Tool: Awesome Map Editor (AME)

This look awesome indeed :D
It's pleasing to see a refined AdvanceMap interface.

This looks absolutely amazing, I'm pretty psyched for a release of this that I can actually run on my PC. (Like, I don't know jack squat about source code, so I'm just waiting for an EXE)

Dark Zeta said:

So glad you went with a gray scale approach. Looks very nice.

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Thanks, hopefully it'll work as good as it looks!

garrett said:

Looks great! Can't wait to be able to use this!

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Awesome!

thedarkdragon11 said:

I'm glad with the progress of the tool!

I would like to verify if our previous suggestions, most particularly the ones which you previously said to be featured, which are not specifically listed in the "To-do list" are still being considered? Thanks!

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Yeah, the to-do list is really just what we need to get done before we release the first alpha.

mikeru said:

This looks really cool, a much better user friendly approach than A-map! how much longer do you think before we will see the first download release?

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Hopefully before the year is over, if not sooner!

NicolasLukas said:

This looks promising. I wasn´t really a big fan of Advanced Map and this is way better and more user-friendly. What do you think, how much time does it take, to finish this project?

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See above!

MarineTyler said:

Thanks diegoisawesome! Keep motivating us with your rom hacking expertise!

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Thanks, I hope I can!

Kalrom said:

Idea/Suggestion:

Player's view mode- Displays a movable in-game-screen-sized box inside the map view
Other details that you can think of but here are they anyways:
- Ofcourse the box also displays a sprite(or any) telling the player's position in-game
- The outside area of the box being a little bit dimmed will help lessen getting a brain cancer
- Being able to edit the map while this is on may be of help too

Good luck on this project!

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Well I don't really see the benefit of doing this... Could you elaborate?

Aethestode said:

This looks good. All the best!

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Thank you!

RB11 said:

This looks really good. I'm tired of A-map atm, too plain.
One thing I would like to see implemented is the triple layered hack, as I can't do on my computer.
Anyways, good luck!

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That will definitely be included!

cep said:

This look awesome indeed :D
It's pleasing to see a refined AdvanceMap interface.

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Thank you!

someguy.fromnevada said:

This looks absolutely amazing, I'm pretty psyched for a release of this that I can actually run on my PC. (Like, I don't know jack squat about source code, so I'm just waiting for an EXE)

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Haha, yeah the source code is really only there for people that want to help us with this project (which we would definitely appreciate if you have experience with C++ and Qt!).

Diegoisawesome said:

Kalrom said:

Idea/Suggestion:

Player's view mode- Displays a movable in-game-screen-sized box inside the map view
Other details that you can think of but here are they anyways:
- Ofcourse the box also displays a sprite(or any) telling the player's position in-game
- The outside area of the box being a little bit dimmed will help lessen getting a brain cancer
- Being able to edit the map while this is on may be of help too

Good luck on this project!

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Well I don't really see the benefit of doing this... Could you elaborate?

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The player view box would be something that I would definitely use. Sometimes it's hard to get the balance of a map right with the overview that the map editor gives you. Sometimes you don't realize when a path has gone on too long in one direction without any switchup, or that the whole screen is taken up by a bland section of your map when standing in a particular couple of tiles. It would also be useful for minimizing the amount of wasted space at the borders of a map, or to quickly know the extremes of the player's view radius so you know when you can stop filling in details that they won't get close enough to see. It wouldn't need to be ridiculous. Just a red box noting the boundaries of the screen with an overlay and a generic, faded NPC in the middle. Make it something that you can toggle and drag around the map (snapping to tilelines, of course) to quickly see the player's view radius and allow us to keep map editing with the overlay up.

Another suggestion would be the ability to completely hide the map list and the icons for open rom, save map, etc. Like pressing F11 on Firefox hides the interface and just shows the page. When I'm working on a map, I don't need those huge icons and (admittedly small once shrunken fully, but still!) map list taking up space that could be used for viewing the map. I assume that we won't ever want to hide the tileset box, but having that as a toggleable option or in a hotkey might be nice too for some users.

Keep up the awesome work! Looking forward to progress updates!

Diegoisawesome said:

Yeah, the to-do list is really just what we need to get done before we release the first alpha.

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I see... Thanks for the clarification and good luck!

It's been almost 2 months and we just wanted to inform you we're still progressing with this editor! We basically just have to finalize the tileset editor and fix some bugs here and there, but then we're ready to finally release the first alpha of AME! Our current progress:



This screenshot illustrates the multi-selection feature of AME.

Is it possible to disable the connected maps view?

This looks great, though I feel kinda bad that the thing I'm most excited about is a goddamn undo button... why A-map doesn't have that is beyond me.

Do you still think this will be done by the end of the year?

chrunch said:

Is it possible to disable the connected maps view?

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Yes, we will make that on by default but optional.

BlitherBlip said:

This looks great, though I feel kinda bad that the thing I'm most excited about is a goddamn undo button... why A-map doesn't have that is beyond me.

Do you still think this will be done by the end of the year?

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We're really shooting for the end of the year as our goal. However, we have to slightly limit the scope of what we're going to release by years' end... which (for now) means no undo function. However, it will have parity with A-Map and be able to fully replace it by then.

Diegoisawesome said:

Yes, we will make that on by default but optional.

We're really shooting for the end of the year as our goal. However, we have to slightly limit the scope of what we're going to release by years' end... which (for now) means no undo function. However, it will have parity with A-Map and be able to fully replace it by then.

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Diegoisawesome said:

However, it will have parity with A-Map and be able to fully replace it by then.

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Diegoisawesome said:

However, it will have parity with A-Map and be able to fully replace it by then.

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I... I think I love you and pokedude9. The teasers you've shown us so far with the connections on the screen and the multi tile selection are so clean and make so much sense. It's like AMap is an abusive spouse that we've been putting up with this whole time, and AME is that well-meaning friend who saves us and we eventually have 2 kids with and settle down in a nice neighborhood with a white picket fence and a good school district. We knew AMap was bad, but didn't really know how poorly it treated us until AME swept us off our feet.

As others have said before this is just great! I've been waiting for MEH but this looks even better.

I'm just wondering how exactly triple tiles will work with AME. Will it be the same way its handled in AMAP? or would there be the possibility of viewing it as one tile?

Suggestion, could you guys include an easier to use Door Manager than the one in this thread? I think that that's within the scope of a map editor like this to have, and it'd be great to not have to use that old, garbage program to mess with door animations.

definitely excited for this! in the first stable beta are you gonna have the animation editor, or nah?

Deokishisu said:

Suggestion, could you guys include an easier to use Door Manager than the one in this thread? I think that that's within the scope of a map editor like this to have, and it'd be great to not have to use that old, garbage program to mess with door animations.

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That's a really good point, I saw that tile animations were planned to be included so it could be nice to add this too. Maybe if there's a tile that has an existing animation when you click it, it could bring up all the associated tiles with it, could be the same with doors.

Unrelated, another suggestion I would potentially like seeing would be to restructure map banks and automatically assigning numbers to them.

Deokishisu said:

Suggestion, could you guys include an easier to use Door Manager than the one in this thread? I think that that's within the scope of a map editor like this to have, and it'd be great to not have to use that old, garbage program to mess with door animations.

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Lu-Ho made a door editor too which you can find here. Sure it could use some improvements but I've never had too much trouble with it. I would rather they focus on more important features myself.

Oh my god, yes! Honestly, I've been turned away from trying to build my own maps before because of Advance Map and it's lack of features that you two are actually adding! This is the first I've heard of this project, and I'm extremely excited to see how it progresses! I can just see myself actually having fun trying to make some test maps with this! Good luck you guys!

For all of you saying A-Map sucks and everything, I just want to point out something.

Almost 99% of hacks around here have used A-Map as their mapping tool, and as you can see, results aren't so bad at all. So if you want to praise this tool over A-Map, please make sure you have tried to do a little more than adding trees to Pallet Town. Thank you.

Now, in order not to make this post off topic, I want to say that I really want to try this out. It's been so long since A-Map was last updated and it's always great to try out new programs. I can't wait :D

This looks incredible! I don't really have any creative input, but it looks great.

Deokishisu said:

I... I think I love you and pokedude9. The teasers you've shown us so far with the connections on the screen and the multi tile selection are so clean and make so much sense. It's like AMap is an abusive spouse that we've been putting up with this whole time, and AME is that well-meaning friend who saves us and we eventually have 2 kids with and settle down in a nice neighborhood with a white picket fence and a good school district. We knew AMap was bad, but didn't really know how poorly it treated us until AME swept us off our feet.

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Hah, nice analogy. Hopefully you still feel the same way once the alpha comes out!

MrDollSteak said:

As others have said before this is just great! I've been waiting for MEH but this looks even better.

I'm just wondering how exactly triple tiles will work with AME. Will it be the same way its handled in AMAP? or would there be the possibility of viewing it as one tile?

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I definitely want to have full support for triple-layer blocks implemented within AME.

Deokishisu said:

Suggestion, could you guys include an easier to use Door Manager than the one in this thread? I think that that's within the scope of a map editor like this to have, and it'd be great to not have to use that old, garbage program to mess with door animations.

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That's definitely in the works!

buttjuice said:

definitely excited for this! in the first stable beta are you gonna have the animation editor, or nah?

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Definitely not for the first stable beta but eventually!

MrDollSteak said:

That's a really good point, I saw that tile animations were planned to be included so it could be nice to add this too. Maybe if there's a tile that has an existing animation when you click it, it could bring up all the associated tiles with it, could be the same with doors.

Unrelated, another suggestion I would potentially like seeing would be to restructure map banks and automatically assigning numbers to them.

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We were thinking of adding the ability to edit and preview tile animations from within AME, not sure what you mean by "associated tiles with it".

chrunch said:

Lu-Ho made a door editor too which you can find here. Sure it could use some improvements but I've never had too much trouble with it. I would rather they focus on more important features myself.

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Obviously it isn't a top priority right now, but definitely for later.

sykotiksonik said:

Oh my god, yes! Honestly, I've been turned away from trying to build my own maps before because of Advance Map and it's lack of features that you two are actually adding! This is the first I've heard of this project, and I'm extremely excited to see how it progresses! I can just see myself actually having fun trying to make some test maps with this! Good luck you guys!

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Thanks for your support!

BLAx501! said:

For all of you saying A-Map sucks and everything, I just want to point out something.

Almost 99% of hacks around here have used A-Map as their mapping tool, and as you can see, results aren't so bad at all. So if you want to praise this tool over A-Map, please make sure you have tried to do a little more than adding trees to Pallet Town. Thank you.

Now, in order not to make this post off topic, I want to say that I really want to try this out. It's been so long since A-Map was last updated and it's always great to try out new programs. I can't wait :D

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Just because the end results have been good doesn't mean that A-Map is a good program internally, or that the creators of hacks haven't been fighting it every step of the way. I can't speak for anyone else but I personally have fought with A-Map numerous times. It's not just buggy, it's closed source so nobody can fix the bugs later even if they had the knowledge and the capability. You have to make a modification in the binary of the program if you want to do something such as change the amount of map names or Pokémon available in the ROM because LU-HO didn't future-proof it.

I have a lot of pent-up aggression towards A-Map, and I believe I have more qualifications than just "adding trees to Pallet Town", so forgive me if I come off kind of abrasive towards A-Map and LU-HO.

FSBS said:

This looks incredible! I don't really have any creative input, but it looks great.

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Thanks!

Oh snap, it's coming. Me and my friend have been eyeing Awesome Map Editor for a long time. You've got a crazy-good product here and we can't wait to start using it.