Box2d bodies that are really close together, are getting “stuck”

Question

I'm using a tiled tmx map, and I created a class that adds bodies to each tile within a certain layer. This has been working great so far except for when a character or an enemy moves around on the screen, its body gets stuck on an edge between two tiles.

This seems to happen "sometimes" and in certain spots. Jumping makes you unstuck but it's annoying when it happens, and I tried increasing the position iterations, but the problem keeps reoccurring.

Here's what my game looks like:

Answer 1

The way Box2D resolves collisions results in it working very poorly with tiles maps where the tiles are converted into square bodies. It is best to have a separate layer for specifying objects to use for collision which is completely separate from the graphical information for the tile map. You can then use this object layer to generate the Box2D bodies needed for your game.

Creating an Object Layer for Specifying the Collision Layer.

Excerpt from a gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com Tutorial

Now if we wanted to specify collisions there are a few ways we can do that too. I'm going to use an object layer since they can be used for just about anything, so it will be a nice introduction.

Select Layer > Add Object Layer. With the object layer selected, select the "Insert Object" at the top of the menu. Now you can click and drag a box around the trunk of the tree to define the collision box.

Converting that Object Layer to Box2D Bodies

This is a solved problem. See this question for an implementation using the same technologies you are.

Answer 2

Change your actor body so the lower part is an arc. Like this it should be able to get over small steps and or walking up/down diagonal slopes.

Answer 3

I ended up redoing to algorithm for building the map. This seems to be working really really well

I wrote this to build it, this basically makes a body for each tile, if there are tiles next to each other, horizontally, it will group them together and create a single body for those tiles

 private static void buildCollision(Map map, World world){
        TiledMapTileLayer layer = (TiledMapTileLayer) map.getLayers().get("collisionlayer");
        BodyDef bDef = new BodyDef();
        PolygonShape shape = new PolygonShape();
        FixtureDef fDef = new FixtureDef();
        fDef.density = 2.5f;
        fDef.isSensor = false;
        fDef.friction = 0;
        fDef.restitution = 0;

        bDef.type = BodyType.StaticBody;
        Body tileBody = world.createBody(bDef);
        tileBody.setUserData("ground");
        int cellcounter = 0;
        TiledMapTileLayer.Cell cell, nextCell, prevCell;
        int firstCellIndexX = 0, firstCellIndexY = 0;

        for(int j = 0; j < layer.getHeight(); j++){
            for(int i = 0; i < layer.getWidth(); i++){
                cell = layer.getCell(i, j);
                prevCell = layer.getCell(i-1, j);
                nextCell = layer.getCell(i+1, j);

                if(cell != null){
                    cellcounter++;



                    if(prevCell == null){
                        firstCellIndexX = i;
                        firstCellIndexY = j;
                    }

                    if(nextCell == null){
                        float width = layer.getTileWidth() * cellcounter * scaledRatio;
                        float height = layer.getTileHeight() * scaledRatio;

                        shape.setAsBox(width/2, height/2, new Vector2((firstCellIndexX * layer.getTileWidth() * scaledRatio) + (width/2), (firstCellIndexY * layer.getTileHeight() * scaledRatio) + (height/2)), 0);
                        fDef.shape = shape;
                        tileBody.createFixture(fDef);
                        cellcounter = 0;
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        shape.dispose();

    }