Complications With the Data-Driven Approach

I've been working on this phase of the project every day this week, but I had completely forgotten to keep up with the blog, so here's an update of what's happened:

I started out by focusing on the Retro mode since it's considerably simpler.  I got Fire and Hyperspace working almost right away.  Over the following couple of days, I got Thrust and Turn working.

Now that all of the player commands in Retro were successfully data-driven, I turned my attention to the Evolved mode.  This one isn't turning out to be nearly as simple.

On the plus side, the data-driven controls from the Retro version transferred over with no issues.  Fire, Hyperspace, Thrust, and Turn still work by processing the messages from the queue.  However, there are some issues.  Here is a list of the current challenges and things to fix:

• The asteroids aren't showing up.
• When the level ends, it throws an exception.
• Ship 1's model is facing down the Z axis for some reason.
• This causes his bullets to miss the opponent because they're passing by behind him.
• Ship 2 doesn't have these issues.  He's facing the right direction and his bullets hit Ship 1.

As a result, I'm probably going to miss this first deadline.  But I plan to have a lot of time to myself next week, so that should provide enough opportunity to catch up.  Here's hoping!