Hi - I just saw these videos on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viREUXITJIw http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gad_9KhDYIE and I find both of them very aesthetically pleasing, and since I've always liked tetris (though admittedly I've never been too great at it), I decided to follow the links in the video descriptions to try and download this lockjaw program. (Note, that most of my tetris experience has been with the original gameboy one, the NES one, and more recently tetris DS) That's how I ended up here, which seems to be a very interesting place . I never knew there was so much variation in tetris and its rules (though I was a bit shocked the first time playing tetris DS being able to rotate the pieces infinitely). My question, anyhow, is how to make my lockjaw look similar to the ones in these videos? I looked through the released skins, and none seemed similar, so I downloaded the skin template, and have been trying to work with it to make it look the same (I have the black background with the grey grid) but I can't quite seem to get the block colors right (especially the translucency) , or make them turn grey after they're locked. Mine also seems to be lacking the "Lines" and "Score" bars, even when I play 40 line mode. Sorry if it's a ridiculous question, but thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
Here's a skin I made before for an earlier version. I don't know if it still works but it may help you. http://www.sendspace.com/file/xzge85 The translucency effect can be found in the options under "Shadow." To make the blocks turn gray after locking, you have to edit the actual images themselves. I forgot which row in the images correspond to what so maybe others can help. The LJ manual may point you to the right direction.
Glad you liked my vid! Here are my current blocks, background, and skin file. With shadow, I don't really see why one would need a grid.
The grid and the shadow have slightly different functions. The grid allows the player to see the placement before moving the piece there. The shadow allows the player to see the placement after moving the piece there.
I guess I'm coming from the old tnet days where there was no shadow, and we'd use the grid. Back then, you'd use it to look from the piece at the top to the bottom to line it up and see where you were. Combined with the shadow, I suppose it would let you look to see how many times you needed to go left or right from where the piece currently is. That to me, seems counterproductive. One should be capable of discerning that information right away without counting grid by grid, much like card counters can tell you how many half-decks are left in a shoe of blackjack by just glancing at the discard pile.
Thank you for the replies! I didn't know one of the actual video creators would respond (or was even here for that matter!) I got it looking how I wanted it finally. There was one strange problem though - no matter which background image I use for background.bmp, my background in game was always black - as if it weren't reading the image at all. Either way, I figured out how to make the grid appear by drawing a box around the top row black square in ljblocks.bmp Thanks for the help - and I've uploaded the skin (with some music I found too) here for anyone that wants it.
Are you refering to the look of the shadow blocks in-game? If so, go to LockJaws "Options" menu, and play around with the "Shadow" option. "Faint Color" and "Fainter Color" look quite nice. Also have a look at the "Template Skin Segmented Blocks.bmp" included with my Template Skins pack. Row 5 is used for the shadows, and if you have LJ's "Shadows" set to the afore-mentioned settings, the center of them (R/G/B 255/0/255) will be transparent (allowing for the background image to show through the center of them). Note that this only works for the shadow blocks, not the other regular blocks. (re: the afore-mentioned "Template Skin Segmented Blocks.bmp" image) Rows 1 and 2 are used for the locked blocks in the well, and rows 3 and 4 are used for the falling pieces and the preview pieces. So, if you edit the blocks in row 1 to gray blocks, but leave blocks in row 3 color, they'll look colored in the game and then turn gray when locked in the well That's a strange one (?). Have you mistakenly edited the skin definition file (".SKIN") for text colors that are the same (or close) to the background image? If so, well, ya know... black on black <G>... YES, folks, I've actually screwed up WinDoZe like that <LOL>! Sounds like that possibly you edited the paths or filename within your skin definition file (".SKIN") incorrectly. Yes, if within your skin definition file (".SKIN") you have "transparentPF=0". then block 1 in the LJBlocks.bmp/LJBlocks-Sega.bmp images will be used as a tiled fill for the well. If "transparentPF=1", then the background image will show through, meaning that you have to manually draw in the well/well borders/pit grid/etc... (see my "Bejeweled 2 Worlds" Skin Pack for LockJaw one of my many that uses a transparent playfield, and my "Minimal" Skins for LockJaw one of my many that uses a non-transparent playfield). P.S. If ya haven't already stumbled upon it <G> (sounds like you might have already), http://www.tetrisconcept.com/wiki/index ... Rich_Nagel and http://www.tetrisconcept.com/wiki/index ... kjaw_Skins P.P.S. Welcome to TetrisConcept, LockJaw, and the world of LockJaw skinning
I'll add here that you don't want to be using a connected blocks image (ljconn), because that then uses the same image for both landed and active pieces.
(more directed @Zednom and other budding LJ skinners, as I'm sure that LA prolly already knows this) Yes, that's correct. Also, note that you'll still need to add the following lines to the skin definition file: Code: ljconnSega= ljconnSRS= with no entries after the "=" sign, otherwise the game will load and use LJ's default connected blocks images as well (refer to the "Template Skin Segmented Blocks.skin" included with my skin template pack). BTW, if your skin doesn't use the connected block images, you'll also want to add the silver and gold blocks to your regular blocks image(s).
