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IGM Conversion by: Kyle_Katarn
Version: 1.00
- If using with the trial version some functions described below may not be available.
- This tutorial is 4 pages long, make sure to click the next page button at the bottom to continue.
What Is A Canvas?
The Canvas is indie Game Maker's equivalent to what RPG Maker defines as a map. You use a canvas to design your level, stage or area depending on what type of game you’re making. For this tutorial I will be making a Jumping Action (Platformer) game. I also did not select any pre-made templates. I recommend you do the same to follow this tutorial. When creating your game select "Jumping Action (New Project)", this will create a blank game with no resources.
The first thing we want to do is define our tile size, this is a global setting per plugin meaning you can define different tile sizes per plugin if your games uses more than one plugin. Click the Jumping Action tab then Per Plugin Settings. For now all were going to change is our Basic Tile Size, I find the Super Mario Bros tileset (More info on this below) works best as an 8x8. You can set it to a higher number but you might have to make edits to the image for it to work correctly when setting the grid up.
IMPORTANT! Always make sure to set your Basic Tile Size right when you start creating your game, attempting to change this later on will mess up every single one of your canvasses.
Click the Jump Action tab then select the Tiles tab. We’re going to be adding a new tileset with the image we imported.
For this tutorial we will be using one of Liana's Super Mario Bros rip, the one labeled "SuperMarioBros116bit.png". You can get it from the attachment below.
On the right-hand menu select Create, a new blank tile will be added, IGM auto-generates the name but we can easily change it by double-clicking it if it’s not selected or just clicking on it if it's selected. Let’s change the name to Super Mario Bros. Alright now we need to select an image to use for our tileset, on the far right side under "Collision Detection and Type Settings" there's a drop down. If you've previously added an image you can select it from the drop down box, if not click Create to add an image. Select SuperMarioBros116bit.png and it will be imported in to IGM; IGM will also split up the image based on our selected Basic Tile Size. This will allow you to see if your image needs to be adjusted for the Basic Tile Size you’re using. If you do need to edit your image here's how you change it, click the Material tab then the Graphics tab. A list of every image used in your game is shown. Select the image you’re using for your tileset, if you lost the original image in the bottom right-hand corner click Save to see it. Select the 3 dots, "..." and select your re-edited image. Once you've imported it click the Update button, this will update the previous saved image with the new one.
Alright back on the Tiles tab we should see our Super Mario Bro's tileset in the middle with its generated gird lines. Now we can't just go off and use our tileset, we need to set at least the walls up. Walls are Indie Game Makers version of Passibility from RPG Maker; we use the Wall Settings to define where a "wall" is. This must be done for each tile you plan to use; a tile is each little square you see. While this would take a long time to do one by one we can do as many as we want at once! If you wish to do multiple tiles at once simply hold down the left or right mouse button, whichever one you prefer and drag it until all the tiles you want are selected.
