How to copy SKSpriteNode with SKPhysicsBody?

Question

I am curious about a situation that I came across today when trying to unarchive and copy a SKSpriteNode from one SKScene to another. In the output from the playground below you can see that both linearDamping and angularDamping or not being maintained after the copy (they seem to be dropping back to default values)

// PLAYGROUND_SW1.2 - SKSpriteNode Copy
import UIKit
import SpriteKit

// ORIGINAL
let spriteNode = SKSpriteNode()
spriteNode.name = "HAPPY_NODE"
let size = CGSize(width: 55.0, height: 150.0)
let physics = SKPhysicsBody(rectangleOfSize: size)
physics.linearDamping = 0.123
physics.angularDamping = 0.456
spriteNode.physicsBody = physics

// COPY
let spriteCopy = spriteNode.copy() as! SKSpriteNode

// ORIGINAL
spriteNode.name
spriteNode.physicsBody?.linearDamping
spriteNode.physicsBody?.angularDamping
spriteNode.physicsBody?.area

// COPY
spriteCopy.name
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.linearDamping
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.angularDamping
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.area

PLAYGROUND OUTPUT

I am not sure that I am copying this correctly, both SKSpriteNode and SKPhysicsBody conform to NSCopying If you look at the output above the area property is maintained after the copy and to my knowledge this is based on the size specified when the SKPhysicsBody was created.

Can anyone cast some light on this and maybe provide me with a pointer as to how I should be deep copying an SKSpriteNode?

Answer 1

I take one way to resolve your problem, probably is not the best way, but

   //COPY
   let spriteCopy = spriteNode.copy() as SKSpriteNode
   let physicsCopy:SKPhysicsBody = spriteNode.physicsBody!;

   ...
   //COPY PHYSICS BODY HARD MODE
   spriteCopy.physicsBody = physicsCopy;

To fix this problem, I created one extension, and @mogelbuster suggested override default copy(), ant it sounds great.

extension SKSpriteNode
{
    override open func copy() -> Any {
        let node = super.copy() as! SKSpriteNode;
        node.physicsBody = super.physicsBody;
        return node;
    }
}

With this extension you can do it, the default copy() method return Any because this you need cast to SKSpriteNode.

// COPY
let spriteCopy = spriteNode.copy() as! SKSpriteNode;

// ORIGINAL
spriteNode.name
spriteNode.physicsBody?.linearDamping
spriteNode.physicsBody?.angularDamping
spriteNode.physicsBody?.area


// COPY
spriteCopy.name
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.linearDamping
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.angularDamping
spriteCopy.physicsBody?.area