Match-3 Starter Kit – Just released!

Notice to the Customers
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This thread is no longer in use because of the impossibility to keep the trolls under control.

The sole way to get in touch with us is by using our support website (http://dftgames.uservoice.com) or by dropping us an email at the address written at the end of the documentation.

 

Any video about it? Also does it support 'swipe' on iPhone, iPad?

 

Are the scripts in c#?

 

@Unity3dx: I didn't think to produce a video... I'll see what I can do and will post here. About mobile gestures, as I wrote in the OP, they are about to be released as update: I'm testing on Android but it'll work on iPhone just the same way

@M_Stolley: yep, it's all C#.

Cheers,
Pino

 

@Unity3dx: ok, just added a small video to the opening post, I hope it shows enough

 

How much?

 

@HTH_mrsnake: is on the Asset Store for $45

 

Thanks for the video. VERY helpful to figure out what it is doing. I bought sometime ago another script on the Asset Store but it is pure crap, unusable on mobile platform or you need to rewrite it!
Your script seems to be very well done and I will purchase it very soon.

 

@unity3dx: thank you very much for your appreciation This kit is about to be updated with a full set of mobile controls to allow a seamless integration on all platforms. The mobile part is now in QA so it'll not take long to have it out. If this QA session ends quickly enough I'll put in also another planned update, making the size of the board completely customizable.

I do understand the problem posed by not knowing what's in the box, that's why to show the community how we work we are about to publish a serie of Commerial Grade Freebies (see related thread).

 

Release 1.1 just been submitted to the Asset Store! (should go live in a couple of days)
(added mobile demo video to the opening message)

Release Notes - Version 1.1
Breaking changes

• The board’s file name has been changed from “board[BoardNumber]” to “Board[BoardNumber].[rows].[columns]”, so upgrading from previous version you have to rename the boards accordingly in Unity project view. For instance, the file board1 becomes board1.10.10 (this because in previous version the board was fixed to be 10 by 10.

• The points are now defined as Board’s parameters.

New features
New parameters added to the Board script as follows:

1. Mobile input is now supported out-of-the-box.
2. Delegates for Pause, Level Cleared and Time Out called in the OnGUI.
3. The Play Area Editor allows now to define and edit any board size.
4. Rows: amount of rows on the board.
5. Columns: amount of columns on the board.
6. Fill On X: tell the script to fit the board on the screen. This is mostly used on mobile phones. The script will not deform the layout so to have the board actually filling the screen you have to design it having the phone resolution in mind. The board will be resized to fit the screen as much as possible having the starting point set on the upper left corner.
7. Centre on X: This is considered only if Fill On X is True.
8. Points to be awarded are now Board’s parameters as follows:
   1. Points Normal
   2. Points Strong
   3. Points Extra Strong
   4. Points Super Strong

 

The release 1.1 is now live on the Asset Store! Make sure to download and import the update

 

I bough the package... it seems you guys spend alot of effort on this, THank you for making it available.

I have few questions, is there any way I can modify this so that brocks are droped to fill empty spots, not fly in.
Is this flexible enough to make 4 in a row type game play if then what is the best way to do it?

thank you,

 

Thanks, glad you like it! don't forget to rate it

I'm not sure to understand: do you want the pieces to simply appear in position without any transition? If so, you can change the code in PieceScript.cs (lines 252-266) to make it faster or simply immediate, for instance if you change this (lines 263-264):

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. velocity.Normalize();
3. myTransform.position = (myTransform.position + (velocity * [COLOR=#2b91af]Time[/COLOR].deltaTime * (damping / 0.20f)));
4.  

to this:

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. myTransform.position = myTransform.position + velocity;
3.  

so that the piece will just be at its destination in one frame. I guess you want to fine tune this or only use that for new pieces, so maybe you can add a flag to perform instant moving or not.... there are many scenarios coming from your request.

A Match-4 instead of a Match-3? Just add one more position test in the methods CheckTileMatchY and CheckTileMatchX (in Board.cs) by testing also the remaining combinations.

At any rate, as I love to update my code to meet users' goals and expectations, your requests will be implemented in the update following the one I'm just releasing (this week update releases the hint system)

 

Just want to say that this is in my "to-buy" list. It looks superb and looks like it will be a great help ^ ^

 

Thank you for your quick respond. I guess I wasn't clear about my question.
My question was if I can make blocks appear top of the screen and drop to fill the empty spots just like bejewel.

 

Sure, in Board.cs go to line 730 and just change this

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. PlayingPieces[x, y] = new PlayingPiece(Instantiate(piecesToUseNormal[t], new Vector3(v0.x, v0.y, zPiecePosition - Random.Range(20f, 30f)), Quaternion.identity) as GameObject, (PieceColour)t);
3.  

to this:

Code (csharp):

1.  
2. PlayingPieces[x, y] = new PlayingPiece(Instantiate(piecesToUseNormal[t], new Vector3(v0.x, v0.y + Random.Range(20f, 30f), zPiecePosition), Quaternion.identity) as GameObject, (PieceColour)t);
3.  

If you want to get that effect also at the board start then you have to change (in the same way) the lines 202, 205, 208 and 211.

I will add this change driven by a flag in the Unity Inspector with next Update

Cheers,
Pino

 

Just a quick note to let you know that I've just uploaded the release 2.0 (I'll update the OT as soon it goes live). Here the change list:

Release Notes - Version 2

Breaking changes
· None

New features
· It’s now possible to make a Match-4 game simply checking the newly added flag “Is Match 4”in the Inspector.
· Hints: now you can add (in the Inspector) an effect and an audio to give moves hints to the player. In the Inspector you can also define after how much inactivity time (in seconds) the hint is shown.
· You can now decide to make the new pieces fall from the top instead of flying in from behind the camera simply checking in the Inspector the flag “New Pieces From Top”.

 

Version 2.0 is now live! Go get it

 

Hey guys,

is anybody willing to showcase what's done using this kit? That would be great

 

Release 2.1 just submitted to the Store

This release will be live on the Asset Store in a couple of days. It delivers a couple of minor fixes about two edge cases. No other issues are pending.

 

Hey guys,

first off, thank you for using this kit (plaese write a review!).

The 2.1 version is now live and I've no problems/bugs/enhancement requests on my to-do list, so, as I'm working on a Match-3 myself (using this kit!), I do see that something can be done to make it better


Here's a shortlist of what will be in next release (very shortly!):

• Multiple animations and effects for the Mouse Over event
• More intelligent Hint System
• Being able to tell the game (in the Inspector) if we want the special pieces to fall out of the board if they reach the bottom line
• Ability to allow special moves, like move on an empty place if under a blocked piece
• Ability to play two independent boards per screen

If you people want to add something to the list... just post here or PM me

Cheers!
Pino

 

What would be the best way to load a new board instead of a new scene?

 

Does this starter kit work with the free version or do I need a pro license?

 

No Pro needed

Honestly I assumed that each new level is a new scene, the idea of restarting the scene over and over it didn't came to me.

 

Having many scenes could make your game's file size to be unnecessarily large. This isn't a problem when it comes to PC/OSX builds, but it's pretty serious when you are making a game for mobile platforms, which mostly will limit your app to be not more than 20 MB.

 

I'm interested in buying,but would like to try it first just so I can have a good feel how it plays. Any chance you could release web game or a .exe demo I could try? Even just a sample scene would be great.

 

I was thinking there was a way to use StartBoard and supplying a different Column and Row num for a new board. That way after CleanSlate I could just call a function and pass the new board to load.... as opposed to creating a new scene for every board that would be around 40 scenes...

 

Its me again .... After much time spent with delegates I am seeking out out. I am trying to simply load a scene when the players time runs out but when the player choses to go back to the level they lost and try again the level loads already in the "TimeOutMethod: state (delegate) and just quits back to the lost scene... I have gone through many tutorials on delegates but I cannot seem to get this to work, if I could get some help with this I would very, very much appreciate it (i have been working on it independently for quite sometime). I am sure its an easy solution I just cant get how delegates are used in the Board class and why even after loading another scene and coming back its in the same state as I left it.

 

No Help??? I'll say please...

 

Hi Matt,

sorry for the delay: we're in the middle of porting all active projects on Unity 3.5 and that has taken quite some time, actually we barely read the email these days... a lot of overtime to work and still not there yet. I'll have a look to your email and answer you ASAP.

Cheers,.
Pino

 

Hello... Has anyone developed "powerups" or added custom special pieces for the system as of yet? Such as just the traditional Match 4 power piece? Iam having problems following along. I thought I would use the given "special piece" as a guide, however I need to be able to generate a special piece when a match 4 is is made..... Not created randomly if a Blocked Tile is present. Right now, it seems you can either have Match 3 or 4 but cannot check for both such that:

1) Is the match more than 3? ----- If we have Matched more than 3 then use one of the given pieces to spawn a given special piece in its place ----

If I could get a starting point for the above I could probably move forward. If the above logic could be developed than there would be other possibilities such as developing combo, or cascade points based on the number of matches...

Any help would be very much appreciated.

 

Hello, I plan on purchasing this starter kit but I figured I might as well wait for the 3.5 port update. Any news on when its scheduled to be finished or did it already occur?

 

Hi Jaleel,

that post was referring to the project port of all our active tasks, not implying code changes on this Kit. The Kit isn't version dependent and no issues have been noted by any user up the current Unity version (3.5.1)

/Pino

 

Awesome, thanks for the news

 

Hi All,

I noticed on the Asset Store product page that a couple of people rated this kit very poorly. None of them ever submitted a bug to me (actually I don't have any bug open for this project), and as far as I can tell the Kit works as expected on all the platforms supported by Unity.

I didn't check with the 3.5 but not being reported any bug and selling steadly I've no reason to believe that there is a problem. At any rate I'll check the kit with the 3.5.2 to see first hand if any issue is there.

/Pino

 

Ok, just added a new video showing that the Kit works on all the supported platforms. Tested with the very last Unity and Xcode versions. The video also shows the demo running on Kindle Fire. While testing I found a minor issue, so one of these days I'll send out an update as well

 

In release 2.2:

• Fixed a crash happening when selecting an empty cell (thanks for the finding!)
• Lowered the price to $30 for a limited time

It'll be live by tomorrow I guess

Next Release (in a week time) will include:

• a counter to report the total tiles destroyed on the last move
• a simple way to reuse the same scene over and over again

Thanks for asking those features! Please feel free to post your requests: as usual we'll gladly add them to the Kit

/Pino

 

We are glad to announce that our Match-3 Starter Kit Update 2.2 is available, so grab the update rigth away!
If you don't have it yet please note that it's on the Asset Store! at a special reduced price of just $30 for a limited time

 

Looking forward to the update with the counter.

 

Hello, I want to destroy multiple pieces around a sing piece such as a "Bomb" piece in many other Match 3. I have been working within the case statement that changes Tiles Type and where a piece gets destroyed. How would I correctly go about triggering the pieces and/or tiles surrounding a piece to be marked as Done or marked as a match to trigger the piece destroy sequence?

 

Hi Matt,
firts off, sorry for the delay... I've just released Eight on iOS and Android and about to release Bionauts (a Gunbound enhanced clone for mobile) so I'm overbusy. Adding that behaviour isn't really complex but it's tricky indeed. My guess is that the best way to go is to add it to the update that is on its way to the Asset Store. Gimme this weekend to plan this. I have the updates mentioned in the previous post out of QA on Monday, so let me see how I can squeeze this bomb behaviour in it without going back to QA for weeks I'll come back to you by the end of the weekend.

 

Thanks. I have been working on this a while. I have decided to put my effort on hold since your implementation will surely be tighter than mine. With that in mind, I was hoping to submit this to apple this week. So if you have a unofficial implementation I would be more than happy to use it and test it since there isn't time for a thorough QA go through.

Thanks,
Matt

 

Hey Matt,
I'll see to make it quick, but you really don't want to publish something that has not undergone the QA... we sometime miss bugs in QA as well, that's normal, no software on earth is bugs free, but QA gives you the guarantee that the bugs are edge cases, hard to find... without QA most likely you get 1 star review by a lot of people that (as per Murphy's Law) will hit a nasty bug that we all missed

 

Hey Matt,

I've added this activity to the current schedule and dalayed the finalized QA to have this one included. Bear with me

/Pino

 

Thanks. Any updated info would be great.

 

Hello,
Do you have any news on the before mentioned update.

 

Hey Matt,

I paste here the answer I sent you in PM (maybe you missed it?):

Hi Matt,
thanks for contacting me directly! Actually I have the changes done and now in QA, but we are closing Bionauts Beta (https://www.dftgames.com/activebeta/) so we have our hands really full

About scoring and all, there are many different ways to implement those, all depending on the structure that you have in place. Can you elaborate about your game structure so that I can point you in the right direction?

Best!
Pino

 

Hello. I noticed you implemented in Astro Match many of the same types of "Special Moves" that I have in mind. However, with the current implementation I have, I tend to get Null exceptions like crazy. I get a random row and column then check for null playing-pieces on that spot and No Tile, then I perform the destroy and whatnot in the update function along side the normal destroy code in the case structure for this.... Any advice? I have had to remove special moves completely because of the null exceptions.

Any advice on this. Also, I have noticed that a diamond shaped playing board of normal pieces will tend to freeze after about 10-30 seconds of play time. I added the check for null PlayingPieces[x,y] as you did in the last update in the OnClick check in Board Update to attempt and thwart crashes that maybe caused by a player clicking a empty cell. However, I do not get a crash in the editor only when running on the IPhone and only on a board with a diamond shape......

 

excuse me, it have java script version?

 

Hi Pino

I bought this Match3 , i like it and the price is so reasonable too
but.i try to modify the basic movement about 2 weeks ago and still it is not easy to modify,
why there is almost no comment in Board.cs the main script?