WIP - Easter Week Mini Game Challenge 2011

[stevmjon]

stevmjon, I just quickly went through the code you posted and just have to say: Thanks for fixing my broken game! Now I'm hoping people will download your version instead of mine.  :-\ Too bad that people will be voting on the messed up version. Oh well, live and learn.

Also, thanks for commenting the code and explaining what you were doing. What's weird is that at some point, I thought I changed the "screen" image from video to an FX image and my fps actually decreased, down to 12 or something like that. Now I'm thinking I messed that up somehow - it was around 4:00 in the morning, so who knows what I was doing.

I looked at the code for my ASCIItude game, and I used an FX formatted image for the "screen" image there, so at some point I knew what I was doing. Now I'll know for next time...

i am happy to help.
the method i used was just the easiest to adjust, with the minimum of code. i relies solely on the cpu and memory speed.  but at least it gets the frame rate up.

the better method, but requiring more code, is this:
http://www.underwaredesign.com/forums/index.php?topic=3395.0

this uses both VIDEO and FX to maximise the render speed.

   stevmjon

[kevin]

Also, thanks for commenting the code and explaining what you were doing. What's weird is that at some point, I thought I changed the "screen" image from video to an FX image and my fps actually decreased, down to 12 or something like that. Now I'm thinking I messed that up somehow - it was around 4:00 in the morning, so who knows what I was doing.

 Only had a quick look through the original code, but just changing the screen cache image from video to FX  doesn't really help.   Since the backdrop picture (the egg pictures) are still in video,  so in order to draw them, it'd be pulling the pixel data back from video memory in order to write to the screen image in system memory.    General Tips on the subject -> Crash course in Image & Sprites Draw Modes

 The most obvious way around that, would be to  load the egg jpg's in an FX, but due to the format the loader still hits video memory.  So it's slow loading process.    But, if you used a transition effect (Something like this), I suspect much of that work load could be hidden from the user.  


 As steve mentioned there's any number of ways to short cutting the render over head for such games,  another method that works really well is   Selective Tile Map Refreshing

[micky4fun]

hi all

Thanks for fixing my broken game! Now I'm hoping people will download your version instead of mine.   Too bad that people will be voting on the messed up version. Oh well, live and learn.

well i think the members on this forum will be very forgiving on a that little mistake

mick ;)

[balaporte]

The most obvious way around that, would be to  load the egg jpg's in an FX, but due to the format the loader still hits video memory.  So it's slow loading process.    But, if you used a transition effect (Something like this), I suspect much of that work load could be hidden from the user.   

I had no idea the loader used video memory, but that makes sense. I originally wanted some transition, so I will look at your suggestion and see what I can do to hide the image loading.

And mick, honestly if I downloaded a game and it ran so slowly I couldn't play it, I probably wouldn't even give it a second look. But hopefully others here are more forgiving like you say. Either way, it's more about learning and getting things done for me right now. Though it's always nice to win something.  :)

[kevin]

I had no idea the loader used video memory, but that makes sense. I originally wanted some transition, so I will look at your suggestion and see what I can do to hide the image loading.

  It only occurs when loading JPG's, the loader just hasn't been replaced.   For a transition, you'd prolly get away with using blocks 4*4, 8*8 or even 16*16.