How to set up Timed Flame Emitters

by George Maciver

Setting up a sequence of timed flame emitters similar to the set up in Palace Midas of the original Tomb Raider game is simple and fun to do.

In this tutorial I will use the set up from the final level of the original Jungle Ruins adventure. There are 7 flame emitters on a timer which are turned off by using a switch. If you don't make it over the pillars in time, the flame emitters all come back on again.

This is how the pillars and the 7 flame emitters are set up in Jungle Ruins:

And this is the switch that turns off the flame emitters:

First thing to do is place your flame emitters and your switch. Place a switch trigger for the switch and stack triggers for all your flame emitters on top. You don't have to use a switch, of course, you could simply use an ordinary floor trigger for one of the flame emitters and stack the other flame emitters on top of that.

Judge how much time would be fair to players to accomplish their tasks and enter a value in the timer field of your Switch Trigger. The value corresponds to the number of seconds before the flame emitters reignite.

Now the most important bit! You can't use anti-triggers in this situation, so you must turn on all the OCB code bits for your flame emitters so that an ordinary trigger will act as an anti-trigger. Highlight each flame emitter and bring up its OCB dialogue box by hitting the letter O key and highlight the Object Code Bits 1-5 as shown below:

Turning the OCB bits on like this means all these flames will be alight from the start of your level without being triggered, so you will have to be extra careful with other flame emitters in your level to ensure the flare bug doesn't kick in.

In a situation like this, it is also a nice touch to place some handy water around so Lara can take a dive if she catches alight. Also note that the lever switch is of no use in this situation.


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