walk behind zones

instead of loading the cut edje object for assign walk behind, can we simply draw walk behind zones like adventure game studio?

Have been thinking the same thing. I think AGS walk behind system works better because it allows you to control walk behind both vertically & horizontally, whereas VS only controls vertical which doesn't work very well for certain objects or scene perspectives.

since when does AGS allow horizontal walkbehind ? There's only the baseline.

because it allows you to define the walk behind area by drawing it in which allows you to create the horizontal parts that can also be walked behind.

AGS only supports up to 16 walk behind areas though per scene instead of one per object but I think if we added the ability to draw in the walk behind area in similar fashion to object area for each object then we would have better control over where our characters can walk without having to mess about making sure our characters don't walk too close to certain objects.

VS current walk behind system covers the entire scene object/image/animation whereas AGS system allows you to define certain areas of the scene.

Check this video from around 4:20 mark. It shows that they draw in the walk behind area (masking method) & then set (same as vs) the walk behind center in which the character will start walking behind the masked areas from.

Do you think it would be possible to add? I was planning on writing an email to you, Alex & David with a proper explanation & ideas of how it could be implemented (visual side not the code obviously).

Actually it doesn't look much different. In the end there is also a "walk-behind-line" similar to VS. The walk-behind-areas are a good way to get fast results for simple objects (straight wall etc.), in VS you have to create an own sprite for this. But I don't think this helps much for high-res games with more complex objects. In the end you need an own sprite with an alpha channel (or transparent region).

Hmm? The complex shapes thing wouldn't necessarily matter I don't think? If you are already using a png image with transparent parts then if you were to color outside of the lines ( ) then it would only affect the actual image part inside of the border/mask anyway?

The reason I mentioned the AGS thing is because someone sent me a .ved the other week, which contained an issue with the object center. It was a bed which was slightly skewed (on an angle) now it worked fine for the right hand side as the character could only walk where the way border allowed & so the characters legs/feet were hidden as they should be, but on the left hand side the border had to be made much further away to prevent the parts of the character from being hidden behind the bed. The other issue was because of the character center the feet could overlap the bed while walking.

But this problems would be resolved in AGS in similar to VS as I understand it, by making another object that is further down or a new walkbehind region. So I don't understand the issue.

Yeah my current solution would be to split the image/object up so that I could edit the object center for each section. Would be nice to sort it out in a single object though (would be faster from a workflow perspective) but not a big deal.

Eh, what? no. In AGS you draw masks directly onto the scene where the character can walk behind & then you set the baseline (which would be the object center). I think AGS sets walk behind masks & baselines directly to the scene instead of objects & has a limited amount of walk behind layers (16 I think). I've not used it mind & what I've said is based on youtube videos I've seen.

No, AGS does exactly the same as you would do in VS. It cuts out the shape you've drawn (it copies it btw, costs a lot of RAM, but it's always a small scene), and if your character is over the baseline it draws the shape on top.

Oh ok. It showed the guy in the video I linked actually drawing the mask over the top of the scene. But he said you could also create a mask inside of whatever art program you are using too. To me masking is a bit old school - well that kind of masking - as I used to use it back when I programmed with Visual Basic, which was what... more than 12 years ago now I think. Back when people still actually used MS Paint!