Logic Switch Creator Pack

EDIT 6/25/09

4 months ago I posted a suggestion for Mm to have a logic gate creator pack as an alternative to complex mechanical devices. The suggestion received a single response. 5 days ago the thread was brought back and received tremendous interest, spanning a 4 page discussion. In light of changes to the game since my initial post and the many opinions expressed over the last week, I feel it is appropriate to revise and expand upon the suggestion. The original suggestion can be found below.

Spoiler - Click here to see the original suggestion

Opposed to a level pack how about a creator pack that was designed to assist those doing more technically complex creations. Currently many people use mechanical logic gates. It would be nice to see non-mechanical ones in a creator pack. Basically I'm talking about is at a bare minimum two additional switches.

AND switch. This accepts on/off connectors from other switches. However, unlike other objects in the game it can accept multiple connectors as inputs. If all the connectors are on then the switch activates (and does whatever it is set to do on/off, direction, 1, etc). If any of the inputs are off, the switch does not activate.

OR switch. As above but if one or more are on it activates.

Obviously more logic gates would be nice but just these would be an enormous gift to those users who make complex levels. Mechanical logic gates operate at 10Hz and take up a lot of thermometer. I'm sure if they were coded directly into the game as switches they would operate near instantaneously and take up far less thermometer space.

In looking at the responses most people (although there were some exceptions) strongly agreed with the suggestion itself. Differences of opinion most commonly occurred when discussing the specifics of how such a suggestion would best be implemented into LBP. So I will break up this post into two parts. I will start by discussing the general concept of a logic gate creator pack without going into specifics. I then, as separate section, discuss a possible implementation of the idea.

Section 1: Logic Switch Creator Pack
Currently in LBP many creators have seen a need to be able to attach multiple wires to a single object. These can range from very basic implementations such as wanting two switches that open and close a door (one on each side) to prevent players from getting stuck all the way up to complex mechanical computers that allow creators to essentially write custom programs that control pieces of their LBP creations.

Many people who would like to include such things in their levels find these mechanical contraptions too challenging to implement. On the other side, for those currently using such devices in their levels find a number of limitations. I present these in no particular order:

1) The minimum timing is 0.1 seconds. This sounds quite fast on paper. In practice it can be a long time. Picture a 0.1 second delay between hitting the x button and sackboy jumping or hitting R1 and having the paintinator firing. Delays on the order of milliseconds are noticeable in control schemes. 0.1 seconds is actually a very long time for some applications.

2) These devices are very thermo intensive. In particular they tend to eat up one’s moving object thermometer. They can also eat into the maximum number of collected objects one can include in a level. This is a big trade-off for creators.

3) Even for creators who are familiar with these devices, they can be difficult to keep organized. If you go back to a level a week or month or year later you might have no idea which device does what.

4) Typically these mechanisms are created using ugly dark matter because they can jam up if they are placed on moving parts. Generally speaking these devices need to be placed away from the objects they control to create a clean looking level. However, this also means that it becomes very hard to emit objects using these mechanisms or give them out as prizes.

So as a general concept, I am suggesting a logic switch creator pack. I recommend doing this as a pack, rather than an update, so only people interested in pursuing this complexity need to be effected by it. This basic suggestion makes the assumption that Mm can implement it in a manner that will improve upon the 4 points I’ve noted above, make it simple enough for the average gamer to use without being intimidated but include enough room for complexity that people who want can get a lot out of it.

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Section 2: A Possible Interface for Realizing a Successful Logic Switch Creator Pack

Okay, so now that we’ve talked about what a logic switch creator pack should do, it’s time to talk about how it can deliver.

Were going to build on what already exists in LBP. Logic switches will be placed in a level in the same way that a proximity switch or magnetic key switch is placed. This will immediately You will have several options in the tweak menu:

First off you can set the behavior. Is it on/off, direction or one shot? Speed will not be an option here. You will also have the option to invert the switch. The standard option of making thing visible or invisible in play mode will also be available.

Basically, you will grab the wire coming off the device and tie it to whatever you want, just like any other switch. The real issue here is that these objects, unlike all the other ones in the game, will allow you to connect more than one wire to them at a time. This number could be unlimited. However, I’m going to recommend that each can only accept 8 input wires to make things easier.

These input wires can only have on/off behavior. They will not allow directional, one shot or speed switches. Invalid wires will appear red, exactly the same as it is implemented throughout the rest of the game.

So, the first hurdle of these devices becomes how to handle multiple wires. I recommend something I’ll call the magnifying lens, which is just a cute name for a cool looking pop-up window. Basically, if you leave the cursor (either empty or holding a wire) hovering over the logic switch for a second or so, a magnifying lens will pop up showing you a close up image of the circuit. The close up image will show 8 spots where input wires can be attached. All you need to do is place the cursor holding the wire over one spot and hit the X button to attach it as normal. This will then close the magnifying glass. If your hand was empty you can place it over one of the inputs that has a wire attached and hit x to pick it up, as normal. Really the only change here is the magnifying glass to help with the management of multiple wires. Otherwise the interface is the exact same one that we are used to for wires.

Proximity and magnetic key switches have a visual indicator to let you know if the switch is active or not. These switches will feature a similar indicator. However, they will also have input indicators to make it easy for people to see what is happening. A light bulb appears where each wire is placed. It will be on if the wire is sending an on signal. It will be off if the wire is sending an off signal. There will be no light bulb, just an empty socket, if there is no wire attached. This will make it very easy for people to follow what is happening.

There will be more than one type of switch. Right now I think three switches are needed.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...ate-en.svg.png
OR Switch: The physical appearance of the switch will look something like this, plus the indicator lights for input and output discussed above. The inputs are on the left, the output wire and indicator on the right. This does a simple OR operation using all the wires that are attached. It activates if any of the wires are on. It is off if there are no wires attached.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...belled.svg.png
AND Switch: The physical appearance of the switch will look something like this, plus the indicator lights for input and output discussed above. The inputs are on the left, the output wire and indicator on the right. This does a simple AND operation using all of the wires that are attached. It activates if all the wires are on. Unused inputs are ignored rather than being counted as off wires. If no wires are attached it is off.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...R_ANSI.svg.png
XOR Switch: The physical appearance of the switch will look something like this, plus the indicator lights for input and output discussed above. The inputs are on the left, the output wire and indicator on the right. This activates if an odd number of wires are on. It is off if an even number of wires are on or if no wires are attached.

There will be a tutorial for each of these, with examples for practical uses to make them accessible to the average player. I’m also happy to add in additional ones suggested by people on this thread. I’ve already mentioned some others in my posts but I want to get this done today so I’m only putting the basic 3 in for now.

Finally, we come to limitations.

The first and most obvious limitation is thermometer. Since these do computer calculations rather than simulated physics they will take up less thermo than the mechanical gates they are replacing. However, they will take up some thermo. Put too many in a level and you’ll get a message saying to use less. Continue putting them in and you’ll eventually get the message that the level has overheated.

The second limitation, and this is a big one, is that the logic switches will not accept wires from other logic switches. You can still wire them together indirectly, just not directly. This will prevent having circular logic. Indirect circular logic is okay, as it will just cause the switch to turn on/off at the mechanical interval. As a side effect this will also prevent nesting, which is extremely limiting. However, we introduce one more element to the mix to make nesting easy for beginners and advanced users alike:

The Circuit Board
The circuit board is placed the same way as the switches. However, it contains a tweak menu that is unlike any other. Instead of having the standard settings you get a screen where you can place logic switches on sockets that are arranged in a grid. A satisfying soldering noise can accompany placing a logic switch. Information must always flow left to right. The left side of the screen has spots for wire inputs. Attaching wires here is done with the magnifying glass as described above. The right side of the screen has spots for output wires. You then link these inputs on the left to the outputs on the right through logic switches in the middle.
http://www.lbpcentral.com/forums/pic...pictureid=4658
http://www.lbpcentral.com/forums/pic...pictureid=4659

Again, I’ll repeat this because it is very important, unlike the normal creator where you can place wires in any direction, here you can only place them left to right. As an additional idea, to help people troubleshoot, the wires that are currently receiving on signals will glow, while the wires that are receiving off signals will not.

The total number of inputs, outputs and logic switches allowed in one of these circuit boards will not be unlimited. There will be a set number of maximum inputs and outputs as well as a set number of positions for logic switches to be placed. An additional failsafe will limit the total number of connections with a “this circuit is too complex” message, just like the number of corners on an object are limited. Mm will need to experiment with this to find out what these maximums should actually be to ensure that no slowdown occurs and the calculation is virtually instantaneous.

Logic switches and the circuit boards cannot be directly wired together. As before, they can be wired indirectly by placing mechanical parts between them (as this slows them down so circular logic stops being a problem and error checking would be too complicated to prevent it).

That is all for now. As I said earlier, there are obviously more switches we could come up with that could be included in this pack (or a logic switch pack 2 ;) ). A delay switch would be the most important as it would be possible to allow logic switches to be hooked together through delay switches. However, just what is written above should give people an idea of the sort of implementation Mm might be able to achieve.

It would look awesome if they either released some "curcuit boards" (that looked like actual circuit boards) with logic functions, then people might be ahppy to have them showing in their level, and they would be easy to use for the less experienced :)
Or if they gave us a "circuit board" pack, where we could design our own circuits, with exact time capacitors and such :)

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Originally Posted by Pinchanzee

It would look awesome if they either released some "curcuit boards" (that looked like actual circuit boards) with logic functions, then people might be ahppy to have them showing in their level, and they would be easy to use for the less experienced :)
Or if they gave us a "circuit board" pack, where we could design our own circuits, with exact time capacitors and such :)

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I currently average a couple hundred mechanical logic gates per level. This is why I made the suggestion. Virtual circuit boards would be a really cool expansion of it. Basically its a way to make complicated switches and have them computed directly instead of being physics simulated in order to save thermometer, space and key colors.

I really like this idea. I'm working on a level where the boss got so complicated that it has to be released on it's own, due to all of the logic required.

I think we'd see the general quality of levels shoot up as well - currently you either need the knowledge to make them yourself or the drive to get one from any one of the "logic giveaway" levels and learn how to use it. I think it would definitely benefit everyone to have a standard switch (or set of switches) instead. I think a basic set would be best - I'm sure even that could make more complicated logic even easier to set up.

Code 18 in the LBPC Best Suggestions List hint, hint ;)

I personally don't think this is a good idea...
This will generalize stuff a lot, most of the best creators discovered their own ways to surpass the basics which gave them the opportunity to go beyond expected.

If this was done many people will just follow that pack's instructions and won't care on going through another route, leaving them stuck in the average where thousands are doing the same...

Thinkof it like a bird about to come out of its shell.
It is a lot better to leave the bird come out of its shell by itself, even if struggling than helping it out.

That's an elegant little comparison, but I foresee the overall quality of logic use improving. No more annoying lifts that go up before you are on them, no more ugly green dissolve floating around for newbs making permanent switches, things of this sort. It also opens the doors for experienced creators to make more complex logic-based elements. I have a comparison as a response:

You can tear down a house with your hands, but it's much more efficient to do it with a sledge-hammer.

Maybe even permanently shutting doors, too?

i wouldnt see the problem with adding these "circut boards"
its not like its that much effort to go out an find a level that will provide and,or and permanent switches for you so why not just have them readily available?

They would be a boon to those who could really use them and those who couldnt wouldnt really be all that better off because in order to properly use one of these switches you have to know how they work and if you know how they work you could probably just make one yourself.

I'm in awe of comphermic's strong hands :p

I agree. Admittedly a lot of what I use are strange custom mechanical circuits which would likely have no comparison to a digital circuit. But a set of primitives with AND / OR / XOR / NOT gating, and some generic latches and timers would improve efficiency for many creators and improve accessibility for many others. The only downside I would see is that it breaks the perception of simplicity and it would just be less fun :p

I don't think i would use them because it would probably get to complicated i prefer just to use logic i created then i know what going on.

Hmm it could be useful to others, i've already created my own of course.

And MM has all they're logic doodah's imbedded into they're floor of a lvl so you can clearly see when a switch is moving around.

I think that it is a great idea. Imagine if we didn't have buttons and we had to make a platform, attached to a spring, attached to a magnetic switch, attached to a magnetic key. It would be much more thermometer intensive and it wouldn't be uniform.

Now think of an AND gate. If you want to add more (assuming its pistons attached to wood), you would have to expand the dark matter, add in another piece of wood and piston and hope everything is set up correctly and goes well. If MediaMolecule had an object that was simply a box you could connect on/off switches to and choose the output, it would be worlds simpler and less thermometer intensive, because no real object data has to be loaded or physics computed. I'd imagine that it would be very simple to code in, much simpler that the objects they've released in the past. Honestly, I see no negative side to this.

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Originally Posted by BSprague

I think that it is a great idea. Imagine if we didn't have buttons and we had to make a platform, attached to a spring, attached to a magnetic switch, attached to a magnetic key. It would be much more thermometer intensive and it wouldn't be uniform.

Now think of an AND gate. If you want to add more (assuming its pistons attached to wood), you would have to expand the dark matter, add in another piece of wood and piston and hope everything is set up correctly and goes well. If MediaMolecule had an object that was simply a box you could connect on/off switches to and choose the output, it would be worlds simpler and less thermometer intensive, because no real object data has to be loaded or physics computed. I'd imagine that it would be very simple to code in, much simpler that the objects they've released in the past. Honestly, I see no negative side to this.

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This is largely the key point. It should have huge thermo savings. Right now logic gates can quickly eat one's moving object thermo. It is also much simpler in terms of making self contained objects. For example, imagine being able to put AND gates directly on a creature instead of needing to wire the creature to something off screen.

This isn't really a suggestion for enabling new things. What it does is let us do things we've already been doing in a more efficient, cleaner manner.

Lower Thermo, less build time creating your own switches... sounds like a win win situation to me. How anyone could see this as a negative is beyond me?

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Originally Posted by Rustbukkit

Lower Thermo, less build time creating your own switches... sounds like a win win situation to me. How anyone could see this as a negative is beyond me?

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Not to mention easy to read symbolic logic and routable wiring. But yeah, MM may well see this as a no-go as it breaks their veneer of simplicity.

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Originally Posted by rtm223

Not to mention easy to read symbolic logic and routable wiring. But yeah, MM may well see this as a no-go as it breaks their veneer of simplicity.

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Not really, they could disguise it as a circuit or something as someone had said before. They already have many different types of IF/THEN statements programmed into the system, why not expand upon that in a way that is both user-friendly and powerful.

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Originally Posted by BSprague

Not really, they could disguise it as a circuit or something as someone had said before. They already have many different types of IF/THEN statements programmed into the system, why not expand upon that in a way that is both user-friendly and powerful.

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The logic systems that exist are hidden from the surface in the sense that you have to build the components from scratch. A tool that explicitly allows you to build electrical circuits and digital systems is actual far more advanced and far less intuitive than any other of the primitive tools in the game. It brings the complexity out of the shadows and into the light. The complexity of the system has always been hidden.

I'd happily use the tool if it was provided, don't get me wrong. I'd also happily use a scripting tool if they gave us one, but I very much doubt MM would consider that either fit with their marketing strategy.

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Originally Posted by rtm223

The logic systems that exist are hidden from the surface in the sense that you have to build the components from scratch. A tool that explicitly allows you to build electrical circuits and digital systems is actual far more advanced and far less intuitive than any other of the primitive tools in the game. It brings the complexity out of the shadows and into the light. The complexity of the system has always been hidden.

I'd happily use the tool if it was provided, don't get me wrong. I'd also happily use a scripting tool if they gave us one, but I very much doubt MM would consider that either fit with their marketing strategy.

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I think that even people without a computing background (young kids and just people in general), can figure out that if you want something to only happen when two or more things do at once, then you can't do it without an AND switch.

I can see it going under the Special objects section, and be as simple as tweaking the output and if both have to be active at the same time to work. Then you just connect two separate ON/OFF switches to it and drag the wire output to whatever you need it to be on.

MediaMolecule can add in powerful tools without losing the simplicity of their product. It's just having a user-friendly interface that doesn't shun or shrug off the needs of more advanced users. This would cut down drastically on some very complicated levels, because instead of having an AND set up and having the game have to load it, it can load an AND switch in a fraction of the time.

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Originally Posted by rtm223

Not to mention easy to read symbolic logic and routable wiring. But yeah, MM may well see this as a no-go as it breaks their veneer of simplicity.

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This is why I suggested it as a downloadable pack opposed to an update. People who don't download it will never see it. They will only enjoy the benefits of it in levels that they play online. :)

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Originally Posted by dcf

This is why I suggested it as a downloadable pack opposed to an update. People who don't download it will never see it. They will only enjoy the benefits of it in levels that they play online. :)

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So basically in the same manner as the Creator Pack. Sounds like a good idea to me. :)

So we are talking about a gate object (or set of objects), that you could tweak to be an AND, or an OR, etc, and that's it? Meh, it'd be alright, but the majority of my control systems would still need creating physically. I can see how it'd be useful to many though.

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Originally Posted by rtm223

So we are talking about a gate object (or set of objects), that you could tweak to be an AND, or an OR, etc, and that's it? Meh, it'd be alright, but the majority of my control systems would still need creating physically. I can see how it'd be useful to many though.

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We're talking about something that looks like a logic gate and is called a "gate switch" and is placed into the editor the same as a magnetic switch. It would be found in the switch menu.

The tweak menu would have the standard visible, inverted options, as well as the on/off, direction, 1 and speed settings. The final option would be the type of gate AND/OR/XOR/NOT. To help people, there should be a visual change to the appearance of the board when this option is tweaked.

A final option should be to allow a delay.

The key feature of the gate switch is that it becomes the only object in the game that allows multiple wires to be attached to it. (Probably only on/off wires though). It has a wire that can be attached to other things.

This therefore becomes the mainstream method for tying multiple inputs to an object. Advanced users might tie these together to make more complex circuits. However, even without making complex circuits, users would still have the advantage of being able to use these functions in a compact manner and without hurting their moving parts thermo.

Perhaps an additional item, which would work in a similar manner could be a latch type switch. Actually, I'd probably call it a 'switcher.' The switcher would only accept a single input but it would have numbered outputs. Only one is active at a time. Each time the switcher gets the 1 signal it cycles to the next output.

I think there's a number of these, relatively simple and easy to use, functions that could exist.

As a final item, to help people organize, we could have what was suggested a while ago to have a circuit board, which essentially would let you build a nested logic board to make custom gates. This would basically work similar to capturing and is just provides a size/organization advantage.

The closest comparisen of adding logic gates to LBP is when Wiremod was made for garrys mod.
(garrys mod is a half life 2 engine physics sandbox mod of which I used to be a bit of a pro)

This is the difference between nonwiremod and wiremod garrys mod.

Nonwiremod;

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urwVjmH9noM"]YouTube - Garry's Mod Rocket Building 101 ( Tutorial )[/ame] Putting thrusters on a explosive barrel tower.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I210xgVRrh8&feature=related"]YouTube - combine car tutorial[/ame] Putting wheels on a plank.

Wiremod;

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAdAg070iQk&feature=channel_page"]YouTube - Garrys Mod Mechanical Auto-Cannon[/ame] Auto cannon with assembled munition.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0kbV8aW67I"]YouTube - Garry's Mod engine with transmission[/ame] Piston engine with transmission.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz1sjq5Cg6g"]YouTube - Slapper 8 Engine GMOD[/ame] Slapper 8 Engine.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4tDeIX8q4w"]YouTube - Gmod megastruct cannon video.[/ame] Gmod megastruct cannon.


IF ANYTHING ELSE WATCH THAT MEGASTRUCT CANNON VIDEO IT IS RIDICULOUS


Ok, now, without A LOT more added to LBP it will never reach this level of complexity, but I think it will bring up the average quality of levels.

There was some backlash in the Gmod community, but that was only be people unwilling to learn how to use wiremod and jealous of the cool things other people were making.

Personally, I wouldn't like this to happen. I feel that part of the fun of LittleBigPlanet is the challenge of complicated switch mechanisms. Further simplifying the create tools would only detract from the enjoyment.

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Originally Posted by dcf

Perhaps an additional item, which would work in a similar manner could be a latch type switch. Actually, I'd probably call it a 'switcher.' The switcher would only accept a single input but it would have numbered outputs. Only one is active at a time. Each time the switcher gets the 1 signal it cycles to the next output.

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I like this idea, but I think that it should also have a variation of the common relay as well. I remember I had a level where I needed to have something run to an emitter and a piston changing direction, and I had to put in around 45 relay switches. Needless to say, my thermometer skyrocketed.

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Originally Posted by Killian

Personally, I wouldn't like this to happen. I feel that part of the fun of LittleBigPlanet is the challenge of complicated switch mechanisms. Further simplifying the create tools would only detract from the enjoyment.

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I'm looking at it from a different standpoint. The way I see it, this would allow for more thermometer space to be used for creating other things that are actually seen and enjoyed by the players, rather than complex logic that hogs up thermometer space.

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Originally Posted by Killian

Personally, I wouldn't like this to happen. I feel that part of the fun of LittleBigPlanet is the challenge of complicated switch mechanisms. Further simplifying the create tools would only detract from the enjoyment.

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I definitely see your point here, and it seems that many agree with you. Aside from the lower thermo attraction, I think what interests me is that it would give those who don't understand logic gates a bit of help with creating better levels... at least, that's what I would hope it would do.

To be honest, I'm not someone who easily comprehends many of the logic gates out there or how to effectively make or use them. I still don't understand a few of them and how they work or what their applications are good for. I understand the basics, but I'm one of those who still use the ugly green dissolve in order to achieve a permanent switch that works (though it's always well out of sight ;)).

I'm no dummy either, I can have in depth conversations about many intricate things in the world... but I'm not a programmer and certainly don't think like one. As an artist and visual person, I simply have a tough time with logic gate concepts without either seeing them at work or having hands on experience. I know there are many others out there like me, who's creations and levels would have benefited early on in our development as creators.

I'm completely dumbfounded that the community has created these logic gates to begin with, and I hadn't even heard of them until playing the game to be honest. I seriously doubt the folks at Mm expected the community to be developing and using them either. Now that they are though, I think it would be a good idea for Mm to embrace and support the communities use and need of good logic gates. Especially for those new-comers, or just folks like me who don't have someone to sit us down and explain to us how to make some of them.

Again, I completely appreciate your point and it's a good one... but for those like me who have never heard of these switches until this point, it can be a bit frustrating at times when we want to achieve an effect similar to one we've seen and have no clue as to how it was done. I just think it might open up the creative possibilities to those who are more creative, and less technical thinkers. :)

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To be honest, I'm not someone who easily comprehends many of the logic gates out there or how to effectively make or use them. I still don't understand a few of them and how they work or what their applications are good for. I understand the basics, but I'm one of those who still use the ugly green dissolve in order to achieve a permanent switch that works (though it's always well out of sight :-)).

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Having a tool that is a gate and having a gate made out of pistons (or transistors or a set of reed relays for that matter) will make no difference to your understanding of how to use them. Understanding the applications of them is a completely separate issue to the implementation. Also, in some ways a mechanical switch is far easier to unserstand - if you slow it down you can see how it works. With a ready made implementation you are literally looking at a magic box that you have to understand conceptually before it can be used. This is in no way meant to be patronising to anyone BTW. Also, everyone seems to use green dissolve for permenent switches...

As for MM not expecting the community to make them.... I couldn't disagree more, MM use them extensively in their levels (just look at the collector boss!!) and I'm sure the software engineers at MM fully expected engineers in the real world to take 1 look at a mag switch and a piston and put the two together. I think they deliberately didn't tell us about them until later and let the info ripple through the community online - if the game was full of electronics theory it would put people off, but let people discover it for themselves, or learn tricks from their friends and it seems a whole lot more appealing.

BTW, many technical fields require a large amount of creative thinking to excel - it's a common misconception. We just suck at making things pretty :p

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Originally Posted by rtm223

Having a tool that is a gate and having a gate made out of pistons (or transistors or a set of reed relays for that matter) will make no difference to your understanding of how to use them. Understanding the applications of them is a completely separate issue to the implementation. Also, in some ways a mechanical switch is far easier to unserstand - if you slow it down you can see how it works. With a ready made implementation you are literally looking at a magic box that you have to understand conceptually before it can be used. This is in no way meant to be patronising to anyone BTW. Also, everyone seems to use green dissolve for permenent switches...

As for MM not expecting the community to make them.... I couldn't disagree more, MM use them extensively in their levels (just look at the collector boss!!) and I'm sure the software engineers at MM fully expected engineers in the real world to take 1 look at a mag switch and a piston and put the two together. I think they deliberately didn't tell us about them until later and let the info ripple through the community online - if the game was full of electronics theory it would put people off, but let people discover it for themselves, or learn tricks from their friends and it seems a whole lot more appealing.

BTW, many technical fields require a large amount of creative thinking to excel - it's a common misconception. We just suck at making things pretty :p

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Excellent points! It wasn't until I was able to get my hands on some logic switches made in community levels that I myself was able to make the connection as to how to apply them in-game. I failed to mention that, but you are absolutely correct... good point. You are definitely not coming across as patronizing to anyone... just making good sense. ;)

Your "magic box" explanation is spot on. That's how I regarded the various diagrams I saw here on the forums that members with knowledge of the switches used to illustrate their workings to other members who were trying to figure them out. I guess I would like to see them implemented still, knowing that if players needed to get a better understanding of what they do they could still have access to the ones made in community levels offered as prizes or come to forums like this to have it explained and get the help they need. Even better, Mm could offer them with an in-depth tutorial as a mini-pack. There were many things left out in their tutorials from the game that left many people confused.

I think Mm may have expected some members of the community to create their own Logic systems, but I don't think they would have expected the average player or even the majority of players to go that route though. As you said... Engineers, absolutely. It is for this reason alone that I fell in love with the community and the Play, Create, Share mind set of the game.

If it wasn't for Engineers and artists coming together, this game and it's community wouldn't have succeeded and be nearly as fun and intriguing as it is.

Also... glad to hear I'm not the only one still using dissolve in this way.

Cheers! :)

Glad I'm not being patronising, I just didn't want people to read it as "I understand it but you don't, nah n-nah n-nah nah!", or something along those lines.

An advantage of the magic box approach (the technical term is "black box", but I have no idea why) is that you would be able to match the diagrams on forums to what you create in create mode, so there is that. But conceptual understanding is still required, and having the right mindset helps a lot with that. But then a lot of players now have the basic concepts down, so releasing a pack at this time wouldn't be so bad.

I'm still not convinced about the expectations of MM, they would have expected the engineers to share ideas and as BSprague says, the average player can understand the use for basic AND and OR switches so IDK. Not much point in trying to second guess them though.


BTW, BSprague, what exactly are you meaning by a relay, because unless you are dealing with speed, a relay can be implemented in LBP using an AND gate...?

As an additional point to the issue of complexity:

How many times have you seen beginners ask how to put two wires on a single piston, light, etc? I've seen it plenty and I'm sure other people have as well. I've also seen numerous times where you explain how to do it and people's eyes glaze over (or at least the psn version of it). This tells me that it's something many people in the community want to be able to do.

I think it's fair to say that many people can understand conceptually how to use these things/why they should be used. However, making them and keeping track of the inputs and outputs is challenging. It's not intuitive or obvious to non-engineers. Even for engineers it can be difficult to keep your logic organized.

This argument doesn't even acknowledge my major reasons for the suggestion: lower thermo and cleaner designs. (Also, back when I first suggested this the capture bug would kill wires between separate objects so that was another motivation.)

Right now I'm working on a standard enemy. The type with a single brain that moves about on the wheel monster piece. I'd love to have an AND switch on the guy. However, putting it on means shrinking it down and hoping it doesn't break or get messed up by the nested movement physics. Alternatively, I can make it a two part creature, with the logic hidden off-screen. However, having a gate switch would be infinitely cleaner. It would allow me to give out the enemy as a collectable and people could pop it into their levels without any instructions.

Therefore, it would seem to me that such a pack would bring up level quality by making things accessible to all players and freeing up more thermo for those who could already do such things mechanically.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rtm223

BTW, BSprague, what exactly are you meaning by a relay, because unless you are dealing with speed, a relay can be implemented in LBP using an AND gate...?

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When I say relay, I mean an input that results in two different types of outputs (ex one-shot and direction). It's easy to implement, but if you need 30+ relay switches, the thermometer tends to take a substantial performance hit.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dcf

Right now I'm working on a standard enemy. The type with a single brain that moves about on the wheel monster piece. I'd love to have an AND switch on the guy. However, putting it on means shrinking it down and hoping it doesn't break or get messed up by the nested movement physics. Alternatively, I can make it a two part creature, with the logic hidden off-screen. However, having a gate switch would be infinitely cleaner. It would allow me to give out the enemy as a collectable and people could pop it into their levels without any instructions.

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This is another very important point that I'm surprised nobody has mentioned in detail yet. Spawning fairly complicated enemies dynamically is a terribly complex task. If the enemy isn't spawning in the exact same spot every time, you have to make sure that your logic gates spawn in a position that they won't interfere with anything else in the level, or the creature won't even spawn. Being able to invisibly place logic gates directly onto the enemy would be an enormously easier solution.

i think the technicality would be good for ppl would would like to become level designers making it to simple will only make it harder for them in the long run also challenges are fun =) wats bad about melding uer creativity and tech smarts together it can only make a better end product

A further problem with provided gates is propogation delay. At the moment, anyone using a physical gating system can see the propogation of signals (parts move). Because they can see the parts moving, they can actually see (and correct) race hazards without having to understand the theory of them in an intuitive manner.

With the proposed system propogation delay would almost certainly still exist (otherwise it would break the existing swithc model and make little sense) but the only real way to deal with race hazards would be at a theoretical design level. You say people give you blank stares when you explain mehanical AND gates to them. Try teaching the average gamer strategies for race hazard prevention as a purely theoretical issue. And if making logic becomes this easy, then far more people are going to hit this problem, because they will be using more logic.

Look, I'm not saying it's a bad idea and I'm not saying I wouldn't like to see it, but I can see many ways in which it could actually make life harder for many people.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rtm223

A further problem with provided gates is propogation delay. At the moment, anyone using a physical gating system can see the propogation of signals (parts move). Because they can see the parts moving, they can actually see (and correct) race hazards without having to understand the theory of them in an intuitive manner.

With the proposed system propogation delay would almost certainly still exist (otherwise it would break the existing swithc model and make little sense) but the only real way to deal with race hazards would be at a theoretical design level. You say people give you blank stares when you explain mehanical AND gates to them. Try teaching the average gamer strategies for race hazard prevention as a purely theoretical issue. And if making logic becomes this easy, then far more people are going to hit this problem, because they will be using more logic.

Look, I'm not saying it's a bad idea and I'm not saying I wouldn't like to see it, but I can see many ways in which it could actually make life harder for many people.

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You would only get delays if you nested an enormous number of these things together. It doesn't take the ps3 very long to do an AND operation. Far less time than the 0.1s mechanical delay.

I know the computational impact, my point is that EVERYTHING in the game is linked into that whole 0.1s thing. I would expect these gate devices to be as well, especially if they are using the same wires as everything else.

And even if it isn't implemented this way and your network of logic propogates through instantaneously (or as close as), the gates still have to be calculated in some order and therefore the propogation effect still exists. The only difference is that now you definately cannot see the propogation, no matter what you do, and your race hazards would be even harder to understand.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rtm223

I know the computational impact, my point is that EVERYTHING in the game is linked into that whole 0.1s thing. I would expect these gate devices to be as well, especially if they are using the same wires as everything else.

And even if it isn't implemented this way and your network of logic propogates through instantaneously (or as close as), the gates still have to be calculated in some order and therefore the propogation effect still exists. The only difference is that now you definately cannot see the propogation, no matter what you do, and your race hazards would be even harder to understand.

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I got to really disagree here. It's going to be so close to instantaneous that there will be no impact at all. It's only with mechanical logic gates with the 0.1 second timings that one runs into delay errors.

I'm coming into the discussion a bit late here, but if I'm understanding this correctly, we are talking about the length of time it takes for a complex gate to complete its actions.

So, as far as my understanding of LittleBigPlanet is concerned, if you have a mess of AND, OR, XOR, NOT, STATE, etc gates connected in the current (mechanical) set up, there will be a delay, one that will affect gameplay if the logic gate is complex enough. The 0.1 speed is for an entire cycle, meaning for it to move one direction, it is actually 0.05, if we are to believe LittleBigPlanet's system. In an oversimplified example, if you had a pyramid of AND gates:

x
xx
xxxx
xxxxxx
xxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx

with each one having one of two inputs already activated, and the other input attached to the previous AND gate to the right, with the furthest on the left linking to the one furthest on the right on the next row up, etc. The setup of x's above, each x representing an AND gate, would take approximately 1.55 seconds to reach the top, which is actually a substantial delay that increases exponentially with more layers of complexity. This exact same setup placed into an array of MediaMolecule programmed items would most likely happen instantaneously. Hopefully that settles it, as I do not think that an item programmed by MediaMolecule would actually have to go through all of the steps that a mechanical object has to go through to reach its goal.

I think this would definitely improve the quality of levels. I personally wouldn't use it, because i'm not a technical kind of person. But other people would definitely benefit from this! I would love to see this plan put into action.