TF Flash Game the Second

[monomonkey]

Tell you what I'll do. If I can manage to make Flash import images, I'll release a version that takes imported images.

However, I honestly do not believe it will work as well as you think it will. Flash is a program that absolutely does not like to be messed with in any way. It feeds on your tears.

Also because anything that I don't pre-program in won't work. So if you're trying to do something outside of just adding a part on, it won't work. I'd have to program in every possible outcome in advance, and there's no way for me to know what kind of images you're going to use and how you plan on using them.

Here's a list of all the problems I forsee:

1) If your proposed scene has any kind of unique aspect to it, it won't work. It will be very generic as a result. No eye movement, no hand movement, no idle movement, no growth/shrinking, no stacked changes, no changes to already-completed items.

2) The stacking order of these images would be a huge pain in the ass.

3) Positioning would also be a major concern. Flash is picky as hell.

Let me give you an example of the code check being done for something very simple like the ear grab in the cat stage:

_root.base3._visible = true; (this sets the base image with the sleeve of her jacket pointed upward to visible)
_root.base1._visible = false; (this hides the original base image)
if (_root.skn == 2) { (a check to see if she has fur, enabling the third image I have with her arm raised if true)
_root.skin3._visible = true;
_root.skin2._visible = false;
}
if (_root.stripe == 2) { (a check to see if she has the stripes, enabling the third image I have with her arm raised if true)
_root.stripe3._visible = true;
_root.stripe2._visible = false;
}
if (_root.hand == 1) { (checking to see if she has paws or not--this is the check that enables the glove touching the ear)
_root.hands3._visible = true;
_root.hands2._visible = false;
}
if (_root.hand == 2) { (checking to see if she has paws or not--this is the check that enables the paw touching the ear)
_root.hands4._visible = true;
_root.hands2._visible = false;
}
if (_root.eye == 1) { (if her eyes are black, show the black eye looking up)
_root.eyesup1._visible = true;
}
if (_root.eye == 2) { (if her eyes are blue, show the blue eye looking up)
_root.eyesup2._visible = true;
}

Every instance of _visible would need to be a named object that you import. That's what it was in my case. They're all individual PNGs I imported into Flash. Something as simple as just moving her arm up literally takes eleven different images (twelve if you count the smile that becomes visible later in the code based on the current mental state), because I decided long ago that this project was going to embrace random chance, allowing the player to perform the full transformation in any order desired. This element is completely removed if you import your own images and you essentially force the player into the 'one right way', since the offshoot paths wouldn't work properly. You would be able to import, at most, 13 things. The base image, the base components you'll be switching to new components (hands and feet basically), and the new components. When something this simple takes 11 elements, you can see how a grand total of 13 for all the changes isn't going to work.

I understand your desire to make custom transformations, but that's what I'm here for! This project is to make things you want to see made. I know not everyone is an artist or a programmer or a writer or a creative thinker. So, as a community, we use each other's skills to produce things we all want to see made.

[ytytyt]

Originally Posted by monomonkey

Tell you what I'll do. If I can manage to make Flash import images, I'll release a version that takes imported images.

However, I honestly do not believe it will work as well as you think it will. Flash is a program that absolutely does not like to be messed with in any way. It feeds on your tears.

Flash enjoys your sadness and I know that. That's why I don't use Flash. :P

Also because anything that I don't pre-program in won't work. So if you're trying to do something outside of just adding a part on, it won't work. I'd have to program in every possible outcome in advance, and there's no way for me to know what kind of images you're going to use and how you plan on using them.

Here's a list of all the problems I forsee:

1) If your proposed scene has any kind of unique aspect to it, it won't work. It will be very generic as a result. No eye movement, no hand movement, no idle movement, no growth/shrinking, no stacked changes, no changes to already-completed items.

If they're just stacked GIFs then you could have the eye or hand or whatever movement. It would really complicate things (whatever would move the eyes would have to be on "top") but technically I think you could do it. You could definitely have idle movement since animated GIFs can be looped (and most of them are but if you don't want idle movement then it's easy enough to have just a static image at the end of the animation too). You'd still have to use a much simpler kind of model than what you already have and some stuff would be insanely hard or outright impossible, like trying to move the sprites up or down (like you did with the cow one) but it'd probably be worth it for the ability to have other people make their own. Of course, just about all the games I've made have been built around that kind of custom content and it's something I usually want to see people shoot for so I'm kind of biased. :P

2) The stacking order of these images would be a huge pain in the ass.

That's probably the biggest problem. Best thing I can think of is if you could have a text file where you could set numbers and have those numbers assign layers but that would probably be extremely hard to do. But like I said even if it would have to be simpler it'd be worth it for custom content.

3) Positioning would also be a major concern. Flash is picky as hell.

That depends. If you just stack all the images and make them all the same size (so one for ears, one for arms, one for legs, but they're all at the part of the image that they need to be for the sprite) and transparent then all you have to do for positioning is make sure that all the GIFs are stacked at the exact same spot. Layering might be harder but I don't really know enough about Flash to know if it would be or not.

Every instance of _visible would need to be a named object that you import. That's what it was in my case. They're all individual PNGs I imported into Flash. Something as simple as just moving her arm up literally takes eleven different images (twelve if you count the smile that becomes visible later in the code based on the current mental state), because I decided long ago that this project was going to embrace random chance, allowing the player to perform the full transformation in any order desired. This element is completely removed if you import your own images and you essentially force the player into the 'one right way', since the offshoot paths wouldn't work properly. You would be able to import, at most, 13 things. The base image, the base components you'll be switching to new components (hands and feet basically), and the new components. When something this simple takes 11 elements, you can see how a grand total of 13 for all the changes isn't going to work.

You don't need thirteen things though. I know enough about Flash to know that it can handle animated GIFs and animated GIFs are a lot more usable than you might think. They support transparency, they can be looped or stop at the end of an animation and you only need one "image" (one GIF) for every animation and that animation can be as long or as short as people want it to be. Some stuff would be just about impossible and so hard to code that it probably wouldn't be worth it (like where it checks if another transformation's already happened and then makes the animation or end point of the new transformation different based on that) but just having the different parts change should be doable if Flash can read GIFs from outside of the actual Flash file (and that's a pretty big if but it's the biggest one there).

If you can have a Flash file read animated GIFs from a folder then that means that you could have a single GIF for every part that can change (and those GIFs could be animated so they could have an idle animation even before the changes happen) and then a single GIF for every one of the changes. What you'd end up with is something that'd be a lot less impressive than what you have with all the handmade transformations you're doing in Flash itself but I still think it'd be worth it to see what other people come up with.

I understand your desire to make custom transformations, but that's what I'm here for! This project is to make things you want to see made. I know not everyone is an artist or a programmer or a writer or a creative thinker. So, as a community, we use each other's skills to produce things we all want to see made.

But what if I want to see her turn into like a cheeseburger or something? :P

I'm not trying to put down your work or your skills or anything and I know that anything you make is probably going to be a lot better than any kind of custom content that other people could make but I still think it's worth looking into letting people make some limited kind of custom TFs if they want to and it's possible for Flash to do the kinds of stuff I mentioned. I know from experience that there's no way the stuff other people make is going to be as customized or special or detailed as what you've got because when I was making games I started out with something where the TFs went through this sort of really specific process and then when I decided to go with custom content I had to cut everything down to one really generic kind of TF process and even when I added more to it it was still a really simple kind of system. Thing is that even with that really simple kind of system people ended up adding like one or two dozen new TFs when all I originally had were about four (it was a text-based game but I still couldn't really do more than that because every one of them had to handle 18 parts minimum plus extra parts if they made you grow a tail or anything like that plus they had to know what to do with clothing plus they had to be able to handle all of it for other characters and... it was hard) and then later on people took the source code of what I made and extended it and added all these different kinds of ways of the TFs happening and ended up with something that had a lot more variety than if I just tried to do it all by myself. There's a pretty long thread on the CYOC forums where you can see just about the entire process but you have to sign up there to be able to see it.

Anyways, all I'm trying to say is that I get that anything people would be able to make on their own would be pretty simplistic and rough compared to what you can make when you work directly in Flash and handle everything yourself but I just think that the kind of variety and ingenuity that people could bring to it and the kinds of ideas some people might want to do on their own could add enough that it's at least worth looking into letting people add their own stuff. But like I said it all really depends on whether or not Flash can read external GIFs because if it can't it's probably going to be really hard to handle/not really worth the trouble.

[monomonkey]

I... probably should've done research before I got all crazy about this >_>

Turns out Flash doesn't even allow you to import animated GIFs. It treats it as a normal GIF and only plays the first frame.

So! In other words... you wanted a cheeseburger version done eh...?

[ytytyt]

Originally Posted by monomonkey

I... probably should've done research before I got all crazy about this >_>

Turns out Flash doesn't even allow you to import animated GIFs. It treats it as a normal GIF and only plays the first frame.

That's what I was wondering about. It's a shame. Maybe I should try and get back into learning Java since I know that can do it... maybe later. :P

So! In other words... you wanted a cheeseburger version done eh...?-

I was joking at first.... but now I totally do. :P

[The_Nameless_One]

Donkey beats cheezburger!!

[monomonkey]

You want a donkey one? Mmkay.

I was kidding about your cheeseburger, though you knew that already =p

So once I finish the rabbit re-do and the SECRET PROJECT and the frog (maybe), I'll do that.

I give it another week before I write the dialogue for the dog and cow stages myself unless you guys give me an update on how that's going >_>

[Ladylike255]

I Can Has Cheezburger?

[The_Nameless_One]

Yeah, a donkey one would be awesome, despite my odd way of asking it .
Monomonkey figured it out.

ladylike255....ceilingcat is watching you master-debating.

[Zipper]

Originally Posted by Ladylike255

I Can Has Cheezburger?

Not till you get your bukkit back.

Interesting side thought. Hav e one game where it makes random changes. Like the dog toung on a cat face with the cowns hoofs
I'm sure tere will be different tfs, so it'll get more random

[Ladylike255]

What Bukkit?

[monomonkey]

Originally Posted by Zipper

Interesting side thought. Hav e one game where it makes random changes. Like the dog toung on a cat face with the cowns hoofs
I'm sure tere will be different tfs, so it'll get more random

I was going to do something like that and release it as a surprise.

Way to ruin the surprise.

[Zipper]

Originally Posted by Ladylike255

What Bukkit?

The story of the lolrus and the bukkit

Originally Posted by monomonkey

I was going to do something like that and release it as a surprise.

Way to ruin the surprise.

Sorry. It just slipped out, along with bad grammar and spelling