Taking WIP feedbacks into consideration, I've decided to set a resolution for the game. Previously, the game is in full screen, but the resolution does not change. A few players said that they preferred a changed resolution. The problem with this is that "screen tearing" becomes noticeable. To avoid this, I implemented "Refresh Rate Synchronization", but as it turned out, my "Frame Skip" script is a little incompatible with that. Not only that there is noticable drop of performance by about 10%, not to mention that the FPS keeps fluctuating. In short, avoiding "screen tearing" leads to other problems.Despite that, I think the pros of changing resolution outweighs the cons. There are many reasons to do so:- it looks better aesthetically (although more choppy graphically)- map scrolling is improved (very important reason for this game)- text becomes easier to read- action becomes bigger on the screen- according to 64Digits poll (the admins are gods!), a fair number of people use a screen resolution higher than 1024x768, which this game is originally designed for- the game is a little incompatible with people who use 640x480 (if any)And then, after some testing, I was surprised to find that, with synchronization, my "Frame Skip" script gave a performance boost of +100%! Malaika, did you hear that? Normally, without synchronization, the performance boost is only, at best, +20%. Unfortunately, as I've said, synchronization results in a constant -10% performance reduction. I felt that it's not worth it to dampen the experience for the majority to further boost that of the unfortunate. After all, the +20% performance boost is probably enough.Now, the game will run fullscreen at 800x600, without synchronization. It's the best compromise.It took a long time making this decision.Site SuggestionThis new "server-calendar-based" one-day blog rule is a little disorienting, considering that it's difficulty to see whether it's a new day or not yet. It'll be so much easier if there's a "notice" saying whether you can submit a new blog yet or not, based on when you posted your previous blog.
I\'ll find some time to write up a new one soon.Before I bore you to death with my sermons, let me first say that I\'m an official reviewer at GameMakerGames. Now interested?
Ack! I forgot! Sorry, melee. That's right, you're always responsible for the good stuff. Yep. [^^]
What did I tell you?
ANTONYMS!