Trying to get a feel of any limitations or alternate logic/workflows

[ladlon]

Hi. I am new to Fusion 2, as well as gamemaking software in general, although I was previously doing Actionscript game coding in Flash.

So, I see that the workflow of Fusion 2 is (apparently) event-based, and I'm just trying to get a sense of whether I will be faced with any limitations or need to re-think my coding logic/workflow, when I try and approach my ways within the program.

I guess one of the things I was immediately concerned(?) about is if I could do things like randomly created dungeons. Normally, using my own creation system, it would involve a bunch of ForNext loops, random numbers, and a whole load of IfThens. This, I was able to do in Actionscript, but I'm not sure yet if I can still approach things the same way with Fusion 2. I've noticed that random numbers are available, and that comparing values and conditionals are there, but I'm not yet sure if I can set up (for example) a pre-game dungeon creating block of code.. randomly 'tunneling' around, checking things all the way (wall or open space?... going off the screen?... etc). The one thing I see as a possible issue is that it SEEMS you can only do 'one off' comparisons, and only during events (such as first frame, or within a certain duration of a timer)... but, I'm not sure if you can do a standard ForNext type loop with lots of conditionals ,etc.

Granted, I'm brand new to this new way of creating apps, and haven't fully gone through the full manual yet... I just figured I might post this, and maybe get some initial feedback that might enlighten me, and speed up the learning process (or steer me away from methods that are no longer valid).

I'm not even really sure if ActionScript is considered event-based, or partially so... or how different the two are.

I'm definitely impressed and inspired by what I've tinkered with in Fusion 2 so far. Definitely a lot easier (and less frustrating) than doing it in Actionscript. Just wondering if I'm going to hit a limitation along the way, specifically in terms of (what I assume is) non-event based code routines, like the ForNext loop with conditionals nested inside.

Can you even do 'code' in Fusion 2, such as a block of Actionscript (or the equivelant), or is it entirely the event editor?

Things will be more clear (as will my questioning) as I go deeper into the learning, but I figured I'd just get some initial feedback first.

Cheers!

[Popcorn]

Hey and welcome to Fusion 2 and the community

YES! You can do loops in Fusion 2, so what you want is perfectly possible. Loops in Fusion are called Fastloops. There is also a ForEach extension, and in Fusion 2.5 which was just released ForEach is built-in in the event editor, so no need for the ForEach extension if you own F2.5.

Basically you start a loop X times in one event, and then create On Loop conditions as the top condition in each event that should be part of the loop.

Here is a fastloop tutorial written by me: http://www.clickteam.com/creation_materials/tutorials/download/The_Clickers_Guide_To_Fastloops.pdf

It is a bit old and written before ForEach was introduced to Fusion 2, but it should be a good guide nevertheless. There are also other tutorial on fastloops including youtube videos. Just search for it

[Popcorn]

You should also know that the Event Editor are read from top to bottom, just like a normal script which you are used to. The order of the conditions and actions in an event does also matter.

Also I forgot to answer your question about codeblocks. Scripting is not natively supported, however there are extensions for environments / languages such as .Net (vb and c#) and Lua which you can use if you're developing a windows game. I don't think these extensions are ported for any of the other runimes. So you cannot create functions in F2.5, but you can could run a fastloop once to call a set of events. You can also put events in Event Groups that you can activate / deactivate at runtime.

[ladlon]

Cool. Thanks, Popcorn. I'm actually going to upgrade to 2.5 in the next day or two, actually. I'll check all that out, as well as give the full manual a proper read, now that I've played with and understand the basics and workflow.