I can't figure out hw you use the Partical Spray thing. How would I make a partical with it (I generally use too many active objects). Do I have to make an emitter or anything?
What Ben means is doing something like making little active objects that will be your particles, then have them be created at one point with direction set to random (or something), and fade out and destroy.
Unless I'm mistaken, each object created by the particle spray object is just another object, with the same memory space allocated to it. So if anything, its LESS efficient to use the particle spray object.
If you want efficiency, you can start using an overlay object to draw simplistic particle effects.
Get the overlay object. You'll quickly discover it can do 90% of the particle effects you need, cutting out alot of your inefficiency. You'll also, however, notice that it will not work so great with scrolling and layers. So use the Active Overlay object in conjunction with the Overlay object to fulfill your particle effects.
And as Phizzy said; with hardware accelleration, ANY particle effects could be handled by your program without slowdown whatsoever, since todays graphics cards are FAR beyond the capability of any homebrew project I have ever seen in my life.