I found a problem here. Don't know what causes it, but it's really bad. So, after spending some time playing with the test stages, I figured I'd download some other levels to see how well it works in an actual level. You know, run it through it's paces and see how well it works in normal use. I went on YouTube and downloaded a level called "Seaside Palace". It looked very well designed and fun to play though, and it looked like it would make a decent level to do a test run in. I followed the directions to insert the level, simply unzipping the folder into the "Stages" folder. When I started the level up, I had absolutely no lighting, textures, or anything. The sky was plain white, and all terrain and objects were completely black. I'm pretty sure Sonic was invisible completely, or if he wasn't, I couldn't see him. Is there a difference in how your test levels work compared to a normal level? If so, what should I do to make a normal level load properly? If not, then this seems like a pretty big bug. I've seen the stage run on videos using older versions of the BlitzSonic engine, so I'm fairly certain it isn't the level. If you want the level I used to test this, just search "Seaside Palace" on YouTube, you should be able to find it easily.
If I recall correctly, it's something to do with the stage's xml. It's only a minor difference—fog related, I think. In fact, I'm pretty certain it has something to do with the fog. Try copying the fog portion of the test level's stage xml into the custom one in the same general area; that should fix it. (in the <information> section of stage.xml)
Didn't work. The level refused to open entirely. Oddly enough, Seaside Palace didn't even have anything about fog in it. I just tried copying it to the empty space where it would have gone.
What I did to fix this on a previous version of the Freerunner engine is just copy a working stage's XML verbatim, but change it so it pointed to the correct files of the other stage I was trying to play.
Stupid internet connection ruined my post. Here's the condensed version of what I wanted to say... Talked to level creator about loading issue. Turns out I forgot a line when copying fog parameters. Level plays well, but doesn't load any enemies. Turning is slightly loose while at high speed, but tolorable. Didn't test grinding, though. If problems come up, I'll bring them up here.
You did a pretty good job on this, I must say. You've really taken the slippery, unpolished BlitzSonic and improved it tons. First off, the control is vastly improved from the standard engine. It's far less slippery and I can get places way better. However, I found platforming to be a pain in the ass with this control scheme. It was just fine for running around, but when it was time to jump on platforms, Sonic's fast midair (and ground) acceleration made it feel like a chore to platform properly. Also, I was having trouble getting the light-dash to work. I was pressing the button as said in the XML, but it either did not work or once I got up the ring chain half way and then fell. I'm not sure if that's the engine or just me though. But overall, I think you did a good job on this, fixing the one huge problem I had with BlitzSonic: slipping.
Thanks for the input guys. I haven't really worked on this project since SAGE, and I haven't even been online lately either. This was, and still is, caused by a number of issues in real life. I mostly wanted to provide a quick update here to let everyone know I'm not dead. In the last few days however, I have managed to get quite a bit done. I've made some improvements to the engine overall to make it run faster, such as improving the way in which game content is handled, and I've improved the LOD system, and I fixed a number of bugs here and there that may have been causing frame lag. The engine is running significantly better than it did at it's SAGE release. It's code is becoming more and more optimized every time I work on it. I've done a lot of stuff relating to gameplay and visuals as well. I'm not going to reveal just how much I've gotten done yet because I'd like to make a more significant update which may inspire people to provide help with this project, and may convince people to let me use their music/models/art. I think once I have something very tangible to show, people will be more inclined to help. In the mean time thanks for your support everyone, and I will try my best to provide more updates for this project.
I've been testing the SAGE release on different pre-existing BlitzSonic levels, and I thought I'd ask something about the engine itself that I noticed. How exactly do the springs work? Different engines end up launching me different distances when I hit a spring, so when I play a level like Green Hill Ocean where you're supposed to go through a sequence where each spring launches you to the next, I often end up either overshooting, or not getting where I need to be. I'm not complaining, I'd just like to know how these things work and why it seems to do that. Some of the engines have a button you can press to lift Sonic up and place him back in the level. While I absolutely hate levels that seem to not be tested thoroughly enough and require this to complete the level, I've been trying to use this to bypass missing objects that are required that the engine doesn't have running properly yet. (Not this engine, but a different one I've been trying out has things missing as well.) Why is it that the lifting ability doesn't lift Sonic some of the time? It seems as though there's a set height that I'm allowed to pick Sonic up to, but many levels are built higher than that, so I can't use it to get Sonic up a cliff that's either missing the needed springs or where they don't work correctly. When you do decide to release the next demo version of this, if you don't have any levels finished, would you consider including existing levels such as Seaside Palace or Green Hill Ocean with a couple tweaks to get them to work correctly in the engine? I enjoyed playing through the demo areas you included before, but it would be nice to see how well it works in an actual level (that works correctly without using debug tools). Finally, do you ever look at other engines for ideas on how to improve yours? I mean, for example, there's another engine being worked on at the moment (I think it's called Blitz Sonic Advanced or something) where the Green Hill test area has an invisible flat surface put over the bridges so you can run across them properly. I know that's more of a level tweak than a feature in the engine, but it got me wondering about if you check out other engines for ideas. Sorry about asking so many questions. I've just been playing with the engine a lot and had come up with these over time, but wasn't sure if asking them would be considered bringing up a dead topic or not, like when somebody puts in a post in the MegaMix topic and it gets everybody disappointed when they think it's an update.
There are a number of factors to consider. Springs in Blitz Sonic work by simply adding lots of vertical momentum to Sonic. If you've ever done any simple game programming, the momentum I'm talking about is in the form of variables - sometimes called dx, dy, and dz, and they are manipulated by various forces like gravity, acceleration, friction, etc and are then added to the player's actual x,y,z once all is said and done. The springs in all Blitz Sonic engines work the same, but they have different amounts of power, and then there are the other factors I mentioned such as friction which can slow Sonic down long before he reaches the next spring, or cause him to overshoot. Also some engines, like Freerunner, have an additional tag in the stage's config file for each spring that allow you to adjust the power of the spring. This tag can vary from engine to engine, and the power of each spring may be ignored completely. There are two ways past this problem. Ask other people who have modded the Blitz Sonic engine to lend me their code to make a cross-compatible version which can read all stages. Or, go in and manually convert (adjust) each and every spring to suit the different physics. Unfortunately, the former is not going to happen. I already tried. And the ladder is too time consuming. Springs that form a chain are pretty much proprietary to the particular engine in which they were configured. It sounds like you may be getting stuck to polygons. When you are running, or some polygons' normals are not set correctly (a problem with the stage model), Sonic will not lift up. You should be able to get around this by jumping and then holding the flying button. Or find the edge of a cliff and walk off and then press the button. I've fixed some of these issues in the build I'm working on. The system for handling actions was a little wonky also. It seems to work perfect in the version I'm building now, so I'll try to provide an update soon. As with springs, configuring the stage to work well with Freerunner can be a tedious process. If I had the model in a format I could read within 3DS Max, I could place the objects much more easily, but I would need an older format; I can read fbx files just fine, but there are many different versions, and I would need an old version. But the biggest problem is finding the time. I do occasionally look at how other people's Blitz Sonic engines are coming along, but I don't add anything from their engine to Freerunner without asking the person who did it first. I'm not out to steal people's thunder. I try to stick with my own ideas wherever possible. The only thing I'm really copying right now are Sonic 3 elements. Sega is about the only entity I'm not going to ask for permission. lol No problem, ask whatever you like, the engine is (thus far) open source. And I don't consider this project or topic to be dead by any stretch. Its kind of hard to 'bump' a topic in the Fangaming forum anyways because most projects are not dead, they are just taking the author a long time to update. Developing a video game on your own isn't an easy or fast process. And people have lives and can't always provide daily, weekly or even monthly updates. The project would have to be truly dead, as in cancelled and left alone for years.
