Miles of Tiles

Posted Tue, 09/29/2009 - 9:31am by vertigoelectric

I was having a discussion with a project team mate today and we agreed on something that's going to take a lot of tedious work and will practically undermine all of the hard design work that has been put into the levels.

This agreement is to convert all of our 25x25 pixel tiles and objects to a more standard 32x32 size. Obviously this means changing the grid size and pretty much remapping everything.

I've already finished converting the first level, which took most of the afternoon and only consists of 4 and a half rooms.

The next level to be converted consists of 13 rooms. This is going to be quite a project.

On a side note, we're aware that we don't HAVE to do this, but per our discussion, we've ruled that the pros outway the cons in this case.

Comments

RickyRombo's picture
by RickyRombo - 09/29/2009 - 5:49pm

What are the pros?

vertigoelectric's picture
by vertigoelectric - 09/30/2009 - 9:50am

Some are as follows:

  • an 8^ tile grid (8, 16, 32, 64, etc) is a standard, and by using this I can more easily implement tiles from existing tilesheets found on the web
  • the size ratio between the player's sprite and the objects/tiles is much easier to work with (previously the player's bounding box was the same size as a tile, which became problematic with many design concepts)
  • larger tiles mean less objects per screen/room, which makes the game feel less cluttered and also promotes a sense of faster progress in the mapping process. It also helps memory-wise as there are less objects on the frame.

I have gotten a lot of the game rebuilt already... stayed up late last night working on it and should be able to finish tonight. After which I will release another private beta build, and if it is found to be generally bug-free, I may release a public build. If it is soon enough, then someone may review it for the GB Show Episode 5.

RickyRombo's picture
by RickyRombo - 10/02/2009 - 6:07pm

Interesting!
I like the idea of having the bounding box now be able to squeeze through those tough spots more easily now :D