Game Mechanics Top down movement with different tile heights?

[zombieattack]

Can anyone explain a good approach to designing a top down movement system where the player can jump up and down from map tiles of different heights? It doesn't have to be full 3D mechanics (i.e. multiple platforms above each other), just one map surface with varying height.

I can imagine that moving characters would have to constantly check whether they are standing on a surface or falling, gravity would need to be included in the z-direction, and you would have to check if the next tile you are trying to walk on is too high up and therefore you are hitting a wall/cliff, but the overall design is unclear to me and feels awkward.

Thanks
-Zombieattack

 

[Yal]

The simplest approach would be just storing the map height of every single tile, so anything below the 'surface level' is solid. You'd need to store x, y and z positions of each object and do some 3D collision checking, but all really mild stuff - you can't move past an obstacle if your bottom Z isn't above its top Z, and you can't move to a different map tile if the Z difference isn't smaller than your maximal slope step size.

 

[stainedofmind]

I have an example of z-movement ready to go. Feel free to rip it apart, and if you have any questions, I'll try to answer them. Do note, in the example, I used instances to create the blocks, but in a real project, I would use data structures, as they are far more efficient.

https://app.box.com/s/si0sdhzxcn9xr7po1vk100nio7nt8x6w