LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Topics on software tools like TileStudio, comments on documentation and tutorials (or the lack of) should go here.
User avatar
uze6666
Site Admin
Posts: 4801
Joined: Tue Aug 12, 2008 9:13 pm
Location: Montreal, Canada
Contact:

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by uze6666 »

Thanks for the update Paul, that's a hell of a lot of work! I love the "Look for update" feature! Now, if I could only find some time to code my SMB port... :)

-Uze
User avatar
D3thAdd3r
Posts: 3222
Joined: Wed Apr 29, 2009 10:00 am
Location: Minneapolis, United States

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by D3thAdd3r »

Paul keeps making it better/easier, there are no excuses anymore . For all the work he's done, someone better get started on the next big Uzebox platformer :) . Maybe a group effort mascot game would be cool? Perhaps I'm delirious :lol:
User avatar
paul
Posts: 457
Joined: Sat May 02, 2009 8:41 am
Location: Brisbane, Australia

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by paul »

Thanks, guys.

I think the thing with Platz is that it's almost there, but not quite. It will need support for multiple actors and projectiles before it can be something really useful. These will come in 2.0 as they require interface changes that will wreck legacy code. And anyway, I write these things for fun (and mostly because I need them for my games :lol: ). But I'm happy if others find them useful and I like to make things generic and re-usable (which is a tricky balance with 64k).
User avatar
uze6666
Site Admin
Posts: 4801
Joined: Tue Aug 12, 2008 9:13 pm
Location: Montreal, Canada
Contact:

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by uze6666 »

I was wondering how platform agnostic Platz is. Since it's coded in C, and with some hardware abstraction layer, it should be pretty easy to use it for other platforms like NES, GB, etc...
For all the work he's done, someone better get started on the next big Uzebox platformer :) . Maybe a group effort mascot game would be cool? Perhaps I'm delirious :lol:
Yeah, my "dream" project would be a brand new Castlevania adventure. But gfx, music and everything else is too much work for a one man army...

-Uze
rlaw
Posts: 36
Joined: Tue Oct 21, 2008 3:19 am

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by rlaw »

I'm trying to get started with LePlatz and I need some help. I've started a new project but I have no idea how to lay tiles onto my game world. I've tried clicking all the icons and dragging tiles into the middle, but I feel I'm not getting the concepts behind LePlatz. Based on my understanding of the Platz Toolset, I first need an outer background. But when I click on the Define New Outer Background icon and choose a background type (BGC), it crashes as soon as I click in the middle area. Am I doing something wrong here?
User avatar
paul
Posts: 457
Joined: Sat May 02, 2009 8:41 am
Location: Brisbane, Australia

Re: LePlatz - Platz Level Editor

Post by paul »

You'll need your art assets already created and then you import them into LePlatz. Sorry about the crash; I've never tested it without any assets defined, but I'll remember that for the next version.

So when you start a new project, you set the Art Folder to where your game level "slices" are located and the Source Folder to your .c and .h files and then LePlatz will load them in as a backdrop. The Outer BG tool (and similar tools) then paints the regions of your game slices that you wish to behave in particular ways. So the art just acts as a backdrop to guide your drawing as you define regions for Platz to interpret within the game. When you compile your game world, all of the BG regions you have drawn are converted into data structures that are included with your project and loaded by Platz during play. Check out the example projects included with the download to get an idea of how it all works. I find making small changes to them and recompiling can be a good way of getting to know how things work.

I do plan on incorporating Gconvert into the build process and making the images more compatible with the default transparencies and formats. Let me know if you have any other difficulties.

LePlatz wiki
Platz wiki
Post Reply