An unusual entity...

Jul 18, 2006 at 11:53 PM
The Bartender
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Entity ID 0x03 is weird as heck. Is there any place in the game where this is used?

Basically, the code uses the internal timer of the entity to count down to 100, then destroys the entity (ie, it lasts 100 units of time then poofs out of existence.) The kicker is this: its display rect is 0, 0, 0, 0 (ie, nothing.) So in other words this thing is invisible, exists for 100 units of time, then stops existing.

Internal use, maybe? It's weird either way. :/
 
Jul 19, 2006 at 12:10 AM
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It could be the timer that controls tose white-cloud bomb thingies?
 
Jul 19, 2006 at 12:21 AM
The Bartender
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Naw, that's built right into the entity itself. It really doesn't do anything more than "exist" for a few moments, then stop existing, unless something else in the code uses it (no such luck finding anything though.)

Is there any entity using ID 3 in the game? A quick search hasn't turned up anything, so this could just be an incomplete entity Pixel scrapped...
 
Jul 19, 2006 at 8:07 AM
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There's a TSC command to branch the script to a new entry if an entity of a certain type exists on the map which only shows up twice in the game (Jellyfish juice, and Alien Medal).

These entity 3 guys sound like they could have been intended to control events in timed sequences through such a means.
 
Jul 19, 2006 at 5:27 PM
The Bartender
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That's a rather good guess. If the game doesn't use it that way, someone certainly could for their own hack.

I've noticed a few other entities like that. I haven't bothered to go through the entire list (it's quite big... over 300 assembly functions, some a few pages in length, is a lot of code to analyze) but 76 is another interesting one. It calculates the "X" of its frame based on a value I haven't figured out yet (offset 0x30 bytes into the entity object instance)

A bit of tweaking could transform it into a "frame-picker" entity which allows you to control 100% what to displays onscreen (which could reduce the amount of hassle ANP causes; you'd lose behavioral effects though, but that's not too much of a problem if it's just for cutscenes.)
 
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