I talked in #gamedev for a while and I've decided how to fix both problems and make the game controls better IMO. There will be a set of keys (default WASD) to move and then a set of keys (default numpad-8456) to aim. You'll also be able to use the mouse to aim. So...I'm off to implement that. I'll probably upload a new demo once I'm done with it (I'll make sure to use the new lighting too.)
3:50am
Got KeyMapInput to accept mouse and key input now. Took a long time because I had to modify and add a lot of code to KeyMapInput as well as my config class and my current game code. Also found out that my MouseButtons class wasn't complete (well, it pretty much was; I forgot to add code for Right in my FromString() method.)
Now to get it to aim at the mouse and to switch it to a forward-backward deal instead of up-down. Then I need to add aiming buttons for the keyboard.
4:36am
Heh, so I get it all done just to realize that it doesn't work quite as planned with 4-direction sprites =/. It works well, but it jumps too much to be usable (you'll be walking along and it'll jump from facing left to facing down and such.) So, I guess mouse-based aiming is out. However, I'm still going to do key-based aiming.
The only good part is that this code will be usable in my next shooter project.
-edit-
Btw, the key-based aiming is going to be an option; not required.
5:46am
Ok, got that all done. I can guarantee that 90% of the people that play this are going to want to use the normal key scheme (face where you're walking) as the new scheme is kind of hard to control (for me anyway.) I've got to go to bed, but later when I get up I'll try to clean up (make sure I have no memory leaks and such) and I'll upload a demo. Hopefully it's not too awful.
Here's a screenshot of the new settings dialog:
To be honest though, I really think a gamepad would best suit this game. I don't know, maybe I'll look into XInput.
I SO WANT TO ADD MULTIPLAYER TO THIS. But I don't have any networking experience and I don't want to stop working so that I can learn networking; that'll push my deadline way back.
Bedtime now. kthxbai
-edit-
A ton of people have been bugging me "OMG, MAKE A DIFFERENT GUI SKIN LOLZ", so here it is:
Not keeping it because I totally love the one that I have now. Especially now that I totally sexyfied it by making the dialog backgrounds partially transparent. Looks AWESOME in my opinion.
Btw, this is something that has come up a couple times; I'm leaving the GUI stuff as is so you'll be able to make your own skin once I release the game. I'll probably even write a small help file on it.
