LF2 GM Progress Thread

[A-Man]

so the entire data handling will be done via .ini files.
.txt and .bin would work as well, but i'd need to parse everything, whereas in ini files i can read out variables way easier.

....just as i was writing down my current method i realized it could be done way easier

right now i would have to create a dummy object for every possible object/background/char etc.
ill see what i can manage to come up with.

right now my method would be:

• a set of lets say 1000 dummy objects, each named 0-999.
  
• for every 'id' there would only be a path for the .ini file.
  
• in the .ini file there would be an identifier section, which then would copy the type of the data (background/char etc) to the corresponding dummy object.
  

that would also mean that the 'id' would be limited to exactly 0-999.

im not too sure whether i will include backgrounds in this as they are coded differently altogether.
im not really sure about backgrounds at all yet tbh

Looks promising! Not really sure what you meant by "create a dummy object for every possible", but that sounds more like allocating an array of your object's type for all the objects that are going to be loaded; and that's how it was done with LF2 as well. But let me share my thoughts :P:
1-Allocate an array of type "object" for the game objects, another array of type "bg" for the bgs, and a 3rd one of the type "object_copy" that stores info about objects on the screen.
2-The "object" array will store the actual objects that are loaded fir the game; including the frames, sounds and the sprites.
3-The "object_copy" array, however, will store data and info about objects on the screen (its current frame, x_y_z_position, the current HP, MP, x_y_z_velocity, the key clicks buffer..etc).
4-In your object[xyz].update() function, set a parameter of type "object_copy" to pass the data of that object on the screen; You surely don't want to load bandit's sprites and stuff 3 times in order to have 3 of them on the screen. You will just load it once, and then create 3 instances of "object_copy" that stores each one's position, hp and etc.

Goood Luck! (finally getting to the fun part, eh?)

Edit: Plus I think that actually specifying the ids like that makes more sense, since an id is supposed to act like the "address" of an object/oranything. Plus it can force modifiers to be more organized.