Hello all. I'm having a bit of a brain-fart here as I can't work out how to do a 'Press any key to continue' routine!

In my old ZXSpectrum or BlitzBasic days it used to be along the lines of...

10 if inkey$<>"" then goto 10

or

while
if not keypressed('esc') ...etc.
wend

I know we have limited BTNs but I can't figure out how to do it neatly. I can do it using a load of GOTOs and separate functions, but it's unnecessarily complicated and there must be a simpler way!

Any help?

Noob.

Back in the days (as you mentionned) we all missed a good state management!

Overall how to:

• have a global variable that captures game mode (title, game, waiting...)
• according to the game mode, define how to transition to the next state (can be buttons, player health, timer...)

local game_mode=‘waiting’
function any_btn()
 return btn(4) or btn(5)
end
function _update()
 if game_mode==‘waiting’ then
  — update game variables as needed
  ...
  — transition out?
  if any_btn() then
   game_mode=‘playing’
  end
 elseif game_mode==‘playing’ then
  — update game
  — transition out?
  if plyr.health==0 then
   game_mode==‘waiting’
  end
 elseif ...
 ...
 end
end
function _draw()
 cls()
 if game_mode==‘waiting’ then
  print(‘press any button’, 64,64,7)
 elseif game_mode==‘playing’ then
   print(‘insert game here :)’,64,64,8)
 end
end

note: this can be vastly improved by having game states creating objects with their own update/draw functions and other niceties (like timed transitions)

Errm ... If you just want a simple, "Hit a key to continue."

print"Hit a key to continue."
repeat
  flip()
until btnp(4)

Hit key (Z) on the IBM-pc to ... continue. :)

If 'any key' includes direction keys, X and O, then you can just check if btn() returns a value higher than 0.

-- warning: untested, writing this on a train
if (btn()>0) state="continue"

The pico8 wiki states:
When btn() is called without arguments, it returns a bitfield of the button states for players 0 and 1.

Doczi is correct, I did this for my wee game throw punch

 if gamestate=="mainmenu" then
  --any button starts the game
  if btnp() != 0 then
   gamestate="playing"
  end
 elseif gamestate=="playing" then
  -- etc

Oh ? I didn't know that. BTNP() no arguments covers all buttons. Good to know !