Cutscenes and mini-games
:?: Would it be possible to use flash games programmed with custom actionscript as mini-games. or could I use flash timeline animation for cutscenes? :idea: Sure. Any flash you import will run just the same is it would in the standard Flash player. Custom action script will still work, as will all of Flash's data import features (loading vars/XML). Timeline animation will work fine in any respect. These elements can be created as full-screen flash elements, then placed as the only object in a new room. The character sprite and drawer can be disabled in a room for exactly this purpose. The only thing you'll need to do is make sure the player has a way out, be it a 'changeRoom' TIM-e called from within the flash animation, or a LASSIE rect overlaying part of the screen with a directional arrow applied to it.

Is there any way to get the buttons in the .swf file to interact with the mouse in LASSIE? The don't getURL or anything like that, they just have 'over' and 'down' keyframes. I would like it to override the verb coin when the mouse is over the .swf file so that just a click activates the button effects. Is that possible?

hmmm. You're going to have to elaborate upon that. I'm not sure what you mean, just have rollover states apper on buttons in the Flash movies? In LassieAS that's no problem, I'm not sure about the Director build... I guess I've never -*test*-('")ed to see if it works. I would think that it would, considering mouse coordinates are still available to flash sprites. The only thing that may botch it up is if you have an inventory item cursor active. The overlayed sprite image may cause Director to block mouse tracking within the flash sprite.

Ok here's what I have: .swf file showing a fuse box. All switches are shown as OFF. When a user clicks on one it flips to ON until they let go of the mouse button, because the fuse is blown and it flips back to OFF. I created that simple effect with buttons in Flash. Using the Director LASSIE, importing the .swf as a sprite won't let the mouse click down on the .swf, I guess because it's loading the verb coin instead, so nothing happens.

oh... did you try making it ambient? Even so, a Director script might block flash mouse response. I didn't anticipate that. There are a lot of nuances in the Director system which are annoying like that (hence be the reason for going all Flash).

Ah ha! Ambient was the key! Thanks! :)

NP. =P

yep, flip off the "show char" and "show dock" toggels in the room editor to disable the display of those sprites. Then just place your animation/minigame as a single, full screen sprite. You will of course need to make an exit out of this room, be it a Lassie hit area with a changeRoom applied to it, or you can call changeRoom from within your flash movie when the game/movie is finished. I can coach you on calling a TIMe from inside Flash if you need it.

Ah, yeah... that was written for LassieDir. I haven't documented that aspect of LassieAS yet. All in good time. However, if you were to call the "changeRoom" command from inside flash... you would place the following on your flash movie's timeline: _root.TIMe.changeRoom("new_room", "startpoint", 0); What that is doing is calling down to the root level of the application (the Lassie game player). On root there is an object called "TIMe" that contains all the TIMe class game functions. So, you are just calling the changeRoom command directly at it's location within the program. Also note that I specified targets using quotes (") rather than apostrophes (') like in the Lassie editor. The editor syntax MAY work within flash (I've not fully -*test*-('")ed it), but the full quotation syntax I know will work; it IS the proper Flash string delimiter. Finally, if you are ever calling a TIMe directly within Flash that uses symbol arguements (input specified with a # sign), then leave the # sign off. Those are Director data identifiers (which are stripped off while the Lassie compiler exports action script). "#true" and "true" are the same value in Director and Flash respectively, but are NOT interchangable between the two.

I'm having trouble calling TIMe's from a ambient swf mini-game. Should this be trouble? The code I'm using works on from other swf's but not in this ambient one.

Nope, ambient should not make a difference... all the ambient property does is tell Lassie not to attach the standard sprite mouse actions. Post your TIMe and a description of your scenario up here though. I may be able to discern the problem if you're attempting the impossible. :D

Hehe, just figured it out, and as usual it was just sloppiness from my side. It was just a "gotoandStop" who messed it up. *Sigh*Long story, never mind. But as always I'm just to eager to post. But sometimes it's useful to bring up the problems, it usually makes you see it from a different angle.

yep... technical support and a sounding board. Both equally useful resources. Hehehe – and that slopiness seems to be lingering in your post: the command is gotoAndStop (capital A) :P