GSim 0.30.02

[testtubegames]

What? Really?

Yeah, really.

I managed to carve some time out from other work to finally make some progress on this long-overdue update. It's not on Humble yet since I haven't had a chance to shake out all the bugs and add all the instructions I would like. I wanted to get it out to you all asap, and once I've (/we've) had more time to stress test it, and add a couple more features I'm excited about... I will send it to Humble.

So, the only way to get it right now is to private message me on the forums, and I'll tell you where the game file is, and how to get it. Secrecy FTW!

GSim 0.30.02

New in this version:
-Black hole now doesn't have the glowing halo (though after hearing about insterstellar, maybe I oughta get Kip Thorne involved in this project!)
-Hold 'f' to autofire
-Orbit lines are less weirdly-pixelated (yay!)
-Time can advance past 2^18
-The game's window now is resizable, just drag the corner like any other window
-Dust reacts to relativity
-Relative velocity is written/editable
-Lines are optimized, so they won't *as easily* make the game crash when there are tons of orbits to draw
-Due to that, we can zoom more. Instead of x10 to x1/10... we can now do twice that: x20 to x1/20
-Reset zoom to x1 by pressing "0" (zero). This is a temporary fix, I'd like to rehash the menu to make this easier
-Asteroids, planets, fixed stars, dust *all* react to collisions now. So if any of those hit a planet/star/fixed star, they'll be destroyed/merged.
-A little animation happens when things collide now
-Save slots are added, so save away!
-Save slots can write to a text file, which will appear next to your game file. (GSim_savefile.txt)
-Save slots can be *loaded* from a text file, at that same location
-You can set the name of the setup you've saved with a "n: NAME HERE" parameter in the first brackets of the code.
-You can set the starting time of the setup you've saved with "t0: 15" parameter in the first brackets of the code.

Aah! The list is long, which is awesome. A couple known issues:
-Full Screen mode doesn't work at all now for some reason. I'll investigate
-The save/load system might be a bit confusing. I haven't had a chance to make it as intuitive as I'd like. But I'm sure you can all figure it out.

To Do:
-Add images to the save slots, so you know what you're loading
-Update the browser version to get rid of some of the bugs I've found / add the tutorial
-Add in comments
-Science equipment
-etc, etc, etc

To try out this version of the GSim -- either wait a few days to get it off of Humble, or if you'd like it now PM me for the location of the game file.

[NealCruco]

Well, I've found problems. Big ones. First, the game cannot run in the background on Windows. If it is running, you cannot view another window of any size without first minimizing the game. Second, I cannot seem to load anything. The "load from text file" button does nothing when I click it- neither do the buttons to its left. Two saves appear to come pre-installed, but no matter what I click, the "Load" button on them is grayed out. So yeah. I can't really test out 0.30.02 any more until I can load up some old setups and see how it performs.
Edit: After seeing ARP's post, I went back into 0.30.02. The load/save buttons at the top of the load/save dialog box still didn't do anything when clicked. Inexplicably, the two pre-installed saves could be loaded this time. I loaded up the first one, but after doing so, I found an even bigger problem- no buttons worked. They "pulsed", but had no effect. I could click on the giant star in the center to open the properties editor, but the X button didn't work there either. I don't think I'll be overwriting the previous version anytime soon.

[A Random Player]

Um.. I think the "short version" is slightly lengthening the code for certain codes.
Confirming NealCruco's issue of GSim not hiding when another window gets focus.

In order to load the saves, you have to click ReSave.

Posting this stuff for now. This is really cool, though. I especially like the 0 key and the path fixes (please keep the 0 as a hotkey (or a similar thing like control-0 (or even a zoom display on the menus!))). Also the whole resizing thing. Though, the text-saving is a bit confusing right now.
***I totally added an asteroid belt to my solar system model with the f key.

[testtubegames]

Ah, good point about the length of the codes. Most are significantly shortened (especially big ones), but some can be even longer (especially if they're short to start with). A simple solution would be to just check string length. If the 'shortened' one is longer, then just write the normal string instead.

I'll check out the game on Windows to see what's wrong. It's strange, since nothing should have changed on that front... but given the problems I'm getting all of the sudden with full-screen mode, I'm not too surprised.

Good feedback on the Save/Load stuff. I knew it was going to be a bit confusing to start with, but it's definitely more-so than I guessed. When you make any changes to a the code for a setup, it asks you to resave it before you load. Which I'll either cut, or make clearer. The Save/Load from/to txt file should make a file appear right next to your game file. So next to GSim_windows.exe, a file called GSim_savefile.txt should be created. Once it exists, you can change it, load from it, etc. In theory at least. It works on my mac, but, again, maybe there are some special problems on windows.

I'll second the 'confusing' aspect. Not as streamlined and clear as I'd like -- hence not sending it to Humble quite yet. That, and the mad crazy bugs you found!

**F key is really fun. I like doing it with tons of planets, and just ending up with a writing mass of planets.

[NealCruco]

**F key is really fun. I like doing it with tons of planets, and just ending up with a writing mass of planets.

These planets are literate? What an advanced sim!

[wtg62]

These planets are literate? What an advanced sim!

This isn't good. They're becoming sentient... and soon, they'll seek REVENGE on us for throwing them into other planets... just you wait.

[testtubegames]

These planets are literate? What an advanced sim!

You're absolutely write, these planets can reed!

I fixed up the sim - and think I've caught all the bugs we've come across. It now works on my pc in the background (I think that was a unity bug, that and the Fullscreen issue got fixed when I updated my software). The save/load is hopefully a bit more understandable. (Though I'd like to make it even better of course). And short codes mean shorter codes.

And then I fixed a few other bugs I found that had to do with resizing the screen (the orbit lines got fuzzy -- but I solved that one after way too much time working on it. I think.)

You'll find it in the same place I put the file last time.

[NealCruco]

I loaded it up, and I can say that this version is much better! I haven't encountered any bugs so far. I do have one question though- how do you enable full-screen mode now? That configuration dialog box wasn't just for window size, you know...
Edit: Ok, you still have a problem to fix. It's that "buttons don't work" bug. Oddly enough, it seems to appear only intermittently. I would keep experimenting with it, but the save/load dialog messed up. I manually merged all of my previous saves into GSim_savefile.txt and added the "n" parameter to each. Then I went to the game and clicked "Load from txt file". That worked, and all of my saves showed up. When loading one save, however, the buttons stopped working. So I restarted the game and tried loading that save again. This time the buttons worked. Then I realized that this save needed some tweaking. I made the changes and copied the save code, then pasted it directly into GSim_savefile.txt. Well, when I tried to load the new version of this save into the game, all of my saves disappeared. I made sure GSim_savefile.txt hadn't been messed up (it hadn't been), then restarted the game. When I tried "Load from txt file" again, things got really messed up. The examples disappeared, all the buttons stopped working, and only my last save showed up in the save/load dialog box. However, it couldn't be selected, since all the buttons had stopped working.
I'm thinking my long story up there is very confusing, so please tell me if you need clarification on something.
Edit 2: Ok, I'm wondering if it could be that particular save that's messed up. I can't seem to load it, add two stars, then load the new code. Not even in the last version. I'm getting frustrated now, so I'm going to get off the computer and do something productive.

[wtg62]

I will say, making an asteroid belt around a sun and then flinging a planet next to the belt... so much fun!

[testtubegames]

I'm getting frustrated now, so I'm going to get off the computer and do something productive.

Hmm... I'll see what I can track down.

Edit: I figured out one bug that caused an issue like you described. It happened when the current code was "haha, nope", it was trying to parse that like a level. Might be the same thing that affected you? If you could pass along the GSim_savefiles.txt (or just the important parts), I could also test your problem out directly.
Edit2: Ah, also apparently the 'load' button from the menu can cause that no-buttons-working issue. Hope that between these two we found your bugs.

I will say, making an asteroid belt around a sun and then flinging a planet next to the belt... so much fun!

Isn't it? I made something that's along those lines, and posted the video (too big for a reasonable gif):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JULW2z ... e=youtu.be

I will say, now that we have auto-flinging, we're running up against that 'haha, nope' message a lot sooner. Especially given the fact that we can shorten the codes now, I don't see a reason not to bump up the max length of the codes. Wish I could save / share the nice, uniform ring of asteroids as a base to play with, but instead I'd have to recreate it each time.