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Question - IDE Draw order in Instance and Asset layers [Feedback / Request]

BoB3k

Member
Trying to fix another bug, I updated to the newest IDE and runtime yesterday. I didn't get the bug fixed (but figured a workaround), but was going to keep the updates...until I noticed my levels weren't drawing right anymore. Stuff that in the Room/Layer Editor that were drawn one way, show up in the game a different way.

Now, I know there is documentation and info out there saying that a single layer is one depth and draw order within is not guaranteed, but come on, what's the point of a graphical IDE for designing levels if the game doesn't render in the way you design it in the tool?

So, this used to work in my old version. If you moved instances and sprites around in the layer properties list, it would change their order on the screen--in the editor and in the running game. I also quickly learned a little trick that if you select something and simply Cut and then Paste it, it moves it to the top of the list and the top of the view. I (like I know other people) would like more front/back type features, but I could work with what's there.

Well, it looks like sometime between updates, even this does not work. (I currently dev and run in 2.2.0.343 / 258). And, I don't really see how I can ever upgrade until this is addressed. I mean, I'm not doing anything crazy--I'm using the GMS2 tools to create levels in a small set of layers, some interactive, some only graphical, foreground and background. But within those layers, I very much care about the order stuff is being drawn. Like I said above. Just because everything in a layer is being drawn as a background doesn't mean that stuff within that background is in front and behind of each other.

I know people will come in and say "put stuff on different layers", be really? You're telling me if I have a background layer that I simply want to put like say a tree with a few bushes behind it and a rock in front of it, I need multiple layers for that? And let's say I'm going to parallax it, I now have to start worrying about syncing multiple layers, instead of just assuming that my draw order is going to match the editor? It just seems unreasonable.

It's got to be implementable some way. I mean, it's being done in the IDE, the info is there. The first thought that comes to mind is fractional depth within a single layer. Whatever, I know this is not a new topic, and there has been discussion on it, but I thought I would just add my thoughts --

If I can't be guaranteed that what I design in the level editor is how it will appear in the game, I'm not sure I can use the level editor. And that's a shame. And, I would have to imagine more than one potential GMS dev has come along and checked it out, and when they started to fight with the editor over how stuff they're laying out in the editors differs with what comes out in the exe, they move on to other game dev kits.
 
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