:O - just got a great idee for MMF2!

[Patrick]

Hey Guys,

Adventure makers already support this (most of them)
Would it be possible to have MMF support "custom zones"

Right now, we can only draw squares. If mouse is within 10,10-100,100...

But i may want to draw like: (a square with a cutout corner)
10,10 -90,10 -90,20 -100,20 -100,100 -10,100 (where MMF2 connects the end with the start automaticly)
More importantly, allowing collision groups!! by lets say adding another parameter where you enter a value between 1 and 99.

An usage example could be:

If 
ActiveObject is withing zone (10,10 -90,10 -90,20 -100,20 -100,100 -10,100)
+ Zone collision group = 2
THEN
Destory ActiveObject

Adding also RUNTIME commands to create zones.

AddZone 10,10 -90,10 -90,20 -100,20 -100,100 -10,100 : 2

This would GREATLY increase platformers, as you can during edittime AND runtime define variable zones other then just squares. And because of the collisiongroup feature -which is just an number that doesnt do anything- you can make all kinds of things we now have todo using active objects, which slow down a lot if your level is full with these zones, special big zones like 800x600 zones. (for example, a space zone, or a lava zone, or a water zone, whatever....)

Imagine how we can also switch to using backdrops instead of actives. This feature thus GREATLY increases preformance AND functionality .. zing!

[Patrick]

I beleive a like thing can be achiefed using the Overlay object, but that wouldnt be as fast would it? Also it can only detect 1 group, and i need to cover the frame or area. Either way, using the Overlay you end up slowing down a lot to i beleive so.

[Jeff]

I don't think an invisible overlay would slow anything down but then I have not tested that.

[Patrick]

A single one will not, but i tried in the past MMF1.5 and had to create manny... that turned out quite slow.

[Jeff]

Why not use 1? it can have many different zones.....

[konjak]

Why not just invisible actives or active system boxes..?

[MattEsch]

I don't just see why you can't use extra conditions. For example: ff you wanted a circular area, you would check for the mouse point within a sqaure area, and and an extra condition to check the distance of the mouse pointer from the center of the square area (using pythagoras' theorem) to be lower or equal to half the width or height of the square area. Of course you probably don't want to add extra events, I just wonder if you can compare to an object within an area and not within an area inside the area you previously conditioned on.

[Patrick]

@Jeff, strange.. but thank you for confirming this. I will try harder then, and see what i missed. I do still think this feature i suggested is a good idea ...

@Konjak, because this will eventualy slow down a game. And besides that it is not a "nice/proper" way of doing it. It is the same as suggestion the use of detectors for a platformer where just raw X/Y physics and calculation can do the same thing but way faster and accurate. But if it was not for the fact that i need to creat numerous types of differend active objects, i could have done this.

@Matt ^^

[00J]

Hey Patrick, I've been wanting a feature in MMF for a long time, based on the "Count objects in a zone" function. I was hoping one more Function could be added called, Count objects in a "Variable" zone, you could actually define a zone during runtime, and move the zone created out side the runtime around the runtime frame, this would open the door also for allowing the mouse pointer to drag and create a zone from the mouse pointer.