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T
Twisted4000
Inspiring
September 29, 2019
Question

How to Remove all Children from a Specified Array?

  • September 29, 2019
  • 1 reply
  • 920 views

I've looked this up multiple times and every method I've tried returned an error. I'd like to know how to remove all MC's added to a specific array. I made this game where enemies drop different kinds of weapons when defeated, and those weapons are added to the array "ground_weapons". When the game is over, is there a way to effeciently remove all of those children added to that array, and if so, what is it? Thank you.

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1 reply

Colin Holgate
Colin Holgate
Inspiring
September 29, 2019

If all of the MCs had the same parent, and if you were using HTML5 Canvas, there is a removeAllChildren() method. If it's AS3, or the MCs have different parents, this would work:

 

var mc:MovieClip;
while(ground_weapons.length>0){
	mc = ground_weapons.shift();
	if(mc.parent) MovieClip(mc.parent).removeChild(mc);
}

 

 

You could cheat a little and skip the checks for if the movieclip currently has a parent, or what that parent is, by adding it to the current level then removing it:

var mc:MovieClip;
while(ground_weapons.length>0){
	mc = ground_weapons.shift();
	addChild(mc);
	removeChild(mc);
}

 

 

 

 

T
Twisted4000Author
Inspiring
September 29, 2019

It is the AS3 canvas, and with both of those codes I get the errors:

 

TypeError: Error #1009: Cannot access a property or method of a null object reference.
at MethodInfo-1594()
ArgumentError: Error #2025: The supplied DisplayObject must be a child of the caller.
at flash.display::DisplayObjectContainer/removeChild()
at MethodInfo-1518()

Colin Holgate
Colin Holgate
Inspiring
September 29, 2019

It's possible that some other code already got rid of the movieclip, but it was still listed in the array. This might solve that:

 

var mc:MovieClip;
while(ground_weapons.length>0){
	mc = ground_weapons.shift();
        if(mc){
	     if(mc.parent) MovieClip(mc.parent).removeChild(mc);
        }
}
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