Hall of Stars - Interactables, UI manager and Project Info

This was by far the hardest part of the project for me. I had to start mixing the generation and objects of the game itself with the UI, to integrate properly working NPC’s and interactable projects. But this was really a necessary part of the process to make the rooms have immersive contents. I managed to survive it (thanks to @torkel ), so now comes the fun part of designing the rooms!

New Features:

• Interactables: Adds a way to select an object and have a specific range around them where the player is able to open an UI upon the press of the set keybind. It also shows a hint for the keybind and what it does when you enter the interaction range. It is also possible to change the texture of the target object when entering the interaction range.
• UI Manager: A global class that manages the active UI’s and overlays (such as hints for interactables). It makes sure everything is displayed correctly and keybinds and events are passed on to the right UI screen.
• Project Info: Every room now contains a altar with a book on it, this will contain all your project info (WIP).

Future Plans:

• Detailed Project Rooms: I wanna add more representing objects in the project rooms and possibly add some decoration later on.
• Better Character? I might add a better fitting character if I have the time for it.
• NPC’s: I might wanna add some NPC’s you can talk to.

Hall of Stars #4 - UI: Welcome Screen, Dialogues & Input Screens

Never thought UI would be this hard, but it looks decently polished after 10h (or 9h and 55m to be precise) of coding. I’ve added a beautiful welcoming screen that sets up the .env for you and explains some stuff (like controls, use case, etc.). I’ve used assets from the Stardance Github. I eventually also found a cartoon yapping mp3 in there, so I thought it’d be funny to use that. No idea what it’s originally used for, but it helps. Thanks to @torkel for supporting my work and helping me endure all this. Peace out!

New Features:

• Welcome Screen: An instructive conversation that consists out of 4 dialogues:
  • An instruction for the keybinds
  • Explaination of what the project is and what the use cases are
  • An input field where you enter your Stardance username to connect to the Stardance Stats API
  • A have fun page
• Dialogues: A class that draws a screen with text. It takes the text that is spoken and has optional arguments for a character png file and a character name to display.
• Input Screen: A screen that returns a value which the users enters. Takes a question and a placeholder.

Future Plans:

• Refactor some messy code
• Add project information to the rooms, like a museum for every project

Hall of Stars - Collision, Hitboxes, Room Loading/Unloading & Working Doors

I’ve been working hard on trying to get this game in a playable state as soon as possible, so I can then further expand the game but also make it ready for shipping whenever I need. That’s why I’m focussing on features like collisions and room navigation. I moved the main loop to level.py to let the world tick everything, and only the visual rendering is done in the main class. You can now walk through doors and easily move rooms and I even added a carpet! Shoutout to my number one fan @torkel for supporting all my great work

New Features:

• Collisions: All collidable are added to a sprite group, which is saved in the level class and passed on to the player class to check for collisions.
• Hitboxes: Added the option for tiles to have a hitbox smaller than it’s tile (16x16). The player also has a smaller hitbox to make it able to create depth.
• Room Loading/Unloading: Each room saves it’s own tiles and collidable objects. When a room is loaded, these are added into the global tiles and collidable objects groups. They are removed form the global groups upon unloading the room.
• Working Doors: The doors now work seamlessly and loads you into a specific room.

Future Plans:

• API class using Stardance Stats from @mixidmb , shoutout to him for creating that API.
• Generating rooms based on project information with the possibility to view project details.

Hall of Stars #2 - Camera, Rooms, Layers, Dynamic Hallway Generation & More

Long time no see! Finally came to a point where committing was valid and the code was not messed up. I was rewriting alot of code throughout the process of adding all these features, because every new feature I came up with needed a change in the previous feature’s code. Anyway shoutout to my number one fan @torkel and may the --force be with you!

New Features:

• Camera: A camera that follows the player around and renders all the visible objects.
• Rooms: Added the functionality to generate rooms with adjustable width, height and walls.
• Dynamic Hallway Generation: A subclass of the Rooms class that generates a hallway with a door for every project you have on stardance.
• Dummy API: Because the stardance API doesn’t have profile fetching yet.
• Layers: So everything renders correctly

Future Plans:

• Adding a way to see what door represents what project.
• Adding decorations
• Adding room teleport logic
• Adding project visualization in rooms

Hall of Stars - Character Sprite Animations & Walking Logic

First devlog for Hall of Stars, yipee! I came up with this idea while playing Pokemon Diamond on my old DS lite. I just like the way it feels, the movement is so jittery, but it still feels nice to play. So I came up with the idea to make a game with a matching style. I was kinda done with minecraft-themed projects, so I thought: “Why not do something with the Stardance API, since I’m building this project for stardance anyway.” I decided to start making a retro topdown game (just like Pokemon Diamond) where you spawn into a long hallway with doors on the sides. Those doors represent all the projects you’ve made on stardance. When entering a door it will give you more information on the project, like hours spent, number of devlogs and their contents, number of ships, and more if I get the chance.

New Features:

• Screen: Yeah, I added a screen. This makes it possible for your eyes to see what’s happening. It must be one of the best inventions ever in gaming.
• Character Sprite Texture: I textured the character in all the frames, this took long . The animation and character template are made by ErisEsra, so big shoutout to her.
• Character Sprite Animations: I’ve made sure the template animation works properly and the player now has idle and walk animations for all four directions.
• Player Movement: I implemented the logic for moving the player, with the same system as most retro games: Up, Down, Left or Right. No diagonal walking.

Future Plans:

• Constructing the hallway
• Adding the doors and rooms
• Making an API class that communicates with the stardance API.
• Add projects to the hallway through the API
• Add project details to the rooms