Tile Map Features

I have to agree with the above two posters. Drag and drop just won't cut it for tile maps. Changing animation frames is a temporary solution at best, and it's not nearly as intuitive as a proper tile map editor.

Tokinsom, you're right. We do have better tile features planned though, it's just right now my todo list is endless. It's difficult to prioritise things because there are people who argue exactly like you do for other significant features like Families, and these are huge jobs, and we're a small company!

We really do urgently need to write the manual, which is one giant monolith of work. I have families next for coding because they make events so much easier, and that's big too. I can do better tile features after that. But then when do the image editor tools fit in? :-\ Hopefully you see our general situation. When I said "quite far" I meant "an awful lot further than if those features didn't exist".

I strongly disagree with the three above posters, especially with Kioyoshi's biased argumentation that rests on false facts.

Sure it would be nice to have some full-blown solution for tile editing. But then again, I'd rather see Scirra's limited ressources be aimed at practical features like families or XML parsing (features that would allow users to make their OWN level editor in the end or even use Tiled, the tile-editor that was already quoted a lot of times).

But for now, as it is C2 IS the tile editor. And it does its job.

It's probably even closer to the tile editor of Braid than anything (Braid doesn't rely on squared tiling like a zelda for example).

I used C2 for my levels in Space Jinx, and it worked wonderful.

And it was even before the "Initial frame" property (it came in middle of the development, and helped save some events but all in all, I had worked around it already).

Something missing maybe could be a "Initial animation" to go along with the "Initial frame".

But from there you're pretty much done as far as editing (placing tiles) goes.

Tile-editing is NOT a priority in the sense it can already be achieved. And a tile editor in its own is a FULL software. For now, let Ash work on C2.

Edit: Ashley posted while I was writing this. The posters mentioned are the three above him of course.

In the end, it appears to me we said about the same thing, all priorities are subjective, and he codes alone, so everything takes time to be achieved.

I'm not arguing that this needs to be top-priority. Sorry if it seemed that way. I would actually prefer you wait a good while before working on some tile-based features, as C2 is still young and there are indeed more important things (families, containers, plugins, what have you.) Not having these is more troublesome than not having a tile-based editor. Like Kyatric said, it IS currently possible to make tile-based levels, but it's a major pain.

Some of the earlier posts just left me under the impression that the whole idea was dropped and the best we were going to get was the "import sprite strip" feature. It is a very nice feature by the way..just not the most practical for tilesets.

Being able to create your own tile-based editor is nice, but I have no clue how it's even possible in C2. On top of that it's an incredibly large amount of work, and you have to constantly add to it for each one of your games. Objects, backgrounds, tiles, triggers, you name it. This all has to be managed and accounted for with EVENTS. It sucks! Just having a drag 'n drop AND tile-based editor built in would be amazing, and could be used for every kind of game. Almost every game out there uses tiles. They just do. Having a game creation tool without tile support just doesn't make sense.

Kyatric Can i know what part of my post is biased and what are the false facts please ? Ok, you don't agree with it. But calling it biased and false without saying why is a severe and childish insult. I'm not trying to be rude with anyone i was just expressing my opinions.

I wasn't trying to be childish or insulting, I just didn't want to start up a discussion that has already been had several times on the forum "tile-editor vs no tile-editor".

Anyway here we go:

rag-n-drop editors are great for a class of games , mainly games that are very art oriented like Aquaria or Braid.

So as I said, Braid's tile-editor differs from "classic" tiles editors from what I've seen from the author in talks he gave. It's not squared/grid based, it looks more like C2's IDE in fact, where you drop your sprite, change its width/height, angle, etc...

So, to me, you're using the perfect counter-argument that goes to the opposite of all your argumentation afterwards. So here is some "false fact" to me.

hat said, a tile editor not only is essential but the types of games that are more adequate to web games right now are most tile based games or games that use tiles in some level. It must be put on top of list.

This comment is biased imo.

I've made several projects, and so far I never had the NEED for a tile editor. A tile-editor is not something ESSENTIAL. Nevertheless, as I mentionned in my previous post, priorities are something subjective anyway. So it is biased, but it is nothing to be ashamed of and I don't mean it in any negative way.

For the comment about webgames, there's also some bias here. Maybe more generalization. There are so many games over the web, it's a bit restrictive to say "types of games that are more adequate to web games right now are most tile based games".

There are thousand of shoot 'em up on the web for example. Do they use tiles-editor ? Probably not. Are they not adequate to web game ? they are adequate else there wouldn't be so many.

I'd rather not start an argument there because I find it quite pointless, you have your opinion, I have mine and debating about it in a dozen of posts won't help achieving anything more than spending the time to write said posts.

I've just noticed you were one of those activaly participating during the "tile-editor feature request" posts that occured several months ago whit the polls about the features the users wanted to see added to C2.

As I stated in my previous post, there are ways to go with C2 and have efficiency in level making. And a tile-editor is a full software in its own right.

You (always) seemed to absolutely desire this tool where I really don't see the urge.

I'm biased too, don't get me wrong, and I know it, but I honestly believe you can work your way through C2 and have tiled levels quite efficiently and without has much pain as it has been said on this topic.

I'm maybe missing something here, but as I said, Space Jinx works with tiles (each tile represent some sort of object with different properties/behaviors) and managed my way quite painlessly through it (once I had settled my mechanics).

Ok. I understand. It's just that the way you said at first sounded offensive. But now it's sorted out.

Some things: First " Drag-n-drop editors are great for a class of games , mainly games that are very art oriented like Aquaria or Braid."

I meant what i said. Drag-n-drop (non tile based) editors like it is now on c2 are great for games with free element positioning. But it falls short for other types. Thats all. It is not a counter argument. You misunderstood it.

Second thing: Ok it is not essential my bad. But if you look at it that way most of the things in C2 are not "Essential". They're there to improve Usability and Ease of Use and most of all Productivity for many kinds of games, and a little more for some kinds. That's all. Hope that ends the argument.

tile based editor can help a lot, especialy with digging games. i'm having a bad nightmare to figure out how to build my project without a tiled based editor and still have the features like, digging at propper place, place object at certain point, grass grow/expand and player building things... with a tiled base we could build the tile propperties better and faster.

i really like the scirra because my assets are hand draw, but a tile based editor plus drag-n-drop = epic win�, we could make better graphics and still have the features that help to build a tiled game.

we all know that the scirra construct can build a tiled based game without a tile editor, but its just hard, like swim against the river.

I want to throw this out for discussion.

Edit: Tiled might be a good editor (I dunno, haven't used it) but tailoring C2 features towards it specifically would be a really bad move. What if Tiled stops being worked on?

Allowing C2 to read XML files and generate terrain based on that would suffice, no need for specific Tiled features I'd say.

Tiled is an open source GPL project meaning that if the current developers ever retired and maintenance became necessary (on tiled as used for Construct2) then Scirra could make upstream changes to tiled in the case tiled became the de-facto editor in practice for tiled maps in Construct2. This is not a new arrangement. Disney (and partnership with Carnegie-Mellon University) maintains the open-source Panda3D engine where it is being used as the de-facto engine for projects including their Pirates of the Caribbean and ToonTown MMO's.

Well right now i'm making everything with tiled backgrounds that's the workaround for now :D In fact the tile system could use the concept of tiled backgrounds for some cases like filling an entire area with the same tile etc. I feel there's a good way to make a tile system without needing an expressive rewrite of the map editor.

Have these better tile features been put in place? Also, is there any update on per-pixel collision? Just joined and want to create a digging game and these seem to be a constant theme on this topic. Thanks!

doublearonaz, there is no per-pixel collision yet (I believe Ashley has given a reason for this in another thread).

Tiles are relatively easy to do using animation frames and the 'initial frame' property.

Thanks for the response!

Any workaround you can think of with the per-pixel collision?

Sounds like I could accomplish a lot of what I am looking at with your initial frame property and arrays.