Also just FYI. Because there will be different realms for different biomes, I'm gonna have multiple sprite sheets that have the same items and player sprite but different monsters and bosses, so that we can have a large amount of those. Just letting people know 'cause that may take a bit of space (though it probably won't be huge)
Right now I've made half of a projectile system. Right now, I'm trying to make arrows move correctly.
EDIT: Arrows were pretty easy once I started thinking lol. All that's left for now that has to do with projectiles is collision.
Ok the main problem now has to do with treasure chests. I'm trying to think of a system to use them similar to the inventory system, but I still need to think it out a bit. Right now, I'm trying to work out collision with them.
INSTANT EDIT: Collision is fixed :p
Ok now torches and treasure chests exist hooray
At this point, I'm mostly worried about speed and stuff (which torches apparently suck at lol) but there are some other things that need to be done, such as adding monsters and items. I also need to make the background layer accessible, because even though it exists the player can't directly make changes to it. But here's my current issue with torches:
So the torch system is working well and isn't super-duper slow, but my system for getting rid of duplicate light-sources doesn't seem to work well. It works great when the player isn't moving at all (in my testing environment for this, at least, which is a 50x15 world with a layer of torches on top) but when the player moves, it stops working and the torch count raises from 50 to something higher (in my last test it raised to 89) and it keeps rising after that every time every block is checked for torches (the way this works is by changing 2 x/y variables that run across the screen checking each tile, and it checks 10 tiles every frame, though I could probably do more.) So the amount of light-sources keeps rising, even though there's always 50 torches, and this gets super slow pretty fast. Because it's late, I won't get into any details with the code, but I might use the chat later for help. Or maybe I'll fix it on my own tomorrow. I don't know.
Ok so here's some amazing news:
I'm getting SB4 when it comes out in the US, so I will probably port this to SB4 after the last 3DS version of this comes out (probably 1.3.) Or I may port this to SB4 when I get tired of the 3DS's limited optimization. Either way, it'll probably go to SB4, where I will continue to update it.
So right now I have ideas for an evil realm that involve going in, avoiding a ton of monsters, beating the boss, and leaving. But I don't really have a plot planned for it. I'll consider any ideas anyone has. I also already have the mechanics of the realm planned out; think of it being kind of like the Sacred Realm of TLoZ Skyward Sword.
Ok I'm super happy and excited right now! I have finished making the background layer accessible. You can place background walls, and remove them with the wooden hammer. I have also made the crafting system work correctly, so now if you have more than 49 (it's a 7x7 grid) recipes availabe, you can reach them all! Next I just need to add all of the content, like monsters and items. I also can't forget to make treasure chests a usable item that you can place. Seriously, the pre-release is likely to come soon!
Not much has happened today. I found a bug where when you mine the anvil, it only gets rid of half of it, but that'll be an easy fix. I also made it so that you don't place doors on top of each other. What I need to do next is make doors and chests mineable. I also started thinking about a buff/debuff system. I'm kind of bord of my ideas with it, though. But after that, I can start doing fun stuff, like adding bosses.
I've done nothing with Wonderflonium today, because I was trying to get accustomed to the new SB4 UI. And I've just been thinking and decided that I can release a premature version on the 3DS, and port it to the Switch. I plan to pretty much redo all of the systems that need to be redone, and hopefully it'll run pretty smoothly. I also plan to increase the resolution to reveal more of the map, and maybe have a zoom option. I don't know everything about how it's gonna go from here, but hopefully it'll go fairly smooth. I'll try my best.
Another thing: because I'm releasing a premature version on the 3DS, it's free for people who have SB3 and not SB4 for whatever reason to play around with it. There are systems working for monsters, projectiles, lighting, items, and a few other things. What I'm saying is that you can make whatever you want with it, if you don't want to make your own system.
EDIT: I'm trying to increase the map size, but I've run into some issues. I had to change how bgload works, so it can load the map after you move a certain amount of blocks, and that's all fine and well. So the lighting system does more than turn lights on and off; it also changes the orientation of some blocks by checking the blocks around it. Like a grass block with air above it would have grass on top instead of the bottom and side. But there's some sort of coordinate-issue that appeared when I changed how the map is loaded that I'm looking into. Hopefully I can fix it.
Ok so all most of the BG issues have been fixed. The reason I say most is because of how many issues I've had to fix so far that were supposed to already be fixed. For instance, changing the coordinate system for the BG was all fine, so now the map moves smoothly and the player doesn't notice anything weird right? That is, until they start digging up parts of trees with their pickaxe. I originally went against this by using a function that checks what block is being dug up, but that suddenly stopped working. What was happening is that it checked one block and returned the location of one nearby, because the coordinate system switched. I had to switch BGGET(L,(X+CX)/8,(Y+CY)/8) to BGGET(L,X,Y,1) in order to check the screen coordinate (not the BG one) and counteract how the top-left corner of the map is always in the top-left of the screen, instead of wherever it wants to be. Another issue was with tile orientation. The old problem with this and how duplicate blocks were made wasn't a super hard fix. But there was an annoying bug where blocks on the side of the screen always changed to a certain orientation, and when the player moves that way it sticks out a lot. Like you see grass surrounded completely by dirt with no air. This doesn't look good. So what I had to do was be lazy and ignore the side blocks when changing the orientation of the blocks. As you can probably tell, this change to the coordinate system was pretty big. So I expect more bugs.
Anyway, next thing to do before 3DS release is add more monsters like slimes and real-estate agents (that was supposed to be a joke towards ASoUE, but people voted for it.) I may polish a few things, and then I should be able to release the game. Note that the only items available in the 3DS will be the starter ones, and the ones made from wood (and the furnace). You can get the other ones by editing the INV% data, but there aren't many more than the ones you can already get. More will be in the switch version.
That's my update for today. I also learned how XSCREEN works a bit on the Switch, but that's not as significant. Still great though.
Ok so I almost have a decent 3DS version out; everything is working great. I just want to add a few monsters and weaken the current ones a tiny bit because you only get wooden gear.
I have also downloaded a version of this on SB4 and started manually converting it. It's actually going really good with the manual conversion; the biggest problem I have so far is with converting BG to text because of how CHKCHR works compared to BGGET. I think I can get rid of all of the BGGET(0,X,Y,1) and replace it with CHKCHR(0,X/8,Y/8) because of how I changed the BGLOAD and BGOFS (which I did to make maps bigger)
Also I think I can probably make worlds 2000x2000 or bigger because SB4 is more powerful and stuff.
I also want to share my plans for how the realms work. Basically, there'll be a few randomly generated worlds that simulate natural biomes, such as the forest, desert, tundra, etc. And there'll also be a few pre-made worlds that are there kind of for plot purposes or just because I want to give the player a specific challenge. And the way to access certain realms could be different from accessing others. You could build a portal, use an item, beat a boss (inspired from one mod I've seen a bit of), or type a command if there'll ever be a chat (there might). And the way that works could possibly be inspired by plot (also got that idea from a mod). So that's how I plan to do this.
Ok so uh I fixed some more BG problems (I knew there were more) and so now I am getting ready to release it to the 3DS. On the 3DS, you can explore your world and build whatever you want as long as it's made of wood, dirt, or rocks. Be careful, though, because monsters are deadly.
Also I'm gonna restart converting it to SB4 because of CONST stuff and because I've changed the 3DS version since starting conversion.
So I'm gonna release a 3DS version soon. It's not amazing, but it's what I've made so far from the systems I've created.
Ok so the conversion to SB4 has started, with the arrival of my new USB keyboard (perfect timing) and it's going well. I need to work on BG (or text) physics and rotation. If there's some number I can just add to my user-defined characters to get them to rotate, please tell me! I don't like duplicating BG (still text in SB4 I'll keep calling it BG from here lol) tiles because they take up space and also require more than minimal effort lol. I very much prefer adding a simple number over going through all of the work to re-organize my screen, make functions to rotate stuff, and then add a different simple number. But that's just me being lazy. So anyway, please tell me if there's a constant that I can add to my tile numbers to rotate/flip them (though I don't think there is.)
Right now, the program won't generate any errors upon starting the program because of undefined constants. I've gotten all of those covered. And it can get to the point where it runs the loop infinitly errorless. The problem with the code right now comes down to how the BG loads. Once the player moves, it seems to disappear. If the player moves the other way, the BG moves the opposite direction very slowly. Gravity works but jumping doesn't, probably due to me not updating BUTTON (though earlier with using items it gave me an error for not updating it.) And what little movement does work is very choppy. I think I may need to restudy how TOFS and TLOAD work.
That's what has happened today.
Ok so today I made another decision. I'm thinking about continuing the 3DS version, because I can't program on the Switch as much as I'd like (due to family members also using it.) So I'm actually gonna try to make something from the 3DS system I made, while the main game will still be on the switch.
What I'm doing now is finishing the crafting system, making hammers, and adding features such as monsters and items. After this stuff is done, I can upload the pre-release. Get hyped; the pre-release will probably come within the next week!