Bounty Mini-Game submissions

Hey guys,
With the recent release of a bounty list including many mini-games that we're looking to have ready for the release of TGB, there have been some submissions that don't seem to take full advantage of the new power of the LevelBuilder. So instead of writing a bunch of duplicate responses as to what to improve, and how exactly we're looking to have them done, I've snagged a Whack-A-Mole submission by Michael Woerister as it stood out and followed the format we are looking for almost to the T.

There is one snag, this was built on a slightly modified version that Michael had to help us out with some other stuff so it may not QUITE work on Beta2 as far as the LevelBuilder is concerned. the version he had resolved some of the more show stopping bugs that Beta2 had in it.

So I know now you're saying 'Well forget the example, when's Beta3?' and you'd be right in wondering. We've not said much in the way of release dates, mostly because we're trying to not dissapoint with a release date we didn't meet anymore, but I will say it's going to be very-soon'ish.

Honestly I must say we've all been kind of taken back by the speed in which people are starting to submit bounties. We anticipated that bounties would be worked on well into when we released Beta3 and thus expected the Beta3 release to be around before submissions started rolling in. Well, you guys are just too fast for us, so in the interim I'm going to link Michael's submission at the bottom of this post for all of you bounty hunters to check out.

Michael's submission is linked Here

There are some key points that I'd like to point out that made Michael's submission stand out so much.

Use of Projects

Most of the submissions we've received have made mention of backing up your T2D directory and copying art assets over manually. This is no longer necessary since the LevelBuilder can create a new project for you, almost identical to the T2D directory, just named properly for your project.

Michael's submission makes use of the full power of the LevelBuilder by introducing you properly to File->New Project and removes the need for copying over the folders or backing up T2D, which can lead to a mess of backed up folders and not knowing which is the one you're looking for.

Use of Configuration Datablocks

The LevelBuilder allows you to create objects based on a given set of parameters, so for instance if you look at Michael's submission under gameScripts/respawnPoint.cs you will see that he's created a t2dSceneObjectDatablock (which will be detected and listed in the Create tab by the LevelBuilder) and a script 'class' to interface with it. This allows you to do things like simply dragging and dropping an art asset onto the scene and automatically have it setup with the scripting necessary for a mole spawn point, without doing anything aside from saying 'Use this configuration datablock'. In Beta3 you are able to modify these via the QuickEdit, but in Beta2 unfortunately you can only specify the block before you create the object.

PDF Documentation with Bookmarks and Master Copies

While PDF documents are not a requirement for tutorials, creating them in the native format that we use for all of our docs makes life for us much easier and therefore is preferred over .doc files and the like. Michael has done a fantastic job of creating the PDF attached to his submission as it's master is .odt and it has bookmarks to specific sections in the document. It also makes great use of screenshots that answer the questions that may be coming to mind while reading.


That said, if you have any more clarification questions about how mini-games should be set up or scripted, documented, etc. Please list them here so we can have a nice comprehensive list.

Thanks again for all of yall's hard work, your bounties are coming together very nicely, you guys are so great :)

Cheers,
-Justin