Corona SDK completely destroy physics joint - lua

I am making a game in Corona sdk where different balls bounce and stick to each other with a weld joint. When I reset the gameplay, all joints are destroyed, then all the balls are repositioned. Here is some of my code:
--stickJoints and balls are tables that contain all the weld joints and ball objects
resetTotal = function()
for i=1,#stickJoints do
stickJoints[i]:removeSelf()
stickJoints[i]=nil
end
for i=1,20 do
--this resets all balls and sets linear and angular velocity to 0
resetP(balls[i],1000+(i-1)*400,5000,0)
end
end
The problem is that as soon as I tap the reset button, the balls that were connected temporarily interact with each other. Any thoughts are helpful. Thanks!

I think your best bet is either
to use timer.performWithDelay to call a function that will reposition the balls after the physics has had a chance to break the constraint.
Remove each ball from physics, and use a delayed function cal (see item 1) to re-add them after having been repositioned.

Related

Ideas on how to manage movement of SKNode related to other, moving down but maintaining the same alignment with the other SKNode

i'm new in the development of swift ios game using spirtekit and i need help. I want to develop a vertical 2d endless run, where with a swipe you are able to move the player in direction and if there is an obstacle, it is created in a position calculate with the position of the player. Once create the obstacle i would like to make it falling down but alway with the same relation with the player (this means that it has to move only on y axis).
Can you suggest me some ideas on how to manage this?
This book teaches you exactly how to make what you are looking for:
https://www.amazon.com/Getting-Started-SpriteKit-Jorge-Jordan-ebook/dp/B01891X7TM
This is the end product:
https://itunes.apple.com/lr/app/inside-the-hat/id1076967804?mt=8
You can get it for free here (with trial):
https://www.packtpub.com/application-development/getting-started-spritekit
The source code for this is around somewhere on the web, but I forgot where :( I bought the book a year ago and can't find it now.
Basically, you have a long background that is .moveTo .. in .update you check the position of the background, then reset it based on its XY position (it basically just goes all the way down, warps to the top position, then falls)
Also in .update you check for score, or a timer, or just a random check, then spawn an enemy, obstacle, etc. You give the enemy / obstacle SKActions to move towards the player, and let .didBegin(contact:) handle scoring, sound effects, death, etc.

physicsBody.applyImpulse & collision happening twice instead of once

Heres the deal. My ball drops, hits the floor, and bounces back up with the help of the following code
ball.physicsBody?.applyImpulse(CGVectorMake(0, 25))
However, sometimes the ball recognises two collisions instead of one (on impact) and the ball gets applyImpulse x2. (Due to lag or something?) Causing the ball to fly way to fast. How do i make sure the ball doesn't collide with the floor twice? The ball is 16x16 an the floor is 16x160. I didn't have this problem earlier when the ball and floor were larger. But i really want to solve the problem and it must be possible!
What is happening is the ball is not moving fast enough between updates to be off the paddle before the next update check.
Remember what we did for the boss? Same thing gets applied to the paddle. When the ball hits the paddle, remove the contact check for it. Now you are going to have to add another node in, so that when you pass this node, you reenable the paddle check

didBeginContact not called on fast moving sprite

I have a game where a user is dragging around my main sprite. The main sprite collides with other sprites just fine except when the user drags the main sprite very quickly. Sometimes when the main sprite is moving quickly, the physics bodies just pass right through each other and the two sprites suddenly overlap. I have a breakpoint set that logs the hit count at didBeginContact, and it is not hit.
Is there a limit to how fast a sprite can move and still be covered by didBeginContact? Am I allowing the user to move the sprite faster than the game cycle can handle the collisions?
Again, when the sprite is moving at slow speeds, the physics are working perfectly.
Remember, these things are all calculated frame by frame. You're probably moving the sprite so fast that its ending up on the other side of the screen in too few frames to count as a collision. If someone is spastically moving their finger around it might not catch it. You could put some kind of speed limit on the sprite or something.
try to set physic body with usesPreciseCollisionDetection = YES

Make a SCNNode drop using gravity?

I have a SceneKit setup and have one Sphere in it that is setup as a Dynamic body.
I am able to run the app and see the sphere drop on the static body floor.
What I am trying to do is setup the scene so the sfere initially does not drop.
Then when a function is run I want the sfere to drop.
what is the correct logic / steps to make the scene suddenly (maybe when a button is pressed or something) drop the sphere?
I have tried also to set the sphere to mass 0 and then set the mass to 100 but it does not cause the drop...
Mass doesn't control how fast something falls. This is true in the real world, but more so in simulations that take shortcuts instead of simulating every detail of real-world physics. (Sadly, iOS devices still don't have the CPU power to account for the rotating reference frame of the Earth, the Van der Waals attraction between your sphere and any body especially close to it, the strong force that keeps its triangles atoms together, etc etc.) In SceneKit, gravity is just a constant acceleration in a specific direction.
Setting mass to zero and switching it to something else interferes with the distinction between static/kinematic and dynamic bodies... so don't do that.
As #mnuages notes, you can add/remove the physics body from your sphere when you want it to be affected or unaffected by physics entirely.
But what if you want to keep the sphere's physics body for other reasons—such as allowing other bodies to collide with it even before you make it start falling? There are a few approaches you could use for that:
Set the sphere body's damping to 1.0.
Set the sphere body's velocityFactor to zero (at least in the direction of gravity).
Both of those will keep the sphere from moving when something else hits it. If you want the ball to get knocked around, but not be affected by gravity, the best thing to do might be to switch out scene gravity for physics fields:
Set scene.physicsWorld.gravity to SCNVector3Zero.
Add a SCNPhysicsField created with the linearGravityField constructor to your scene, and set its direction and strength to get the kind of gravity behavior you want.
Set the categoryBitMasks on both your sphere body and the gravity field such that the field affects other bodies but not the sphere.
Whichever of these methods you use, you can change them when you want to "turn gravity on" for the sphere: reduce the damping, reset the velocityFactor, or change the sphere's or the gravity field's categoryBitMask.
As of iOS 9, you can set the isAffectedByGravity property to false then flip the value to true to make the sphere drop: https://developer.apple.com/reference/scenekit/scnphysicsbody/1514738-isaffectedbygravity
setting a physics body to sphere only when you want to it to be affected by gravity should work.

How would I build pool-cues / simplified pinball-style plungers with SpriteKit?

I'm working on a game in which the user should be able to trigger 'rods' that come out from the edge of the screen to displace elements on screen (balls). These projectiles roughly resemble pool-cues. Or perhaps pinball plungers, except that they start from the 'loaded' position (mostly offscreen), and when triggered, they eject out, then quickly retreat.
I'm unclear how I should build these with Sprite Kit.
The game uses the PhysicsEngine, and the onscreen balls should be effected both by gravity AND they should be displaced when they collide with the rods. However the rods should neither be effected by gravity, not displaced when they collide with the balls -- they should simply retreat regardless of whether they've made contact with the balls.
I realize I can set the affectedByGravity property for the rods. However because they will still displace slightly when they collide with the balls. How can I 'fix' or 'peg' them in place? Do I need to use an SKPhysicsSlidingJoint? If so, has anyone encountered any examples online? Is there a simpler way to do this?
A related physics engine, Box2D distinguishes static, kinematic, and dynamic bodies.
Kinematic bodies can move and will collide with other objects, but they are themselves not affected by dynamic bodies or forces like gravity. Thus, consider setting rod.dynamic = NO; but animate it with actions. See also here in the reference for SKPhysicsBody.

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