Game Update thing

Arcade Help
1

Hi! I’m wondering whether I should change all my game update blocks to forever blocks. A lot of mechanics in my game are time based and I don’t want the game balance to be different across devices. Thank you for reading!

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2

I should’ve mentioned, I’m relying on the on game update blocks to resume timers after pausing. Does anyone know a way to have both?

3

Both Forever and On Game Update blocks will be unreliable for time keeping, though On Game Update blocks would theoretically be much more effected by different devices, and forever blocks would technically be better. I would consider using delta time in your programs, which is what normal sprite movement uses to keep sprites looking the same speed on different devices.

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4

Can you elaborate on what you mean by this second comment? I can’t tell what exactly you’re asking.

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5

I mean that I’m using on game update blocks to resume timers after pausing. For example, I will create a variable for whether or not the timer is active, a variable for the time left, and a variable for the starting time. When the first variable I mentioned is true, the timer variable will go down every certain amount of game updates. When it hits 0, the first variable will be set false and the timer variable will be set to the starting time variable. I was wondering if there was a way to make timers consistent across devices and resume timers after pausing. Thanks for the feedback!

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6

You may want to include a sample to show what you’ve tried and what isn’t working.

Also, if you’re implementing timers, then this may help.

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7

Yeah, delta time will also be useful for that too! Just a little bit of logic/math to get pausing working ofc. I don’t remember if delta time is normally in blocks, so you might have to find an extension for it.

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8

Thanks guys! It’s hard to show what the problem is because the problem involves multiple devices. I’m going to check out what delta time is.

9

Thanks for all the feedback! More specifically, if I have a mechanic where you have to react in time and the timer for that is made using on game update blocks, would my game be harder if my frame rate was higher?