Anyone done flying bird movement?

[Outcast]

I am working on having some small birds in my games (just background pretty small song birds that will fly around, maybe land sometimes on the ground etc) I am just thinking on how to best do their movement pattern, have anyone worked on anything like this, have suggestions or have some example? I think I would prefer to do it without the inbuilt movements.

To be honest I am even a little unsure how to just make them smoothly move from one point to another in X-Y space without any inbuilt bouncing ball movements etc since I have never really done that kind of thing before in any of my games

[Janette5]

Is this 2D or 3D?

I use graphics - create an animation in graphics software and import the full animation into Fusion - rather than create everything inside of Fusion - just don't crop it when you bring it into Fusion.

On the other hand just the normal 8 directions will work too - create the bird tell it to look in the direction of a small square (which you can make invisible). Place the small square on the ground or the tree. The bird will continue until it hits the small square - write a collision or overlap event to stop the bird there.

If the bird is flying towards the player - just change your size from smaller to larger as the bird approaches.

[Outcast]

Is this 2D or 3D?

I use graphics - create an animation in graphics software and import the full animation into Fusion - rather than create everything inside of Fusion - just don't crop it when you bring it into Fusion.

On the other hand just the normal 8 directions will work too - create the bird tell it to look in the direction of a small square (which you can make invisible). Place the small square on the ground or the tree. The bird will continue until it hits the small square - write a collision or overlap event to stop the bird there.

If the bird is flying towards the player - just change your size from smaller to larger as the bird approaches.

It is 2D. But then you mean with using the bouncing ball movement?

[Janette5]

I always just use the 8 directions movement.

[Julian82]

@Outcast : Here's a swarm simulation from SolarB, found it in my toolbox and don't really understand it, math only, so should be cross-platform

[Volnaiskra]

I haven't done birds, but I've done little schools of fish that do a similar thing: hover around a seaweed plant, then all scurry away together when player comes near, then swim over to another seaweed plant.

I use the Flocking object, combined with what Janette5 suggested (making them follow an invisible target that I periodically reposition).

There are lots of parameters to adjust in the Flocking object that will probably suit your needs (and it actually refers to sprites as "boids", so I guess it's originally intended for birds)

IIRC SolarB's swarming example was modelled on the Flocking object, because he wanted an extension-less method. I haven't tried it, but his examples are always excellent, so I'm sure it's great as well.

[Outcast]

Thanks everyone! I found an example of an isometric line movement in the click store that I am using as the base for now!

Btw, when asking about doing stuff, what are really the best source of tutorials for learning to make movement and AI etc (especially isometric style where the AI need to navigate corners etc)? Are there any good tutorials out there? My next game will probably be an isometric rougelike game (not turn based, but rather more open (think Nuclear Throne style) so the AI can't be based on just fixed movements) so I need to start learning that stuff for real.