Ideas & Suggestions for future versions of PGE

[lighthouse64]

Would it be possible to make a random map maker?

[tb1024]

That was the previous suggestion xD

Yeah, but for it to throw a consistent level we should create a proper generator. Another application for Lua scripting - Level Generator!

[Fridj]

I was thinking if something like this would be possible to implement in the engine from a graphical standpoint: make the sprites more dynamic. I'll try to explain : in many mario related flash movies, or in general sprite movies hosted primarly on Newrounds.com, people used the sprites in a very dynamic way to make their movies. For example, when mario jumps and touches on the ground, his sprite gets a little bit squished for a moment.
Along this line, with more animations outside of the original ones, level creators could implement their own animations (for example, if someone wants jump animation exactly like in standard mario games, could set this "dynamic mode off".) The same dynamic mode could allow also some running and stopping anmations, and instead of having mario transit from one sprite being firm on the ground to the second sprite where he starts running, the transition could be more dynamic and fluid, maybe adding some stretch effect on the sprite prior to the start of the animation, stretching it in the direction in which is running for a split second, and obviously it would apply the same as for when mario stops or changes direction etc.

To give a more practical view of what i'm actually talking about I'd advise you to watch a bit of this flash movie on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUvRRrsj6PM

Most of us probably already know about this kind of flash movies. another example would be provided by the rise of mushroom kingdom:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA8JnIiXVh8

which brings me to the next very important point: in the initial part of this flash movie there is a good segment (from 0:45) in which mario jumps from one layer to another layer in front of him, as if he was actually interacting with "multiple backgrounds" or sort of, and he does so by entering in a pipe. Could something like this be implemented ? I do not know how to call this since i'm no expert. I did do some flash movies though, and I always thought "It would be awesome to actually play a mario game based on this kind of structure, with multi layers, camera moving around you, zooming in and out based on what is going on with the environment. Basically "playing a flash movie". There is a flash game called Mario Combat on newgrounds which actually lets you do exactly this, here's the link if you want to check it out:

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/471144

Anyway, it's just a combat game which has some adventure element, and is very short too....nothing compared to what smbx or PGE are.
I think this would be a good way to revitalize a little the standard mario gameplay (i'm not talking about the punching and grabbing of the flash game, but i'm referring to everything mentioned above) and a way of adding something more to the smbx formula, of which otherwhise PGE project would merely be a copy of, with standard gameplay elements, whitout adding much more from the gameplay standpoint and the overall presentation.

What do you guys think of this?

[h2643]

Hey, I've been lurking at NSMBX forums and I found some really good suggestions that were suggested for SMBX:R. I think they would be good for this project too. Here they are (writted by Chad, original topic: http://nsmbxforums.prophpbb.com/post4683.html#p4683):

Spoiler

1. You should be able to edit what height Podoboos jump at. I know that's already been suggested, but I'd like to edit their directions as well. Ceiling/wall Podoboos would be awesome. I'd also like both of these to apply to jumping Piranha Plants and such.

2. Upside-down and sideways Venus Fire Traps.

3. NPC flags that alter an NPC's default AI. For example, take a Goomba and add "npc=26" to its text file, and it will function like a springboard, and other NPC flags will make it function like the springboard by default, but you could still put other NPC flags in the text file to override them.

4. NPC flags for every possible hazard (tail, statue, bomb, veggie, etc.)

5. Everything should have an editable mask.

6. When 5 Dragon Coins are collected, it should take 5 more before it gives you another life. That way, you could basically put as many as you want and it'd be fine, as long as there's at least 5.

7. I know flying Boom Boom was suggested, but I think that it should be a separate boss from the type that doesn't fly.

8. A single event should not be limited to triggering one other event, or making one layer move in one direction or speed.

9. In SMBX, once you have looping timed events, it's impossible to stop them. I believe there should be an event setting for stopping them.

10. Question: If warps are limited to up, down, left, and right, how does that work with rotating layers?

11. When you mouse over any object in the editor, it should tell you exactly what type and number the object is, which would greatly simplify searching through folders.

12. Resizing the level window should just show more of the level, rather than stretching everything. That's what fullscreen is for.

13. I see wall-jump is an accepted suggestion. Please make it optional, as it could break a lot of levels.

14. Block train.

15. An alternate way to generate enemies where no more than a specific number of them generates at a time, and no new ones appear from that generator until those are defeated. For example, if said specific number is 1, you could have Lakitus that work the way they do in the original games, where a new one appears only after the current one dies. This sort of thing could also simplify the process of creating multiple-phase bosses and bosses based on waves of regular enemies, especially since this type of generator could be put on a layer that can be hidden anytime.

16. Events that depend on player damage or current powerups. For example, you could reward the player for completing a level without getting hit once (which would definitely increase replay value), or have certain areas open or close depending on what powerup the character currently has. Like the character blocks, but with powerups. Also, "No More Objects In Layer"-type events applying to blocks being hit, so you could create events where you could reward the player at the end of a level for doing absolutely everything in it.

17. If you hit two coin blocks that are next to each other at the same time, you should be able to hit both, not just the one.

18. The ability to pan the camera a certain distance from the player's position, to make blind jumps and abruptly-appearing obstacles and such easier to deal with.

19. May or may not have been suggested already, but I'd like to throw this out there anyway - More airship stuff, such as flamethrowers, working diagonal cannons, and the like.

20. When playing a level, I think that somewhere in the pause menu should be information on how many stars a level has, and what kind of exits it has. Information such as red coins, Dragon Coins, and whatever else could go here, too. This could especially be helpful for determining if levels such as Ghost Houses and castles have secret exits, as well as episodes where yellow and red spaces don't indicate exits the way they're meant to.

21. Events that enable or disable a specific cheat. It'd be like using cheats legitimately, and only where/when designers would intend for players to do so. Such applications include an extremely simple, very linear level with very few hazards all considerably spaced apart, but you have to use speeddemon the whole time. Would be better as a bonus level, sure, but you see my point. You could also make a level that relies on the ahippinandahoppin or shadowstar cheats. You could also use hold-item cheats such as boingyboing and upandout to make a Toad give you a springboard or propeller block, or use "needa-" cheats for events where players could receive items in their reserve boxes.

Some of these suggestions actually can be done in SMBX (like the block train), but they either require custom graphics or a ton of events.

[Squishy Rex]

I agree, it would be nice to be able to place a Block Train into the level and have it just work like a default NPC instead of writing up a ton of events. Most of those I remember well from NSMBX's development, and to be able to implement them would be great, especially the ones regarding cheats and the more physical suggestions. It is certainly better than all of the "add this NPC" suggestions. Assuming that customization is the biggest objective, I don't see why most of that won't be possible.

Also, that Level Generator idea is awesome, at least that way you could make Bonus/Blockade levels change when and if you can enter them multiple times. Effectively that would also randomize the possible items that you could gain from entering the level. That could also work well for the Battle mini game, where instead of choosing a map, the game selects a random arena for you.

[lighthouse64]

Yeah, that'd be cool. I'd like to see one just moving around :P

[Wohlstand]

Hello people!
Some days ago I made a WIKI-page especially for suggestions to PGE: http://wohlsoft.ru/pgewiki/PGE_Wishlist where you also can append your wish and suggestions for PGE components. I think, this is a best and organized place for PGE Suggestions (thanks to LunaLUA Wishlist idea!)

Waiting for new suggestions

[Ironed Sandwich]

I suggest that Timers should be an optional feature from Level Settings, rather than a mandatory thing.

[tb1024]

I think this editor should be a lot more "bare bones" than it is.

I don't think this being a "codeable SMBX" is enough anymore. We should make this a full 2D game editor.
Here is my set of ideas:

Compatibility with SMBX must be dropped. This locks this from being an full-capability 2D editor, and to some degree locks us to Mario-like games. This does not mean an importer (and possibly an exporter) shouldn't be made for SMBXtented.

I think we should wipe the concept of Player, Block, NPC, BGO and Warp. Think of those as objects instead. Fully codeable objects.

But isn't it making it counter-intuitive to new players, who will first need to learn coding? That's where Config packs will come in. They will come with preset objects, preset level settings, preset features (preset features: things like "Conditional Branches"), preset everything, so you don't need to make them yourself. This actually fixes where SMBX is the worst: customization. If objects are implemented instead of the classic SMBX categories of level objects, everything will customizable.

Control of camera shouldn't be hardcoded into the engine like it is in SMBX. This should be handled in code. This also kills the need of sections and section boundaries, as the code that handles the camera can be programmed to lock into a boundary determined by objects and only move outside of these when the player enters a warp. And allows for camera-trolling like in SMW, where you think there's nothing over there because the camera doesn't move when you jump, but when you use things like the Cap Mario, you can see actually something was in there.
But isn't it making it counter-intuitive to new players...: I know the question, and same answer. Config packs may implement their own camera control codes as base.

Physics shouldn't be locked to 2D single-plane side-scrolling, like most 2D platformers and some beat 'em ups (like Altered Beast). Allowing physics to be changed will allow more genres like top-view RPG and multi-plane beat 'em ups to be programmed.

Before asking it: config pack may provide preset physics settings.

Sizables should be abandoned. They must be built part by part, like in Mario builder. This also allows blocks in SMBXtended to behave like they are coded in SMW. If you ever played with Lunar Magic, you may know only the side blocks in SMW are actually solid. Everything else can be passed through from below or from all sides. It's hard to explain only with text, but try making this in Lunar Magic:

Making standalone versions of the game should be made possible, and things like encryption should lock files from editing. Yeah, decompiling the executable can provide decryption keys, but hardly anyone would be interested in modding 2D games like this one could output. Also, if people were interested in making people mod their games, they'd give the codes freely once the thing was downloaded for anyone to make mods.

Maybe things like 2.5 graphics/gameplay support?

Maybe it's too late in development, but this could go in PGE 3.0 or even PGE 2...

[Wohlstand]

Concept #0 писал(а):
Compatibility with SMBX must be dropped. This locks this from being an full-capability 2D editor, and to some degree locks us to Mario-like games. This does not mean an importer (and possibly an exporter) shouldn't be made for SMBXtented.

That would be done only when legacy SMBX engine will be finally dropped out, unfortunately it still in active usage. Compatibility is SUPER-important, anyway, if you choosing to use new features, there are automatically unlocking when you saving LVLX/WLDX and you free to have any non-SMBX features. However when you save into LVL/WLD, all those features are locking because impossible in the SMBX. When PGE Engine will be finally released, I will set LVLX/WLDX formats as default file format to save, but currently I keep SMBX64-LVL/WLD while PGE Engine in alpha-state.

Concept #1 писал(а):
I think we should wipe the concept of Player, Block, NPC, BGO and Warp. Think of those as objects instead. Fully codeable objects.

But isn't it making it counter-intuitive to new players, who will first need to learn coding? That's where Config packs will come in. They will come with preset objects, preset level settings, preset features (preset features: things like "Conditional Branches"), preset everything, so you don't need to make them yourself. This actually fixes where SMBX is the worst: customization. If objects are implemented instead of the classic SMBX categories of level objects, everything will customizable.

Internally, all physical bodies (Player, BGO, NPC, Warp, Physical environment zone) are inherited from "Physical body" class, so, I would allow to game makers to make own object types via LUA code. (and most features which are player and NPC's are have would be coded in lua from scratch!)
When I will finish some reorganization, any elements are will be customizable (via TXT's and NPC.txt already has WIP field "script" which allows you to put a custom NPC-AI to let your NPC do absolutely new actions sequence!)

Concept #2 писал(а):
Control of camera shouldn't be hardcoded into the engine like it is in SMBX. This should be handled in code. This also kills the need of sections and section boundaries, as the code that handles the camera can be programmed to lock into a boundary determined by objects and only move outside of these when the player enters a warp. And allows for camera-trolling like in SMW, where you think there's nothing over there because the camera doesn't move when you jump, but when you use things like the Cap Mario, you can see actually something was in there.
But isn't it making it counter-intuitive to new players...: I know the question, and same answer. Config packs may implement their own camera control codes as base.

Camera manipulation via lua code is planned, so, you will be able to customize camera psychology and have any non-standard features with cameras. One of things - custom ground-quash like effects while thwomps (or some fat idiots) are falling to the ground, etc. Another thing is smoother camera movement like in original Mario games, etc. (I.e. allow optional thing which keeps camera at bottom of section until player will begin climbing up, etc.)

Concept #3 писал(а):
Physics shouldn't be locked to 2D single-plane side-scrolling, like most 2D platformers and some beat 'em ups (like Altered Beast). Allowing physics to be changed will allow more genres like top-view RPG and multi-plane beat 'em ups to be programmed.

Before asking it: config pack may provide preset physics settings.

Mainly PGE is side-scrolling platform genre specific engine. top-view games is another thing, anyway physics are already reconfigurable and similar workarounds are possible too (disable gravity and move player up down left right via arrows, and kill player with "falling" animation if it wasn't jumped over pit, etc.). The thing I still need to implement everything what is already planned for implementation of necessary features.

Concept #4 писал(а):
Sizables should be abandoned. They must be built part by part, like in Mario builder. This also allows blocks in SMBXtended to behave like they are coded in SMW. If you ever played with Lunar Magic, you may know only the side blocks in SMW are actually solid. Everything else can be passed through from below or from all sides. It's hard to explain only with text, but try making this in Lunar Magic:

I think, you means a making custom sizables based on regular blocks (block will work as sizable if you will add "sizable=true" flag in the lvl_blocks.ini at specific block). Good idea to provide resourse ecomomy (don't flood with dots to make a a big wall)

Concept #5 писал(а):
Making standalone versions of the game should be made possible, and things like encryption should lock files from editing. Yeah, decompiling the executable can provide decryption keys, but hardly anyone would be interested in modding 2D games like this one could output. Also, if people were interested in making people mod their games, they'd give the codes freely once the thing was downloaded for anyone to make mods.

Standalone packages are already planned (especially for this case, and also to be convenient on mobile devices where tonn of files required to isntall is super-inconvenient):
- episodes packages (SMBX-like episodes packed into ZIP-file). Designed to play them on a same config pack
- config packs packages (packed configuration package with resources and scripts which are used commonly in episodes and lonely levels)
- Entire-game package: blended config pack with episode(s): everything is packed and you don't need any config packs to play that. Clean PGE Engine will be able play this package, and it will be not editable, because I would make binary format of levels/episodes especially for releasing, not for editing. Regular editable files are LVLX/WLDX/LVL/WLD - are in text format even non-understandable by human.

Concept #6 писал(а):
Maybe things like 2.5 graphics/gameplay support?

What are you mean?

[DeuxEx]

Hello Wohl and communities,
1) SMBX us to a version 2.0, is the editor of Wohl, is included.
SMBX 2.0 (the sum of LuaLua if I'm not mistaken, a new launcher, and smbx).
2) It would be time to collaborate with other forums, is to try to put this editor in the foreground, because I think, editor PGE, will never be known properly, it does not speed up.

[tb1024]

1) SMBX us to a version 2.0, is the editor of Wohl, is included.

Personally, I find SMBX 2.0 one of the worst updates promoted by SMBX.org and Friends. Hardly any new content (most of those came before with LunaLua), poor new content (1x1 new playable characters sprites, nonsense powerups, characters are very specific and more), new content that can be made with regular LunaLua (starman and new playable characters)... Well, SMBX 2.0 is even more useless than SMBX 1.3.0.1. And they share the same reason for success: they were promoted by Joey and co. and their community, who always claim they are the official SMBX community and everything they do are official SMBX content. If anyone else made that, most people would continue playing SMBX 1.3 even if they found it interesting.

PGE included is nothing exceptional. LunaLua supports it natively.
I probably went too aggressive here but, seriously, I find it pointless.

2) It would be time to collaborate with other forums, is to try to put this editor in the foreground, because I think, editor PGE, will never be known properly, it does not speed up.

PGE is already a partner of SMBX.org.

What do* you mean [by 2.5D]?

2.5D is about using 3D graphics with 2D gameplay.

[Wohlstand]

Personally, I find SMBX 2.0 one of the worst updates promoted by SMBX.org and Friends. Hardly any new content (most of those came before with LunaLua), poor new content (1x1 new playable characters sprites, nonsense powerups, characters are very specific and more), new content that can be made with regular LunaLua (starman and new playable characters)... Well, SMBX 2.0 is even more useless than SMBX 1.3.0.1. And they share the same reason for success: they were promoted by Joey and co. and their community, who always claim they are the official SMBX community and everything they do are official SMBX content. If anyone else made that, most people would continue playing SMBX 1.3 even if they found it interesting.

PGE included is nothing exceptional. LunaLua supports it natively.
I probably went too aggressive here but, seriously, I find it pointless.

I think, that is an attempt to make LunaLUA-SMBX to be wide, so, we are will be free to share LunaLUA specific levels and episodes, and pre-including of PGE also releases people to manual downloading of it (+ installation of config packs, except online installer which provides everything except LunaLUA-SMBX downloading).

2.5D is about using 3D graphics with 2D gameplay.

OpenGL firstly is 3D rendering API, however PGE is 2D engine and built-in features are gives drawing on 2D screen, and if you wish to have 2.5D, you would follow to Donkey Kong Country way: use pre-rendered 3D animations into 2D-sprites (and feel free to use 1x1px, it's is no SNES where super small resolution!). Anyway, I would check out for possibility to draw 3D models without toggling of OpenGL mode into 3D

[h2643]

wall of text

While I agree with you here, I think the update isn't that bad. I mean yeah, people could download things like PGE and LunaLua themselfes, but I noticed that most of them, for some reason, fear them. They either think it's a virus or it's fake (I do have sources for this btw). When the owner of the "official" SMBX forum supports these programs, people begin to trust them because, well, they're "official" now.

At http://www.supermariobrosx.org/forums/ you still can see people saying that SMBX 2.0 is fake because it has LunaLua. I... really don't get that.

[telequillo]

Hi everyone!

I searched over the forum but I couldn't find much about it: the one feature I miss more in SMBX is to be able to play in full-screen with true widescreen. In SMBX 1.3.1, when I go full-screen the image is streched to fill my 16:9 screen, so it is not really widescreen. Many new Sonic fan-games are now being done in widescreen, and they really look better and what is more important: have a better gameplay (you can see a lot more of the level map in your screen, so you know better where to jump or what is ahead). So two questions regarding this:

- Does or will PGE be able to do widescreen games?
- If answer for first question is yes: would it be possible to play episodes done for SMBX 1.3.1 in widescreen? I know this is hard (for example it is not possible to play all roms for Snes in widescreen, there is no hack for that) but in this case you have full access to the code so...

Now another thing I would love to see: Everytime I play a Snes or Sega Genesis game with an emulator I use graphic filters (image scaling), I am not a fan of pixelated games, so I just use filters and its almost like having HD games. My favourite filters are Super Eagle and HQ4x. Would it be possible to apply filters like these to low-resolution games (like the SMBX episodes) in a future?

Thanks a lot for readying!

[tb1024]

(On Android, no quote bbcodes.)

I'm sure image filtering will not be applied render-level. PGE is not just about pixelated games, HD sprites or even 2.5D games will be possible.

Widescreen support seems a good idea. But keeping aspect ratio seems enough for me. I think it should be a option for the game developer.

Some hours later

I'm sure it should be an option for the designer. In some games, like Shinobi, a narrow field of vision is essential for the game design (in this case, the difficulty).

[Mushroom King]

A filter for custom counters in the debugger would be nice.

[Squishy Rex]

I know I mentioned the idea of having medals or achievements of some sort built into the game so that you can create your own for players to pick up, like SMBDX's Scrapbook or Kirby Triple Deluxe's Medals etc, but to touch on that subject again, with a visual I made recently. I'm open to any ideas as this is still a concept:


Okay, so this looks a lot like Kirby Triple Deluxe's Medals board, and for a starting point, is supposed to in a way. Let me explain what's going on in the image.

1. The Arrow Lift Blocks would allow you to move up and down the Medals page to examine the medals you've obtained so far.
2. The exclamation marks simply tell you what new medals you've picked up. This will go away when you click on a medal.
3. Clicking on medals, will display what task you had to complete to obtain said achievement, and/or a quick description of the medal, in this case a Goomba.
4. Medal Tags: Medal tags are either red with little yellow star, or are Stars. Red tags indicate common medals, Star tags indicate rare medals.
5. Empty tags: The empty tags act as placeholders so that the player knows how many medals are missing. When a medal is collected, the medal will appear on it's respective tag.
6. Back Button: Will return you to the pause screen/main menu/ wherever the Medals page access point is.

Medals would appear in-game like this:

They would all look the same like in Kirby Triple Deluxe, until an event, presumably the end of the level, is triggered, and each collected medal is revealed.

So what do you guys think?

EDIT: If you were wondering, the Goomba medals mean as follows:

Goomba: Defeat 1 Goomba
Bronze Goomba: Defeat 50 Goombas
Silver Goomba: Defeat 100 Goombas
Gold Goomba: Defeat 500 Goombas
Diamond Goomba: Defeat 1000 Goombas
Goomboss: Defeat Goomboss

[Mushroom King]

Goomba: Defeat 1 Goomba, isn't a little too easy to be awarded by a medal? Also, is it needed to defeat all the goombas in a same walkthrough without quitting the game?

[Squishy Rex]

Well, most games do have easy achievements like that early on, usually known as Level 1 achievements. They're easily obtained, and are basically only there to entice the player to discover more. Also, no they don't all have to be defeated in the single walkthrough, basically that would run off of an event very similar to the "No More Objects In Layer" event in SMBX, however, the counter continues thoughout the game, like the 1,000,000 coin challenge in NSMB2. It runs in the background counting up, and then once the target is reached, the medal appears and you'll get a small notification on screen to say the medal has been earned, like a lot of Steam games do.

Also, those Goomba medals aren't official or anything, they are simply just examples for now. They may eventuate to be legit medals, if say an "achievements maker" was added to the engine.