simple machines forum

Something that's always bothered me about the copy/paste paradigm is if you need to paste an item into a list, then if when you paste the item does it displace the highlighted item? or is it to be placed after the highlighted item?

There isn't a good answer for this. If it's the first option then there is often no way to paste into the last item in the list. Sometimes you can select the area below the list, but not always, and usually keyboard support for that if present is awkward.

The second option is no better, you can't then paste an item at the top of the list!

I definitely prefer the first option, since the highlighted item then becomes the newly pasted item. In fact yesterday I tried to add this functionality to SOM_MAP's programming screen. At first I added a button that inserted new instructions above the current selection (so that the newly inserted item becomes selected (this may be an extension provided by SomEx) but the cursor itself doesn't move) but I soon realized that the ability to double-click the instructions in the menu meant that there can only be one way to insert, because there isn't two ways to double-click!

So instead of a button I changed it to a checkbox to change the way the insert button behaves. Except there is an option to make a checkbox appear like a button, so I used that so it looks like a toggle button instead, since that looks much better on that screen. In hindsight I realized that in that case inserting after was generally more useful, because you are essentially building up a program from top to bottom, but with the toggle on to do that you'd have to think in reverse to do the same! So although I find it more intuitive toggled, I think it would only be useful if you are coming in to alter an already built up program.

Still when building up an outline do the same rules apply? I don't know. I think the >> and << buttons do advance the cursor. But I prefer to enter and paste items so that they end up on the same line, even if that means you must manually advance the current line sometimes.


But there actually is a good solution to the copy/paste problem using the XCV keys on the QWERTY keyboard. It turns out that the key right after V is actually B. Which is perfect for Paste Below! or Paste Behind!! Heck even Paste Before if you are in the RTL world!!! It's actually pretty interesting that all of these keys just happened to be clustered together and in the right place. Anyway, I just wanted to share that. XCVB.

The other cool thing about Ctrl+B is it auto advances the cursor if that's what you want. Still in a copy/paste scenario you'd have to go back to whatever you are copying, so it isn't quite as fluid as entering new items.

To make a new item with Enter key there isn't a way to advance the cursor, but since it necessarily opens up an input window it's easy to move it down once past the last item. Ctrl+Enter might be fine for automating that. Ctrl+X,B after the fact would also work.


EDITED: For the record the way >> and << work in the script and project settings editors is the source side's cursor moves in reverse while the destination side remains in place. That's to make it easy to push over a line of items even though you have to start at the end of the list on the source side. In the settings editor there is an "endnotes" item that caps off the list, so adding to the end isn't a problem. But in the script outlines there are no such items, so my plan is to have an error-like box ask if you want to add to the end of the list if the last item is selected. If you need to move many items over and don't want to see the box then it's easy to think to make a temporary dummy item in advance and delete it afterward. It would be possible to add a checkbox to change the behavior, but I feel like it would mess up the symmetry of the classic layout based on the weird MAP file import mini-tool that is now obsolete.

Here is just something I find interesting I wanted to make a note of. I was wondering if the TrueType font format had any kind of exotic support for a color palette or something like that for its fonts. Just out of curiosity because I doubted Windows would have acted on the information if available.

Web searches don't turn up much, maybe "Multi-color Font" is the best keywords to use. Here (http://www.istartedsomething.com/20130628/microsoft-adds-multi-color-fonts-in-windows-8-1-proposes-opentype-standard/) is a top scoring page that suggests this is something coming to Windows (along with spelling checking in Windows 8)

This (and spelling checking) are both two very interesting additions to Windows. I was curious myself why this wasn't a thing, because it seems like it would be so obviously useful, especially because font rendering is the only place desktop operating systems tend to provide native support for scalable (aka. vector) graphics.


I think games of the 21st century need to get far away from bitmaps for fonts and other UI elements, especially if they are for PCs which can come in many different resolution modes. I think SOM's menus would actually be much improved if the frames were built out of fonts for instance, that and perhaps 3D models (with fonts at least for the lettering elements)


Black and white (or tinted) would work fine, but fonts with colours would make things more interesting naturally.


P.S. Random thought. I had thought for a long time that the way SOM offers resolutions to play at (clearly based on originally being a fullscreen only affair) is antiquated and should be revised on a new system screen ASAP. But looking at videos of the PlayStation games (edited: and playing one a little bit a few days ago) and other "indie" games it occurred to me that that old blocky look that comes from low resolution may actually be useful for emulating the style of older games, so I'm inclined to keep things the way they are. Or at the very least not just have the resolution set to the size of the window hosting the game.

I just decided on how to handle Big Endian with http://svn.swordofmoonlight.net/code/lib/swordofmoonlight.h even though I'm not sure how big of a deal that is these days since Apple bought into x86/Intel for its Macintosh line like a decade ago but there are probably other BE systems out there.

One thing that kind of makes me angry is it seems like C the programming language should have some intrinsic(s) way to represent cross Endian data types but it doesn't seem to. That would be so obviously useful it's really irksome. Anyway since C doesn't the plan is to just require non-Little Endian systems to use a C++ compiler instead of C which allows for custom made intrinsic-like data types. This way cuts down on a lot of code bloat and eliminates opportunities for human error.

So tonight so far I was able to improve things somewhat around minimizing SOM. I noticed after working on SOM_MAIN (adding a number of new screens) that the new screens I'd setup didn't keep the program from minimizing from the taskbar.

Note that the standard way Windows works seems to be to keep programs with popup screens from minimizing. Even clunkier if you right-click in the thumbnail on the taskbar for such a pair (or more) of windows the right click goes straight though the thumbnail with it disappearing and I think the windows are activated. But still its really strange to click on a window and have it disappear out form under the cursor! And as soon as the button is down at that; Microsoft engineering at its finest.


I never liked that behavior, but I couldn't get to the bottom of it for the longest. Tonight I was bound and determined. I caught a break when I noticed that the windows below the popop screen were disabled. Disabled is a status flag that can be discovered with software like Microsoft's own Spy++.

I forgot that you could disable main windows this way. Usually disabling means making a window element (also called windows by the API) grey.

Apparently SOM disables all of the windows that are behind the active window. This is also the apparent behavior of the plain "modal" DialogBox API provided by Windows, but curiously SOM doesn't use that. I think it uses some kind of middleware that abstracts away the standard Windows APIs. It does lots of strange things this way, but in other ways it makes things easier, because its behavior is very regular.


So anyway, the main problem it turns out was this was disabling the special taskbar window I'd setup, it's invisible but has an icon in the taskbar, the reason being so that it can have a [-] minimize button, which looks strange without a maximize button, and is incompatible with the [?] help button.


I developed a system for keeping the bottom windows from being activated, since I didn't realize that disabling them probably would've worked just as well (I haven't tried it so I don't know if the beeping flash behavior is part of being disabled or not) but I decided to keep the new behavior since it lets you reposition the bottom layer windows--which was something I'm not sure I even realized was possible--which I reckon could come in handy if you need to see the information on them (it also has a side effect of changing the cursor to things like an I-beam when you hover over a text editing region, but I'll probably just work on that later. Will probably change it to a (/) cursor)


PS: It's a little weird that you can drag the bottom windows around with this system but can't resize them. I may even take a page out of SOM's book and make it where clicking the bottom windows at any place drags them, the way you could drag the black regions of SOM_PRM and SOM_SYS before with the weird frameless setup that From Software used originally (I think the reason the tools have so many quirks is the programmers couldn't get the application to behave the way they wanted it to, so they just did all they could to make it just barely work!)

EDITED: I think that would be a nice addition. That and eliminating the beep/flash when dragging the bottom windows is probably a good idea. Using the cross arrows cursor is probably a good idea too if it isn't annoying. Maybe only if the cursor is not continuously moving.


UPDATE: I tried setting up the move cursor but it wouldn't work right on Vista because the buttons and menu (click the icon) areas on the top of the window seem to exist outside of the actual window. So unless you have time to invest in the new window manager introduced in Vista it isn't worth the trouble really. On the up side it turns out that the flashing window is a side effect of the background window being disabled, so all of the code I worked on to emulate that effect proved to be unnecessary. Now I just wish I knew why the windows don't minimize the first time you click on the taskbar.

For the record I remember reading a while back that Konami after giving the go ahead ultimately pulled the rug out from under this "fan" initiative. So maybe Konami really is losing its grip, literally that is.

There was some speculation that the reason Konami did this is the fan game wasn't looking so hot, and so Konami decided it would tarnish the Metal Gear brand. At the very least its reasonable to to conclude that Konami concluded that there wouldn't be much outcry for loss of something that could've been great (because of lack of said greatness.) I am in agreement that it didn't look very good myself, but then I don't think any games look good anymore. To be honest I'm constantly surprised that anyone plays new video games. I don't know what they see in them.

Anyway, the game maybe didn't look so hot, but since when do Konami's games consistently look so hot across the board? Konami seems to be saying if you want to do free work for Konami we'll let you until we decide it's not in Konami's interest, then we'll inform you that you just colossally wasted your time (unless you want to go to trial???)

Apparently this is a debate people are having:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0ReU2tvLFo&list=UUr_2H8pPitVJ85bmpLwFUyQ

Video courtesy PBS Game/Show.


I myself don't actually consider King's Field to be a game at all. I can't say why exactly but that's just my "there's no wrong answer" quick/gut response. I definitely have more sympathy with the people making games who are running away from the word game itself...

In the vid the Monument Valley game's authors supposedly want it to be called a "designed experience". Even though it looks outwardly at least (haven't played it. It looks like a smartphone only game) like a very traditional game, or at least a puzzle. I think that term though is pretty good, one of the best I've heard, the only problem is it isn't at all catchy and has a lot of syllables, so it's seems limited to technical speak.


People have coined the word "walking simulator" to call out games that they don't feel to be genuine games. I actually love this term. I think it's the perfect term for Sword of Moonlight's default game model. I think SOM can also do games like Armored Core without breaking the mold, but I think at its heart AC is a walking simulator too. Making robots walk isn't nothing, I think it's something, and even genre defining.

My personal idea of the perfect KF game is a walking simulator with a fleshed out protagonist that makes decisions for themselves, you just lead them about like walking a dog. For instance one thing I really don't enjoy in games is "crafting" or combining items from the inventory to make new items. For me when you have to do that its like the whole game stops and just fumbles around hopelessly. I find it utterly contemptible. I feel like if you need to combine something to progress the story then simply obtaining those things (perhaps the character takes them themselves for some purpose) and then simply walking the player where the things are needed. Essentially its a door with more than one key, wherein the player character will then on their own try to pass through the checkpoint however they can, which may be a cutscene where two available items are used together, which may or may not work...

For me the "hidden object" genre would work much better if the objects were simply put to use this way once obtained. It's less of a puzzle approach more of a story approach. For me the brilliance of games is actually inhabiting the spaces.


I do also think consumable items can be combined, but not via an inventory. My preferred approach is to map the items to keys/buttons and then press the two or more buttons down simultaneously to use them all in unison. That's organic. Use a water and wind magic together to make an ice magic. Same thing. Use a sword and whetstone together to sharpen it. Use the sword alone (mapped to a button/key) to equip or unequip it, together to combine it. Use the whetstone itself then to sharpen the item on the ground/table beside you. I just want this kind of system to be standardized and I don't want to play a "game" that uses a different system ever again. I want to play hundreds of games that all use the same interfaces and the same artwork just like all of the movies and series I enjoy everyday. I want the story to be the focus. That's what animates me anyway.

So I don't think KF is a game, because it doesn't have any gamey elements really, and certainly not any that it couldn't do without, and because its really not that challenging even though people claim its more difficult than Dark Souls, I think those people must just be people with no moral compass who have only ever heard of King's Field, or exceedingly trustworthy people who're regurgitating some horseshit idea that they got from somewhere.

Shadow Tower is a little difficult though. Especially on the resource management end. Does that make it more of a game, I don't know. I guess for me it depends on if the focus is on story heavy single player experience or not. Or if it's more like a sport, with arbitrary rules, which are not there to enhance the story but instead exist to make the game's novel mechanics standout among the pack.

Addendum:

Here is an example of naturalism I came across reading things online today. It's disembodied for sure, but you can easily see (I hope) how just doing things in a natural/straightforward way yields so much better results. Never mind the artistry on display, nothing on the market today looks anything like this.

Source: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/gallery/view/35/12248/3147.3

EDITED: Not recommending the game, just the general esthetic of the boxart here.

Once more unto the breach.

This thread is rather becoming a companion to the New Hope game thread in the project subforum/board. What it represents is the formulation of a suitable dialectic between Guyra and Seath. IOW: a scaffolding onto which the most interesting stories can be wove for centuries and even millennia...


This time I have something that truly approaches a kind of formalism. It comes courtesy a chapter from an art book (it's a small book with brief chapters interspersed with personal hand illustrations) about David Bowie, prepared by Simon Critchley, a kind of pop-philosopher ("The most powerful and provocative philosopher now writing" -Cornel West--from the back of the book) or rather David's impact on Simon, published by ORbooks.com a little while back (like a month ago)

I put this book on my ticket when I grabbed up Julian Assange's new book, "When Google Met Wikileaks" not knowing what to expect, but thinking it was worth a gamble. I don't usually buy new things.


Here I am about to layout the basis for Guyra/Seath, the firmament of the universe if you will, according to the third chapter from this book. Because it is so formal, I think this is the final word on the subject. And will be the final post for this thread I believe.


SPOILER ALERT


Simon puts forth with emphasis the exact word that this thread is looking for a I believe. It is called irreality in the subject, but other things throughout. Simon's word is inauthenticity; which is a wonderful word, which for some reason doesn't pass the spell checker I am using right now. I have to look the word up in the book and check it letter for letter to be sure I wrote it down right.


It is used to describe the work of David Bowie's career and Andy Warhol who prefigured it. I think I've read when David was introduced to Andy, Andy was afraid, afraid David was an unhinged stalker. I'm guessing this was before David's meteoric rise to fame, or it could be Andy was too isolated or did not want to internalize being second rung to David... I'm guessing the former, but I'm not willing to do the research right now. What I remember is when they met, there is video footage, and David is wearing a weird hat like Vampire Hunter D, and b/w stills from this footage look most like Vampire Hunter D, the kind with blonde/white hair often depicted by the cover art done by Yoshitaka Amano (of Final Fantasy fame; the good generation), than anything I can possibly imagine (edited: adding attachment...)


Specifically the sense held by the men that their entire life was a movie, a movie they are not directing, or experiencing, but merely watching. Andy has stated as much, David perhaps is only as much in the form of his staged alter-egos, one only knows.


But Simon goes on to explain that it is this thread that runs throughout all of David's lyrical compositions. The sense of acting out a movie that is, detached, and knowing how it all ends from the offset. Simon concludes the title of this movie would be Melancholia. Never mind Lars Von Trier already made that movie. In a sense it is the nature of the universe that through repetition it gains this quality, because repetition is the trope Simon says used in staged productions to create the sense of melancholia. Repetition as if nothing matters that is.

Either this chapter or excerpts from it were part of the promotional material that made me bite this book. But I think if the whole thing was there intact I would've written this post after reading said materials that day. It's that grabbing.


Simon goes on (I meant to say this before, but I opted for some flavoring) to say this: Art's filthy lesson (a play on The Heart's Filthy Lesson and the name of the chapter) is inauthenticity all the way down, a series of repetition and reenactments: fakes that strip away the illusion of reality in which we live and confront us with the reality of illusion.

Inauthenticity, illusion, it's another way of saying the same thing. And I want to be clear, my goal here in this thread, is not and never has been to create some kind of "Cnut" like theory of everything. My goal is to encapsulate a theory of art, literature, the thing that I value most (in games/etc) that can be readily "game-ified" or stripped down to something that can represent a nugget of order amid the largest conceivable world of fiction. In other words, the underpinnings of a fictional universe that celebrates and revels in art at its very center.


And it's here, in this delicious dichotomy, the "illusion of reality" and the "reality of illusion" that speaks volumes in so few words, and comes back around full circle perfectly embodying the Guyra/Seath complex that I've struggled here until now to put into precise words.


Okay then, so which is which? We're talking Guyra and Seath after all...

Well if it isn't obvious, for me it is: clearly Guyra is the "illusion of reality" and Seath is the "reality of illusion". The easiest way to think about this if you are finding it difficult is that there really is ultimately neither, no reality, no illusion, they are two sides of the same coin--but still the view of a coin depends on which side you approach it from--or rather perhaps if you push either to its extreme you come out on the other side... you've stepped over the edge of the coin so to speak. What is reality, what is illusion, you can never truly know for a fact...

And that is in fact what the two tricky dragons conspire to communicate to anyone who'll listen. For this reason they are each given an epithet that are together in the English language homonyms. In the tradition of word play and deception that I find often integral to understanding the KF series:

Guyra the elusive one. And Seath the illusive one. These are not common names, they are occult names. They represent the elusiveness of truth in Guyra's case, and the illusory nature of art and power in Seath's case. Or as Simon puts it, the illusion of reality (reality escapes us as if it is an illusion, and try as we might we can't get at it anyway) and the reality of illusion (illusions affect us in very real ways, even if we buy into them knowing what to expect, or are deluded into accepting them as real)

In this way Seath represents everything that is seductive about reality/illusion, and Guyra everything that is repulsive yet simultaneously attractive. Freud calls it the shadow. Or the truth. The thing you cannot bear to look at. IOW the reality, or as close as you can get without realizing that it isn't that much different from the illusion. It's only through synthesis that the universe is made whole (we often say universe to mean outer-space, but there is inner-space too, and it is just as infinite)


PS/EDITED: Also in the book somewhere in this chapter of the two before it, a quote of David's is trotted out. "Hitler was the world's first pop-star." I am probably paraphrasing. But to be clear, Seath is Hitler. He represents art/power and its seductiveness, or something very close to that. Guyra is the countervailing force whatever that is. The enlightenment, the search for knowledge that belies that which bewitches the men of the age. The only trouble is if you follow Guyra to its logical conclusion the land is stripped of all meaning and reality is revealed to ultimately be meaningless. Such is the quest for the meaning of life. So this way we come to understand that there needs to be a healthy balance. Both within the zeitgeist and within the individual psyche...

And that's what the Moonlight represents, the healthy balance. It's made of Hitler stuff (Seath/art/power) but use it wisely and use it well it is a force for undoing harm of all kind. Neither dragon is in and of themself good or bad/evil (to be clear we can say just or unjust) just as neither "reality" nor "illusion" is, and neither are the swords Moonlight and Dark Slayer (Guyra/truth/wisdom) that's up to you. But I personally believe that the player is always good. It's the NPCs that are the bad guys. It's just a question of how good is the player? Can they overcome the bad guys? Or will they succumb to them? And how many times will they have to Continue? That question can only be answered on the field, the King's Field. Dun dun dun.