AMC TC features a cutscene system that you can use to create cutscenes of varying complexity. There's alot of settings you can use - for a big example of what's capable check out the AMC TC's intro map (simply named intro.map)
The first step is to create the camera - at the very least this requires 3 sprites. A Touchplate, an Activator sprite, and a Cutscene cam sprite. First, place the Camera where you want the Camera to view from (The camera sprite's tile number is 3807) - the little red triangle at the bottom shows where the view will originate from. There are many settings to give the camera, but for now we're going to give it just 3. First, give it a hitag of 320, and then a extra of 90, and finally a XVEL of 104 (The Xvel and Extra can be modified by pressing F8 on the sprite in 2D mode) I'll explain what these values do later.
Place a touchplate sprite in the sector you want to trigger the camera from (Of course, if you want it to be activated by a switch than skip this step) and give it a lotag of 320. Next, create a small sector away from the rest of the map, and place an activator in it. Make the sector a door sector (lotag 20) then give the activator sprite a tag of 320. This step isn't neccesary if you wish to activate something else in the map as well as view a cutscene; it's only needed if you just want to show something with a camera. If you wish, texture this room with tile 3329 so you know what purpose it serves later on in the map
Test the map ingame, and you'll notice that as soon as you activate that activator, the cutscene camera will 'roll' and show you what it can see for about roughly 4 seconds. That's the basics down - you can just use this setup to show doors opening on the far side of a map, or enemies spawning. However, much more is possible.
The camera has many more settings; it can fade in and out in black or white, move, pitch up and down, turn, as well as display black cutscene bars. It can also activate Masterswitches, Respawn sprites and activators once done (This in turn can be used to trigger another camera via a Trigger room)
Spritepal 3 | Fade in black, fade out black |
Spritepal 5 | Fade in black, fade out white |
Spritepal 6 | Fade in white, fade out black |
Spritepal 9 | Fade in white, fade out white |
Spritepal 10 | Fade out black |
Spritepal 11 | Fade out white |
Spritepal 12 | AMC Transition effect |
Owner 0 | Default |
Owner 1 | Water/Blue |
Owner 2 | Nightvision/Green |
Owner 3 | Flashback |
Owner 4 | Greyscale |
Owner 5 | Heat/Red |
YVEL 0 | Normal type |
YVEL 1 | Cinematic bars |
YVEL 2 | locked player movement, Cinematic bars |
YVEL 3 | Same as above, clear cutscene text |
YVEL 4 | Same as 2; show the AMC ship's cockpit |
ZVEL 1 | Move camera forward * |
ZVEL 2 | Move camera up * |
ZVEL 4 | Move camera down * |
ZVEL 8 | Pitch Camera up |
ZVEL 16 | Turn Camera (Cam sprite's shade determines speed + direction, positive right & negative left) |
ZVEL 32 | Move camera backward* |
ZVEL 64 | Move camera backward slowly* |
ZVEL 128 | Move camera forward slowly* |
ZVEL 256 | Pitch Camera down |
ZVEL 512 | Move Camera Left (Cam sprite's clipdist determines speed, the lower it is the faster it moves) |
ZVEL 1024 | Move Camera Right (Cam sprite's clipdist determines speed, the lower it is the faster it moves) |
The Camera sprite changer can be used to modify a camera's parameters whilst it is in movement. This sprite passes on most of it's attributes to the camera sprite, so it shares values (consult the tables above to see what values to modify) Place this sprite in the path that the camera will move in. When the camera comes into contact, it will change it's camera angle to match that of the changing sprite (It will gradually change, but if you wish for it to snap instantly to the new angle give this sprite a hitag of 1) Give the changing sprite a spritepal if you wish for a screen flashing effect. The palette can be changed by modifying the OWNER variable. If you give this sprite an XVEL it will change the camera's sprite time to this value. The same goes for the EXTRA value which controls the camera's pitch; give this sprite an extra value equal to the new camera pitch you want and the camerasprite will change to meet it. By consulting the table above and giving this sprite a ZVEL you can also change the camerasprite's movement as well. Finally, if you give this sprite a lotag than when the camerasprite comes into contact with this changing sprite than any activators, masterswitches and respawns with the same tag will activate.
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