side on that is it should be getting way better at some point in the future. No clue when, but that should be nice.

Hmm. I might want to hold off on Batelier’s Trial until that’s done. Those platform kind of tiles are already painful not to have, and I am about four jumps in.
I guess I’ll start on one of the other Trials for now?

Okay.

Yup. Used visibility unchecked on the invisible sign in the stone pillar, if I recall correctly.
But for tilesets, I prefer changing opacity. Means I can have it be visible when I want, but it can be fully invisible when I am adding objects or similar. Plus, since I use one tileset for all tile controlling, it doesn’t take too much work to deal with the opacity.

[IndigoFenix]

Yeah, I intend to put in some more elaborate platforming options by combining multiple tile types, which is the main reason why you can select multiple checkboxes for a single tile instead of it operating as a drop-down menu.  For example, drop + block would enable semi-solid platforms, and drop + water would allow sidescrolling water areas.  But I'm not sure when that's going in, it's kind of a low priority compared to other stuff.

I've improved on the morale system to somewhat fix the issue where sprites end up "hovering" right outside their aggro range as if unsure if they want to attack or retreat.  I've also added a _morale variable; you can adjust it manually if _courage is -1, otherwise it functions automatically.  Sprites will retreat if their _morale is less than 0.

[Kamani]

Makes sense. Should be cool. I’ve got two more Trials I can do between now and Batelier’s, so I’ll just focus on those until changes.

Makes sense. I really have to get around to taking a look at that.

Edit: I should really learn how to sprite. Being able to make a couple of characters would make life far easier. I just realized that I don't have a great sprite for the next Trial Guardian, and I checked OpenGameArt and didn't really find what I need. I really do need to look into that...

[IndigoFenix]

Well, if you find something close you can make edits of existing sprites (provided you credit the original author.)  What are you going for?

I'm improving the animation system - I'm redesigning the item code to allow for animations while using an item, and a play animation event is in the works.  I think it's about time to start thinking about animated tilesets as well.

[Kamani]

I solved around it for this dungeon (the Trial Guardian being a sand... entity I guess? (I just made them a shapeshifting sand monster, which makes sense for them anyway, and means I can use most sprites after some recolors)), but five or so Trials down the line, I have a character I doubt I’ll be able to simple edits (because their design could be summed up as bizarre, quadrupedal, and, optimally, slightly unnerving the first time you see them without actually moving too far from the tileset aesthetic I use (it makes sense within the context), and I am guessing that that combination of traits will be hard to edit on. Plus, I’d have to improve my sprinting to be good enough to manage that).

Cool. And yeah, animated tilesets would probably be helpful.