ACCA

Automatic constructor for character animation in LÖVE.

Overview

It's a simple library for use when you need an easy way to animate characters, working on LÖVE framework. In relation with the artistic part, in this case you use separate image with the character movements. The structure of folder tree is what define the actions. The library make an object that contain all movements and actions in tree-folder structure.

#Example of use

Imagine this tree-folder content:

.
├── img
│   └── Scorpion
│       ├── Dizzy
│       │   ├── 01.gif
│       │   ├── 02.gif
│       │   ├── 03.gif
│       │   ├── 04.gif
│       │   ├── 05.gif
│       │   ├── 06.gif
│       │   └── 07.gif
│       ├── Ducking
│       │   ├── 01.gif
│       │   ├── 02.gif
│       │   └── 03.gif
│       ├── Stance
│       │   ├── 01.gif
│       │   ├── 02.gif
│       │   ├── 03.gif
│       │   ├── 04.gif
│       │   ├── 05.gif
│       │   ├── 06.gif
│       │   └── 07.gif
│       └── Walking
│           ├── 01.gif
│           ├── 02.gif
│           ├── 03.gif
│           ├── 04.gif
│           ├── 05.gif
│           ├── 06.gif
│           ├── 07.gif
│           ├── 08.gif
│           └── 09.gif
├── lib
│   └── acca.lua
└── main.lua

Where img is the folder where we save the images for our game. Now, the Scorpion folder is your character and the subdirectories are the actions. Every single image inside the action is a piece of whole movement of action.

To create a object with the complete set of animations for a single character, you need use newCharacter method:

Scorpion = newCharacter("img","Scorpion", "gif", 0.1, "Stance")

In this example the delay is set to 0.1 seconds and the default action is «Stance».

See the next main.lua as guideline:

-- Example: Create and use an Animation
love.filesystem.load("lib/acca.lua")()
x = 400
y = 300

function love.load()
  Scorpion = newCharacter("img","Scorpion", "gif", 0.1, "Stance")
  love.mouse.setVisible = false
end

function love.update(dt)
    -- The animation must be updated so it 
    -- knows when to change frames.
    Scorpion:update(dt)
  if love.keyboard.isDown("left") then
    x = x - 100 * dt
    Scorpion:setAction("Walking")
    Scorpion:setDirection("Backward")
  elseif love.keyboard.isDown("right") then
    x = x + 100 * dt
    Scorpion:setAction("Walking")
    Scorpion:setDirection("Forward")
  elseif love.keyboard.isDown("up") then
    --y = y - 100 * dt
    Scorpion:setAction("Ducking")
    Scorpion:setDirection("Backward")
    Scorpion:setMode("once")
  elseif love.keyboard.isDown("down") then
    --y = y + 100 * dt
    Scorpion:setAction("Ducking")
    Scorpion:setDirection("Forward")
    Scorpion:setMode("once")
  else
    Scorpion:setAction("Stance")
    Scorpion:setDirection("Forward")
  end
end

function love.draw()
    -- Draw the animation the center of the screen.
    Scorpion:draw(x, y, 0, 1, 1)
end

function love.keypressed(key)
  if key == "f" then
    if love.window.getFullscreen() == true then
      love.window.setFullscreen(false)
    else
      love.window.setFullscreen(true)
    end
  elseif key == "escape" then
    love.quit()
  end
end 

The previous example in action

Happy hacking!