well i figured out a way anywho. working on an engine debugging it. trying to implement 3dimensions.
the current method i have is different then the pic a few posts back suggests. it draws from the back farthest from the screen towards the screen but the coordinates for the grid are opposite. i got it to where x and y come out of the screen instead of going into it. i'm amazed at how simple it actually is lol.
using a nested loop to run through each x and y
loop y from 1 to (however high the array is) by +1
loop x from 1 to (however wide the array is) by +1
heres the c++ for it. the above was as easy as i could describe it in more plin english.
for(int y = 1; y <= playHeight; y++)
{
for(int x = 1; x <= playWidth; x++)
{
draw_sprite(buffer, iso, playX + tileStretch*(y - x), playY + tileStretch*(x + y) / 2);
}
}
thats the lines that draws the the basic land from a normal x, y array and projects them in an isometric like pattern on the screen. theres a lot more for movement, collisions, objects.
edit - and i got it to work in tgf but using the fastloops fail misrebly. after the size of the array gets bigger than 24x24 it starts to not draw some it. and using counters is slow as hell which would make a game using this method in tgf have long ass load times . i dont have mmf or tgf2 or mmf2 so it could work very well under those. but this is so far turning out to be a fantastic engine for isometric style games.
lol. i saw your project awhile back and i was blown away. mine is still very simple, but i hope to just keep fiddling with it until i get something i want. i've recoded it a few times already. just optimizing the mapreading and rendering of the isometric plane. i havent really made any improvements on actual turning it into a proper engine yet.
i've actually already used the directx sdk, SDL, allegro, and allegroGL. but allegro is just the one i use predominantly. too much school work to really learn and use it all.