Alarms Q&A

An alarm is a very simple concept in Gamemaker. Its one of the first things that you learn, but though they are simple there are some nagging questions that go with them. I will answer them here.

Q:How many steps in an alarm counts as 1 second?

A:One second in an alarm is equal to the room speed. For instance if your room speed is 30 then to set an alarm for 4 seconds you make the alarm equal 120 steps(30x4).

Code:


alarm[1]=120


However what if you want to make the room speed change? Then all your alarms would be messed up! Well don't worry simply do this.

Code:


alarm[1]=room_speed*4


"Wow its so simple"

Q:How do I make my own alarms?
A:

Code:


timer+=1
if timer>50{
do this
do this
do this
timer=0}


Using this is a lot more accurate then using normal alarms. Just make sure you put it in the step event of an object. You can also add another "if" before the timer+=1 so it doesn't just keep going after your done with it.

Well that's it. If you have any questions that I should add in here please tell me!

I always thought 1 second = 20 steps.

At some point in time I tried to calculate steps per second. I came up with room_speed*2. But more likely it is just room_speed. It may vary on different computers

So therefore, for my computer, 1 second "should" equal 20 steps.

on mine its usually 20 but at one point it was a wopping 40

You must have a slow computer!

Here's a challenge try using alarms to program speific objects such as a large boss that attracks independently at different times.