Archive: 19 posts

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I'm trying to work out how to make something that will block the carts in the small intestine section of my digestion level from falling down the wrong gap. I can't just use an emitter on a timer to project dark matter, as the cart can go through at all sorts of different speeds. I could try and customise it for each section at an "average time", but who knows is the player is being cautious, full throttle, or is catching on something and going in between those speeds. I was considering just disolve material, but then there is the matter of keeping it up. If it's glued to dark matter and set to disolve, then the dark matter is going to still be there. That's not that big an issue, but if I wanted to project a second barrier it would clash with the first one. If it's just dissolve, then the gap blocking piece needs to be held up somehow. I could glue one version to the wall, but if I wanted to reproject it, it will just fall through the gap. So... any ideas? If you want to see the cart ride itself, the current version on the main level just has a simplified route compared to the original "proper" version. If you finish the level you can access and old version, and even though it's very buggy, you can see what the proper thing is suppose to look like, at least in terms of structure. It feels like I've almost worked out how to do it in my head, but I feel like I'm missing something. I just can't quite work it out, at least not yet. So... any ideas?

2008-12-16 03:31:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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Can't you have a trap door sort of thing with a magnetic switch hooked up to it? Then have the magnetic key on the cart, so if the colors match the door is closed. I haven't actually tried the level, so I'm not sure if this applies or not.

2008-12-16 05:26:00 Author: Walter-Kovacs Posts: 542

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I really don't know but this MIGHT work. Have an emitter emit a dissolve wall or whatever, blocking the path, attach a magnetic key to the carts, and attach the switch to the dissolve material, have the emmiter set to infinite amount, one emitted always. And have the lifetime really really really long. In the end it would be something like this. Emitter emits dissolve wall, cart reaches the dissolve material, it dissolves, cart falls in the correct gap, emitter emits another dissolve wall, making it an endless loop. Hope that helped... If not, sorry

2008-12-16 05:32:00 Author: Whalio Cappuccino Posts: 5250

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I really don't know but this MIGHT work. Have an emitter emit a dissolve wall or whatever, blocking the path, attach a magnetic key to the carts, and attach the switch to the dissolve material, have the emmiter set to infinite amount, one emitted always. And have the lifetime really really really long. In the end it would be something like this. Emitter emits dissolve wall, cart reaches the dissolve material, it dissolves, cart falls in the correct gap, emitter emits another dissolve wall, making it an endless loop. Hope that helped... If not, sorry I think I understand what you mean, but won't that mean the disolve material made by the emitter will fall through the gap? For those that haven't played the level, it's a very long cart ride all on the frontal plane. There is no way to transition change - that's how you get out at the end. But there are gaps along the track, which carts need to skip over (or go between). The track itself loops on itself several times, and it does ride on it's nose and roof at certain points. So it might reach a cross intersection, and the first time it reaches it it needs to go from the left to the right (or the right to the left) without falling through the gap. But there are other times when it's falling through (or flying up) and I don't want it to be going down the wrong path if it starts to spin out. To make things even more complex, some intersections it approaches from a left/right angle for the first time, others from an up/down angle. The system I had in place was based on some very careful balancing between thrust and weight to avoid most of the problems, but still every now and then the cart would not have enough thrust and go the wrong way, or just start to fall through and get caught on itself. Other people might not have been giving it enough thrust in general so I need some sort of variable system rather than one based on timing. The cart has a rocket on the back that is activated by a grab switch, so the player can activate it on or off as they like. I can put magnetic keys on the cart, but sometimes it's on it's roof or nose when it's travelling.

2008-12-16 06:50:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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Yeah it would fall through the gap, you could have it so there's a really really small block holding it up, but small enough for the carts to fall through. That's really the only other way I see it happening with my idea.

2008-12-16 06:53:00 Author: Whalio Cappuccino Posts: 5250

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You could have a multiple keys on the cart, one for each gap that need to be skipped. Than after it goes over the gap the first time, it will lose the key(on a thin layer of dissolve?). Then next time the cart comes to the gap, the door/dissolve will go away since it is missing the colored key for that gap. This might be overly complicated, but you could probably simplify it a little to fit your needs.

2008-12-16 07:15:00 Author: Walter-Kovacs Posts: 542

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You could have a multiple keys on the cart, one for each gap that need to be skipped. Than after it goes over the gap the first time, it will lose the key(on a thin layer of dissolve?). Then next time the cart comes to the gap, the door/dissolve will go away since it is missing the colored key for that gap. This might be overly complicated, but you could probably simplify it a little to fit your needs. Hmmm... the only problem with that is extra disolve material on the cart would make the weighting all wonky. Disolve has weight which effects physics, at least until it's dissolved, at which point the weight changes again. So even if I compensate for the extra initial weight, with parts disappearing it will eventually go out of whack. Maybe if there was some way to turn off an emitted object at will. That way dark matter could be projected, and then have it vanish when the cart is past...

2008-12-16 07:19:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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Just attach a super small piece of dark matter to the dissolve and emit that. As long as it is on the side near the wall, it shouldn't block the gap...unless you're gaps are really tight fits. You can have dark matter so small it is invisible if you use the circle shape and the grid is turned off. Also the dark matter could be on a thin plane.

2008-12-16 07:21:00 Author: Walter-Kovacs Posts: 542

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You could use "invisible" dark matter on the gaps that prove troublesome so they only appear as if you will fall to your doom, but only use it near the landing edge of the gap, that way if the car is just crawling along it will still fall in.

2008-12-16 07:30:00 Author: Trader Sam Posts: 92

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Just attach a super small piece of dark matter to the dissolve and emit that. As long as it is on the side near the wall, it shouldn't block the gap...unless you're gaps are really tight fits. You can have dark matter so small it is invisible if you use the circle shape and the grid is turned off. Also the dark matter could be on a thin plane. Hmmm... I'm just worried that if I use dissolve on a thin plane, that it would stay there, thus preventing a second piece being projected. But there would be the issue of projecting the same piece again, wouldn't the dark matter that's left over, even if it's just a dot, prevent a new piece being emitted? I didn't mention it before, but the vehicle has what I call a one shot emitter system. So even if you get stuck, you can retry and the old vehicle (should) get wiped and replaced with a new one with the player respawning at the start of the track. If I don't use an emitter system for the barriers, then the track barriers will be all gone if the player was to retry. In an ideal world what ever gap system is used should only need to be used once, without the need to retry. But well, it's a very, very long and complex track, and all sorts of things could go wrong. :blush: You could use "invisible" dark matter on the gaps that prove troublesome so they only appear as if you will fall to your doom, but only use it near the landing edge of the gap, that way if the car is just crawling along it will still fall in. I don't quite understand this suggestion, Trader Sam. Do you mean invisible as in just a dot of dark matter? And what do you mean by the "landing edge of the gap"? Sometimes the cart is going upside down on it's nose when it crosses a gap, which is at slow speed and would ideally need a pretty complete covering. There are parts of the track where it's okay for the cart to miss a jump and fall in the gap, in fact near the end if you know the track backwards it's actually a short cut. But in an ideal world you wouldn't want to miss, and if it's left to chance if they get over or not, sometimes it's not a short cut at all if you fall through, and the cart can end up going back to a previous part of the track or even turn around and start heading back to the start. All of that though, once again, is not the ideal scenario, but at the moment it's possible.

2008-12-16 11:35:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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Hmmm... I'm just worried that if I use dissolve on a thin plane, that it would stay there, thus preventing a second piece being projected. But there would be the issue of projecting the same piece again, wouldn't the dark matter that's left over, even if it's just a dot, prevent a new piece being emitted? Actually, I have found that if you emit an object (specifically dark matter) on the exact spot where a previous copy of it exists, the first copy will be replaced with a newly emitted copy. I would assume this is due to it being in the exact location where the emitter is set. This has the effect of resetting the lifetime of the object.

2008-12-16 13:57:00 Author: Gilgamesh Posts: 2536

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Actually, I have found that if you emit an object (specifically dark matter) on the exact spot where a previous copy of it exists, the first copy will be replaced with a newly emitted copy. I would assume this is due to it being in the exact location where the emitter is set. This has the effect of resetting the lifetime of the object. Hmmm... if this is the case, I can have a thin layer of darkmatter, cow lick it so it looks like the background, stick on some disolve, and then have some key system on the cart to make it disappear... I'd have to tinker with the specifics, but this sounds like a great start.

2008-12-16 14:04:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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I don't quite understand this suggestion, Trader Sam. Do you mean invisible as in just a dot of dark matter? And what do you mean by the "landing edge of the gap"? Sometimes the cart is going upside down on it's nose when it crosses a gap, which is at slow speed and would ideally need a pretty complete covering.I haven't tried it yet, but my understanding is that if you shrink your cursor to the smallest possible size and draw a line of dark matter, it will be invisible but will still allow players and objects to interact with it, however since it is invisible it could be difficult to edit or delete. By my "landing edge" suggestion I meant that you could employ this trick to extend the far edge of some of the gaps so they only appear larger than they are, in this way you can make some of the more difficult gaps easier to clear.

2008-12-16 14:58:00 Author: Trader Sam Posts: 92

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To make the emmitter replace the previous one, all you have to do is set max at a time to 1.

2008-12-16 15:14:00 Author: Walter-Kovacs Posts: 542

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dude i've played your level and i was gonna suggest using an emitter that emits dark matter above and below(to the left and right for the vertical ones) the gaps. You could have a mag switch attached to the emitters and the key on the front of the cart. The switch would be just before each gap and you could have the lifetime of the dark matter to 5-10seconds. I think this would work fine for the problem you have. As most of the time we were getting stuck with the cart wedged sideways because it had wavered sideways at the junctions. Hope you understand what i mean and that it helps you each gap

2008-12-16 15:16:00 Author: dorien Posts: 2767

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Emit the dissolve onto a "ledge" basically on both sides the sides stick out ever so slightly, just enough to stop the material from falling through

2008-12-16 19:41:00 Author: DrunkMiffy Posts: 2758

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Pistons with small 'bridges' on them, when the cart comes near, they pop up and prevent it from falling? Or some glass. Or emmitters that emit dark matter ONLY when the cart is nearby

2008-12-16 23:01:00 Author: DRT99 Posts: 431

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Elbee, I've been meaning to ask.. have you considered giving your vehicle more of a "Round" Front? To keep it from snagging on corners and stuff? Ironically, the first time I played it, I was doing well.. then got stuck, so I let go of the gas, and then hit the gas.. and TOOK off like a rocket to the end in about 3 seconds... (Probably through one of those "holes").

2008-12-17 01:03:00 Author: DaSaintFan Posts: 136

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Elbee, I've been meaning to ask.. have you considered giving your vehicle more of a "Round" Front? To keep it from snagging on corners and stuff? Ironically, the first time I played it, I was doing well.. then got stuck, so I let go of the gas, and then hit the gas.. and TOOK off like a rocket to the end in about 3 seconds... (Probably through one of those "holes"). I have experimented with round noses, like this shape: ) And triangle point noses, like this shape: > For those that don't know, the current shape is a like a really bent capital L but backwards. With the alternative noses I found that it would either make the cart too heavy at the front and then cause it to fall down gaps or at least clip them and start to spin out. Also when they hit the corners, they would tend to catch even more than the current system, if you can believe that. The current system has the ultra-round golf balls where most of the edge hitting occurs, which makes it level out, but when it's force onto it's nose, it can kind of still balance on the nose section and keep moving, although at a slower rate. I still suspect the problem is the way the default circle shape just does not work all that well when made very large. The circle shape is actually made up of a lot of small angles, just make a really, really big one in create mode and you can see them for yourself. I suspect the MM made circular objects like golf balls and oranges are actually prebuilt 3D objects that they have forced into the psuedo 2D world of LBP. If you look closely at them you can see them react to shadows in a 3D sort of way, and if you blow them up to a huge size it's much harder to see the individual polygons, all in all suggesting that they are cheating. So I'm hoping to rebuild the corner sections so it clips less, either by taking out or adding more angles to it. Keep the advice coming though! I hope to revist the small intestine section soon after I've finished work on my "How to" part 2!

2008-12-17 01:56:00 Author: Elbee23 Posts: 1280

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