At 7/14/06 08:14 AM, HaroFreak wrote:

At 7/14/06 05:27 AM, GameSQUID wrote: No reason to use what? Sprites? You should, because they're faster than movieclips, and should be used for everything that doesn't have a timeline (you can still attach movieclips to it that do have a timeline).

So what if they are faster than vectored images if they fail to achieve what I want?

I'm not saying you should use them all the time. Just keep in mind that they're there and that they're faster, which is nice.

You're complaining that Flash9 display isn't faster - all I'm saying is that it can be a bit faster if you use sprites. It might not be possible to use them in your particular situation, but it's still something that's making Flash9 faster, whether you like it or not.

Oh, and by the way, I'm pretty sure you can use sprites with vector images as well. Just make a class that extends sprite, and map that to a library item. If I'm not mistaking, you'll have a vector-based display object, but it won't have a timeline. Haven't tested this though, so I could be wrong.

At 7/14/06 05:56 AM, TastyLamp wrote: If it does the job, 'S good.
XD

That's not true at all. Some code might do the job, but it might do it very inefficiently, it might be a bitch to add stuff to later, or even to understand later, ... Writing good code is not just writing code that works.

At 7/14/06 05:02 AM, Ichimanako wrote: kirupa... hmz nice tutorials site but i need something like reference like this
http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/tables.html (CSS here)

What about the help files within Flash?

By the way, don't use telltarget. It's an old, depricated way of doing things, and very ugly too.

It's not that bad, but not good either. Try to look into classes and object oriented programming and you'll be fine.

At 7/14/06 05:38 AM, jdubwatson wrote: i haven't tried changing quality before, but would it be _root._quality instead of just _quality?

Depends on whether he wants to change the quality of the entire movie or just the movieclip that was hitting the son mc.

At 7/13/06 08:06 PM, HaroFreak wrote:

At 7/13/06 07:54 PM, GameSQUID wrote: To get a slight increase in speed for graphics, use sprites instead of movieclips, and use cacheAsBitmap where needed (not on things that change a lot, that will actually slow things down). cacheasbitmap is also available in Flash 8 in case you didn't know.

I don't see any need to use it nonetheless.

No reason to use what? Sprites? You should, because they're faster than movieclips, and should be used for everything that doesn't have a timeline (you can still attach movieclips to it that do have a timeline).
If you meant no reason to use cacheAsBitmap, well, in some cases it can be extremely useful. In my scrolling tile engine, I cache entire layers as bitmaps (I only have the necessary tiles attached to them off course), and the speed increase is fenomenal. Just remember to set it to false if you're doing a lot of operations on the displayobject for a while, and set it to true again when you're done.

At 7/10/06 08:20 PM, HaroFreak wrote: They claim to have a much faster processing rate, but I don't see much difference after testing some graphic-intense animations on my browser (Flash Player 9) and on the standalone player (Flash 8).

Animations etc aren't faster at all - the graphics engine is relatively the same. It's code that's faster. For instance, path finding would be a lot faster (about 10 times faster if not more).
To get a slight increase in speed for graphics, use sprites instead of movieclips, and use cacheAsBitmap where needed (not on things that change a lot, that will actually slow things down). cacheasbitmap is also available in Flash 8 in case you didn't know.

To get a stable framerate in the browser, you should set your framerate a bit lower, to about 30 or 40. It won't be as fast as you set it to, but it will be more stable.
30-40 fps is more than enough for a 2D game, imho.

Sorry for bumping, but I really need some more people to test this, to give me an indication whether it's fast enough or not. I need to know this before adding some new stuff to the engine.
It's a free engine btw, so everyone benefits from this :)

At 7/10/06 07:49 AM, Cryzabey wrote: How would I import and export data using flash and a mysql database along w/ php
= )

That's not an advanced topic at all. More like, very basic stuff. Check out the LoadVars class.

At 7/10/06 09:35 AM, True_Darkness wrote:

At 7/10/06 07:12 AM, liaaaam wrote:

Well, using ActionScript 3 you could make a homebrew browser in Flash using the new Socket class. In the examples you can download somewhere from the Adobe site, they made a Telnet application in Flash - it doesn't really work that well but it does work (Start Menu > Run > Telnet for the Windows telnet).

I know this thread is like 2 years old -_-

Hmm never seen/heard that before. I'd be shocked to see if it worked, an actual flash browser.
But yeah, this thread is really old so who gives a hoot.

If you made a server-side script that takes an url as parameter (through the querystring), and outputs a valid xml document or a loadvars-document, you wouldn't need Flash 9. However, parsing the html is tedious. You could try html display in a text label, but this is a very basic non-standard html implementation.

Never done much with video, but I'm guessing it's encoded with a codec that you don't have installed.

Thanks a lot everyone!
Still would like to see some more, especially if you have a not-so-new computer.

Thanks!

At 7/9/06 07:37 PM, misterdog wrote: Stays at 24
Mostly 0's but a 10 comes by once in a while
and it scrolls smoothly unless i zoom in :3

Thanks. A 10 is fine. It probably happens when new regions are being drawn, so a little slowdown there should be expected, and even a 20 wouldn't slow down the framerate. Cool.

More? :)

Hi everybody,

Please have look at this : http://www.gamesquid..TileSQUID/30fps.html

(Flash Player 9 required)

And answer the following questions :

- What are your pc's specs? (cpu and ram mainly, but OS would be interesting too)
- What FPS do you get (number on the left)? Is it stable?
- On the right is a list of numbers. It should be 0 at most times, or a very low number at least. What numbers do you get? What's the maximum you see?
- Does it appear to be scrolling smoothly?

Thanks a bunch.

At 7/7/06 09:09 PM, flashmenow_kthx wrote: chill brother, did i not say i could be wrong about some of this? i dont even have it, and i simply asked if it was worth it to change to flash 9. and i when i said every action put into a frame, i mainly meant that no movie clips had their own script. it would be piled up if you were making a game. i wouldnt care if all i did was make movies and i only used gotoAndPlay to loop, as you say.

I'm chill, don't worry :)

If you're making games, AS3 is a dream to work with. For simple things like animations (not saying making an animation is simple, but code-wise it's simpler), it might be a bit too complex.

You don't have to put your code "into a frame", in fact, you should completely avoid that. Put your code in classes.

At 7/8/06 01:42 AM, -hashbrown- wrote: so your telling me as 3 will let me have a shitload of particle effects that would be lagalicious on as 2 and let me make my games bootiful. if yes teach me as3 if no teach me as 2

I doubt it. Code execution is a lot faster, but render speed is roughly the same AFAIK. Haven't tested though, it will probably be a bit better because of the new Sprite class.

At 7/8/06 10:19 AM, True_Darkness wrote:

At 7/8/06 09:37 AM, Kinsman wrote:

Now try and remember that in AS2 it would be more or less:

Button_MC.onRelease=function(){
_root.gotoAndPlay("FirstScene")
}

So yeah... bug difference don't ya think?

You could still do something like:

myButton.addEventListener("click",function
(e:MouseEvent) {
// do stuff
});

To everyone worrying about AS3 - Flash 9 will still support AS2 and AS1, so no need to worry about it (for now). They added AS3 for people who need more power.

Try using Zinc or, the free alternative, Screenweaver.

Both these tools can convert an swf to a standalone program (exe), but in a much better way than the standard exe projector stuff that comes with Flash. They both provide an api that allows you to write to files. Not sure if it will work with binary files, maybe it's just text files, never tried this, but there's a good chance it might work.

At 7/7/06 04:27 PM, JerRyKirkhAm wrote:

At 7/7/06 04:22 PM, GameSQUID wrote: Quick and dirty method : just add a this.gotoAndStop(frameNumber); to the first frame, where you replace frameNumber by the number of the frame, or by it's label in a string.

It said this:

**Error** Scene=Game, layer=Layer 6, frame=6:Line 2: Statement must appear within on/onClipEvent handler
this.gotoAndPlay(6)

Yeah that's cause you put the actionscript on a movieclip instance, not on it's first frame.

Double-click the movieclip you want this for, make sure you have nothing selected, and that the playhead is at the first frame. Then that code should work.

Quick and dirty method : just add a this.gotoAndStop(frameNumber); to the first frame, where you replace frameNumber by the number of the frame, or by it's label in a string.

Scenes are evil.

At 7/7/06 03:56 PM, CheeseHairdo wrote: Where? In Frame 1? Then i'll have to move every frame down.

Just select the first frame in all your layers and press F5 a few times which will make it a few frames longer. Move your first keyframes around, and you have room for the preloader.

just make sure that you deselect "Export in first frame" for all movieclips that have linkage settings, and add them to a frame that the playhead never reaches, so they get loaded properly, and after the preloader.

At 7/7/06 03:26 PM, electricfreak wrote:

At 7/7/06 03:23 PM, thedarkeye wrote: how do you get flash 9

you don't yet, as it's not out. :/

Yes it is, well, the free preview version is. Right here : http://labs.adobe.co..ies/flash9as3preview

Been doing nothing but Flash 9/AS3 the last couple of days.

At 7/7/06 03:33 PM, thedarkeye wrote: mods please delete this thread

Asking where to download Flash9 is a valid question.

What's wrong with you people on this board? If you don't know what you're talking about, just keep your damn mouth shut.

Sorry if this sounded rude, but this is a flash forum, I would expect people to know something about it. But all I see is bad advice.

At 7/7/06 03:01 PM, flashmenow_kthx wrote: is it worth it to change to flash 9? i was thinking about it but i hear some of the scripting functions dont exist in AS3, and you can't put script on MC's or something like that. it all has to be on the frame. is it truly better for everything? if so, i'd change, but im very used to MC's having their own script. yes, everything on the frame would make it much easier and less confusing for us to try and write something, but every single action piled into one frame...its good? or am i wrong about some of this?

Every single action piled into one frame? What the hell are you talking about? AS3 is the best structured incarnation of the language to date, with packages and namespaces to help you organize your classes. Don't put code in your frames, unless it's a gotoAndPlay to loop something.

But yeah, ActionScript 3.0 does not support actions on button or MovieClip instances. The only situation I can think of where this could be a problem is for simple navigation and menu work, where you don't want to write classes for small things, but hey, I can live with that.

At 7/7/06 03:38 PM, JD77 wrote: Lag my friend. The main reason for AS 3.0 is to reduce lag! If you dont know much AS 2.0 id recomend u stick with it, since AS 3.0 is not complete, it's still a alpha.

If AS3 is still in alpha, why did they release Flash Player 9 and Flex Builder 2? I might be wrong, but to me that indicates that AS3 is pretty much finished.

First off, bitmapdata probably isn't a whole lot faster than in previous versions of flash. In fact, the rendering engine as a whole is roughly the same speed-wise, with the exception that you can use Sprite instead of MovieClip, which should be a bit faster (so if you want to show bitmapdata, add it to a sprite now).
The big difference is the language itself. With the new VM, the speed has increased to about 10 times what was possible in AS2.

As for the documentation, it does exist, and it can be found here : http://livedocs.macr../as3preview/langref/

Note that it's a reference, not a guide that teaches you how to program. There's some AS3/F9 tutorials on Flashkit somewhere though, in the games section.

At 7/7/06 10:07 AM, mat_de_b wrote: Books, i once tried too... U can only learn so much from the internet it seems you either need a guide (e.g a person who knows actionscript) or a really good book like flash bible

Nah, I personally never read a book about AS, yet I think I'm a fairly advanced programmer. The best way to learn is practice, practice and practice. And reading some of the better blogs/sites/tutorials (stimunation, gskinner, andre michelle, tonypa, strille, ...) for some interesting tips.

At 7/7/06 10:09 AM, --Storm-- wrote: Anyway, stuff like Newgrounds Sim use "variables".

What the hell, EVERYTHING uses variables. No programming without them.

What you need to look into is classes. It really amazes me how many people here seem to work without them. Get with the times, or you'll be completely lost when Flash9 hits the stores :)

At 7/7/06 09:09 AM, -onlyproductions- wrote: nah i want something original
and if its really good i will co-author

Why not create an rpg with mode7 style 3d graphics (using clever masking techniques)?

At 7/7/06 02:59 AM, shazwoogle wrote: well have somthing like this

on(release){
_root.plane_mc.duplicateMovieClip("plane_m
c"+_root.planeCount, _root.planeCount)
_root["plane_mc"+_root.planeCount]._x = 0

_root.planeCount++
}

Nah, that's no good. If you add events using on and onClipEvent, you'll have events all over the place and it's not very maintainable. Add the events through code, preferably through the constructor of a class.

It amazes me how little people here on newgrounds now how to actually program.

If you want to randomly spawn movieclips, in your main loop you can use if (random(tresshold)<someValue) and then use attachMovie to add a new instance to your game, possibly with a counter that makes sure planes don't appear too fast. DuplicateMovieClip shouldn't be used for this, because if all your current instances are gone, you don't have anything to duplicate from.

At 7/7/06 07:50 AM, ottermaniac wrote: or you could be all hardcore like me and hold

control+alt+shift+s

Or control-alt-p if you're working with a project.

He's probably using a newer version of Flash than you are.

At 7/7/06 07:35 AM, liaaaam wrote: Pretty nice, I'm guessing you load the png and then slice it four ways to get the four tiles? I can't be arsed opening Flash to check :P

Don't bother opening the fla, all the source is in class files (com/gamesquid/tilesquid/ScrollingEngine.a
s is the most important one) :)

But yeah, I have multiple types of tiles, one is just Tile which will display a given movieclip/sprite, there's a SuperTile class which is like a group of other tiles, and finally a BitmapTile, which slices an image and grabs it's tiles out of it based on an index.

At 7/7/06 05:28 AM, HappyCustomer wrote:

At 7/7/06 05:12 AM, Jareddeitch wrote: You start with an editting .fla, when you save, a twin .swf is made.

.fla is for editting, .swf is for viewing.

I'm saving but it's not making a .swf, at all.

It's not supposed to do this automatically. Jareddeitch apparantly doesn't know what he's talking about.
If you press control-enter, the fla is compiled to an swf, and this is viewed, but also saved in the same directory as the fla.
You can also use publish from the file menu.