To much code in a single actor...creator lag.

Thunder_Child

Ok so many of you know I'm a slots maniac...been working on so many ways to code and "logic" my way to a complete process to make winning paylines.

Typically you have a controller to look for winning combinations right ? If you have 13 symbols...15 reels and 30 paylines you have an ANORMOUS amount of individual rules and cascading otherwises to write. Throw in a wild symbol and the combinations end up in the thousands of lines...around 25,000 lines of logic to be pretty accurate.

So what I'm leading to here is I only have 3 paylines with ONLY 1 wild done and if I open this actor for editing it takes about 5-8 minutes to unlock it for editing...then it takes about 10 minutes to one by one load each payline logic tree...I can then edit....very slowly because each time I click the expression editor to find my integers and bookeans the is another lag before I can scroll to find them...then another 5-8 minutes to exit out to my main scene for testing. OMG you can see where some frustration can add up here !!

Finally I decided to try this....create 30 controlling actors...one for each payline. I copied my first payline and dropped them into each actor...where all I have to do is edit the expression editor and because I have less code....yet more actors to place around or above my actual scene....it seems to be helping but still slow...just not a total of 30 minutes.

Because I had so much code logic in ONE actor...the creator just says no no...not today folks lol.

Even still because this is a side hobby and only have an hour or two each night or every other night to do these logic trees...I've calculated it can take me over a year to write all this code. Not looking forward to this. @Armelline spent some time...which I appreciate very much to figure out a way to use tables or a different logic tree and when I look at it its like reading "Greek" so to speak.

25,000 lines just to look for winning combos.

Does ANYONE know a better way ? Why can an online number generator find every combination possible in a instant ? Is there some math formula that can do this...insert into an expression editor or table and have the best dang slots game creator can make ? Does it just come down to having to spend hundreds of hours to do this? All the rest of my game is done...all the bonus spins...multipliers...all that fun stuff that makes slots games so fun...animations the whole bit....but who want to play a slots game if there is no wild symbol :-(. Frowny face Dave here.

Just reaching out one more time. Any advice would be GREATLY appreciated!!

Thanks
TC

MentalDonkeyGames

I noticed the same. Rule heavy actors load very slowly in the latest build. It was not that bad with the earlier builds.

The_Gamesalad_Guru

Okay so in a recent discussion with the gamesalad staff they told us that using more actors with less code it more efficient than using tons of custom duplicate actors. So that is to say if you have actors that contain code only specific to a numbered prototype and the actor contains code that will not be used by the prototype containing that number it is better to break the code into multiple actors.

Thunder_Child

Cool Thanks @Lost_Oasis_Games I will continue with 30 actors off scene. One for each payline. That's still 833 lines per payline. Yuk ! BTW it only seems to affect the creator....actually playing the game still seems to be a blitz and there is no lag on a device luckily.

Also I'm still pleased to not have had a creator crash in over a month :-)

Armelline

My offer to talk you through my very simple and extremely code-lite solution is still on the table. Once you understand what it's doing it will be very easy to work with. And it will literally be 1000th of the logic required. Probably less.

Thunder_Child

Ok maybe this weekend or an off work day we can talk as we are on such a difference in times across the globe. :-) I had recalled you saying GS blitzes through "nested code lines" and that may end up being the way I have to do it so I dove in.

Armelline

@Thunder_Child said:
Ok maybe this weekend or an off work day we can talk as we are on such a difference in times across the globe. :-) I had recalled you saying GS blitzes through "nested code lines" and that may end up being the way I have to do it so I dove in.

My template does everything you need and does it in just a few rules. Would be madness to nest hundreds of conditions when it can be done so much more simply! If I ever have time (I remember time, I had some long ago) I'll turn it into a proper template with notes.