Secret Agent level editor (Camoto update)

Discuss classic and favorite computer or console games here.
Post Reply
User avatar
Malvineous
Shikadi Webmaster
Posts: 382
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2007 21:48
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Contact:

Secret Agent level editor (Camoto update)

Post by Malvineous »

Hi all,

Just in case anyone is interested in modding Secret Agent, I have just released an updated version of the Windows release of Camoto which can edit Secret Agent levels.

For those who didn't see my post on the 3D Realms forum, I've also released a one-level mod as a test just to make sure everything is working.

There are a few unknowns and some quirks with the game, so if you do create any levels and run into problems please let me know so hopefully they can be fixed.

Thanks also to Frenkel - I am using is his mappings between the internal level codes and the actual tile images that are drawn, as it saved me considerable time. However I believe these were only developed for the first episode, so there may be issues with later episodes. If you do load any levels with missing or incorrect tiles, please let me know!

Image
User avatar
Paramultart
VBB's Partner in Crime
Posts: 3004
Joined: Mon Jul 26, 2010 8:36

Post by Paramultart »

Truly awesome... Good work!
"Father Mabeuf was surveying his plants"
User avatar
Roobar
Vorticon Elite
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2008 16:12
Contact:

Post by Roobar »

Image
WOW!!!

YOU ARE GOD!

ImageImageImage

I've been waiting for this!

:O :rollin :love
User avatar
Nospike
Keen Minecrafter
Posts: 1402
Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 13:56
Location: Czech Republic

Post by Nospike »

Wow. I'm so looking forward to playing some custom levels. :drool
User avatar
Roobar
Vorticon Elite
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2008 16:12
Contact:

Post by Roobar »

How does the levels order works this time? It doesn't seem to be from top left to bottom right.
User avatar
Malvineous
Shikadi Webmaster
Posts: 382
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2007 21:48
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Contact:

Post by Malvineous »

As far as I can tell it goes left-to-right, top-to-bottom. There's a castle (final) level and I'm not sure whether that is treated specially or not.

If you need to swap levels around, you can right-click on the level item (in the item list on the left) to save it to a file or overwrite the level from a previously saved file.
User avatar
Roobar
Vorticon Elite
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2008 16:12
Contact:

Post by Roobar »

Well, I've been editing the world map for hours since it's not really fast and precise to work with the editor, and when it was finally done, I tried to save it, but it displayed me that garg error again:

Image

The first time it displayed me this, I figured I should delete all the foreground layer tiles and paste them in the background layer, so it will shut up. But this time it didn't work that way... Most of the tiles pasted were messed up! And there is no undo option... So yeah. Basically I have to start from the beginning... again.

I'm not sure why, but even if I work only in the background (I presume you need to tun the X in front of the Foreground layer), it turns out some of the tiles are still in the foreground layer.

Are there some tips on a work around or should I have to wait for the next version? If possible, put an indication to tells you that you've reached the maximum foreground tiles before it's too late.
User avatar
Malvineous
Shikadi Webmaster
Posts: 382
Joined: Wed Oct 31, 2007 21:48
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Contact:

Post by Malvineous »

Hey sorry you've been having some frustration with the editor, but if you care to read the message at the beginning when you first load Camoto it does warn you that this could happen, so you should save regularly and to back up your project folder for precisely this reason, so that you don't lose hours of work. If you ignore this and don't save for hours, well, you can't say you weren't warned :-P

The error itself is because of a limitation with the Secret Agent level format. If you want to place more foreground tiles, go bug the original game programmers to make the file format more flexible! If you get the error there is no need to delete the whole level, just do what it says. Pick a row, select all the foreground tiles on it and delete them. Then save again and the error will be gone. It's no big deal really. Also there is a warning when you reach the limit - it's called saving regularly like you're supposed to, so you get the warning not long after you reach it ;-)

Having said that, it sounds like all your problems stem from a misunderstanding about how the level editor works. Here is an explanation:

The list of layers will show two ticks next to the layer title. The one in the "A" column means the layer is active, and it will be included when you copy and paste. The tick in the "V" column means the layer is visible in the editor. You can double-click or right-click on each layer to change the flags. Left-click once on the layer to mark it is the current layer. When you select tiles from the tileset by right-clicking on them, you are putting them in the current layer, so make sure the correct layer is marked as current.

With Secret Agent, I *strongly* recommend you use the editor with only one layer active at a time. This is so important I am going to say it again, and in capitals too. ONLY ONE LAYER SHOULD HAVE A TICK IN THE "A" COLUMN! If you don't do this, when you select tiles in one layer, whatever tiles were there before in the other layer remain selected. So as you go merrily placing tiles around a level, you are also placing tiles in a layer you forgot about. Don't do this! The game doesn't like it, and once you have too many foreground tiles there's not enough space in the level file to complete the save and you get the error.

Only a tiny number of things are normally placed in a map's foreground layer, so basically you can ignore the foreground layer completely and work entirely in the background layer.

You can't copy from the foreground layer to the background layer because the layers are completely independent. It's like copying English text and complaining that it doesn't get translated into French when you paste it onto a French website. The reason the tiles were "corrupted" was because you had the wrong layers active, so you copied and pasted a different layer to the one you were expecting.

There is no undo yet because as the warning at the start says, the editor is still very early in development. Since it is only me working on the project in my spare time and nobody else is interested in helping with the UI (or knows C++ well enough to do so), it will probably stay this way for some time.

Lastly, remember to save often and test your level regularly. Lots of these games are picky about how levels are designed, so it's better to find out that something doesn't work sooner rather than later. If you're not saving and testing every 4-5 minutes, you're doing it wrong...
User avatar
Roobar
Vorticon Elite
Posts: 3267
Joined: Tue Jan 08, 2008 16:12
Contact:

Post by Roobar »

Thanks for the explanation. Now it's more clear to me.
Post Reply