Animation of character

[ppppp]

I dont know how the hell to make a character move with a series of animations.

I want it to run 3 or 4 pictures in a row when i push a key, seperated by about a half a second. I also want it to rerun the series for as long as the key is pushed. I know how to loop it but I want it to stop when I release the key.

I know this is dumb but, hey, Im new at this stuff

[SLH]

You could use the getkeystate API, use it like this.

If GetKeyState(vbKeyLeft) < 0 Then MsgBox "The Left arrow key is pressed"

To achieve what you want, you could perhaps, put it in your loop and have it exit the loop (exit do/while) if it's >0 (i.e. not pressed).

[SLH]

Sorry, forgot the declaration.

Public Declare Function GetKeyState Lib "user32" Alias "GetKeyState" (ByVal nVirtKey As Long) As Integer

[KingArthur]

try this out(API)

[slx47]

add a picture and a timer, the rest is up to you, just fill in the blanks

Dim a As Integer 'fram number
 
'raster operations
Const BLACKNESS = &H42
Const DSTINVERT = &H550009
Const MERGECOPY = &HC000CA
Const MERGEPAINT = &HBB0226
Const NOTSRCCOPY = &H330008
Const NOTSRCERASE = &H1100A6
Const PATCOPY = &HF00021
Const PATINVERT = &H5A0049
Const PATPAINT = &HFB0A09
Const SRCAND = &H8800C6
Const SRCCOPY = &HCC0020
Const SRCERASE = &H440328
Const SRCINVERT = &H660046
Const SRCPAINT = &HEE0086
Const WHITENESS = &HFF0062
'=======================================
Private Sub Form_KeyDown(KeyCode As Integer, Shift As Integer)
a = a + 1
 
'frame number
Select Case a
Case 1:
Picture1.Picture = LoadPicture("filenamehere")
Case 2:
Picture1.Picture = LoadPicture("filenamehere")
Case 3:
Picture1.Picture = LoadPicture("filenamehere")
Case 4:
Picture1.Picture = LoadPicture("filenamehere")
 
End Select
 
If a > 5 Then '5 is the number of pics
a = 0
End If
 
End Sub
 
Private Sub Form_Load()
Timer1.Interval = 500 '1/2 a sec
Me.AutoRedraw = True
End Sub
 
Private Sub Timer1_Timer()
Me.Cls
Me.PaintPicture Picture1.Picture, x, y, 100, 100, 0, 0, 100, 100, SRCCOPY
End Sub

[Gaming_World]

A timer is not a good thing for a game...

[SLH]

Look into the gettickcount api, there are lots of examples in this forum.

[slx47]

A timer works fine for me.

[Yhoko]

It works, yes, but a loop is more accurate and you can better manage the timing. By the way: VB has pre-defined constants for all those ROPs like vbSrcCopy or vbSrcPaint.

Yhoko

[Zaei]

Originally posted by Yhoko
It works, yes, but a loop is more accurate and you can better manage the timing. By the way: VB has pre-defined constants for all those ROPs like vbSrcCopy or vbSrcPaint.

Yhoko

Someone other then me has pointed the constant thing out, finally =).

Yes, when writing games, Timers are simply one of the worst things that you can use. They are inaccurate, inflexible, and a pain in the arse to do anything moderatly complex with. For reference, here is a standard game loop:

While running
  CheckInput()
  Update()
  Render()

  DoEvents
Wend

You can expand the above to limit frame rates:

Const Delay As Long = 25
Dim lt as Long
lt = GetTickCount()
While running
   If lt + Delay > GetTickCount()
     CheckInput()
     Update()
     Render()
     
     lt = GetTickCount()
   End If
   DoEvents
Wend

Z.

[Jotaf98]

[worthless post]

        'Slow down the FPS...
        Do Until GetTickCount() >= LastTick + TicksPerFrame
            DoEvents
        Loop
        DebugMsg "Frame delay: " & GetTickCount() - LastTick - TicksPerFrame 'Show the delay
        LastTick = GetTickCount()

This is the code I always use... This way you don't have to encapsulate everything in that IF, in my first game I had so many nested blocks in the main loop that I couldn't have my comments bigger than 30 characters (or I would have to manually word-wrap them and that's very annoying when you're concentrating on the coding). Hmm... ok... so it's not a very good excuse. Wait, it shows the frame delay When the game is ok it varies from 0 to 5 every frame. If it's slow it will of course go up. DebugMsg just shows a line of text on the screen. It's a good reference because when you're limiting the FPS you usually don't measure it

[/worthless post]