player.config - player configuration file for crock

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SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

There are four sections to the player config file: variables, bitmaps (and sounds), moves, and keybindings. Each command is terminated by a newline. Lines that begin with a hash sign (#) are interpreted as comments and are ignored, as are blank linkes. Variable entries have the following form:

set variable value

variable

can be one of the following:

width

to set the global width of the character

version

to set the version of the config file format. The only valid values are:

1

Obsolate. Initial version of config file.

2

The current version of the config file, as described by this man page.

pathprefix

Specifies the path that should prefix all bitmap and bitmask file names. Note that if the environment variable CROCKROOT is defined, it is prepended to all filenames, before the pathprefix. This allows the pathprefix to refer only to directories within the crock distribution (or an alternative set of directories).

bmsuffix

Specifies the suffix that should be added on the end of all bitmap file names. Typcially ".xbm".

bmmsuffix

Specifies the suffix that should be added on the end of all bitmap mask file names. Typcially ".m".

sndsuffix

Specifies the suffix that should be added on the end of all sound file names. Typcially ".wav".

face

Specifies which direction the player is facing. Legal values are "left" and "right".

stepsize

Specifies how far a player moves with each step to the left or right.

startattribute

Obsolete. Specifies the flag values initially for the character. This value would be the sum of all the special move attributes that the character should initially possess. The idea being that certain special moves would require a certain amount of "experience" to be gained before they could be used. Support for this feature was removed from the code due to the tediousness of keeping it in sync with the special moves. No support for adding attributes was implemented.

value

is a symbolic or numeric value, depending on the variable set.

Bitmap loading entries have the following form:

load tag filename xoffset yoffset offense_zone, head_zone, mid_zone, low_zone

tag

is the "tag name" or nickname of that image. The tag is used to refer to the bitmap when defining moves.

filename

is the full path to the X bitmap file. This is for both the bitmap image and the bitmap mask. The actual filename to load is constructed by taking the filename and prepending pathprefix to it and adding bmsuffix or bmmsuffix to it (for bitmaps and bitmap masks, respectively).

xoffset

and yoffset are numeric offsets for the image in pixels from the upper left corner of the window. Note that these must be determined and calibrated, because different frames have different widths and heights, since each is cropped to reduce space utilization. The perl scripts adjustbm.1 and changeconfig.1 can be used to determine the offsets and uniformly change the offsets respectively. If the global width and height values are changed, the bitmap offsets must be changed as well.

offense_zone, head_zone, mid_zone,

and low_zone all have the same form:

xhigh yhigh xlow ylow

these form the boundary line for that zone. Note that the comma (,) is required to separate each zone definition.

offense_zone

represents the area of the image that is attacking, such as the first in a punch or foot in a kick. If the move is not an attack then it should be defined as: "-1 -1 -1 -1,".

head_zone

represents the area from the top of the head to the neck and is used to determine if an attack hit the head. If there is no head zone present, perhaps due to an unusual crouch or doubling over, then it should be defined as "-1 -1 -1 -1,".

mid_zone

represents the area from the neck to just below the torso (typically approximated around the mid-thigh region) and is used to determine if an attack hit the mid section. If there is no mid zone present, then it should be defined as "-1 -1 -1 -1,".

low_zone

represents the area from just below the torso (around the mid-thigh) to the bottom of the feet and is used to determine if an attack hit the legs and trips the fighter. If there is no low zone present, perhaps due to a jump, then it should be defined as "-1 -1 -1 -1". Note that there is no comma after the low zone definition.

Also note that if a frame is defined as being "invulnerable",

then all three vulnerable zones, head_zone, mid_zone, and low_zone should be defined with -1's. A fighter is "invulnerable" while recovering from an attack (e.g., getting knocked down and then standing back up), losing, wining, etc.

A varient of the

load command is the loadmask command which allows a new mask to be associated with an image that has already been loaded. It has the following form:

load originaltag tag filename xoffset yoffset offense_zone, head_zone, mid_zone, low_zone

orignaltag

is the tag name of the already loaded bitmap image to use for the frame. Note that only the new mask will be loaded from disk.

All other fields are exactly the same as the

load command.

The final loading command is the

soundload command which loads in sounds. It has the following form:

soundload sound_tag filename

sound_tag

is the "tag name" or nickname of that sound. The sound_tag is used to refer to the sound when defining moves.

filename

is the full path to the sound file. The actual filename to load is constructed by taking the filename and prepending pathprefix to it and adding sndsuffix to it. Note that it may be necessary to change the pathprefix variable before this command, if the sounds are in a different directory than the images.

Moves definitions are multiline commands formed by specifying

the move name and attributes and all of the images that comprise it. Moves are defined as follows:

define movename damage xoffset yoffset flag

[ soundtag stag ]

[ tag delay ]

[ ... ]

enddef

movename

is the name that the move is called. Crock requires several movenames to be defined. Refer to section XXXXX for a complete list. The movename is used when binding a key to that move. Refer to the definition of bind for more details.

damage

specifies how much damage the move does. Players strength start at 100 and go to zero. Blocked moves do one quarter the damage of undefended moves. xoffset and yoffset specify the force imparted by the attacker to defender when they receive an unblocked hit. This can be used to knock the defender back or in the air.

flag

specifies if this move has any special attributes. A value of 0 indicates that it is a normal move. A non-zero value causes crock to call a code to handle the move. Note that unfortunately, much of the code must be custom written for that move. Refer to the source file flags.h for a list of all the legal values of flag. In addition, special moves have been defined (currently) as bitfields, so the values tend to get large, since each value must be twice that of the previous. This may change in a future version.

If there is a sound to be associated with that move (and played

when it is invoked) then the line immediately following the define command must be a soundtag line.

stag

is the tag associated with the sound that was loaded with the soundload command.

After the optional

soundtag line, there are zero or more instances of the tag line, which specifies the frames, in order, to use for the move.

tag

is the tag associated with the image that was loaded with the load or loadmask commands.

delay

is the delay or number of "ticks" associated with that frame. A larger number holds the player in that pose for a long time, a small number makes a quick move. "ticks" is a game dependent time unit and is currently defined to be 100,000 microseconds.

The move definition is terminated by the

enddef line.

Keybindings associate keys to the move names and have the following form:

movename binding

movename

is the name of the move as specified with a define command.

binding

specifies they key bindings to be used for that move. The key bindings follow the X key translation conventions (refer to XXX for details).

EXAMPLES

Here is a trimmed down version of the config file currently used by crock. Note that the only difference is that the real version has more backgrounds it uses.

#  PHASE I:
#
#Set up some variables.  Format
# is: set varname value

set version 2

# path to look for bitmaps
set pathprefix /n/weather/0/frank/frames/done-golden/

#bitmap suffix
set bmsuffix .xbm

#bitmap mask suffix
set bmmsuffix .m

#sound file suffix
set sndsuffix .wav

#character is facing right or left
set face right

#width (approx. max) of character
set width 230

# size of step he takes 
set stepsize 25

#    PHASE II:
# Load in bitmaps

#stances
load ts0 s0 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 122 12 119 58, 119 58 134 150, 134 150 155 264
load ts1 s1 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 127 12 118 53, 118 53 138 160, 138 160 174 268
load ts2 s2 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 100 13 100 59, 100 59 118 158, 118 158 166 263

#move
load tw0 walk0 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 115 16 101 57, 101 57 132 163, 132 163 183 263
load tw1 walk1 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 142 14 137 53, 137 53 160 162, 160 162 200 263
load tw2 walk2 5 105 -1 -1 -1 -1, 143 13 137 54, 137 54 156 165, 156 165 183 271
load tw3 walk3 0 70 -1 -1 -1 -1, 115 14 103 52, 103 52 120 167, 120 167 149 275
load tw4 walk4 0 90 -1 -1 -1 -1, 125 18 108 56, 108 56 134 154, 134 154 158 264

#left jab
load tlj0 lj0 -20 80 -1 -1 -1 -1, 115 16 109 56, 109 56 138 171, 138 171 176 271
load tlj1 lj1 -10 80 188 34 204 54, 110 17 107 57, 107 57 134 174, 134 174 169 274
load tlj2 lj2 5 80 224 29 225 25, 121 12 114 50, 114 50 145 172, 145 172 175 269
load tlj3 lj3 -20 85 -1 -1 -1 -1, 98 11 92 52, 92 52 121 162, 121 162 163 264

#
# load a sound into the audio server (if present)

set pathprefix /n/monster/1/remcon/frank/sounds/
soundload low  hmmm

#     PHASE III:
#define a move 

define stance 0 0 0 0
  ts0   2
  ts1   2
  ts2   2
  ts1   2
enddef

define leftjab 10 10 0 0
  tlj0  1
  tlj1  1
  tlj2  3
  tlj3  1
  ts0   3
enddef

define moveleft 0 0 0 0
  tw4    2
  tw3    2
  tw2    2
  tw1    2
  tw0    2
enddef

define moveright 0 0 0 0
  tw0    2
  tw1    2
  tw2    2
  tw3    2
  tw4    2
enddef

#    PHASE IV:
#
#
#bind a move name to an action.
bind leftjab <Key>KP_Add
bind quit    <Key>q
bind moveleft <Key>Left
bind moveright <Key>Right

FILES

config.crock

player1.config

player2.config

SEE ALSO

AUTHOR

Created by unroff & hp-tools. © by Hans-Peter Bischof. All Rights Reserved (1997).

Last modified 21/April/97