Best way to make a pause screen mid game?

[lxFirebal69xl]

I was wondering how would you guys go about making a pause screen while you play the game, aka, the player presses ESC and a menu shows up, completely stoping everything in the world, then I guess 2 buttons would pop up, "continue" and "exit". Each of them doing exactly what they say, obviously.

 

[Genebris]

Well, I guess you have to add variable in all your scripts that will be true when the game is on pause. For example in enemy script you should check this variable each update and move enemy only if it's false. There is no automatic way to stop time for all entities and scripts.

Or you can stop calling World:Update? Maybe it's a proper way.

[thehankinator]

You could do something like this in the main loop of App.lua:

 

In Start()

self.paused = false

 

 

In Loop()

if self.window:KeyHit(Key.P) then
 self.paused = not self.paused

 if self.paused then
   Time:Pause()
 else
   Time:Resume()
 end
end
--Update the app timing
Time:Update()

--Update the world
if self.paused then
 --draw your menu
 --if mouse clicked
   --if mouse is over button
     --do something
else
 self.world:Update()
end

--Render the world
self.world:Render()

 

Basically read up on Time:Pause() and Time:Resume()

[tjheldna]

Looking into Time::Pause and Time::Resume() would be a good place to start. Pretty sure that stops the physics simulation too.

 

 

http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/page/api-reference/_/time/timepause-r498

[lxFirebal69xl]

Alright, thank you for your answers, I'll look into it.

[holschuh]

Hi,

 

you have to handle sounds(noise.lua) by yourself - souds Play and Play and Play...

 

cu

Volker

[lxFirebal69xl]

Hi,

 

you have to handle sounds(noise.lua) by yourself - souds Play and Play and Play...

 

cu

Volker

 

Yea, I was expecting that to happen. It's more complicated than I thought it would be

[holschuh]

Sound may to handle with an global table adding all Sound and parse it to pause them.

But there so many other things not time dependent.

[xtom]

This is my PauseMenu.lua script below that I'm using in my game - I put it on a pivot and make it a child of the player. It also has a restart map option if player is dead. Could probably be improved but it does the job and should be fairly portable.

 

 

--[[
Apply this script to a pivot and make it a child of the player entity
This script uses the Esc key to pause - you will need to remove the Esc key check from App.lua
In App.lua - App:Start() you need to have self.exitgame = false
--]]
Script.restartMap="start.map"--path "Restart Map" "Map (*.map):map|Maps"

function Script:Start()
self.screenWidth = App.context:GetWidth()
self.screenHeight = App.context:GetHeight()
self.fontsize = 24
self.font = Font:Load("Fonts/arial.ttf",self.fontsize)
App.context:SetFont(self.font)

self.resumeTxt = "Resume"
self.resumeTxtWidth = self.font:GetTextWidth(self.resumeTxt)
self.resumeTxtPos = Vec2((self.screenWidth/2)-(self.resumeTxtWidth/2),(self.screenHeight/2)-60)

self.restartTxt = "Restart"
self.restartTxtWidth = self.font:GetTextWidth(self.restartTxt)
self.restartTxtPos = Vec2((self.screenWidth/2)-(self.restartTxtWidth/2),(self.screenHeight/2)-60)

self.exitTxt = "Exit"
self.exitTxtWidth = self.font:GetTextWidth(self.exitTxt)
self.exitTxtPos = Vec2((self.screenWidth/2)-(self.exitTxtWidth/2),self.resumeTxtPos.y+(self.fontsize*3))
self.gamePaused = 0

self.player = self.entity:GetParent()

end
function Script:UpdateWorld()

if App.window:KeyHit(Key.Escape) then
App.window:ShowMouse()
self.gamePaused = 1
end
while self.gamePaused >0 do

-- get key presses
if App.window:KeyHit(Key.Escape) then
App.window:HideMouse()
self.gamePaused = 0
end

--Render the world
App.world:Render()

-- get mouse position and clicks
local mousepos = App.window:GetMousePosition()
local LeftMouseClick = App.window:MouseDown(Key.LButton)
local RightMouseClick = App.window:MouseDown(Key.RButton)
if self.player.script.health<=0 then
App.context:SetBlendMode(Blend.Alpha)
App.context:SetColor(0,0,0,0.7)
App.context:DrawRect(0,0,self.screenWidth,self.screenHeight)
App.context:SetFont(self.font)
App.context:SetColor(1,1,1,1)
-- check for mouseover resume
if mousepos.y>=self.restartTxtPos.y and mousepos.y<=self.restartTxtPos.y+self.fontsize then
if mousepos.x>=self.restartTxtPos.x and mousepos.x<=self.restartTxtPos.x+self.restartTxtWidth then
 App.context:SetColor(0,1,0,1)
 -- player leftclicks on item
 if LeftMouseClick==true then
 App.window:HideMouse()
 self.gamePaused = 0
 changemapname=self.restartMap
 end
end
end
App.context:DrawText(self.restartTxt,self.restartTxtPos.x,self.restartTxtPos.y)
else
App.context:SetBlendMode(Blend.Alpha)
App.context:SetColor(0,0,0,0.7)
App.context:DrawRect(0,0,self.screenWidth,self.screenHeight)
App.context:SetFont(self.font)
App.context:SetColor(1,1,1,1)
-- check for mouseover resume
if mousepos.y>=self.resumeTxtPos.y and mousepos.y<=self.resumeTxtPos.y+self.fontsize then
if mousepos.x>=self.resumeTxtPos.x and mousepos.x<=self.resumeTxtPos.x+self.resumeTxtWidth then
 App.context:SetColor(0,1,0,1)
 -- player leftclicks on item
 if LeftMouseClick==true then
 App.window:HideMouse()
 self.gamePaused = 0
 end
end
end
App.context:DrawText(self.resumeTxt,self.resumeTxtPos.x,self.resumeTxtPos.y)
end

App.context:SetColor(1,1,1,1)
-- check for mouseover exit
if mousepos.y>=self.exitTxtPos.y and mousepos.y<=self.exitTxtPos.y+self.fontsize then
if mousepos.x>=self.exitTxtPos.x and mousepos.x<=self.exitTxtPos.x+self.exitTxtWidth then
App.context:SetColor(1,0,0,1)
-- player leftclicks on item
if LeftMouseClick==true then
 self.gamePaused = 0
 App.exitgame = true
end
end
end
App.context:DrawText(self.exitTxt,self.exitTxtPos.x,self.exitTxtPos.y)


if App.window:Closed() then
self.gamePaused = 0
App.exitgame = true
end

--Refresh the screen
App.context:Sync(true)

end

end

 

 

You need to make some small changes in app.lua ..

 

In app:start add

 

self.exitgame = false

 

In App:Loop() ..

 

--If window has been closed, end the program
if self.exitgame or self.window:Closed() then return false end

--Handle map change
if changemapname~=nil then

--Clear all entities
self.world:Clear()

--Load the next map
Time:Pause()
if Map:Load(changemapname)==false then return false end
Time:Resume()

changemapname = nil
end

[Thirsty Panther]

Thanks for sharing.

[TylerH]

I'd say the most logical approach is for your game to persist a finite state machine during runtime, that way you can handle states for menus, death, active playtime, spectating, etc.

 

Combining that approach with the other advice offered above should lead you towards the light.

 

 

Cheers,

Tyler

[Josh]

Due to the amount of trouble people have with this and the frequency it comes up, a built-in solution is coming.

[reepblue]

Due to the amount of trouble people have with this and the frequency it comes up, a built-in solution is coming.

 

So, are you thinking about adding a function to the World/Time class to remove the step of disabling the world from updating in the loop if paused is set to true? Will old methods still work?

[Josh]

I'm talking about something else, but I don't want to say anything yet because I'm not 100% sure yet. Regarding the pausing logic, it is simple, just call a function that pauses the time, renders the menu in a loop, then when the player exits the menu resume the time and return from the function.

 

You'll see soon.