Ryumaru

You might not need to increase the bounding box. If the player's bounding box is set right and the statue is set right, you could check if place_meeting(x,y,obj_player) in the statue's object's step event (step event is more flexible, I feel). As long as the bounding boxes are touching, it will work. So you may need to make the statue's box SMALLER to force the player closer.

This is the code I tried to put in the step event of the statue ( actually the pedestal it sits on) to check if the character is within bounds of the examinable area ( which is currently just the pedestal, but would optimally be a couple of tiles around it) AND is pressing A. I can get it to go to the next room upon collision of the two objects if " while keyboard_check('A') is on the second line... but it doesn't check if A is pressed at all. I've actually noticed this multiple times having two lines like this and only the first is executed. I assume there is an error in my syntax? Either way the code below does not work at all and eventually makes the game freeze up and I have to force quit the program. Any suggestions on how to fix?

{
if place_meeting( x, y, obj_chris3) while keyboard_check('A')
room_goto_next()         // go to the next room
}

Say you make the statue an object. You can check that the hero is near the statue and looking at it inside the statue object's step event. I haven't messed with isometrics yet, so I don't know how the metrics work with it. But that's the general idea. Make sure you have a "diamond" bounding box assigned to each sculpture.

Ah ok, so simply increase the size of the art objects to include a large bounding box for this " examinable" area that this character can react in? Sounds good.

What code would I use to check if the character is within the bounding box of art object AND is pressing the correct key? Is there any particular reason to use it in the step event?

Thank you for your reply and hopefully you can answer these questions