Flex 2 is a multi-purpose art and mapping editor for the Sega Megadrive. Key improvements in V2; desktop version project files sexy flexible UI layout custom mapping formats undo / redo ability to draw directly on sprites multiple heuristics for spritesheet importing full access to dplc/mapping data Various other additions have been made - a usage guide can be found in the documentation. download source code / report issues The first version will likely have a flurry of various bugs or other issues. Bear with me and I'll try and keep on top of them.
How does Sprite Sheet importing work? It detects the entire sheet as a single sprite no matter which one I try.
Mappings set to S3K format, art loaded with KosM compression, and entire palette loaded in all 4 lines. Supposed to be spring mappings, which appear fine in SonMapEd, but are loaded as a broken mess here.
You need a minimum separation distance of at least one tile between sprites. (Need to add that to the readme) seems to work for me; wanna send me the assets you're using so I can see what's up?
I was not aware of any mapping formats that are compressed. There is rudimentary support for custom mapping formats that may be expanded in future. If you mean art compressing it supports everything the KENSC library supports.
Plane mappings are a potential future feature - it depends if this program gathers enough momentum through use to expand into other areas.
Glad to see those heavy javascript'd stuff are finally gone. Also, it's good to see the 64-bit operating systems are receiving their deserved love from the romhacking tools.
Bugfix release - 0.0.4 Fixed a bug where imported sprites would be one pixel too short and wide. redownload Flex 2 is 100% javascript.
Oh, sorry. I didn't expressed it well. I was refering to the need of opening the java console to load the program. You made it using a executable file, so there's no need to open a browser to run the tool. I'm very thankful for this, particularly.
Latest release is now 0.0.5 Fixes a bug where spritesheets without a surrounding empty border import as a single sprite. (thanks Lil-G)
I think that when importing a sprite sheet, the sprites should be sorted into rows and the sprites in each row should be ordered by X position from left to right, like SpritePlotter.NET does. Also, it appears that Flex 2 does not support the DPLC format unique to S3K objects.
Why does both Flex and Flex 2 send data to Google Analytics, without any mention of it on the documentation? (or this is what it seems like, correct me if wrong please) I see it's explicitly stated in a Source Code revision at Github but, "researchers" aside, in all honesty for any general user, "Documentation > Source code" (from their tools, at least). Not only that, but it just feels kind of shady that an executable, offline program without even any kind of ToS is sending our data to a hacker and Google; I'd understand it from any webpage on the internet (or even the web version of Flex), but only because I can actually expect this kind of stuff on the internet (where anything could happen) so I have an opportunity to configure my stuff as I see fit. EDIT: By the way, not trying to mean anything "evil" from snkenjoi's part here, it's Google who concern me the most. Screw Google.
I tried importing some art into Flex to and it ended up importing with some errors with the pixel placement. Thinking it was no big deal, I fixed the art. However, exporting the art results in it being wrong, as shown in SonMapED. DPLCs are being used, in case that's important.
So Flex 2 applies many optimizations to mappings and DPLCs that SonMapEd just does not support, and this breaks compatibility with it for the sake of better filesizes and fewer DPLC requests. If it displays fine in Flex 2, it should display fine in game - you cannot rely on SonMapEd to accurately render all forms of mapping and DPLCs. Try using it in game and see what happens. If you are still having trouble you can share the assets with me to see if I can reproduce it.
I'm pretty sure these are art issues, though. I've been having issues, but I'll try get it to show up in game so I can find out if it is still messed up.