tankwars kent sarikaya - kryton9

[Petr Schreiber]

Thanks Kent,

the way you did the indicator reminds me of old classic game "F-29 Retaliator" ( or something like that ).
It was flight sim, but it had similar icon used for missiles on hud I think


Very nice,
Petr

[kryton9]

Glad you liked the new indicator Petr, I think it suits the tank pretty well. It was on my mind for future improvement, but while I was thinking of ai, got it finished.
There is a bug in the game which will be addressed further down the line. When you move your tank in the z axis, the radar indicator for the shot does not match reality.
The aspect ratio adjustment is messing it up when I move the tank. I am aware of this bug, but it is not critical for now. The actual 3d world stuff works, it is when translating to 2d and adjusting for aspect that it only messes up in the game z but radar y values. I tried some quick solutions, but none worked.

Anyways onto the main topic now...

Petr, I think I know the answer, but I want to make sure with you first.

Ok, we have:
Begin Const
%TankFirst = 1
%TankLast = Game.NumTanks
%Tanks
%Player
%Light
%Level
%PlayerShot
%Reticle
%Explosion
End Const

But it gets really confusing when we add more elements as:
Begin Const
%TankFirst = 1
%TankLast = Game.NumTanks
%TankShotFirst
%TankShotLast = %TankLast + Game.NumTanks
%Tanks
%Player
%Light
%Level
%PlayerShot
%Reticle
%Explosion
End Const

Now you can imagine how confusing it gets when later on in the programs trying to do loops and when you create your arrays.
The Constants don't match the dimension of the arrays and you get all sorts of errors.

Right now the only solution I see is to keep offset variables for each entity that is an array, can you think of anything else?

So I would have an offset variable for any array entity after the first set:
%TankShotOffset = Game.NumTanks

Then when I loop the array of TankShots it would look like
For s = %TankShotFirst to %TankShotLast
TankShot(s-%TankShotOffset).Alive = 1
tbgl_EntitySetPos(%Game, s , TankShot(s-%TankShotOffset).Pos.x, TankShot(s-%TankShotOffset).Pos.y, TankShot(s-%TankShotOffset).Pos.z)
Next

Of this could also be written:
For s = %TankShotFirst to %TankShotLast
s = s - %TankShotOffset
TankShot(s).Alive = 1
tbgl_EntitySetPos(%Game, s + %TankShotOffset , TankShot(s).Pos.x, TankShot(s).Pos.y, TankShot(s).Pos.z)
Next

As you can see not the cleanest of solutions... just wanted to mention it to you so your super brain can work on it in the background till you find an amazing solution!

[kryton9]

This is just to show why it won't be this way

This is if the enemy tanks had the same capabilities that we the player would have.
As you can see, it won't be any fun.

I just wanted to share this version, so when you do see how it is handled,
you won't wonder why I didn't do it this way

Don't set it to difficulty 8, it crashes the game... right now 7 of the 8 tanks fire in the same manner our tank does.
Same range and distance and ability to shoot. There is no collision tests for enemy shots at all. That will come later when I get a nice shot sequence that will be challenging but not crazy. But as you will see formations will be coming, so it should be pretty fun.

I removed this attachment as it is outdated now.

[kryton9]

Thanks to Petr's help and great bug hunting abilities.
Here is pretty good early version of tanks shooting.
The major bugs seem fixed with the great help from Petr.

Not an official release till I add more to it to bring it to version 2.

Under the Radar there is a tank integrity read out and how many times you have been hit / max hits you can take.

Version 1.9.5 is in first post.

[ErosOlmi]

Great Kent!
I'm sorry I cannot contribute more on this project but it seems you are making great progression with this game.

[kryton9]

Thanks Eros. You are contributing greatly by making thinBasic better and better each day!
I hope to make good progression today, that is all I dreamed about while sleeping

[kryton9]

I'm having fun playing with AI tests today.

Right now, I have the enemy tanks fire only when they are in range to you. This way you know when you hear a shot, it was fired while the tank was in hitting range. Makes it much better already with that tweak alone.

The next thing I want to work on that is annoying me is that the tanks right now are always aiming at you. I am using the cool entity command for this:
TBGL_EntitySetTargetPos ... But it works too well

You never see the tanks from the sides as before when I had them turning. So I need to replace this with something where the tanks have to turn to find you and you see them turning. I think it is worth the effort to add this as it should make it more interesting visually.

Just wanted to keep you guys up to date on what is going on.

[kryton9]

Well, Version 2.0 is here.

Major changes to it the last 2 days. Right now it is set on the easiest difficulty setting, but with the most tanks, 8.
You get lots of hits before you get killed, so it is easy and fun.

It is fun to just go in for a couple of minutes if you want to blow up some tanks and get fired upon. I want it to be a fun little break and not too hard of a game. I think it fits that with my tests.

I added gamepad support, the standard keys still work as before.

GamePad:
Button 2 Forward
Button 3 Backwards
Button 6 or 8 Fire
POVLeft Turn Left
POVRight Turn Right

You can go into the Input Subroutine if you want to change the gamepad settings for now.

Next on the list:
Splash Screen
Instructions
User Settings
More Formations
And Levels from easy to difficult depending on user's choices.

I need help on how to make it turn without using the target command in tbgl. Right now it is too perfect. Once I understand that, then hopefully you will see the tanks in different views than the almost constant head on view.

Enjoy!

[ErosOlmi]

This is a very good version Kent, very good.

[Petr Schreiber]

Thanks Kent,

very nice update!
Regarding turning ... I prepaired little concept for you, hope it will be usable for the project.


Petr

UPDATED VERSION > Smarter and correct turning