Voxel Particles & More: dot big bang v0.9.9 Is Live!

A new version of dot big bang went live this week, bringing a raft of improvements, updates, and new features. Headline items in version 0.9.9 include the arrival of the Voxel Particles system, a batch of super-useful new scripting examples and game-building kits, and many valuable quality of life tweaks to the Game, Voxel, and Script Editors.

Read on for a full rundown of the changes, and keep an eye on our Discord and YouTube for new content that’ll help you put these changes to work in your games!

General

• • Add image placeholder icon which displays as images are loading
  • Format resource created/modified dates in a more clear manner
  • Add link to developers.dotbigbang.com to main burger menu
  • Minor style tweaks to comments panel

Games & Content

• • FPS Kit
    • Now supports teams. Check out the Round Controller for more information!
  • Featured Templates in the bottom bar have been updated!
    • Added Orange Monster Enemy, Green Slime Enemy and Custom Orc Enemy
    • Added Toy Sword and Toy Hammer that can be used to fight the enemies
    • Added Watermelon, Alarm Clock and Turtle hats
    • Added Wolf Costume Package
    • Added Swimming Pool
    • Added Summer Emoji Override
    • Added Game Teleporter With Image
    • Added Campfire with new “Particubes”
    • Added Default Player Template for easier access to it
    • Updated existing hats to all use the same script
    • Updated many scripts to allow for more customization
    • Updated Flower Gun look
    • Removed Light Ribbons until we can fix an issue with the trails
  • Candy Collector Kit
    • New game example featuring collectable candy and doors that are locked until you pay candies to open them
  • Featured Templates
    • New game to provide access to featured template parts
  • NPC Examples
    • Added customizable Orc NPC (changes with sliders)
  • Combat Kit
    • Renamed from “Basic Combat Example”
    • Added “Spawn on Damage Taken” to optional scripts
    • Added “Open Screen on UI Button Press” to optional scripts
    • Fixed interaction arrow sticking on screen after death
  • Doodle Safari Kit
    • Renamed from “Doodle Safari”
    • Added workroom
    • Added example containers & player
    • Made environment collider visible when game is stopped
  • Doodle Safari Templates
    • Reorganized example layout
  • Halloween Fun Templates
    • Added emoji override
    • Updated home button & ambient sound icons
    • Added voxel icon & gizmo to particle emitters
    • Reorganized game to make assets easier to find
    • Added moon with billboard script
    • Made game use the default player
    • Replaced tip cubes with doodle cubes
  • Player Template Examples & Tips
    • Added pride, summer, & pocket garden emotes
    • Updated puppy av to support voxel animations
    • Fixed bug where host would control all players using swimming av
    • Fixed bug where avatar switched characters showed as guests in multiplayer
  • Environment Examples & Tips
    • Replaced tip cubes with doodle cubes
    • Added example of swimmable water
    • Added voxel handles to particle emitters
    • Made collision on rainbow bridges use gizmo script
  • All above Kits and Example games
    • Updated chatty scripts
    • Added swimming support
  • Diamond Wars
    • Fix for a potential exploit.
  • Pocket Garden
    • Swimming added to all bodies of water
    • Ice cream is free on your farm if you purchased an Ice Cream machine
    • Kitchenette decoration is interactable

Editors

• • Voxel Object Editor
    • Add Voxel Object name to Voxel Object Editor – clicking name will now open the save options panel
    • Make Voxel Object Editor animation toolbar always present by default
    • Add ability to view created/modified dates in Voxel Object Viewer
  • Game Editor
    • Add “Recent Items” to resource browsers
    • Add hover preview for resource browser thumbnails
    • Fix issues with hover state in game editor bottom panel
    • Retain state of game editor bottom panel after close/re-open
    • Fix minor issue where the Entity Panel would briefly close and re-open when opening Entity Search
    • In Entity Search, add icon for an Entity with no VoxelObjectRenderer
    • In Entity Search, add icon for Spawn Point
    • Fix issue where the initial click of a number slider could sometimes cause the value to move unexpectedly
    • Fix issue where game Debug Options panel could display incorrect state when re-opening
    • Clicking Game name will now open the save options panel in the Game Editor
    • Expose link to voxel object viewer from Entity Panel
    • Prevent users from selecting uneditable text in all game panels
    • Allow users to see their own scripts which are not “Usable By Others” in the bottom editor panel
      • Warn user if not “Usable By Others” and force them to change permissions
  • Transform Gizmo
    • Added a “pivot” option (shortcut ‘P’) to tell the transform tools (shortcuts ‘1’ to ‘4’) which center of rotation to use:
      • the center of the entity’s (or entities’) bounding box
      • the origin (i.e it’s “zero”) of the entity (or the average of these when multiple entities are selected).
    • Both the “Space” and “Pivot” options are now in the right “Transform Options” panel
  • Script Editor
    • Keyboard shortcut fixes and improvements
      • Respect ctrl-s (cmd-s on mac) shortcut to save script, when script editor has focus but monaco does not
      • Respect ctrl-d (cmd-d on mac) shortcut to find, when script editor has focus but monaco does not
      • Respect ctrl-f (cmd-f on mac) shortcut to addSelectionToNextFindMatch, when script editor has focus but monaco does not
      • ctrl-p (cmd-p on mac) will now toggle the script browse window, instead of just opening it
  • Avatar Editor
    • Handle uncaught exception on User Profile page if their avatar fails to load
    • Create a random Avatar and display error message in the Avatar Editor if a user’s Avatar fails to load
    • Fix an issue where Avatar Editor thumbnails could appear incorrectly on slow connections

Engine

• • Many improvements to various engine error messages, so that they contain more information about what went wrong.
  • UserScript API
    • Added new input functions for Keyboard: isKeyJustPressed, isKeyJustReleased, getHeldTime
    • Added an official demo world for the new input functions
    • Added new input functions for Gamepad: isButtonJustPressed, isButtonJustReleased, getHeldTime
  • Particles
    • Added cube particles
    • Added billboard quad particles
    • Changed faceCamera to billboard point and quad particles
    • Changed spawnRate to calculate based on systemLifetime, startNumParticles and (end) numParticles
    • Added time property to change the time value of the system either by script or manual pre-warming in the editor
    • Added play property to control whether time is progressed automatically
    • Particle properties can now be edited and visualised when the game isn’t running
    • Added shadow casting
    • Non-faceCamera (Quad) particles are now located at the particle origin, so need to be offset in existing games
    • Added randomSeed to control the random offset in the shader. This is assigned a random value when creating a new particle system in the editor. You can change this seed to match others in the property panel
    • Added dbb_particle_wrap_repeat to demo how to manipulate time in script to create a repeating system
    • Added dbb_particle_wrap_mirror to demo how to manipulate time in script to create a system that mirrors when time exceeds systemLifetime
    • Added 89931142b3dd4252a3ad57ca59cd1ce4 test game to demo dbb_particle_wrap_repeat and dbb_particle_wrap_mirror

CIP Users

• • The fix_cref URL option (default: false) now outputs the resource tree in the console (and shows the legacy scripts in red)
  • Added the legacy_js_support URL option (default: true). If false, legacy JS scripts won’t do anything anymore. Only the properties definition at the top will be considered, so the engine/editor know about the properties and preserve the values in the game. This option, combined with fix_cref is useful to work on migrating old JS scripts to the new TS user-script system.

Feel free to drop into our Discord to talk to the dev team if you have any questions about the updates, and check out the #Changelogs channel to stay up to date with what’s new.