This tutorial will attempt to highlight the other things you need to do to have a fully functional area of ship; an area in which creatures can enter and leave, and how to make a 'signpost' for it so that it appears as an option alongside the other metaroom icons in game.
An understanding of CAOS is expected, so if you don't know what NEW: SIMP does (at least!) then you will need to follow a CAOS tutorial first - try this one: Balloon Maker for DS
Getting Started
The most important thing you need to do first is to identify what exactly your new metaroom is for; is it a location that creatures can live in - or is it purely for the user? Rooms that are created to house machinery for the player to use don't necessarily need food sources or doors whereas a room designed to house creatures will obviously need food sources and things for them to play with.
Signposts and Favourite Places
As you explore around the ship you collect icons at the top of the screen that allow you, the player, to move quickly from metaroom to metaroom; these are known as favourite places. The Favourite Places mechanism is relatively straightforward, and the workings can be summarised like this:
And that is it! You don't even need to make CAOS scripts to get this working, you just need to reserve a classifier for your signpost and favourite place icon (both should use the same species number) and create the signpost in your room. An article explaining this process can be found in the 'Favourite Places' article.
Doors
Doors are used to allow creatures to move around the ship and usually operate in pairs; one door to get into the metaroom and one door to get out. The basic workings of a door are fairly simple, but there are some things you need to watch out for. Although throughout this section we will be referring to 'doors' the actual look and feel of the agent can be anything you desire - it might be a teleporter to get in and out of your room, it might be a glimmering forcefield, or it could even be a spatula of power that transports creatures when picked up.
Basic Code
Here is the basic code that will:
Create two doors
Here is the CAOS Code, you will need to customise this to make it work:
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******Create
one door *** You will need to choose your own classifier and sprite file. new: simp 2 2 998 "ds door" 13 65 0 attr 4 bhvr 1 *** You will need to choose a decent location for your doors mvto 1690 9056 * Save the Room number setv va50 room targ ******Create the other door *** Again, you will need to choose your own classifier and sprite file new: simp 2 2 999 "ds door" 13 0 0 attr 4 bhvr 1 *** Again, you will need to choose a decent location mvto 2182 8976 ** Save the Room number setv va53 room targ * CA link the rooms together link va50 va53 100 |
Give them scripts
These doors only need one or two scripts, this example uses two scripts; one when clicked on or activated by a creature, and the other that deals with animation of the partner door. Again, you will need to customise these scripts to get things working in your world.
Both doors will have nearly a identical set of scripts- only in a few key places do they need changing. For the sake of brevity only one set of scripts is shown here.
We will be using one OV variable as a permanent variable - OV00 - as follows:
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***OV00
is state of door *0=closed, 1=open *** The main script - Door has been pushed. *** You will need one of these scripts for each of your doors. *** REMEMBER to update script classifier with your real door classifier. scrp 2 2 998 1 lock inst ** stim with "wait" stim writ from 75 1 ** we'll be using VA99 to indicate whether a metaroom ** visual change is required or just a creature transfer * clear 'change metaroom' signal setv va99 0 * check who gave signal targ from * check if its the pointer doif targ eq pntr * flag metaroom change setv va99 1 endi * check your neighbour door *** THIS PART WILL NEED CHANGING FOR EACH DOOR *** Make sure you use the correct CDN_Classifiers rtar 2 2 999 doif targ ne null doif ov00 eq 1 stop else *** WE NEED THESE 3 VALUES TO KNOW WHERE TO MOVE THE CREATURE/VIEW TO * store X Y location setv va00 posx setv va01 posy * store metaroom number setv va02 gmap va00 va01 *** THIS NEXT LINE TRIGGERS AN EVENT IN PARTNER DOOR. *** This is usually used to animate the recieving door. * otherwise animate mesg writ targ 1 endi endi targ ownr * flag you are open setv ov00 1 * DO YOUR OPENING ANIMATION HERE *************************** ** Only transfers all touching creatures if the pointer activated the door, ** if it wasn't the pointer then it only transfers the creature that touched it. inst doif from = pntr etch 4 0 0 * move creatures because hand clicked door *** IMPORTANT SAFETY CHECKS HERE! We are making sure that the creatures we are moving *** aren't being held by the hand, being carried, asleep or dead doif targ ne hhld and carr = null and aslp = 0 and dead = 0 mvft va00 va01 stim writ targ 95 1 endi next else * or only move the creature that pressed the door doif touc ownr from = 1 inst doif from ne null targ from mvft va00 va01 stim writ targ 95 1 setv va99 0 endi endi endi targ ownr * if meta change wanted doif va99 eq 1 inst subv va00 100 subv va01 250 doif hhld eq null meta va02 va00 va01 0 slow endi endi targ ownr * SORT OUT YOUR CLOSING ANIMATION HERE * reset your movement flag setv ov00 0 endm ***open and close event from partnering door. ***You will need one of these scripts for each door. scrp 2 2 999 2 lock * mark as open setv ov00 1 * ANIMATE OPEN AND CLOSE HERE * mark as closed setv ov00 0 endm |
The above scripts are cut-down versions of the code used to create the doors in Docking Station, only the code for locking out a particular species is missing. If you want to look at the complete code then you should open up the "doors.cos" file in your Docking Station bootstrap folder.
What else?
Now we have a metaroom that has a way for the user to access it anytime they desire, using the favourite places mechanism, and also a way for both user and creature to enter the room, using the door mechanism. What else do you need to bring your world to life?
If your room is designed for creatures to live in then you will need to provide some facilities for them. The minimum you will need is some food and some toys. If you want the room to have its own food chain then you might like to make some plants and animals. If you are into making quite advanced agents and food chains you will also want to use the Cellular Automata (CA) system in the engine, as this is an advanced topic it will be covered in a different tutorial.
REMEMBER:
If you don't know anything about CAOS then you need to start somewhere, a good starting place is the tutorial on making a Balloon Maker object.
Food
All creatures need good sources of food to survive, here's a tutorial on making a simple fat/protein rich food - change the STIM to make other types. Add your own images to make your own food.
See: Making food for C3
Food vendor
Rather than having food lying around the place making it look untidy you might want to dispense food from a vending machine.
See: Making a vendor for C3
Toys
Creatures get bored and need distractions like the rest of us, make them something to keep them occupied! Here's a tutorial on making a simple toy object.
See: Making a toy for C3
Elevators
Elevators and lifts can be viewed as some of the hardest agents to make properly, but the basic workings of a lift are pretty straightforward.
The elevators in Docking Station can be described, at a high level, as working like this:
The DS lifts were written to be general purpose, that is to say that the code for one of the elevators in DS is the same as all other elevators - there is no inherent 'awareness of location' in the code itself. This means you can re-use the code for the lifts and simply create your own install script so that some are created in the location you desire.
In this section the install code for the lifts will be explained, so you can make the changes you need. Open up the file called "nav lift.cos" which is in your Docking Station bootstrap folder.
This code is for the creation of the lift in the Norn Meso area. It creates the carriage part and 3 call buttons. When creating your own lift code you need to have the answers to these questions; How many call buttons will there be and at what level does the lift start
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*base
part new: vhcl 3 1 3 "ds lifts" 1 0 10 * open air cabin (+512) attr 512 * creatures can act1 and act2 this object bhvr 3 * define the cabin cabn 55 80 190 210 cabp 50 cabw 100 *the animating internal part pat: dull 1 "ds lifts" 1 63 104 1 *the doors pat: dull 2 "ds lifts" 3 44 89 200 part 2 frat 3 *anim [0 1 2 3 3 3 2 1 0 255] *the left foot pat: dull 3 "ds lifts" 7 -1 161 1 *the right foot pat: dull 4 "ds lifts" 12 184 161 1 *the navigator! pat: dull 5 "ds lifts" 17 75 -1 0 *bottom left flame pat: dull 6 "ds lifts" 26 -10 190 0 *bottom right flame pat: dull 7 "ds lifts" 28 203 190 0 *top left flame pat: dull 8 "ds lifts" 30 22 45 1 *top right flame pat: dull 9 "ds lifts" 32 184 45 1 *the go down button - send activate 2 pat: butt 10 "ds lifts" 22 2 115 186 1 [] 1 0 *the go up button - sends activate 1 pat: butt 11 "ds lifts" 24 2 115 157 1 [] 0 0 *position it in the Norn area mvto 1165 9035 *give it ID of which level it is at ** THIS PART IS IMPORTANT. YOU WILL SEE IN A MOMENT THAT EACH CALL BUTTON IS GIVEN A NUMBER. ** THESE NUMBERS ARE USED TO LABEL EACH LEVEL THE LIFT STOPS AT. EACH LIFT ALSO KEEPS ** TRACK OF THIS NUMBER SO IT KNOWS WHAT LEVEL IT IS AT. ** THE LOWEST LEVEL IS 0, THE NEXT LEVEL UP IS 1, THE NEXT LEVEL UP IS 2 ETC. ** WE WILL BE CREATING 3 CALL BUTTONS, AND THE LIFT STARTS ON THE MIDDLE LEVEL. ** THIS MEANS IT IS GIVEN AN OV01 VALUE OF 1. setv ov01 1 *store it's TARG ID in temp variable *** WHEN WE CREATE THE CALL BUTTONS IN A MOMENT WE WANT THEM TO KNOW WHICH LIFT THEY *** 'BELONG TO'. CREATING AN AGENT VARIABLE TO RECORD THE ID OF THE LIFT ALLOWS US *** TO STORE IT IN THE CALL BUTTONS LATER. seta va00 targ *set variable for type agents *** THE CODE FOR THE LIFTS REQUIRES THEM TO GRAB A PARTICULAR CREATURE SOMETIMES, WE ARE *** JUST SETTING UP THIS VARIABLE TO BE ABLE TO STORE 'AGENT' TYPE RATHER THAN *** AN INTEGER OR STRING seta ov02 null *** WE CAN NOW CREATE EACH INDIVIDUAL CALL BUTTON, STARTING WITH THE BUTTON AT THE LOWEST *** LEVEL AND WORKING OUR WAY UP. *********CALL BUTTON *each button needs an ID - OV00 ***top level of norn area new: simp 2 12 21 "ds lifts" 2 34 310 attr 4 *creatures can act1 this object bhvr 1 *** AS MENTIONED EARLIER, EACH LIFT NEEDS AN ID TO TELL IT WHICH LEVEL IT IS AT. THIS IS *** THE BOTTOM MOST BUTTON SO HAS A VALUE OF 0 setv ov00 0 *store ID of corresponding lift in OV16 *** NOW WE CAN STORE THE AGENT POINTER TO THE LIFT INSIDE AN OV VARIABLE OF THE CALL BUTTON, *** USED IN THE SCRIPT TO TELL THE CORRECT LIFT TO MOVE seta ov16 va00 mvto 1156 8954 *** NOW WE CREATE THE SECOND LIFT ***mid level of norn area new: simp 2 12 21 "ds lifts" 2 34 310 attr 4 *creatures can act1 this object bhvr 1 *** NOTICE THE DIFFERENT LEVEL NUMBER STORED IN OV01 setv ov00 1 *store ID of corresponding lift in OV16 *** AND THE POINTER TO THE 'PARENT' LIFT IS STORED IN THIS BUTTON TOO seta ov16 va00 mvto 1432 9185 ** AND NOW WE CREATE THE LAST LIFT ***bottom level of norn area new: simp 2 12 21 "ds lifts" 2 34 310 attr 4 *creatures can act1 this object bhvr 1 *** DIFFERENT LEVEL NUMBER AGAIN setv ov00 2 *store ID of corresponding lift in OV16 *** AND STORE THE ID OF THE PARENT LIFT seta ov16 va00 mvto 1424 9595 |
And that is it! When creating your own lifts just make sure you create your lift call buttons with increasing level numbers, and remember to position the lift and the buttons in your own location. If you use the DS lift graphics and make these changes there is no need for you to alter the CDN_Classifiers used, or write your own scripts. Your newly positioned lifts should function just like the existing ones.
For a greater challenge, why not take the basics of the code and create your own lift images? With a small amount of reworking you can easily make your own elevator code.
IMPORTANT
All images and code included with Creatures 3 and Docking Station are copyright Creature Labs Ltd. You have permission to use them within your own Docking Station and Creatures 3 development projects unless you are making them for commercial gain. All commercial uses of our code and images are prohibited without a license.