How do get a parent to listen to multiple dynamically instanced children when the children don't exist at the start?

Question

I'm adding more features to the "Your First Game". Currently I'm trying to increase the score when a bullet collides with a creep.

My initial attempt was to emit a custom signal from within the Bullet scene and then connect that to a function inside the Main scene. Almost none of the signals are detected (it did seem to detect once in a while, is that a bug?), so I concluded that it's because the bullets don't exist initially.

I currently am exporting the Bullet PackedScene into the Player scene.

Do you need to set up a listener for each Bullet child instance (is that possible)? Or is there just a flaw in my structuring?

Answer 1

It probably would be easier to help you, if you provided any code.

That being said, if "the children don't exist at the start", I assume you instance them from code during runtime. That's where you should connect the signal as well:

var BULLET_SCENE = preload("res://Bullet.tscn")

func spawn_bullet():
    var new_bullet = BULLET_SCENE.instance()

    new_bullet.connect("fired", self, "_on_fired")

    # you can provide an array of extra arguments to the callback 
    new_bullet.connect("hit", self, "_on_hit", [new_bullet])

    add_child(new_bullet)

func _on_fired():
    print("BANG BANG BANG")

func _on_hit(bullet):
    print("OUCH! Something was hit by ", bullet)