Fixing the Rock Throw Bug - Write Up
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The document describes fixes made to prevent players from endlessly throwing rocks by holding down the "K" button in a game. Originally, a timer was used to reset attributes after 0.3 seconds that controlled whether a rock could be thrown and the throwing animation. To instead require the player to release and press the button again, the timer was removed and a rule was added to reset the throw attribute when K is released. However, this stopped the animation from completing. So the rules were separated, with a new timer added to just reset the animation attribute, allowing it to finish while keeping the throw attribute reset until K is pressed again.
Fixing the Rock Throw Bug - Write Up
- 1. Fixing the Rock Throw We wanted the player to not be able to old down the K button and endlessly throw rocks, so they have to press the button again for another rock to be spawned. We already had an attribute; 'Rock Thrown' that was created to delay a second rock being thrown. What Aaron had previously set up was some logic that stated the rock could only be thrown if 'Rock Thrown' = 0. There is also a second attribute named ‘Throwing Rock’, that controls the animation. If it’s true the throwing animation plays, and if false it stops. When K is pressed and the rock is spawned Rock Throw changes to 1 and Throwing Rock to true, meaning the rock can't be thrown again and the animation plays. A timer then switches the attributes back to 0 and false after 0.3 seconds, so you can throw again, but 0.03 seconds after you first threw. What we wanted was for the player to have to release the key ad press it again in order to be able to fire again. I remembered that when setting up a rule and the conditions, there was an option to make the condition that a key was up, rather then down. So first I turned that timer logic off, so that now after you throw a rock it never changes back to 0: you can't throw again. Next I created a new rule, that states if K is UP, then Rock Thrown should change to 0, and Throwing Rock is false Whilst this did space out the spawning of the rocks, it didn't stop them endlessly spawning with the key pressed down. Squid can only throw a second rock if the attribute is 0. After firing once it changes to 1. It only changes back to 0 if the K key goes up. The rock throwing is limited to one rock spawning until you release the K key and press it again.
- 2. Whilst the rock mechanic was all fixed, this method didn’t quite work with the animation and so needed adjustment. What was happening was that Throwing Rock was being set to false upon the key going up, stopping the animation. This meant that it didn’t run to completion, often just showing the first frame before being cut off. So first I took that change attribute out of the Throw again rule, as clearly that wasn’t working. I then made a timer in the Throwing rule, much like the timer that originally re-set the attributes. I made it re-set the Throwing Rock attribute after 0.3 seconds. No the animation plays out even after the K key goes up. It’s the same set up as before, except now it only resets the animation attribute, ending the animation, and the attribute that controls weather or not the player can throw a rock is reset in a different rule.