Large image scrolling is not great

Toby

I've tried lots of different combinations of images at different resolution sizes all to the 'power of 2' and the image scrolling really does not scroll well on the iPhone using GS viewer (3GS too).

It really steps or hops pretty badly when the player starts to move quickly probably due to the framerate dropping from 60 >30 > 10

I simplified my image right down to just black and white with no improvement.

Suggestions?

I have a large background image at 1024 pixels in height and width.

quantumsheep

Before you panic, mate, try it as an actual app via xcode - the viewer may be the problem as opposed to the actual game!

SDMG

you could try a 256x256 image on an 1024x1024 actor...

jonmulcahy

have you tried splitting your image into segments? Like 4 512x512 squares and just tiling them?

Toby

Have tried your suggestions and as an actual app via xcode (QS). Sadly little if any noticeable improvement in scrolling / laggy performance, even sliced the image into 20 smaller parts (Created actors of each and tiled etc...)

I guess GS is still beta so I should expect these kinds of issues. Hope they will be addressed.

iPhone/iPod Touch can definitely handle large background images well over the dimensions I'm using. Look at Minigore or Alive 4 Ever some of these levels are absolutely huge and the scroll is silky smooth.

Hoping GS can be optimised to get the same levels of comparable performance just doing some simple scrolling!?!

Comments.....

JGary321

what reso are u using? Because despite what some people are saying the iPhone IS hard-coded to a max 1024 x 1024. Some simple games may get away with more, but you sacrifice peformance. UIImage and UIView doesn’t support image sizes above 1024×1024.

If it's below this then I have no idea.. Which now I notice that you said you did try splitting it. Does it work good in the viewer on the computer at least??

Toby

Works fine on the computer using GS builder, using GS Viewer or even a compiled game in Xcode the framerates on the iPhone and iTouch fall dramatically when scrolling starts?

I've stripped my app down to the bare essentials (player and background) and the scroll issue is still present. It just seems to be struggling to keep up when trying to do something pretty basic & fundamental to most games.

Hoping there's some optimisations coming soon to fix the problem, my game's not really 100% playable when the gameplay gets busy and you need the framerates to see the action etc.

Maybe I'll just stick to non scrolling games for now.

butterbean

Toby,

I had the same prob with my platformer game. I'm trying to create some depth to my game by creating scrolling backgrounds but dropped that idea b/c the framerates on the ipod are so different. I even had mine stripped down to just the background scrolling, and on the MAC it looks great, but on the ipod it suffers, and you can't even tell there's a scrolling background. Hoping this will improve too!