00
Stealth said:
I got bored and did this:
(You'll likely have to copy the URL and paste it back into the URL bar after you're already on the emulationzone site, since it doesn't allow off-site linking)
It's not a whole lot, but you can see some of the current stuff in motion, and use the fileset as a basis for expansion. The solidity on the slopes is just a bit jerky because I suck at drawing solidity that doesn't correspond directly with the edges of the art
So, basically, what I did was take a few of the images from the tile graphics thread, and build this image. I used a high-color image during placement and a 16x16 grid for alignment, then reduced the color count. There were around 80 unique colors in the original image, but I reduced them to 64 with apparently no significant loss in quality (It was unnecessary if the level doesn't use water, but, well, I felt the extras were wasteful when it makes such little difference). I then saved the image as pic0000.pcx in the E02Win.exe folder, and ran it through the level ripper with the "Alter Palette" setting for Palette 0 with 64 level colors, and the "Image Colors" setting for "0-63" set to "0-63" to import palette entries 0-63 from the image to level indexes 0-63. The level would need further setup, so I used the main launcher window's "Start Editor" option, and clicked the "Rip Level" button
A default level created with the ripper has only three level planes, but the current Sonic scripts use 4, so I added a plane 3 onto the end by holding Ctrl to view the plane ID list, hovering over the X at the end of the list, and pressing A. Because I ripped both the background and foreground from the same image, they both appeared on plane 0, so I copied it to Plane 2 by hovering over Plane 0 ID, pressing C, then hovering over plane 2 ID, and pressing P (while still holding ctrl to view the ID list), and then removed the background image from Plane 2 by left-clicking Plane 2 ID in the list to select it for editing, then selecting a blank area of the level by right-clicking just below the background image and dragging the mouse across the level to create a line of the same width, pressing C to copy the row of tiles, then hovering over the top-left corner of the background image, pressing and holding P for Paste, and dragging the mouse down to blank out each row
The background planes need to be set to one of the "relative" forms of scrolling so they don't display beyond their height/width, so I selected plane 0 for editing, and while still holding ctrl, selected the "relative" setting, and then did the same thing for Plane 1, and then saved the level by opening the main menu with the 0 key, and selecting "save"
After having created the Sonic4 folder with a Zone01 folder to host the level, I copied rip.lev and rip.til as 1.lev and 1.til into the folder and started the game. The level would now display properly, but there were no solidity settings to affect the player, so I entered the Level Editor with the E key and selected Plane 2 for editing. Each unique tile needed solidity drawn onto it, so for each tile along the path, I hovered over the tile, pressed G for "grab", and pressed 3 to edit the tile in the tile editor. Since the editor starts in tile graphic editing mode, for the first tile, I clicked the area between the two selection boxes immediately to the right of the tile grid to switch to solidity editing mode. I used "top-only" solidity for the grass, so I selected it by clicking the green color box below the palette listing, and then drew onto the tile grid, and repeated until all tiles were solid, using the blue color for "all-sides solid" on the walls. I kept track of which tiles were and weren't solid by pressing 5 once in level editor mode to turn on the solidity overlay, and switching back to gameplay mode for testing by opening the main menu (0) and selecting "Return To Game". I saved regularly using the "Save Tiles" option in the main menu
One section in the level displays above the player, which is done using Plane 3. I selected the area from Plane 2, copied, switched to Plane 3 for editing, and while still holding ctrl, right-clicked plane 2 for viewing, then pasted onto Plane 3. I created a tile with a blank image to use on Plane 2 for collision in this area by first pressing 1 to go to the tile selector, pressing A to add a tile to the end of the list, right-clicking on the newly-created tile (it appears right before the boxed X at the bottom of the list) to load it in the tile editor, and then drew blue "all-sides" solidity onto it, then switched back to the level editor and drew it onto Plane 2
I then went back to Plane 0 to set some "fancy" scrolling by first setting the plane type to "HTil". I set the looping position by hovering over the lower-right tile of the background image and pressing Y and U for setting X and Y looping points, set the Y scrolling speed by using R/T, and then setting each tile row's X scroll speed by using W/E, which was made easier by the fact that I could right-click and draw a selection column down the image, allowing me to change the settings for each selected row all at once
I then made a few copy/paste changes to the level structure, and made sure everything was saved by opening the main menu and using both "Save" (for the level) and "Save Tiles", and checked it out in gameplay mode
I didn't include the little flowers that're off to the right of the image when I first ripped the level, so I had to add them in afterward. First, I took the map image in Paint Shop Pro and saved the palette, then loaded the image I got the flowers from, and loaded the palette onto it using the "match nearest color" option to make sure that they would use the same palette as the existing level. I then copied the flowers onto the map image (which isn't necessary, I could have used an image with only the flowers) and re-ripped the level using the "Add To Existing Tileset" and "Add To Existing Level" options. I used the "Browse" buttons to find the existing tile and level files in the Zone01 folder. I set the "Start Til" to the ID number of the last existing tile in the current tileset (the last existing, not the one after), which I got from checking the last tile's ID in the tile editor, and set the "Plane ID" to 4, which would place the ripped image onto a new plane 4 (the last currently-used plane is 3), and then used "Rip Level". Afterward, I ran the game again and entered editor mode. Plane 4 now contained the entire image including the newly-added flowers, but no tiles were duplicated, as the tiles for the rest of the image already existed. I copied the flowers and switched to Plane 3 for editing, enabling Plane 2 for viewing, and placed a few throughout the level
..Well, that's a bit long, but if you followed along, you should be able to create and expand levels without any issue
Also, you'll want to use the new exe's in this download, since I made a couple of corrections
(You'll likely have to copy the URL and paste it back into the URL bar after you're already on the emulationzone site, since it doesn't allow off-site linking)
It's not a whole lot, but you can see some of the current stuff in motion, and use the fileset as a basis for expansion. The solidity on the slopes is just a bit jerky because I suck at drawing solidity that doesn't correspond directly with the edges of the art
So, basically, what I did was take a few of the images from the tile graphics thread, and build this image. I used a high-color image during placement and a 16x16 grid for alignment, then reduced the color count. There were around 80 unique colors in the original image, but I reduced them to 64 with apparently no significant loss in quality (It was unnecessary if the level doesn't use water, but, well, I felt the extras were wasteful when it makes such little difference). I then saved the image as pic0000.pcx in the E02Win.exe folder, and ran it through the level ripper with the "Alter Palette" setting for Palette 0 with 64 level colors, and the "Image Colors" setting for "0-63" set to "0-63" to import palette entries 0-63 from the image to level indexes 0-63. The level would need further setup, so I used the main launcher window's "Start Editor" option, and clicked the "Rip Level" button
A default level created with the ripper has only three level planes, but the current Sonic scripts use 4, so I added a plane 3 onto the end by holding Ctrl to view the plane ID list, hovering over the X at the end of the list, and pressing A. Because I ripped both the background and foreground from the same image, they both appeared on plane 0, so I copied it to Plane 2 by hovering over Plane 0 ID, pressing C, then hovering over plane 2 ID, and pressing P (while still holding ctrl to view the ID list), and then removed the background image from Plane 2 by left-clicking Plane 2 ID in the list to select it for editing, then selecting a blank area of the level by right-clicking just below the background image and dragging the mouse across the level to create a line of the same width, pressing C to copy the row of tiles, then hovering over the top-left corner of the background image, pressing and holding P for Paste, and dragging the mouse down to blank out each row
The background planes need to be set to one of the "relative" forms of scrolling so they don't display beyond their height/width, so I selected plane 0 for editing, and while still holding ctrl, selected the "relative" setting, and then did the same thing for Plane 1, and then saved the level by opening the main menu with the 0 key, and selecting "save"
After having created the Sonic4 folder with a Zone01 folder to host the level, I copied rip.lev and rip.til as 1.lev and 1.til into the folder and started the game. The level would now display properly, but there were no solidity settings to affect the player, so I entered the Level Editor with the E key and selected Plane 2 for editing. Each unique tile needed solidity drawn onto it, so for each tile along the path, I hovered over the tile, pressed G for "grab", and pressed 3 to edit the tile in the tile editor. Since the editor starts in tile graphic editing mode, for the first tile, I clicked the area between the two selection boxes immediately to the right of the tile grid to switch to solidity editing mode. I used "top-only" solidity for the grass, so I selected it by clicking the green color box below the palette listing, and then drew onto the tile grid, and repeated until all tiles were solid, using the blue color for "all-sides solid" on the walls. I kept track of which tiles were and weren't solid by pressing 5 once in level editor mode to turn on the solidity overlay, and switching back to gameplay mode for testing by opening the main menu (0) and selecting "Return To Game". I saved regularly using the "Save Tiles" option in the main menu
One section in the level displays above the player, which is done using Plane 3. I selected the area from Plane 2, copied, switched to Plane 3 for editing, and while still holding ctrl, right-clicked plane 2 for viewing, then pasted onto Plane 3. I created a tile with a blank image to use on Plane 2 for collision in this area by first pressing 1 to go to the tile selector, pressing A to add a tile to the end of the list, right-clicking on the newly-created tile (it appears right before the boxed X at the bottom of the list) to load it in the tile editor, and then drew blue "all-sides" solidity onto it, then switched back to the level editor and drew it onto Plane 2
I then went back to Plane 0 to set some "fancy" scrolling by first setting the plane type to "HTil". I set the looping position by hovering over the lower-right tile of the background image and pressing Y and U for setting X and Y looping points, set the Y scrolling speed by using R/T, and then setting each tile row's X scroll speed by using W/E, which was made easier by the fact that I could right-click and draw a selection column down the image, allowing me to change the settings for each selected row all at once
I then made a few copy/paste changes to the level structure, and made sure everything was saved by opening the main menu and using both "Save" (for the level) and "Save Tiles", and checked it out in gameplay mode
I didn't include the little flowers that're off to the right of the image when I first ripped the level, so I had to add them in afterward. First, I took the map image in Paint Shop Pro and saved the palette, then loaded the image I got the flowers from, and loaded the palette onto it using the "match nearest color" option to make sure that they would use the same palette as the existing level. I then copied the flowers onto the map image (which isn't necessary, I could have used an image with only the flowers) and re-ripped the level using the "Add To Existing Tileset" and "Add To Existing Level" options. I used the "Browse" buttons to find the existing tile and level files in the Zone01 folder. I set the "Start Til" to the ID number of the last existing tile in the current tileset (the last existing, not the one after), which I got from checking the last tile's ID in the tile editor, and set the "Plane ID" to 4, which would place the ripped image onto a new plane 4 (the last currently-used plane is 3), and then used "Rip Level". Afterward, I ran the game again and entered editor mode. Plane 4 now contained the entire image including the newly-added flowers, but no tiles were duplicated, as the tiles for the rest of the image already existed. I copied the flowers and switched to Plane 3 for editing, enabling Plane 2 for viewing, and placed a few throughout the level
..Well, that's a bit long, but if you followed along, you should be able to create and expand levels without any issue
Also, you'll want to use the new exe's in this download, since I made a couple of corrections
This post has been edited by Phoebius: 10 November 2008 - 01:13 AM
