An idea for a roguelike
ShockFrost
I'm gonna step in the room, guns blazing. Duck.
I've been working on a concept for a new roguelike and would like to
post the central concepts here, so the players may respond with what
they think of the concepts. I don't want to spend a lot of time
developing something that no one will play, so I wanted to see if
there would be support for this type of variant.
The primary concept:
You start a new game. You are asked for a location name. (?) You
supply a city name, and then you are asked for the more familiar
character name. You are not given a choice of class; instead, you are
shown a statistic sheet which you can reroll or tweak or (unknown). A
little modifying (shooting for a wizard-class), and into the game you
go.
The city is a plane with borders (this would leave the city. Really
quit and leave this world?), trees, grass, and other naturey junk.
You call up your char sheet. You are an 'Adventurer'. You have some
rudimentary stuff. But, you didn't get any wizard equipment so now you
have a smart but weak character. A quick examination of your skills
reveals some broad but boring starting skills and no magical talent to
be seen.
After a bit of drifting the totally non-hostile surface, you find the
doorway to the lower world. Inside, it just looks like a dungeon
crawl. You get some gold, some little bits of junk, a weapon that is
probably poorer than the one you already have. You surf down 4 floors
and get killed by several dingbats, or whatever. You check out your
stats, and your possessions. You get your name recorded in the *city
name* high score board, and the overall scoreboard too.
-RIP CHARACTER 1
You start a new game. Your old city is available to be loaded. You
select it. This time you balance your character for solid combat. The
surface still looks generally the same. As you descend, the first
floor of the dungeon - in fact, all of it - has changed. As you sink,
you realize there are different level formats. The monster list has
been pretty nondescript. You collect goodies, drift around looking for
prizes, fight a couple of tough monsters.
Then it happens. On, say, the 15th floor, you run across a hostile
Ranger. Apparently you've been doing pretty good - you use the terrain
to get close and beat him to a pulp. He drops a Medal - a Ranger
medal. Upon examination, you discover the writing 'Take me to the
surface' or some such thing.
You do so. As you surface, the medal vanishes into thin air.
As you venture down into the pits again, you get 3 levels in and
decide to come up for air again. At the surface you issue a Quit
command. You get --
"Are you sure you want to Retire?" Hm. You agree.
"Would you like to oversee your retirement?" Hm. You agree again.
You are guided through a set of options. With 1300 gold, you are given
a 2x2 house and live out your life as a cheap goods merchant. Yay.
"See you again soon!"
--
Next day, you boot up the game. You select that same old city, and are
making away on your char, when before statistics, you are confronted
with a character choice-
"
a - Adventurer
r - Ranger
"
By attaining the proper medal, you have unlocked the Ranger class.
As you enter the game, you notice there is a building in town!
You enter the 2x2 building, and there is your retired character. He is
a cheap-goods merchant. Big surprise. :-)
Welcome to my roguelike variation. You unlock classes, retire
characters when you are bored of them, build a city, and just plain
have fun.
You start out with the Adventurer class. As you descend you can attain
Medals, and resurface with them to unlock new classes. If you keep
trying to get medals but can't they will slowly float to the surface
until eventually they will be found as shallow as 3rd level. Some
medals can only be obtained through certain classes. In addition to
class medals, there are also race medals.
Potential classes include Adventurer, Fighter, Rogue, Barbarian,
Centurion, Knight, Paladin, Ranger, Necromancer, Summoner, Wizard,
Sorcerer, Conjuerer, Elementalists in Air, Fire, Water, Earth, Poison,
and Electricity, Magi, Warlock, Thief, Assassin, Huskarl, Viking,
Monk, Priest, Cleric, Antipaladin, Death Knight, Alchemist, Runist,
the popular Tourist, Blacksmith, Archer, Soldier, Miner, Tailor,
Bartender, Shopkeep, Captain, Mercenary, Swordsman, Axeman, Slinger,
Pikeman, Farmer, Beastkeeper, Chronomancer, Chef, Weaponsmith,
Tinsmith, Armorer, Artificer, Sage, Scribe, Glassblower, Carpenter,
Warmonger, Mason, Enchanter, Sheriff, Gladiator, Druid, Shaman, Ghost
Hunter, Runist, Chanter, the highly elusive King, and so on.
But rather than all these choices getting bombarded on the player all
at once, they are revealed one at a time.
Races ... ah, gimme some time on that. Or place requests.
Races alter base statistics, while classes instead alter starting
skills and equipment. Hence, almost any combination can be struck
although some combinations will be highly ineffective. Hidden will be
race Medals which let you play as monsters and more.
Skills have a chance to appear anytime you perform the associated
action, and include Armor, various Weapons, Dodging, Stealth,
Generalship, Spellcasting, SpellWielding, Necromancy, Healing,
Summoning, Animal Training, Conjuration, Illusion, Enchantment,
Altercation, Transmutation, Transmogrification, Runistry, Alchemy,
Abjuration, Mining, Dissection, Harvesting, Poisons,
Traps/Ensnarement, Corruption, Cursing, Faith, Pioneering,
Enlightenment, Blacksmithing, Armorsmithing, Tinsmithing, Artificery,
Specific-item-smithing, Scribing, Chanting, Glassblowing, Sprinting,
Jumping, Unarmed Combat, Gladiatorial Combat, Spiritual Combat,
Animalistic Combat, Holy/Unholy Combat, Distillation, Carpentry,
Masonry, Gemcutting, specific-monster-slaying, Appraisal, Balance,
Learning, Education (Teaching) . . .
The skills you have grant a bonus to learn associated skills, and some
are only connected to a couple others while some have skills spidering
all about them, like Spellcasting. Learning out-of-class is difficult
but possible, and it's POSSIBLE to change your class if - A. You have
the class you want to change to and B. have moderate skills in the
field, or A. You DON'T have that class and B. You are a general MASTER
of those skills. SO, yes, you could change class. There's more, such
as books which you can use to boost your chance of unlocking the skill
(once you have rudimentary knowledge of the skill, you may focus upon
it), but that's the gist of it.
On top of all this, Charisma comes into play. You see, people in your
town have opinions of one another, and a full town of low charisma and
incompatible char. builds will mean fighting and death of parts of
your town. In addition, you can request your old players to ACCOMPANY
YOU into the dungeon. Yes, take a party! Dependent upon your charisma
+ the target's charisma, your level, and who you are traveling with,
he may refuse, or he may follow you into the depths for some distance.
*I am aware of the potential cheese and memory intensity - suffice to
say I am working on it*
As the town grows, the game becomes more difficult. The enemy may
launch an attack upon the village at some point, and kill parts of it
off if you do not protect them/they do not protect themselves. The
town has a small economy -- if you are rich while your laboring
Retirees are poor, the prices will skyrocket. On the other hand, if
everyone is rich, all prices may plummet!
--On a developer's note, I feel obligated to say that I have been
working on more substantial things than this fluff. Please, wait for
next message for further details, but post with responses and other
things right away.
R. Alan Monroe
>By attaining the proper medal, you have unlocked the Ranger class.
>characters when you are bored of them, build a city, and just plain
>have fun.
Hmm I thought at first it might be a little masochistic, slogging
through and dying repeatedly just to unlock stuff, until I saw the
"retire" part. Whew!
>Specific-item-smithing, Scribing, Chanting, Glassblowing, Sprinting,
Glassblowing caught my eye. That's one thing lacking from every
Roguelike I've ever seen. We have potions by the wagonload, but they
must be stored in SOMETHING :^) Could be cool.
Alan
Greg McIntyre
roguelike and The Sims.
--
Greg McIntyre
gr...@puyo.cjb.net
http://puyo.cjb.net
copx
"ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:cb8231c1.02101...@posting.google.com...
> Hi. I'm new here.
>
> I'm gonna step in the room, guns blazing. Duck.
>
> I've been working on a concept for a new roguelike and would like to
> post the central concepts here, so the players may respond with what
> they think of the concepts. I don't want to spend a lot of time
> developing something that no one will play, so I wanted to see if
> there would be support for this type of variant.
>
> The primary concept:
Sounds quite interesting.
BTW, a hell lot of classes. I'm still waiting for a RL where
I can play a demicanadian voodoo princess, a gyrognome
robot-monk or a double wookiee tongueblade, though *g
Daniel Lowenstein
>
> As you enter the game, you notice there is a building in town!
> You enter the 2x2 building, and there is your retired character. He is
> a cheap-goods merchant. Big surprise. :-)
D: Good idea.
>
> Welcome to my roguelike variation. You unlock classes, retire
> characters when you are bored of them, build a city, and just plain
> have fun.
>
D: Plain have fun rules.
>
> You start out with the Adventurer class. As you descend you can attain
> Medals, and resurface with them to unlock new classes. If you keep
> trying to get medals but can't they will slowly float to the surface
> until eventually they will be found as shallow as 3rd level.
D: I would personaly vote against this.
Because it would destroy the "standard" status of being able to play
Wizard class.
So you can't show off to your friends because you can't prove if you did
it the "hardcore" way or the "1000 death's" way.
> Some
> medals can only be obtained through certain classes. In addition to
> class medals, there are also race medals.
>
D: Isn't that racist?
> Races ... ah, gimme some time on that. Or place requests.
>
D:
Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
(with proper story/background culture)
>
> On top of all this, Charisma comes into play. You see, people in your
> town have opinions of one another, and a full town of low charisma and
> incompatible char. builds will mean fighting and death of parts of
> your town. In addition, you can request your old players to ACCOMPANY
> YOU into the dungeon. Yes, take a party! Dependent upon your charisma
> + the target's charisma, your level, and who you are traveling with,
> he may refuse, or he may follow you into the depths for some distance.
> *I am aware of the potential cheese and memory intensity - suffice to
> say I am working on it*
>
D: Memory intensity?
> --On a developer's note, I feel obligated to say that I have been
> working on more substantial things than this fluff. Please, wait for
> next message for further details, but post with responses and other
> things right away.
D: Can't wait! (We want more, we want more!)
Groetend,
Daniel "www.vorkinjelinkeroog.nl/DRAAK" Lowenstein.
NN
Sign me up for betatesting. Depending on the language and platform (and
amount of work) I could help too. Reply to this if you're interested and
I'll supply my email.
ShockFrost
I'm glad to see my ideas are at least moderately well recieved. :-)
IN RESPONSES:
TO DANIEL:
On the note of the wizard class- that would be an ultra-common medal.
You could probably scrounge it up on 1:4-5 level 15's (or as
previously mentioned, eventually the tame level 3) but that's NOT the
only way.
To learn MANY various types of skills (spellcraft) you just pick up a
spellbook with an Adventurer, soak some of your skill XP into it by
trying to study it, and when you get lucky, BAM - you unlock
Conjuration I or some other skill.
Succeed in actually casting a spell a few times and you unlock
SpellCasting I.
And master general spellcasting, and you can just CHANGE to wizard.
Whether or not you have the medal, if you develop a char. with mastery
over the arts described, you'll gain the option to switch class. (And
thereby unlock the char. type, if your hero survives to retirement.)
Having the wizard class spares you the labor and XP loss of trying to
train a total novice and lets you jump right into niche character
development. BUT the novice could theoretically do anything the wizard
could, if he learned how and was engineered properly.
- BUT - It's not that way with EVERY class. Some classes can't be
obtained through osmosis learning as listed above. Some medals will
only be discovered very deep. And SOME classes can only be wished for
with the Amulet of Yendor (grab it, surface with it, and spend it
unlocking an ultra-rare class -- for example, the King class with
super-high charisma and persuasion bonuses for leading your entire
village into the dungeon, plus high sword skills and inherent medium
armor skills etc. ALSO, monster races will only be unlockable with
either the amulet or TOTAL GENOCIDE. Sick, eh? Slay all the dung rats
and you unlock the DUNG RAT MEDAL to be found! Then you can BE a dung
rat! What a glorious waste of time!)
BTW, that genocide thing holds true from game to game. Aw, kill all
the hobgoblins? TOO BAD. They ain't coming back (unless you go into
game options and discard the appropriate monster medal -- then they
will respawn). This also would hold true for some unique bosses, but a
few uniques will keep coming back for more...
And by memory strain, I meant having a dungeon filled with over
100x100 monsters each trying to move after you take your turn. Better
go get a cup of coffee. Well, I'm working on it. The village will
control its own size -- too many crappy level 2-3 retirees will cause
the game difficulty to mount, the townsfolk will try to kill each
other if there is any diversity (or charisma levels are just too low -
Jed jist got diss-grunteled for thuh last tiyme) and after too many
attempts, the monsters from floor 1 will attack the town - then floor
2 - and so on, as the dungeon levels mysteriously 'rise', the next
level is found underground. Townspeople too weak to fend off the
attacks, randomly get attacked and DIE. Simple enough.
Greg - I don't know if there will be THAT much interaction, just a
general tolerance level that drops with the increasing population and
is dependant upon own charisma, charisma of target, and relative type.
It's just a matter of time until your two most deranged hermits, a
stable-fed monk and an endbringing necromancer, each decide they're
fed up with the other and duke it out, turn-time in the town streets.
Not a total loss - one will kill the other and gain XP. The other,
well... it's a good idea to keep your characters at least GENERALLY
social.
NN - Yah, ok. Beta tester #1, you shall be.
Alan - I wanted to make glassblowing a generally easy skill to attain,
but still wanted to include it so alchemists could go about making
their own potions and adventurers could take water and other
substances into the dungeon with them, with out that mysterious
container-appearing thing. Plus, it's another shtick for players to
develop. The glassblowing book (there may be just one, I don't know)
will have multiple types of containers indicating various amounts of
contained potion (THAT'S RIGHT, no more one-size-fits-all. You wanna
levitate for an hour? Chug that gallon pitcher of potion, but watch
for nasty side effects of OD... Need to get over a pit? Better use
your vial instead. Much safer, and more potion-efficient, because the
more potion you drink, the more the effect seems to diminish per ounce
drunk. Figure the minimal limit out and work with it to make many
effective, very temporary levitation potions, a perfect solution to
nasty traps that you see.) and also different tensile strengths for
the really volatile stuff. BUT I am going to omit corks. Sorry, no
system is split-strand perfect. :-P
To Copx: Yeah, there's a lot of classes, but I have a theory I am
gonna share with everybody now. It explains the othercaste. Plus,
remember, you start with just 1. To see the overwhelming list of races
and classes from which to make your final selection, you've gotta get
the amulet or play your life away. It's ... Perfect.
ShockFrost
Enchanter - Specializing in the subtler arts of magic, the Enchanter
specializes in Transmutation, Altercation, and other quiet tricks.
Shapeshifter - Self-explanatory. Transmogrification is the only skill.
NOT a wimp in combat, of course. Very rare class. Very specific class.
Do funny things to complexify the situation - turn into a Vampire and
bite somebody, then turn into a gargoyle and use the surge of strength
to CRUSH your enemies. Other funny tweaks. Use beholder stare to
freeze, then shift to a serpent and poison, then to a young dragon and
do a little flamethrowing to finish the job. Uses minimal mana to
shift, but if killed as a monster, you stay dead! Shift with care!
Chronomancer - Another ultra rare. This one has spells that play with
time. Involves a common fetish- an hourglass. More details soon. (OR,
give ME the details.)
Artificer - A very rare side tree of blacksmithing. MANY arts to
learn. Glassblowing, Tinsmithing, Blacksmithing, Tailoring,
Enchanting, Runistry, Scribing, Gemcutting, Alchemy and other skills
will all increase what you can actually MAKE with your 'Artificery'.
(Fortunately, all these skills come easily). Use glassblowing,
gemcutting, blacksmithing, tinsmithing, and tailoring to get base
equipment. Use special Runistry, Enchanting, and alchemy 'soaking'
(using potions on artifacts) to raise the overall power level of the
object. Then use your Artificic skill to release the power and the
object will gain specific, powerful abilities. The art is not fully
controllable, but as your skill increases, you can start making REALLY
strong stuff. Artificery only adds the final skill needed to make the
artifact work, 'binding'. Artificers also can make rods, staves, and
wands. You bind a scroll/potion/spellbook/reagent/etc. to the
wand/rod/staff you engineered (with hopefully a nice high base power)
and the bound ingredient is destroyed, and you have generated a
special rod/staff/wand! As I said, a highly rare character class,
POSSIBLY only accessible through the amulet and POSSIBLY obtainable by
unlocking EVERY ASSOCIATED SKILL.
Sage - The sage is a very special class that gets XP for exploring(it
uses the rare pioneering skill that you might get if you explore a
level 100%). If you can tell me the name of the game where this class
came from, you get to be beta tester #2. Rare.
Scribe - Can generate maps, copy spellbooks and scrolls, etc. His
abilities all revolve around the pen. It's amazing what a little
writing can accomplish. If he learns runistry, he can write brand new,
working magic scrolls (and vice versa - a runist who learns to scribe
will be able to write scrolls as well) A common class but nothing
amazing without additional components. There is something missing from
this guy. Tell me what, I don't know.
AntiPaladin - Bordering mage and warrior, much like a paladin, the
antipaladin wears little but some armor. He specializes in whips/chain
weapons and axes though. His magical techniques are violent in nature.
He is a good fusion of warrior and wizard. He is also decidedly evil.
DeathKnight - The distinctly different DeathKnight has a special
weapon, a SoulBlade, which he uses to no end. The SoulBlade is a part
of the Death Knight - he must feed it, or he will slowly be destroyed
by it. Killing will increase the SoulBlade's power. When you level up,
your SoulBlade's power is then returned to you. This cursed weapon can
become very good if you kill everything in sight, but as you use it,
you weaken, and do not regain your might until you level and the sword
'bursts', returning all the power you gave it and then some.
Viking - These burly warriors like shields and axes. They heal VERY
fast. They too can perform battle rage, but unlike the Barbarian, they
START the GAME with this art and can perform it at will. Battle rage
causes defenses to drop and attack power to ramp up. An angry viking
could crush the world. There IS a limit to a Viking's strength, but
you'll be straining the reins well into floor 60-75 before you hit it.
Tourist - By popular demand. Rare class. A camera, plenty of food,
plenty of money, no skill with weapons, magic, or armor. Take photos
of the monsters and then surface, and your findings will be recorded
in town log books. The same goes for any objects you discover. If you
get the Amulet of Yendor, there is a special tourist trap waiting for
you. Good luck!
Blacksmith - Forging weapons is the big draw to a blacksmith. There
are many subclasses including Tinsmithing, Weaponsmithing, Armoring,
etc. There is an increase to strength, and a decrease to constitution,
but for the most part he is kept neutral so you may develop him
however you wish.
Tinsmith, Weaponsmith, Armorer, etc. - Rarer classes. All can be
reached from the smith, and each has special creation talents. They
are all variations on a normal blacksmith.
Archer - A marksman. Specialist in ranged attacks. High dexterity and
such, with great accuracy. Has the special ability to snowball damage
onto attacks with his levels, both with ranged weapon and precision
skills. He is fatal but generally frail up close. Some of the 'harder'
monsters may give him cause to fret.
Soldier - A trained soldier. Starts with combat bonuses and reasonable
equipment. The first half of the dungeon is a cake walk, but all his
skills are retarded so it is unlikely he will get past halfway down.
Miner - Capable of *mining*, the miner can dig holes in the walls and
floor too. This offers special access to riches -- and also to
dangers, such as gas pockets and some things that should not have been
forgotten. He learns mercantile and appraisal, and gemcutting, and
masonry, and other associated skills faster. His pick is a unique
weapon that is not exceptional in combat, but he can pick up a bonus
with it.
Tailor - A soft armor maker. Capable of skinning a monster and making
tailored armor from it. Dragon scales make excellent armor - and now
you can prove it. Will occasionally venture down to get more skins if
retired, and can die in this manner, unless you bring him
corpses/skins when you buy up his stock.
Also, bring him a VERY nice monster and he'll make some fine armor
(albeit a little stale - fresh kills make for the best armor, so use
up a recall...)
Thief - Common class. Capable of sneaking, pickpocketing, and more
sneaky things. Thief has dagger-class skills and easily picks up
poison skills. He is best when using hit-and-run tactics. He is a
variation of possibly the greatest challenge of the game, but he is a
little better balanced, with extra speed.
Assassin - This balance of thief already has knowledge of poisons. He
is not as fast and not as resourceful as the thief. But he excels at
one-on-one combat. He can use dagger, sword, axe, polearm, any edged
weapon. He is especially skilled at throwing things. Surround an
assassin and he will be dead in an instant. Also, being an assassin,
it is best to never be surprised, lest you meet your fate. You have
been warned...
ROGUE - This ultra-rare class must be unlocked with the Amulet of
Yendor. (Out of respect) It is very hard to win with the rogue, as the
townsfolk shun you and will sell you nothing. Your skills are few and
far between. You have no great strengths to draw upon. Only your wits
can support you, and that won't get you far... will it? Winning the
game with the Rogue is the toughest thing to accomplish in the entire
game. You'll have to use EVERY trick to pull it off, but if you can,
there is a great reward waiting for you...
...more IS on the way. I am still typing, just need a momentary break.
Karl St-Jacques
> NOT a wimp in combat, of course. Very rare class. Very specific class.
> Do funny things to complexify the situation - turn into a Vampire and
> bite somebody, then turn into a gargoyle and use the surge of strength
> to CRUSH your enemies. Other funny tweaks. Use beholder stare to
> freeze, then shift to a serpent and poison, then to a young dragon and
> do a little flamethrowing to finish the job. Uses minimal mana to
> shift, but if killed as a monster, you stay dead! Shift with care!
Sound like a Doppleganger. In my little head, shapeshifter are Were
creature. Like WereWolf. But this is only my opinion and other might have
divergents one
--
Karl St-Jacques.
*A healthy sensitivity to both moral and environmental standards forbids the
practicing of aluminum foil fetishism.*
ShockFrost
Beastkeeper - This type of character raises animals and monsters. He
has the art of beast empathy, and animal-type creatures can be
atrtracted with proper supplies to join him. Afterward, they function
just like summoned beasts. Rare class.
Sheriff - When retired, tries to prevent fights, lowers the likelihood
of them. Protects the town. Possibly to be cut.
Bartender - capable of distilling, harvesting mold, etc. Rare class.
Main reason to raise one is the boost in charisma score your town gets
for his presence, so it is easier to form a large group. Possibly to
be cut.
Shopkeep - Possibly to be cut.
Captain - A watered down version of a King, with command skills.
Possibly to be cut.
Mercenary - Possibly to be cut.
Farmer - Droll class. Possibly to be cut.
Chef - Possibly to be cut.
Warmonger - Possibly to be cut.
Carpenter - Possibly to be cut.
Mason - Possibly to be cut.
I need to eat. When I come back, a few words on floor styles, and also
play style concepts, and tempo control (*key concept*)
Archor
<snipped a lot of good ideas for a very good game>
This seems like the perfect roguelike to me. I can imagine
everything... A town with some people living in it, working
in it and even dieing in it...
An entrance to a mysterious dungeon which allows adventurers
to enter the dungeon, slay some monsters, become stronger
and even save town (for a little while, at least.)
I've got some ideas you might like:
Have you though about religion? It's a standard thing, i
know, but can be brought in a new way, like atheists who are
immune to godly magic, monotheist, polytheist, elementalists
(those who believe in gods of elements or essences of
elements,) spiritualists (voodoo) and more...
Maybe guilds can be used; once a character is unlocked,
he/she/it can start a guild, which allows other characters
to join and learn specific skills, find companions and have
some friends (most adventurers seem to be lonely - always
saving the world by themselves...)
Currently, I can't think of more, but when I do, I'll post
it...
Greetz,
Archor
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Archor Ver 3.1 2K2 ArchorTheN...@HotMail.Com
GC/GED/GL/>GCS>$ d-(---) s: a--- C++>$ UL++(++++) P+ L+(++)>++++
E W(++) N++ a? K-- w++(--) O? !M- V? PS+ !PE Y+ PGP(-) t--- 5(+)
X- R>+++ tv-- b++ DI(+) D- G>G+++ e->e++++ h!>h--- r++>+++ !y+++
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ShockFrost
POST #2: more details and justifications
THE NUMBER 1 GRIPE I EXPECT TO SEE IS-
"Those extra classes are just filler junk. They're a waste of time and
they disgust me."
Well, actually, I'm founding each class on a different play style.
That's the big reason you change classes - a different play style. You
want a different feel to your game. You don't want to go in, sword
drawn, stomping everything with the same old sword swings every TIME.
So here are some classes and the things that make them feel unique:
Adventurer - Your first hero. Ultra-generic. He has no great
strengths, but no major weaknesses - in fact, he is statistically more
efficient than most classes. He is perfect for beginners, and in fact
he is the only options beginners are confronted with.
Fighter - Ultra common. Enough general combat skill unlocks him. He is
equipment-heavy. He gets bonuses to learning weapons. (Possible
schools are Throwing, Chain, Bludgeon, Sword, Axe, and Unarmed Combat)
He is very easy to play early on, but in the end he is quite limited.
Barbarian - Freakishly strong, the Barbarian has tendencies to
Bludgeons, Axes, and Swords. He has a bonus to learning berserk, and a
bonus to learning Battle Rage. He starts quickly, and doesn't have it
QUITE as soft as the Fighter due to a slight mortality thing, but his
strength doesn't have the same bounds, and he can reach new depths of
power. Most impressive his perhaps his pain resistance.
Centurion - Highly dependent on armor and shield, with talents in
Polearms and the capability for Swords. He has high stun and force
resistance. He does a better job of surviving the mid levels, because
it's hard to shake him up. Although he excels up close, he can be
proficient with a small shield at some distance, and easily develops
spear-throwing.
Knight - Innate armor capabilities and massive armor bonuses-to-learn
and usefulness make the knight an eventual Tin Can. He earns bonuses
for Sword and Chain weapons. Getting excellent equipment is key to a
Knight. They tend to be slow, but have very high constitution, and
coupled with their armor they can mow down lesser foes with good
equipment. Their only problem is they tend to get rattled in their
heavy armor rather easily, so force and stun attacks can be difficult
to overcome.
Paladin - Like the Knight, but magic-capable, the Paladin starts with
Faith as a skill and should spend a lot of time enhancing it. He is a
bit more nimble than the Knight which is good because he won't get as
much from his armor. He is sword and bludgeon-exclusive, and perhaps
is awarded his greatest abilities with a hammer. Faith can apply
resistance to many things, including pain, stun, force, and magic.
Looser and quicker with occasional support, the Paladin must be played
in a Lawful manner for his advantages -- he must not attack the
neutral fauna that has not attacked him first. Exceptions include
obvious demonic apparitions.
Ranger - Fast, with inherent skills in all weaponry, a ranger lives
'on the edge of a knife'. With his weapon advantages, he has high
bonuses against natural creatures and fauna, and high tendencies to
develop slaying skills against all monsters. He is deadly accurate and
precise, and learns stealth and balance easily. On the flipside, he
does poorly with armor and can take a long time to learn heavy armor
skills, so he should stick to lighter equipment. Neither his strength
nor constitution is overwhelming, so he must rely on finesse in combat
- besting opponents with swift, skillful weaponplay - to stay alive.
Wizard - The most mystic of fun ideas, a wizard is a generally
physically weak guy with tremendous spiritual powers to make up for
it. The wizard is a jack-of-all-trades, with good knowledge in
SpellCasting and SpellWielding and a step up on Education skills. This
can rapidly unlock many mystical arts to a resourceful Wizard. A
fairly trained wizard will dabble in many magic arts, like
Conjuration, Illusion, Enchantment, Corruption, Elementalism,
Necromancy, Summoning, Altercation, Runistry, Alchemy, and more. But a
TRULY smart one will never focus too long on any one thing... else the
power of diversity be lost to a more mundane trade... The wizard is
classically weak early on but more powerful later. He can be used as a
stepping stone to reach the majority of the magical classes, if you
are too lazy to just get the proper medal. By combining various arts,
the Wizard is the most exploitable class in the game, as it should be.
Necromancer - One of the more popular wizard classes, the necromancer
specializes in controlling life and death. His party-favor trick is
resurrecting the recently or long dead to serve his will. Learning the
necromantic arts is exhausting study, but using them seems to have an
even more draining effect. Due to this, necromancers are commonly very
frail. They tend to have fair advantages against holy monsters, but
since such creatures are commonly benign to divers (Although not
magical chars) this is very little help. To play and win, you must
turn the tide of the battle to your favor by returning your dead
opponents to life on your side, while avoiding getting slain. You are
never safe, early or late-game. However, it is rumored that truly
powerful Necromancers have turned themselves into the similar but much
less frail LICH. (Can obtain Monster Race medal)
Sorcerer - This is the school of book-learned magic. To cast any
spells, a sorcerer must obtain the proper sorceric book for the skill.
These books contain random assortments of spells, and some spells
(from certain arts in particular) are quite rare. A lucky sorcerer may
locate a perfect blank book and, if he learns scribing, which comes
naturally, he may record his spells from other books into a private
spellbook that he has advantages with. He has no need for spell
points. Instead, he spends his 'energy' memorizing spells. When he
casts them, he forgets them again. What a miracle! Each time he levels
up, a sorcerer is given an allocation of memory. When he spends it all
memorizing this spell or that, no more magic for Mr. Sorcerer until
next level, although it grows exponentially. More critically, a
Sorcerer may invest his precious memory in ANY LEVEL of spell,
spending 10 'memorizes' on a single level-10 spell while being only
level 2-3 himself. Hence the reason he is played at all - the ability
to instantly memorize any spell with enough effort, and cast it with
reasonable consistancy. Explosive magic abilities. Spooky, eh?
Conjurer - This art focuses on nothing but obliteration. If it is
intended to harm, damage, agonize, castrate, indemnify, or otherwise
harm a target, the conjurer can perform it. He excels in the violent
magical arts, and as such, his spells tend to be a bit MORE violent
than usual. He can also shoot various TYPES of damage, sneaking around
resistances. This class is just for those who love to splash monsters
with 4000 damage-spells and nothing else. However there is no variety
to his casting, and if he comes up against a more subtle situation,
such as *extremely FAST* monsters, he may be in big trouble.
Elementalist - Each element has its own pivotal theories. Air, earth,
fire, water, Poison, Electricity. Any questions? No? Good. There is a
class for each element to be had, and don't think you can get one to
get them all - changing elements would be harder than taking a neutral
character and teaching him.
Druid - Here, the neutral elementalist. As a restriction, he must have
a reagent to make his spells work. This can be difficult for some
elements, and it always gets kind of expensive - you run out fast. He
serves a MUCH better platform to obtain all the elementalists. He also
tends to be a little less combat-incompetent than most wizards, as
druids tend to have excellent constitution, and has some talent with
Swords.
Shaman - Once again, not combat-incompetent, although faster than
stronger. And rather skilled with chain-style weapons. The shaman's
power is dependent upon tidal forces of nature. By slightly shifting
position a bit, a shaman's power changes dramatically. In fact, her
'spell points' actually serve as a potency guage as to a cast from
your current location - she has no mana. Spell power is dependent upon
a cycle of time, location power, and whether the energy in the area
has been drained already. She needs no mana and starts with a PHAT
spellbook, although there are a few more spells to be had for her. Her
spells tend to be indirect in nature.
Summoner - The summoner actually is not the same as the expected norm.
With 2 distinct types of spells, a summoner has a record to uphold.
'Calling' a monster will make it appear, and fight, then vanish.
Attacking it may cause it to retaliate, but not much else. However,
the caster may also 'SUMMON' a monster. This is no temporary deal -
summons are till' death do you part, one way or another. They don't
fail much. However, they may be REFUSED... You have a track record as
a Summoner of how you treat summoned companions. Feed them, heal them,
keep them around a long time, and your rating will rise - which will
convince more powerful creatures to come to your aid. Also, if you
have too many creatures summoned already, a new one may not join you.
Summoned creatures can grow in strength. If you attack them, they will
assume you are training them, and retaliate, until you '.' rest. Then
the monster will assume training is over (and likely rest too) a
monster's XP and skill will rise slowly from sparring, but yours will
not. Your monster can hurt you can even accidentally kill you in
training, so be careful what you train! But if you accidentally kill a
summoned creature in training, though, your rating will DIVE. Get high
ratings and start summoning something you can ride, like an Ancient
Red Dragon!
Mage - The art of the magi is veiled in secrecy. (I haven't finished
this system just yet. Suggestions are welcome but they may/will likely
get ignored)
Warlock - The darker side of Magic, the Warlock has the distinct
ability to cast from HP instead of XP. HP is very powerful as magical
fuel, but a Warlock never seems to have too much of it -- leveling
will drive the value of your HP up, but as you cast too often and
drain your life away, your consitution will slowly drop. . . Warlocks
gain access to strong magic very early, since HP is such a potent
power source. Use your magical power wisely and sparingly to dominate
enemies with near endless power. A rare and unique class or magician.
Priest - The lighter side of magic, the Priest excels in healing and
restorative abilities. If it is hurt, a priest can heal it. Raising a
high-level, lawful priest can be quite difficult, but it pays off big
time when he retires and opens a temple that will heal your most
severe wounds, sell powerful blessings to ward off the most unpleasant
of creature effects, create medicine and rejuvenators, and even create
a pact that will restore you to life if you've been good. A
high-charisma priest makes an excellent party leader. He has negatives
to all weapons save bludgeons which he has an innate advantage with.
Cleric - The more vengeant side of light, a militant priest who uses
his faith as a weapon. Like a paladin, but slower, and dependant
against magic granted from his deity to survive. Good performance
(high skill) before leveling will improve your deity's opinion of you.
Pray for help if you dare. While Priests are always vanilla, Clerics
have the additional choice of which deity to serve (The pantheon has
not been written yet)
Alchemist - Potions and mixes and wonders galore! Alchemists only
IMITATE magicians! Instead, they are given a base book of alchemy,
which lets you study core skills like glassblowing, monster
dissection, distillation, and other talents. Then, carve up corpses
and see what base elements you can identify. Create powerful mixes
using the core components. Alchemical potions tend to be imprecise and
slurred in effect. Master the art of refining a perfect potion!
Discover a book of lore to uncover a formula for a super-potion, or
break such a potion down for a hint. (Strangely, these working
super-formulas change from town to town!) Write the formula for a
potion onto a scroll or book and when you retire, the alchemist
merchant will continue to produce and sell that potion upon request.
Truly, a unique class. And generally uncommon too.
Runist - The art of runistry is scribing glyphs for an effect - onto
the ground, onto parchment, and onto weapons and armor. A form of
enchanting, you must create glyphs based on your level. As you apply
them to a piece of equipment, the eeffect will increase, but the
stress on the object also increases. Too many glyphs and not enough
skill, and *SMASH* no more item. Too bad. Don't push it so far next
time. Runists tend to (obviously) have excellent equipment, with
subpar skills to use them. In town, they tend to be invaluable as they
scratch magic onto any equipment. This is a pretty rare class.
Monk - Their unarmed combat skills may seem magical, but there's
nothing really mystic about these warriors. They become fatal with a
sword, chain, polearm, or throwing weapon, but they abhor armor and
dislike axes for some reason. They tend to seem fragile, but
meditation can cause their wounds to heal really fast, their
statistics to improve, and even their LEVELS INCREASE (!)Monks have
excellent chances to gain skills in gladiatorial (anti-person),
animalistic(anti-beast), Spiritual (anti-mystic) or
Holy(anti-evil)/Unholy(anti-good) combat, but they have trouble
getting individual monster-slaying skills as a tradeoff.
Read the next post for a continuation.
ABCGi NewsMonkey
UNLOCKING CLASSES
ShockFrost I like the idea of unlocking classes. I would probably like it in
a different way. A few general classes first, once you reach a high enough
level in that class, a more specialised class becomes available. Perhaps
even the option for the general classed character to change to the
specialised class from level 1. But whatever it's still a good variation. I
wouldn't lock down races that much as that doesn't make as much sense in
terms of "learning a new more specialised and useful class". A silly
example;
Magician
---- Sorcerer
------ Necromancer
---- Wizard
----- Protection Wizard
----- Physics Wizard
----- Combat Wizard
------- Fire Wizard
------- Cold Wizard
------- Death Wizard
PERSISTENT GAME WORLDS:
I particularly like the idea of building up the town to make life easier for
future adventurers. Perhaps one adventurer may build a morgue in the town
where you can view dead heroes retrieved from the dungeon and look at their
death file. Perhaps another adventurer might start a retrieval shop where
items from dead characters can be sold (for high prices of course). Maybe
some of the retired adventurers would also set sub-quests (one retires as
the mayor). The higher the level of the retired character the higher level
position (and thus more useful to following characters) available - also
their stats could be used to influence what jobs they might be doing. A
warrior of INT 9 won't be able to run a very good magic lab!
AND IN THE MAKING WAY TOO MUCH WORK FOR YOU CATEGORY!:
Perhaps a wilderness where multiple towns can be set up so that you can
travel between them and create a whole mini-world. The player decides which
town they want to build up and the character created is of "that town".
Allowing say crusade *against* another town (the mayor might give a mission
to steal another town's supplies). Perhaps a town has a general alignment
and only good characters can be created in good towns and only evil
characters in evil towns (and make necromancer and some other classes
restricted to only evil to force some evil towns to be created). And of
course Orcs would get their own "settlement" and get attacked by humans all
the time!
Keep up the good work, await to hear more - perhaps a web site to keep my
eye on it :-)
--
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Rick C
> BTW, a hell lot of classes. I'm still waiting for a RL where
> I can play a demicanadian voodoo princess, a gyrognome
> robot-monk or a double wookiee tongueblade, though *g
What makes you say PQ isn't a roguelike? You don't have any idea what the
underlying gameplay is...
:)
Rick C
news:kLIr9.31925$334....@news-server.bigpond.net.au...
[I snipped a few hundred lines one of y'all should've done.]
> UNLOCKING CLASSES
> ShockFrost I like the idea of unlocking classes. I would probably like it
in
> a different way. A few general classes first, once you reach a high enough
> level in that class, a more specialised class becomes available.
One real-world example of this techique (sort of) is Heroes of Might and
Magic IV. Starting heroes are one of 11 classes. Skills are grouped into
about a dozen small trees; each of the starting 11 classes has one point in
the base skill for the appropriate tree. The first non-base skill you learn
in a different tree will alter your class to one of the 30 or so "advanced"
classes.
Hmm, that doesn't sound very descriptive, does it? Lemme give a specific
example. There are 9 skill trees (5 schools of magic, 2 combat, and 2
other). You start off as one of the 11 base classes (one for each of 7 of
the trees, and the two combat skills have 2 classes each.) Let's take a
Sorcerer (starts with Chaos Magic.) He can learn any of the other 8 base
skills and remain a sorcerer. So let's say he picks up Life Magic. THe
three advanced Life Magic skills are Healing, Spirituality, and
Resurrection. Learning any of those skills will convert the Sorcerer to a
Heretic. If you then learn Tactics and an advanced Tactics skill, you stay
a Heretic. (Chaos + Tact = Pyromancer, Life + Tact = Priest).
Rick C
> > Some
> > medals can only be obtained through certain classes. In addition to
> > class medals, there are also race medals.
> D: Isn't that racist?
*thwack*
> > Races ... ah, gimme some time on that. Or place requests.
> D:
> Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
> (with proper story/background culture)
*cough* Demicanadian. Double Wookie. Half Halfling. Double Hobbit.
Enchanted Motorcycle (my personal favorite.)
copx
"Rick C" <pixe...@hotmail.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:aoo792$o6jfv$1...@ID-80100.news.dfncis.de...
Finally someone who got the joke :)
Daniel Lowenstein
> > > Races ... ah, gimme some time on that. Or place requests.
>
> > D:
> > Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
> > (with proper story/background culture)
>
> *cough* Demicanadian. Double Wookie. Half Halfling. Double Hobbit.
> Enchanted Motorcycle (my personal favorite.)
D:
And now for the proper background culture of those .................
Hansjörg Malthaner
... Motorcycles like to live in groups. They are loud and fast. Known
not to care much about the slower species.
They are affected by bad weather, more than usual. On sunny days they
appear in large groups. They usually prefer the open plains, but some
live in rough mountaneous regions, too.
During winter many of them hibernate ...
c.u.
Hajo
DarkGod
>> D:
>> And now for the proper background culture of those .................
>
> ... Motorcycles like to live in groups. They are loud and fast. Known
> not to care much about the slower species.
>
> They are affected by bad weather, more than usual. On sunny days they
> appear in large groups. They usually prefer the open plains, but some
> live in rough mountaneous regions, too.
>
> During winter many of them hibernate ...
AHAHHA great ! :)
--
-----------------------+----------------------------------------------
DarkGod comes from | Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards
the hells for YOU ! :) | because they are subtle and quick to anger.
-----------------------+----------------------------------------------
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Pe*/PM*(Cr) D H- D c++ f- PV s- TT- d++ P++ M+ C- S++ I+++ So++ B/-
ac- GHB- SQ+ RQ V+++ F:Mage playing Mage-like(see Pernangband Sorcerors)
Mika-Petri Lauronen
>> > Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
>> > (with proper story/background culture)
>>
>> *cough* Demicanadian. Double Wookie. Half Halfling. Double Hobbit.
>> Enchanted Motorcycle (my personal favorite.)
>
Hmm... half halfling would be... a quarterling?
Double hobbit is dobbit, and double wookie is dookie.
Some more: Powerpuff. Teletubbie. Yoda. Osama (the ultimate evil race, good
in disappearing).
How about a Shonen Knife patch? Monsters like jackalopes, conrete animals,
tomato heads, cannibal papayas, flying jellies, neon zebras, banana fish,
punk animals; items like red krosses, lazybones, white flags, brown
mushrooms, wonder wine, buddha's faces, people traps, and, of course,
shonen knives; places like elmer elevator, burning farm, parrot polynesia,
ice cream city, music square, tower of the sun, mysterious drugstore;
character classes like parallel woman, twist barbie, insect collector,
faith healer, and butterfly boy. Yum!
--
-- Ala mua, elä sottaa!
-- Make love, not war!
-- Mixu Lauronen, mpla...@paju.oulu.fi
Timo Viitanen
"Daniel Lowenstein" <dlo...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
news:3DAE8CAC...@xs4all.nl...
> > By attaining the proper medal, you have unlocked the Ranger class.
> >
>
> D:
> Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
> (with proper story/background culture)
Poll : how many here have heard of the Nephilim and the
Slithzeriskai?
Timo Viitanen
"ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:cb8231c1.02101...@posting.google.com...
> Hi. I'm new here.
>
> I'm gonna step in the room, guns blazing. Duck.
>
> I've been working on a concept for a new roguelike and would like to
I just got a weird idea for unlocking classes. First off, you
have access to a handful of general classes - say, Warrior,
Rogue, Sorcerer, Cleric. Each one of these has a handful of
quests. When you complete the first quest, you get an Apprentice
medallion of that class and some cool special abilities, a title
and some loot, the second quest gives you the Journeyman
medallion, Master, Adept, Grand Master, until finally the sixth
quest nets you the Grand Medallion of foo.
Each one of these medallions opens up to three new classes when
brought to the Pedestal of Power amidst the town. For example,
the Rogue Journeyman medallion might open the Assassin and the
Swashbuckler classes while the Grand Master would open the all-
mighty Ninja class. (www.realultimatepower.net)
But wait, now it gets fun. Each character you start starts with
all the previous medals you have placed on the runestone (or
something similar, this part of the idea is a bit unclear. Perhaps
he can choose one medallion at the start of the game, bringing
some of the warrior skills to a cleric or something like that.)
Anyway, you can then drop, say, the Warrior and the Sorcerer
Master medals on the stone and unlock the Spellsword class.
For this stuff, an assassin you start is concidered to be a
rogue that has already completed the journeyman quest. At the
start of the game he is given high enough level and enough
equipment and goal to be that far in the game. A spellsword
(fighter/mage) could do both warrior and sorcerer quests and
thus such multiclasses would be highly desirable.
To get an ultimate goal to the game : the goal is to attain the
six Grand Medallions. This unlocks the Avatar class that can,
through a special quest, open the entrance to the Final Gauntlet
where he faces the Big Baddy.
I hope this is helpful, or at least fun. Reply if you didn't
understand a word of my confused ramblings, i'll try to clarify
them a bit ;).
Mika-Petri Lauronen
> Poll : how many here have heard of the Nephilim and the
> Slithzeriskai?
>
I've even played them.
Daniel Lowenstein
D:
Yes, half human half angel.
> and the
> Slithzeriskai?
D:
No, enlighten us!
Groetend,
Daniel Lowenstein
DRAAK , a roguelike project : http://www.vorkinjelinkeroog.nl/DRAAK/
Timo Viitanen
> Timo Viitanen wrote:
>
> > "Daniel Lowenstein" <dlo...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
> > news:3DAE8CAC...@xs4all.nl...
> > > > By attaining the proper medal, you have unlocked the Ranger class.
> > > > Races ... ah, gimme some time on that. Or place requests.
> > > >
> > >
> > > D:
> > > Request : A totaly new race no roguelike player has ever heard of.
> > > (with proper story/background culture)
> >
> > Poll : how many here have heard of the Nephilim
>
> D:
> Yes, half human half angel.
>
> > and the
> > Slithzeriskai?
>
> D:
> No, enlighten us!
From the Exile and the Avernum series from Spiderweb Software,
which i concider to be perhaps the best CRPG's of the world.
(For the curious around here, they are based in an immense
underground warren of caverns where all who dare to oppose
the dictators above are banished. Each of the games had three
main quests which could be completed in any order and lots
of sidequests (except for exile 3 and the remake avernum 3).
Exile/avernum I had destroying the evil demon lord that terrorized
the underworld, finding a way to escape it, and slaying the
emperor of the Great Empire above. E/A 2 had the empire invading
the underworld because of the emperor's assassination and
involved enlisting the aid of an alien race, destroying the
imperial mass teleporter which would surely bring victory to
the empire and slaying the mighty wizard leader of the imperial
armies. The coolest games ever.)
The Nephilim are a race of furry cat-people, mostly primitive
and savage, agile and good with missile weapons. They were
hunted into near extinction by the empire and the rest were
banished below.
The Slithzeriskai are lizard people of great strenght and
intelligence. Outcasts from the deeper caverns, they were
banished to Avernum by their own race. Most of the Sliths
are evil and savage - the reason for their banishment - but
some are intelligent and friends of the human race. These
long to return to their homeland below.
Hmm... i gave all the surprise away ;). Now, a cookie to the
one who can quess the nature of the Vahnatai without having
played Avernum 2 ;).
Shadow Wolf
I got it too -- My own character (Liorna, Half-man Voodoo Princess) is
currently level 156 on Expodrine (she was 52 yesterday :-(
--
Shadow Wolf
shado...@softhome.net
Stories at http://www.asstr.org/~Shadow_Wolf
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Greg McIntyre
Sounds reminiscent of Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis. In that game
you collect medals by doing certain things in battle, and the medals
unlock further classes. e.g. If you spear two enemies at once, you get
the Lancer medal and can become a Valkyrie if you have the other
requisites (female soldier, I think).
ABCGi NewsMonkey
>
> Sounds reminiscent of Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis. In that game
> you collect medals by doing certain things in battle, and the medals
> unlock further classes. e.g. If you spear two enemies at once, you get
> the Lancer medal and can become a Valkyrie if you have the other
> requisites (female soldier, I think).
>
Hey multiple "medals" or pre-requisites to unlock - that's even cooler!
Especially if some of them overlap.
Was the game Tactics Ogre any good Puyo?
Greg McIntyre
> Was the game Tactics Ogre any good Puyo?
Yes. It is one of my all time favourites. :)
ABCGi NewsMonkey
>
> > Was the game Tactics Ogre any good Puyo?
>
> Yes. It is one of my all time favourites. :)
Is it still available anywhere?
Greg McIntyre
> > > Was the game Tactics Ogre any good Puyo?
> >
> > Yes. It is one of my all time favourites. :)
>
> Is it still available anywhere?
It's a new game. :) Well... there was Tactics Ogre for the SNES but
AFAIK it was never translated from Japanese. I'm speaking of the Gameboy
Advance game Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis, which is a recent
release.
ShockFrost
definitely. If I didn't already have such a clear idea of this, I
probably would have included more of these.
But I don't think I will include most of them. Here's why.
#1. Medals vanish when you surface with them. Otherwise it seems too
much like Monster Rancher or Pokemon.
#2. No quests. Too far from the grass roots of having just one goal -
dive deep, grab the cash, get the goodies, nab the Amulet of Yendor.
Quests are fun, but in my opinion they have no respectable place in a
pure roguelike. A plot has no business in a testosterone-based hack
and slash dungeon dive.
#3. The tree is cool but I will base the diversity of available medals
on a better measure of achievement: Depth. Deep divers get the rare
ones, that simple. Sticking to the heart of rogue, you don't get to
just engineer which one you want - it's random. In addition, you have
to fight a special nastie - in particular, a char of the class you are
trying to unlock. :-)
And for heaven's sake--
THANK YOU for reminding me to include the ever-popular ninja class!
(It will probably be a rare tertiary of assassin with talents in
special weapons, er... chains, throwers, poison, stealth, etc..)
If I had left that out, 1/5th of the Rogue players in the world would
be angry at me. Thanks for the reminder
Timo Viitanen
> definitely. If I didn't already have such a clear idea of this, I
> probably would have included more of these.
>
> But I don't think I will include most of them. Here's why.
>
> #1. Medals vanish when you surface with them. Otherwise it seems too
> much like Monster Rancher or Pokemon.
No, the idea was, sort of, that you can only unlock,
at most, all the subclasses of a base class and all
the multi-classes between your current base class and
one other you've played... sort of ;). BTW, have you
played Final Fantasy 5? It had the weirdest and coolest
class system of all times. And it'd be much more like
FF5 than Pokemon - not that they look very different
but...
(Oh, and it had one must-have class you should consider
throwing in : the Mystic Knight. It was sort of a
warrior that could spend a turn enchanting his weapon
with a spell. Say, Fire spell would make it cause
extra fire damage. The enchantment lasts for one battle
only. Very high level ones might be able to make permanent
enchantments.)
> #2. No quests. Too far from the grass roots of having just one goal -
> dive deep, grab the cash, get the goodies, nab the Amulet of Yendor.
> Quests are fun, but in my opinion they have no respectable place in a
> pure roguelike. A plot has no business in a testosterone-based hack
> and slash dungeon dive.
> #3. The tree is cool but I will base the diversity of available medals
> on a better measure of achievement: Depth. Deep divers get the rare
> ones, that simple. Sticking to the heart of rogue, you don't get to
> just engineer which one you want - it's random. In addition, you have
> to fight a special nastie - in particular, a char of the class you are
> trying to unlock. :-)
#2 and #3 would be at least partially solved by the
"quest" being just some appropriately nasty monster
at the depth, possibly with a handful of minions,
special dungeon features and a cool special message.
This would make the medals a bit more "special" than
some rusty crude dagger dropped by a goblin.
And I think it would be cool that if you wanted to
get, say, the Enchanter class you would have to play
a Wizard. If you wanted the ultra-cool Ninja class,
you have to play the pretty difficult Rogue class
and survive very, very deep to get the Grand Master
medal of rogue. You couldn't just get a tough fighter-
type and whack away until you got all the classes,
some planning and strategy would be needed.
Besides, since getting the medals is random, I hope
you've remembered to tame your own pet Evil RNG.
Otherwise we players will be constantly complaining
about how we're on level 666 of the dungeon and only
have unlocked the Chef and the Butler classes. And
something so elemental to the game just plain shouldn't
be totally random, IMHO. Even Nethack has the Book,
Bell, Candelabrum and the Amulet itself in predefined,
guaranteed, trustworthy locations ;). And even in
Rogue the Amulet of Yendor isn't dropped by any
random monster ;).
And the player should have *some* influence to what
classes he gets - otherwise the aforementioned players
will also be complaíning how, after three months of
playing, they still haven't got to try their hands
at a magic-using class :).
> And for heaven's sake--
> THANK YOU for reminding me to include the ever-popular ninja class!
> (It will probably be a rare tertiary of assassin with talents in
> special weapons, er... chains, throwers, poison, stealth, etc..)
Did you look at the cool site? ;)
> If I had left that out, 1/5th of the Rogue players in the world would
> be angry at me. Thanks for the reminder.
Heh... BTW, are there any roguelikes with a Ninja
class? Gimmie gimmie gimmie!
copx
"Timo Viitanen" <timo...@mbnet.fi> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:aosacf$nhq$1...@phys-news1.kolumbus.fi...
[snip]
> Heh... BTW, are there any roguelikes with a Ninja
> class? Gimmie gimmie gimmie!
IIRC Hengband:
http://echizen.s5.xrea.com/heng/eng-hengband/index.html
Rick C
> It's a new game. :) Well... there was Tactics Ogre for the SNES but
> AFAIK it was never translated from Japanese. I'm speaking of the Gameboy
> Advance game Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis, which is a recent
> release.
I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and KoL does
as well. Or you can probably get it on many of the major IRC networks (try
#gba^roms on dalnet). You'll also need a GBA emulator. I'm partial to
VisualBoy Advance, available at vboy.emuhq.com.
Greg McIntyre
> KoL does as well.
Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
speak Japanese.
Daniel Lowenstein
> > I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
> > KoL does as well.
>
> Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
> speak Japanese.
>
D:
Nag, nag nag...
Why don't you lazy people pick up a book and LEARN something!
(It's only Japanese, milions of people have mastered it, how hard can it
be)
>
> --
> Greg McIntyre
> gr...@puyo.cjb.net
> http://puyo.cjb.net
Groetend,
Daniel Lowenstein.
Greg McIntyre
> Why don't you lazy people pick up a book and LEARN something!
> (It's only Japanese, milions of people have mastered it, how hard can
> it be)
I did. Not much, but I did. No need to be so abrasive.
ABCGi NewsMonkey
> > Nag, nag nag...
> > Why don't you lazy people pick up a book and LEARN something!
> > (It's only Japanese, milions of people have mastered it, how hard can
> > it be)
>
> I did. Not much, but I did. No need to be so abrasive.
>
Well I speak a little Japanese! But I can't read it so your right Puyo I
wouldn't get much out of an RPG in Japanese. A shoot-em up sure :-)
ABCGi NewsMonkey
> The pedestal/quest/tree-based unlocking ideas are cool, most
> definitely. If I didn't already have such a clear idea of this, I
> probably would have included more of these.
>
> But I don't think I will include most of them. Here's why.
>
> #1. Medals vanish when you surface with them. Otherwise it seems too
> much like Monster Rancher or Pokemon.
Yes and my ideas about this were too much like a "technology" tree in a RTS
game, I realise now.
>
> #2. No quests. Too far from the grass roots of having just one goal -
> dive deep, grab the cash, get the goodies, nab the Amulet of Yendor.
> Quests are fun, but in my opinion they have no respectable place in a
> pure roguelike. A plot has no business in a testosterone-based hack
> and slash dungeon dive.
Boo hoo :-( What about ADoM? The quests and various dungeons really add to
the variety and scope in that game... but I guess it goes against your
design goal. Oh well.
>
> #3. The tree is cool but I will base the diversity of available medals
> on a better measure of achievement: Depth. Deep divers get the rare
> ones, that simple. Sticking to the heart of rogue, you don't get to
> just engineer which one you want - it's random. In addition, you have
> to fight a special nastie - in particular, a char of the class you are
> trying to unlock. :-)
This is going to be cool, and pretty original.
>
>
> And for heaven's sake--
> THANK YOU for reminding me to include the ever-popular ninja class!
> (It will probably be a rare tertiary of assassin with talents in
> special weapons, er... chains, throwers, poison, stealth, etc..)
>
> If I had left that out, 1/5th of the Rogue players in the world would
> be angry at me. Thanks for the reminder
You know you are right, your way is original so it should be favoured. Go go
go! We're just throwing ideas around, you take what you like (like Ninjas!).
Rick C
news:20021020093454...@puyo.cjb.net...
> > I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
> > KoL does as well.
> Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
> speak Japanese.
KoL was released months ago in an English version. You want rom #432. I
think the SNES game had an English port too.
ABCGi NewsMonkey
> "Greg McIntyre" <gr...@puyo.cjb.net> wrote
> > > I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
> > > KoL does as well.
>
> > Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
> > speak Japanese.
>
> KoL was released months ago in an English version. You want rom #432. I
> think the SNES game had an English port too.
>
Thanks Rick!
Rick C
> "Rick C" <pixe...@hotmail.com> wrote
> > "Greg McIntyre" <gr...@puyo.cjb.net> wrote
> > > > I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
> > > > KoL does as well.
> >
> > > Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
> > > speak Japanese.
> > KoL was released months ago in an English version. You want rom #432.
I
> > think the SNES game had an English port too.
> Thanks Rick!
Welcome. Standard disclaimers apply, of course: if you don't own the ROM
it's illegal to download it. The RIAA will probably send jackbooted thugs
to your house to rip out your CPU if you pirate ROMS, blah blah blah.
ABCGi NewsMonkey
Well the modern reincarnation of the SS aside, the existence of the ROM
means that the game is available in English which is what I was after due to
my brainOS lacking an international language file :-)
ShockFrost
Now this all brings me to the reason why I have been posting all this
data here...
I. I am trying to wrangle up support, a starting player base, and
maybe even some fans. Any cheering I get from the peanut gallery will
help provide the motivation to turn this game from pen and ink into
byte and Zip. So show your support for this game! Give a cheer, a
shout, talk about which class or feature sounds cool or lame and why.
Help keep me focused!
II. I'm going to ask for ideas now, in 3 major categories --
- A. Level generation algorithms. I want to have several-to-many. I
want to take several systems and blend them together. The
algorithm-generating-algorithm will be at the heart of the engine, but
I want cutoffs to hard-set algors that produce predictable-style
levels (example -- In crawl, you can enter the Orcish mines and the
look/feel changes from a cramped chamber/path maze to an open cavern
swarming with orcs. These are the kinds of transitions I want to use.
It is possible that I write an algorithm that loops around itself in a
crazy manner, generating caverns, and one that cuts back and forth
around itself, generating labyrinthian mazes, and a third that uses a
room size/shape style to generate chamber mazes, but I want MORE!!!
(Greedy of me, but the final result is more diversity as you dive, so
pony up those algorithms! In particular, I want algorithms that could
generate special condition rooms, like the Vaults and stores in
NetHack.
- B. MONSTERS. I want ideas for monsters. Post, post, post. Post your
favorite, post 10 at a time, post the Monster Manual for AD&D or YOUR
variation of it. I've been scooping up every monster for every system
from all the Angband variations to Moria, ADOM, NetHack, Dungeon
Crawl, Dungeon Hack, Moraff's World, the original Rogue, iRogue, and
others. BUT IF THERE WAS EVER A MONSTER YOU WANTED TO SEE, AND NEVER
SAW, POINT HIM OUT!
- C. General ideas, code tips, Magic systems [still digging for the
Mage, although I think he will become a generic-energy-expression
style character, like a saiyan from DBZ ;-) ] artifacts, objects,
traps, toys, anything. Bring it to the table so I can tinker with it.
III. There are some things I am *CONSIDERING* doing. I *may* make the
game have a real-time mode. And, I may give the game a tile-based 3D
perspective (I'm talking like Moraff's games here - Revenge, World,
and Unforgiven) But these things would be VERY expensive time-wise,
and also I'm not sure how well they are desired. Some folks feel that
realtime murders the strategy of Rogue, and some hate the look of 3D
levels versus the overhead gaze.
IF this goes real-time (the most likely improvement) it will take a
more detailed agility system...
IF we go tiled, I'll be needin' the 8x8 or 16x16 tiles, and
somebody'll have to draw em'.
And IF we go 3D (**NOT LIKELY WITHOUT MAJOR SUPPORT**) I'm going to
need monster sprites, object sprites, and wall textures. This is where
you netizens come in... If you don't care, or prefer the overhead,
don't bother. Otherwise, declare your support, both in desire AND in
paintbrush! I will need HELP painting all those pretty monsters! And
textures are just as important. 10 types of floor, at least 4 types of
brick, building walls, 10 types of doors - up to 64 or more square
bitmap textures. I don't have specs right now because I haven't spent
my time looking into it but if you're willing to support this, you
NEED TO LET ME KNOW! Be aware that going 3D has a SERIOUS effect on
the feel of the game, plus there are a lot of side considerations like
light effects and such. Going 3D makes it feel more egocentric, but
you can only look in one direction at a time, and you may miss seeing
things on the ground... There are dozens of concerns, like diagonal
viewing/attacking mode, moving diagonal/movement constraints, etc...
So. This is what it comes down to.
I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
Level generation algorithms. Let's hear em'.
Monsters. Big and small. If you want to see it, tell me about it.
And any general ideas.
--
Also, do you REALLY want to see real-time play?
Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective? (If
not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
...Cuz these 3 addons would take a ton of resources, and I won't do
em' unless theres an outcry for em'.
It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and you
DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
Daniel Lowenstein
> shout, talk about which class or feature sounds cool or lame and why.
> Help keep me focused!
>
D:
Hurray!
Go for it!
20 cheers for you!
>
> II. I'm going to ask for ideas now, in 3 major categories --
>
> - A. Level generation algorithms. I want to have several-to-many. I
> want to take several systems and blend them together.
D:
You can use any of mine (cavern style, maze style & room style)
I can create all of those in the .TXT output file format.
(External programs)
> I want MORE!!!
D:
That's the spirit!
> (Greedy of me, but the final result is more diversity as you dive, so
> pony up those algorithms!
D:
You ask we create.
> III. There are some things I am *CONSIDERING* doing. I *may* make the
> game have a real-time mode. And, I may give the game a tile-based 3D
> perspective
D:
I'm currently learning DirectX so by the time you're doing 3D, I'm able
to help.
>
> And IF we go 3D (**NOT LIKELY WITHOUT MAJOR SUPPORT**) I'm going to
> need monster sprites,
D:
Could that be done by "random" sprite generating algorithms?
> I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
>
D:
Cheer!
>
> Level generation algorithms. Let's hear em'.
D:
Get them here:
www.vorkinjelinkeroog.nl/DRAAK
(Don't be affraid to ask for anything more specific)
> Also, do you REALLY want to see real-time play?
>
D:
NO!
> Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
D:
Yes! Magic & Mayhem style! (Part 1 , not 2 (the Art of Magic graphics
don't work))
Groetend,
Daniel Lowenstein.
Timo Viitanen
> Cool.
>
> Now this all brings me to the reason why I have been posting all this
> data here...
>
>
> I. I am trying to wrangle up support, a starting player base, and
> maybe even some fans. Any cheering I get from the peanut gallery will
> help provide the motivation to turn this game from pen and ink into
> byte and Zip. So show your support for this game! Give a cheer, a
> shout, talk about which class or feature sounds cool or lame and why.
> Help keep me focused!
CHEERS! (You'll need them...)
And remember the Mystic Knight class? Good.
And don't cut away Mercenary.
CHEERS!
CHEERS!
> - B. MONSTERS. I want ideas for monsters. Post, post, post. Post your
> favorite, post 10 at a time, post the Monster Manual for AD&D or YOUR
> variation of it. I've been scooping up every monster for every system
> from all the Angband variations to Moria, ADOM, NetHack, Dungeon
> Crawl, Dungeon Hack, Moraff's World, the original Rogue, iRogue, and
> others. BUT IF THERE WAS EVER A MONSTER YOU WANTED TO SEE, AND NEVER
> SAW, POINT HIM OUT!
No good monster ideas... But one thingy that you might
want to have in mind : If you have a monster like Orc,
remember to have Orcish Shamans and Witch Doctors, Orcish
Mercenaries, Orcish Archers, Orchish Chieftains, Orcish
Emperors...
Have several variations of these monsters - Dark Orc,
Hill Orc, Uruk-Hai.
Have groups formed of these monsters that act intelligently,
ambushing and surrounding players
Have special levels, or even whole dungeon branches themed
so that there is a Dark Orc lair, some groups of Dark Orcs
moving about patrolling and some protecting the dark orc lord.
Have monster heroes leading such lairs - for example a mighty
level 8 Orcish Blademaster might be, properly backed up, a far
more interesting foe than a thousand standard orcs.
Oh, and a fun monster idea : the Taarg, a race of enormous,
scorpion-like insects with a slimy, black carapace that is
extremely difficult to breach. They are also known as Berserker
Beetles, battering the hero with four deadly, quick, blade-like
claws while poisoning him with a talon.
The one and only way of safely slaying them seems to be
ranged combat, but it is difficult to slay one before it reaches
the archer, and even more difficult to outrun it afterwards,
weakened by the poison flung by it. And god forbid if two such
beasts catch him amidst them in a corridor...
The only true weakness of the Taarg are the Goern'Taarg,
the queen-mothers of the Berserker Beetles. Without their queens
the Taarkh are reduced into mindless beasts wandering mindlessly
and scarcely fighting back the blows of an adventurer. The Goern'
Taarg control the Taarg with their vast psychic power, guiding
them to optimally use their natural weapons with masterful
tactics.
The Goern'Taarkh themshelves are without the carapace of
their sons and completely immobile, their only abbendages being
their four long, mighty tentacles (a bit like the long worms of
Nethack) that can constrict and rip apart many unlucky adventurers
that survive through their Taarg minions. They are pillars of
quivering flesh and slime, fed by their minions, protected
within pillars of hardened earth created by Taarg, only their
eyes and their tentacles visible outside. But by no means are
they defenseless - first off they are surrounded by a small
moat and hordes of water-breathing Taarg, and second by their
psychic power that slows and weakens all that near it and
third by their mighty magic that can easily obliterate many
adventurers at once.
ShockFrost
ideas, and look what you hand me!
"
the Taarg, a race of enormous,
scorpion-like insects with a slimy, black carapace that is
extremely difficult to breach. They are also known as Berserker
Beetles, battering the hero with four deadly, quick, blade-like
claws while poisoning him with a talon.
"
You then go on to explain how they are parented. This is great!
Certain levels can be filled with this monster (not as invincible as
you make them to be, but out-of-depth by a good manner with high
Armor, they don't avoid getting hit but it's hard to break their
shells...) 4x Attack + Poison. I'll make em' slow, and hide THE QUEEN
on the level somewhere! Kill the queen, and all the beetles become
benign! On a side note, I'd better make this style of zone have
moderately large chambers, so you can successfully avoid the beetles
and go for the queen in some instances. After all, the real objective
of a game is to potentially be able to win, right? And if these
fraggers are going to be out-of-depth difficult, let's make em'
avoidable!
You reminded me of a serious connection: The parent/child relation
between monsters. This will cause a slight alteration to the
blueprint, but not much.
(Maybe if you are lucky, you can sieze an egg from the brood room
after you slay the queen! Having the egg will make the Taarg angry
again, but when it hatches, you get an uber-minion! But, you'll
probably be able to do this with most brood rooms.) A NOTE ON FORMAT:
Brood rooms will contain specific bosses to minor foes littered about
the map.
Hive rooms will contain a massive swarm of said monsters, plus the
boss. There will be virtually little-to-no trace of the monster until
you find the hive (just like a hive of bees - not even there until
it's too late)
Pits will be traps of some sort. After managing to snag yourself into
a monster pit by some disaster (possibly a revolving wall - HAA HAA
HAA!) you find yourself in a moderately large room with a reasonable
number of in-season enemies. Not so tough, but a surprise and also
nowhere to go -- you can't search for the exit to the pit while the
monsters are attacking you, can you?
A lair will be a chamber filled with a type of monster. Said monster
will be barely present throughout the level. There will be many of the
monster, and they may be out of depth(if so, no presence). The classic
'treasure room', there will be goodies to be had in the room itself if
you get past the guard, but in most cases the guard itself will hand
over the lion's share of the treasure.
In keeping with the noble traditions of NetHack, monster Vaults WILL
be created. They will be secret rooms with no connecting visible
tunnels - you will have to find at least 2 secret doors to reach the
vault. It will be a BIG room, and PACKED with mosnters of every shape
and size, liberally out of depth. You have to go looking for trouble
to find a vault, and when you find a vault, you DEFINITELY find
trouble.
Keep it coming.
Greg McIntyre
> SAW, POINT HIM OUT!
Not so much a monster, but I would enjoy it if you had persistant
monsters. Like arch nemeses, which continue to hound our intrepid hero
(and subsequent heroes when he dies). It would bring enormous
satisfaction, destroying the evil mage who had instigated so many plots
against your last three characters. I mean... don't be a bastard to the
player, but give them a few different goals that stretch over games, and
make one of them to do with powerful randomly generated arch enemies.
Imagine the scene: You've created your new character after the last one
died from being caught in a rusty iron bear trap, the trademark of
Garound, the evil master of disguise. Now, your next character is a
ranger with a damn good Detect Traps skill, or a Paladin with a lot of
Detect Evil spells lined up...
:)
Of course, you'd have to somehow ensure that arch enemies were of about
the same or less power as PCs, even if the PC restarts at level 1...
Perhaps if they only start to hound your player when he becomes a
threat. i.e. of equal level. But it would be fun, I reckon!
> Also, do you REALLY want to see real-time play?
I'm not too fussed although if it's real time I like being able to pause
and think. And if you use a text mode, you can't really have
fine-grained movement so you'd want to make it turn-based also.
> Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
I'm not too fussed, although I'd prefer isometric to overhead graphics,
or some sort of Zelda III-ish system to make everything look a little
less flat.
> Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective? (If
> not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
Nah.
If you're worried about keeping focus and momentum on the project, I
certainly wouldn't implement graphics or 3D, and if I did I would do it
incrementally or with placeholder graphics or some such, so as not to
get bogged down with them.
OTOH, having nice graphics can inspire you to keep working on the
project. :)
Greg McIntyre
> > the game have a real-time mode. And, I may give the game a
> > tile-based 3D perspective
>
> D:
> I'm currently learning DirectX so by the time you're doing 3D, I'm
> able to help.
I can write some OpenGL if you really want (and maybe buy me
chocolates). But the bigger problem is creating the sprites and textures
(or finding them).
> > And IF we go 3D (**NOT LIKELY WITHOUT MAJOR SUPPORT**) I'm going to
> > need monster sprites,
>
> D:
> Could that be done by "random" sprite generating algorithms?
Not easily and from my experience usually not to good effect. :)
ABCGi
news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com:
> I. I am trying to wrangle up support, a starting player base, and
> maybe even some fans. Any cheering I get from the peanut gallery will
> help provide the motivation to turn this game from pen and ink into
> byte and Zip. So show your support for this game! Give a cheer, a
> shout, talk about which class or feature sounds cool or lame and why.
> Help keep me focused!
HOOO-RAH!
> pony up those algorithms! In particular, I want algorithms that could
> generate special condition rooms, like the Vaults and stores in
> NetHack.
Theme rooms that while still random operate on certain parameters. A throne
room has pillars along each side of its length, and a throne at one end (red
carpet?). A dining hall is roughly rectangular with a lengthy dining table in
its centre. A store room that has barrels against its walls and can not be
too large. A cell room with a porticulus for its only door and shackles on
one part of the wall.
>
> - B. MONSTERS. I want ideas for monsters. Post, post, post. Post your
Earth Serpents led by the gigantic earth serpent named "Python" from Greek
myth. These serpents can travel underground (but not under or through walls
like a Xorn) and pup up again through gaps in the floor and attack in the
same round, giving you one subsequent round to attack back before they go
back under. When two adult Earth Serpents meet underground they spawn a baby
Earth Serpent (a baby becomes adult upon its first feeding - ie a hit against
something). Ancient Earth Serpents have the ability to attract the player to
their location by mimicking a favourable sound ("you hear coins falling on
water"). Eating them is poisonious but if the player survives it grants some
benefit as befits game balance.
> IF we go tiled, I'll be needin' the 8x8 or 16x16 tiles, and
> somebody'll have to draw em'.
There are some sources on the Net I have seen that provide free tile sets for
free which could then be modified.
>
> And IF we go 3D (**NOT LIKELY WITHOUT MAJOR SUPPORT**) I'm going to
DirectX could be used to make a very pretty game whilst still only using the
2D stuff. This sort of stuff is going to make your game pretty platform
specific though.
>
> I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
>
HOO-RAH! again 8)
> --
> Also, do you REALLY want to see real-time play?
Nope.
>
> Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
Yes please.
>
> Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective? (If
> not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
Nope it was a sad day when the early AD&D Gold Edition games (Secret of the
Silver Blades etc) went to first person.
Good fortune!
R. Alan Monroe
>game have a real-time mode. And, I may give the game a tile-based 3D
>perspective (I'm talking like Moraff's games here - Revenge, World,
>and Unforgiven)
Do this and I'll play it. Cheesy as it is, I think Moraff's World has
a very "fun" feeling.
I couldn't get Revenge to run on any of my PCs though.
Alan
R. Alan Monroe
>you get past the guard, but in most cases the guard itself will hand
>over the lion's share of the treasure.
This gives me an idea. I don't remember seeing this in any existing
games. What about an option to hold enemies at knifepoint and order
them around, without actually attacking them? For pacifist players, or
players with a religious system that frowns on killing.
Alan
R. Alan Monroe
>SAW, POINT HIM OUT!
In cultivated forest areas you could have Log Golems. A jointed
creature with small, sturdy sawn log pieces for body & limbs. I bet
there are loads of natural materials you could animate as Golems,
other than the traditional stone.
Alan
copx
"ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com...
> Cool.
>
> Now this all brings me to the reason why I have been posting all this
> data here...
>
>
> I. I am trying to wrangle up support, a starting player base, and
> maybe even some fans. Any cheering I get from the peanut gallery will
> help provide the motivation to turn this game from pen and ink into
> byte and Zip. So show your support for this game! Give a cheer, a
> shout, talk about which class or feature sounds cool or lame and why.
> Help keep me focused!
Relying on "cheering" from other people for motivation
is a bad idea: you will fail.
A more solid base for a hobby project like this would
be the 'I am the target market' paradigm. Code for yourself,
code because YOU WANT to play that game.
> II. I'm going to ask for ideas now, in 3 major categories --
>
> - A. Level generation algorithms. I want to have several-to-many. I
> want to take several systems and blend them together. The
> algorithm-generating-algorithm will be at the heart of the engine, but
> I want cutoffs to hard-set algors that produce predictable-style
> levels (example -- In crawl, you can enter the Orcish mines and the
> look/feel changes from a cramped chamber/path maze to an open cavern
> swarming with orcs. These are the kinds of transitions I want to use.
>
> It is possible that I write an algorithm that loops around itself in a
> crazy manner, generating caverns, and one that cuts back and forth
> around itself, generating labyrinthian mazes, and a third that uses a
> room size/shape style to generate chamber mazes, but I want MORE!!!
> (Greedy of me, but the final result is more diversity as you dive, so
> pony up those algorithms! In particular, I want algorithms that could
> generate special condition rooms, like the Vaults and stores in
> NetHack.
Another good paradigm for RL development would be:
"Start small, grow tall" - you should not waste your time with
dozens of complex algorithms at the start. Start with a small core
that can be finished fast then plug-in feature after feature (over the years).
> - B. MONSTERS. I want ideas for monsters. Post, post, post. Post your
> favorite, post 10 at a time, post the Monster Manual for AD&D or YOUR
> variation of it. I've been scooping up every monster for every system
> from all the Angband variations to Moria, ADOM, NetHack, Dungeon
> Crawl, Dungeon Hack, Moraff's World, the original Rogue, iRogue, and
> others. BUT IF THERE WAS EVER A MONSTER YOU WANTED TO SEE, AND NEVER
> SAW, POINT HIM OUT!
What about: ('r') Yet another failed RL project
Again don't rely on support from other people.
It won't work.
Hell no.
> Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
I prefer ASCII.
> Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective? (If
> not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
Hell no. You know this isn't quake.development it's
roguelike.development (the funny little ASCII turnbased
dungeon crawlers). I may sound orthodox but without
some criteria of what a roguelike is we could call
every game on the market a RL. 1st-person 3D realtime
monster killing: that's quake and has nothing todo with
the RL genre at all.
> ...Cuz these 3 addons would take a ton of resources, and I won't do
> em' unless theres an outcry for em'.
> It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and you
> DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
I like your ideas, they're novel/creative and I would
like to play such a game but as said before: If you don't
change your way of thinking the project will never
get anywhere. Just like 99,9999999... % of all other
RLs.
HTH
Hansjörg Malthaner
>>Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
>
> I'm not too fussed, although I'd prefer isometric to overhead graphics,
> or some sort of Zelda III-ish system to make everything look a little
> less flat.
>
>>Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective? (If
>>not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
>
> Nah.
>
> If you're worried about keeping focus and momentum on the project, I
> certainly wouldn't implement graphics or 3D, and if I did I would do it
> incrementally or with placeholder graphics or some such, so as not to
> get bogged down with them.
>
> OTOH, having nice graphics can inspire you to keep working on the
> project. :)
That's true.
Due to my experience with H-World, I can tell that non-animated
isometric graphics of good quality take up at least 50% of development
time. I asssume any kind of tiled graphics will be very similar.
IMO 3D graphics will take more time, but there are people who keep
telling me that it will save time in the long run. I'm not sure.
A real life example:
When R. Dan Henry posted his messages about spaceships in a RL, I
started to design a 'space ship' level. The coding to create the level
itself (level generator) was done in 3 hours. But the graphics (ship
walls, floors, lights, computers, screens, ship aggregates like drive,
sensors, weapons), well I've already invested about 10 hours and so far
I only have the walls, some lights, a bad looking computer, and one
aggregate type for the ships engine.
Just painting the single engine aggregate took 1,5 hours, and it still
needs improvement. As do most of the other things. I had plans for 16
different aggregate types, even if the following will be easier than the
first one, I assume I need at least another 10 hours for painting them.
If you plan to go for good graphics, there will be a stage where time
for painting exceeds time for coding.
Finding good artists tends to be difficult.
At times I'm really jelous of the ASCII projects, where new features can
be added within minutes. A new item for H-World/The Jungle requires
three images (lying on the floor, in inventory, held by the player) and
thus I rarely get below one hour of painting for a new item. But I like
graphics so generally I don't complain - I write this just to let you
know that even a graphics fetishist sees the advantages of ASCII display.
Coming back to FPS view. I don't think this kind of display is good for
a RL game. OTOH if you have 3D routines, you can position the camera as
well above as you can position it for FPS display, so you get both
options with nearly the same code. But you'll need to take care that
your level layout is suitable for both displays.
--
Hajo
http://h-world.simugraph.com
ABCGi
Being a programmer who is definately *not* an artist here's how I hoped
my project would go...
I release game with crappy graphics that I could do quickly or get for
free somewhere. Have easy system for users to replace graphics with
their own. Users send me in their creations and they are added to next
release. Ah the dreams of us optimists!
Hansjörg Malthaner
[Time consuming creation of GFX]
> Being a programmer who is definately *not* an artist here's how I hoped
> my project would go...
>
> I release game with crappy graphics that I could do quickly or get for
> free somewhere. Have easy system for users to replace graphics with
> their own. Users send me in their creations and they are added to next
> release. Ah the dreams of us optimists!
No, it works. I did that before.
But it seems to require:
1) The project must be mature enough that players trust in its success.
2) At least some high quality GFX to show what is possible. Some eye
catchers.
But expect to get many replies like "this game suxxx" and only
a few % will offer serious help. At times this can be frustrating -
the people will blame you for the bad graphics most of the time
instead of helping.
Some say, going open source will help to attract helpers more easily.
I'm not sure if this is true. I found helpers for closed source projects
too - IMO it depends on the project itself, and not on the availability
of the source. If the project is interesting people will ask if they can
join.
You started Beyond in 1998. I've started coding Simutrans in 1997. Until
late 1999 I had coded the core and drawn about 500 tiles by myself
(compared to H-World, very bad quality. I was just lerning how to
paint). Then after a long time of searching for help, I found the first
helpers who created good tiles. Since then the group of helper raised,
and finally some really skilled people jumped in.
I'm not sure how far Beyond coding is done. Expect a long time whithout
help, but if the project is good, at some point people will even ask you
if they may help.
For H-World, surprisingly I got an offer for help quite early (roughly
after 1 year of development), but my helper lost his job quite soon
after that and now has more serious troubles than helping with H-World.
c.u.
Hajo
NN
Hi
/me cheers
/me offers to help with coding / testing /debugging
DON'T do realtime at the expense of turn based. If you do both, fine, if you
sacrifice turn based I think you'll lose a lot of players.
I would like to see random generated quests. e.g
1: Retiered rouge character (that started thieves guild) offers reward for
you to break into prison (run by retiered fighter character) you to break
out other (retired) rouge character.
2: Retired fighter/mage turned blacksmith will make powerful magic sword if
you can get him the (rare) materials needed to make two.
3: Mayor offer reward for recovery of item stolen from his mansion (found in
dungeons under thieves guild)
4: Mayor wants you to steal a possesion of female retired character
(valkyrie?) so that he can 'find' it. If you succeed town is rearranged and
mayor and his new wife live together
mail me: n_vaskinn at (!cold)mail dot (company)
ABCGi
> ABCGi schrieb:
>> Hansjörg Malthaner <hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote in
>> news:3DB50788...@danet.de:
>
> [Time consuming creation of GFX]
>
>> Being a programmer who is definitely *not* an artist here's how I
>> hoped my project would go...
>>
>> I release game with crappy graphics that I could do quickly or get
>> for free somewhere. Have easy system for users to replace graphics
>> with their own. Users send me in their creations and they are added
>> to next release. Ah the dreams of us optimists!
>
> No, it works. I did that before.
>
> But it seems to require:
>
> 1) The project must be mature enough that players trust in its
> success. 2) At least some high quality GFX to show what is possible.
> Some eye catchers.
I was thinking of this is regard to other areas. A reasonably generic
system with editors that read XML text files. I implement enough
different examples to test the genericity of the system but only a small
number of the proposed options. Then users edit and add their own and
they can be sent to me for inclusion in the next release.
An example is monsters. Using my editor I create a flying monster, a
burrowing monster, a vampiric monster, a spawning monster etc. you know
all the things to make sure my system can handle lots of the typical
ideas. And as you say if I could get a couple of my graphic artist
friends to make them *look* really good it would help take up of the
game. Then players see how these monsters are created and add their own
using my editor.
There is lots of leg work there (creating editors is a total additional
workload) but my initial testing shows this isn't *as* technically hard
as I thought it would be... time will tell I guess.
>
> But expect to get many replies like "this game suxxx" and only
> a few % will offer serious help. At times this can be frustrating -
> the people will blame you for the bad graphics most of the time
> instead of helping.
I hate those replies :-(
> Some say, going open source will help to attract helpers more easily.
> I'm not sure if this is true. I found helpers for closed source
> projects too - IMO it depends on the project itself, and not on the
> availability of the source. If the project is interesting people will
> ask if they can join.
Me thinks you are correct.
> You started Beyond in 1998. I've started coding Simutrans in 1997.
> Until late 1999 I had coded the core and drawn about 500 tiles by
> myself (compared to H-World, very bad quality. I was just learning how
> to paint). Then after a long time of searching for help, I found the
> first helpers who created good tiles. Since then the group of helper
> raised, and finally some really skilled people jumped in.
That's correct - four long years... Back in, hmmm pre-2000 I had written
the core of an ASCII RogueLike much like ADoM (nowhere near as good) but
it went the way of the dodo (for a contract job where I got ripped off!
doh!)
> I'm not sure how far Beyond coding is done. Expect a long time
> without help, but if the project is good, at some point people will
> even ask you if they may help.
Coding has started again from scratch recently, so not very far, I'm
being a bit more sophisticated in my approach these days than 1998 so
one could argue I'm being too ambitious :-) If I become YAUR (Yet
Another Unfinished Rouge Like) I will still of enjoyed it as a hobby.
What I'm coding at the moment are: landscape generation, combat, and a
test of group AI. Also playing with that random river generation
question someone posted earlier. Of course I am busy with other things
like running a small software and consulting company :-)
> For H-World, surprisingly I got an offer for help quite early (roughly
> after 1 year of development), but my helper lost his job quite soon
> after that and now has more serious troubles than helping with
> H-World.
H-World looks really professional, I'm not surprised ppl were impressed
and wanted to help out :-) I was really impressed by the landscape stuff
on your site and by Greg's lighting code for Shade (if I'm remembering
correctly!)
Thanks for all your advice :-) I really admire the people here who have
released their projects (both for the amount of work it takes and the
guts).
Timo Viitanen
Umm... forgot some stuff. First off, these monsters dwell fairly
deep in the dungeon and rarely stray away from their queen-mothers.
The part of the dungeon they frequently inhabit is easily discernable
from the rest of the dungeon - walls covered in green slime or
something. Don't take away the lethal speed, just the armor? Please?
Also, why it's worth it raiding one of these easily avoidable nests :
The bodies of the Taarg. The blood of a Taarg combined with that of a
Goern'Taarg is a very powerful explosive and a mighty weapon in the
hands of even an unskilled alchemist. And the blade-claws of the Taarg
can be hardened and smithed to craft a Claw Sword, a potent weapon
that can, due to a trait of the material that is nearly impossible to
reproduce, rip through most forms of armour, natural or crafted, with
frightening ease. A very good midgame weapon when properly enchanced
through magic.
Hmm... a new monster idea... hmm... Here :
The three fabled Shadowlords, who according to a myth
are feared even by the lords of the Nether Realms, the
Underworld, inhabit the deepest reaches of the world.
Their presence holds those not pure of heart in their
sway, and paralyzes others with fear. Their gaze as well
as their touch is deadly, for they rend the life of their
victims from their very bodies, leaving them lifeless
shells. And their magic is strong indeed : relentlessly
they wield it against those who dare oppose them.
As the world was still young, these sovereigns of the
eternal night waged war against the gods themshelves and
only by the command of the Shaper, the father of the gods,
could they be defeated. Thus were they sealed to the
dephts of the world, so that only by the invocation of
their names - Astaroth, Nosfentor, Faulinei - could they
leave their eternal abode. (Cheers to the one who knows
where i stole the names from :).
And a bit less powerful monster, but still powerful,
idea :
The Slayers are alien and powerful beings about which
even demons tread carefully. Where the demons are men,
Slayers are beasts, too wild for even the lords of
inferno to command or control and thus driven away from
them, far into the Planar Flux past the Ethereal Plane
where only they can survive.
Only by a carefully prepared spell of grand power,
wielded by a will strong enough to surpass the barriers
that keep the Slayers at bay, can one be pulled from
the Flux. Only insane or suicidial magi have ever used
the spell in question, and even then only as a last
resort. Thus, most of the properties of the Slayers are
shrouded in mystery - magi who summon them rarely live
long enough to describe them to anyone. On the bright
side, the foes of the caster are usually slain with
him.
It is commonly held that the Slayers can, at will,
summon the power of the Sunfire to burst out and assault
its victims, an ability most formidable. If there is a
limit to the usage of this ability, none have survived
to see it. This power can be channeled either to burst¨
to all directions from the Slayer's horrid form or to
be breathed from it as a cone. Its tentacles can quickly
fill a medium-sized room and constrict and crush all
therein. While all its foes are held by them, it assaults
them with its deadly claws that slay with touch. End of
story.
This monster is never encountered randomly. It must
be summoned by another monster - which causes it to go
on a killing spree - or the player himself.
Kornel "Anubis" Kisielewicz
news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com...
> Cool.
>
> So. This is what it comes down to.
>
> I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
Go to a college, riding a '86 roadster. :)
> Level generation algorithms. Let's hear em'.
http://roguelikedevelopment.org
> Monsters. Big and small. If you want to see it, tell me about it.
AD&D Monster Manual. To much wierdo stuff makes my brains blow out.
> And any general ideas.
Cool down (see below).
> --
> Also, do you REALLY want to see real-time play?
No.
> Or REALLY want to see tiled graphics?
No.
> Or REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see it in 1st person perspective?
(If
> not REALLY, then there's no way I'll be bothered with this.)
No.
> It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and you
> DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
Ok, this thing will die, and I wont feel guilty. Ok, lets be
serious -- UNLESS you :
a) already made another roguelike game
b) made "x" rewrites on your current game (where x > 4)
c) you're a true proffesional programmer
d) you're a proffesional game programmer
... then there's a "long and winding raod" ahead you. I remember... it
was 1992 AFAIR, when I first started collecting support for my game...
I wrote with the same enthusiasm as you, and had gazillions of
ideas... Up to date I made a few failed projects, and 8 rewrites of my
main project. It all died. So did my enthusiasm...But now I'm older,
more experienced, and a little more pragmatic. For I know I made a big
mistake in the begining. The mistake would have been avoided if only I
would listen to that f***** maxim: "Start small... then you can think
about the bigger things..."
And that's my advice to you. If you're smart, you'll understand, and
maybe make a true roguelike. If not... hell... you'll end up as many
of us here.
regards,
--
Kornel "Anubis" Kisielewicz
RLDev Code v.0.6
L:FP E+ T+ R+++ P+ D++ G++ RL-- RLA+++ F:Omega
GenRogue 0.18 V2 ( http://genrogue.felis7.civ.pl/ )
W:DF Q+++ AI++ !GFX !SFX RN+++ PO--- Hp-- Re+++ S+++
R. Alan Monroe
<hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>IMO 3D graphics will take more time, but there are people who keep
>telling me that it will save time in the long run. I'm not sure.
>...
>be added within minutes. A new item for H-World/The Jungle requires
>three images (lying on the floor, in inventory, held by the player) and
If you need multiple images or views of an object, it seems pretty
sensible to use 3d. Of course 3d modelling can be just as time
consuming as painting...
Alan
Michael Blackney
>
> Uzytkownik "ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> napisal w wiadomosci
> news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com...
>
> > DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
>
> Ok, this thing will die, and I wont feel guilty.
You step onto a polymorph trap! You feel a change coming over you! -More-
You feel like Amy Wang!
Isaac Kuo
What about a "mixed" ASCII/Graphics system? By this, I mean
mixing ASCII tiles and graphical icon tiles in the same display.
This way, a new item or monster can be added right away using an
ASCII character or canonical icon, to be replaced later with nicer
graphics (maybe).
For my project, I've decided I can't be bothered with worrying
about the tile graphics much, but will go with something more
abstract. I want players to be able to take full advantage of
their range 15 view radius (31x31 tiles for a scrolling view,
more for a semi-scrolling view). That means small tiles, which
means either tiny little barely recognizable pixel smudges or
more abstract easily readable symbols.
Those symbols don't necessarily mean just ASCII characters, but
also easy to recognize icons.
--
_____ Isaac Kuo mec...@yahoo.com
__|_>o<_|__
/___________\ The most important way to defend one's nation
\=\>-----</=/ is to make it worth defending. - a true patriot
Rick C
> Well the modern reincarnation of the SS aside, the existence of the ROM
> means that the game is available in English
Heh. Well, not exactly...
Brendan Sechter
>> I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
>> KoL does as well.
>
> Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
> speak Japanese.
The Playstation Tactics Ogre is the same game. AFAIK it has been
translated. Good stuff. Also look at Ogre Battle, and Final Fantasy
Tactics. (Also made by quest. Square had input into FFT.)
-Brendan
Hansjörg Malthaner
> In article <urbs761...@corp.supernews.com>,
> R. Alan Monroe <amon...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>In article <3DB50788...@danet.de>, =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Hansj=F6rg_Malthaner?=
>><hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>
>
>>>IMO 3D graphics will take more time, but there are people who keep
>>>telling me that it will save time in the long run. I'm not sure.
>>>...
>>>be added within minutes. A new item for H-World/The Jungle requires
>>>three images (lying on the floor, in inventory, held by the player) and
>>
>
>>If you need multiple images or views of an object, it seems pretty
>>sensible to use 3d. Of course 3d modelling can be just as time
>>consuming as painting...
>
>
> What about a "mixed" ASCII/Graphics system? By this, I mean
> mixing ASCII tiles and graphical icon tiles in the same display.
> This way, a new item or monster can be added right away using an
> ASCII character or canonical icon, to be replaced later with nicer
> graphics (maybe).
I *want* graphics. Otherwise I wouldn't spend so much time on them.
> For my project, I've decided I can't be bothered with worrying
> about the tile graphics much, but will go with something more
> abstract.
That's fine, but one of the reasons that made me start H_World was the
lack of nice display for most RL games.
> I want players to be able to take full advantage of
> their range 15 view radius (31x31 tiles for a scrolling view,
> more for a semi-scrolling view). That means small tiles, which
> means either tiny little barely recognizable pixel smudges or
> more abstract easily readable symbols.
Do you really think H_World has 'smudgy pixels' ?
http://h-world.simugraph.com
Take a look at the screnshot section.
The displayed area is quite large, larger than 15 sqaures along the
major axes (screen diagonals, it's isometric view). Despite of that I
think the graphics are pretty detailed.
> Those symbols don't necessarily mean just ASCII characters, but
> also easy to recognize icons.
Please take a look at H-World. If you still think my graphics are
unrecognizeable, please tell me.
IMO what you say is just aprejuduce of the ASCII people. Graphics can be
nice and reconizeable.
c.u.
Hajo
Brendan Sechter
> Greg McIntyre wrote:
>
>> > I'm sure the SNES game has a ROM easily available on the web, and
>> > KoL does as well.
>>
>> Yes but it doesn't help in the case of the SNES game if you don't
>> speak Japanese.
>>
>
> Nag, nag nag...
> Why don't you lazy people pick up a book and LEARN something!
> (It's only Japanese, milions of people have mastered it, how hard can it
> be)
Book? Bah! Learn the basic basics from a book, but immersion is the
only way to really learn a language. BTW, would anyone be interested in
a bi-lingual rougelike (Japanese/English) with literature to go with it?
-Brendan
R. Alan Monroe
>>If you need multiple images or views of an object, it seems pretty
>>sensible to use 3d. Of course 3d modelling can be just as time
>>consuming as painting...
>
>What about a "mixed" ASCII/Graphics system? By this, I mean
>mixing ASCII tiles and graphical icon tiles in the same display.
>This way, a new item or monster can be added right away using an
>ASCII character or canonical icon, to be replaced later with nicer
>graphics (maybe).
>
>For my project, I've decided I can't be bothered with worrying
>about the tile graphics much, but will go with something more
>abstract. I want players to be able to take full advantage of
>their range 15 view radius (31x31 tiles for a scrolling view,
>more for a semi-scrolling view). That means small tiles, which
>means either tiny little barely recognizable pixel smudges or
>more abstract easily readable symbols.
>
>Those symbols don't necessarily mean just ASCII characters, but
>also easy to recognize icons.
Here's an idea. How about a Roguelike font created with a program like
Fontographer? This would give you (if you had the patience to draw
them) hundreds of symbols, that could be displayed at any size, and
it's cross-platform too!
The only downside is that each character would be a single color. But
if you're going for abstract symbols, that would be OK, I think. Oh,
and it would be best suited to top-down view, so isometric games like
h-world might not be able to use it as easily.
Alan
Isaac Kuo
=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Hansj=F6rg_Malthaner?=
<hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>Isaac Kuo schrieb:
>> I want players to be able to take full advantage of
>> their range 15 view radius (31x31 tiles for a scrolling view,
>> more for a semi-scrolling view). That means small tiles, which
>> means either tiny little barely recognizable pixel smudges or
>> more abstract easily readable symbols.
>Do you really think H_World has 'smudgy pixels' ?
>http://h-world.simugraph.com
>Take a look at the screnshot section.
>The displayed area is quite large, larger than 15 sqaures along the
>major axes (screen diagonals, it's isometric view). Despite of that I
>think the graphics are pretty detailed.
I don't consider that a large view area. It shows 1/8 as many tiles
as what I'm going for!
Also, I start with the base assumption of a non-fullscreen window
on a 15" monitor (perhaps 700x500 out of 800x600 pixels). Along
with the 31 tile height, That is what implies little 8 pixel tall
pixel smudges.
Hansjörg Malthaner
[...]
> Here's an idea. How about a Roguelike font created with a program like
> Fontographer? This would give you (if you had the patience to draw
> them) hundreds of symbols, that could be displayed at any size, and
> it's cross-platform too!
I've suggested this some time ago, too. I'm not sure if anyone actually
used this appraoch since then.
I plan to use custom fonts for some things like spell symbols or runes.
> The only downside is that each character would be a single color.
Well, two solutions:
- use your own renderer and your own font format.
- create character overlays.
With 'character overlays' I mean, instead of one multi-color character,
create sevaral monochromatic and paint them all over onto the same spot.
In total they appear as multi-color symbol.
> But
> if you're going for abstract symbols, that would be OK, I think. Oh,
> and it would be best suited to top-down view, so isometric games like
> h-world might not be able to use it as easily.
Maybe not so much for the main map, but other parts of the user
interface can benefit. IMO custom fonst allow quite some variety while
being very abstract - but it's no longer the symbolic idea of RL display
"k = kobold", but an idea of shape abstraction.
> Alan
c.u.
Hajo
Hansjörg Malthaner
> In article <3DB64CB2...@danet.de>,
> =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Hansj=F6rg_Malthaner?=
> <hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>>The displayed area is quite large, larger than 15 sqaures along the
>>major axes (screen diagonals, it's isometric view). Despite of that I
>>think the graphics are pretty detailed.
>
> I don't consider that a large view area. It shows 1/8 as many tiles
> as what I'm going for!
I guess different games have different needs. For H-World/The Jungle the
currently displayed area is even a little too big.
> Also, I start with the base assumption of a non-fullscreen window
> on a 15" monitor (perhaps 700x500 out of 800x600 pixels).
I assume, when my project comes to a playable stage, 1280x1024 will be
common. Then the current 800x600 window will appear rather small on the
desktop.
> Along
> with the 31 tile height, That is what implies little 8 pixel tall
> pixel smudges.
Then I'd really discourage the use of graphics.
H-World tiles are isometric. The base is a diamond shape with a bounding
box of 36x18 pixels. The max height is 64 pixels. This allows pretty
nice detailed graphics. Isometric display is 45 degress rotated against
the screen axes. Along the screen diagonal 32 tiles fit.
32x32 tiles isn't bad, in one dimension it's still 25% more than the
usual 80x24, and the tiles are pretty large, effectively 32x64 pixles.
But now we are in the old "ASCII is better than GFX - no its not!!!"
fight. I'll stop arguing here. My decision to use graphics is mostly
fixed, and I still very happy with H-World.
c.u.
Hajo
Joseph Hewitt
> Uzytkownik "ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> napisal w wiadomosci
> news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com...
> >
> > I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
> > It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and you
> > DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
>
> Ok, this thing will die, and I wont feel guilty. Ok, lets be
> serious --
> there's a "long and winding raod" ahead you.
Anubis has a lot of good advice, and if anyone on this newsgroup knows
about overly complex projects which never get finished it's him
(sorry, man :). When I see people trying to drum up publicity for a
game which doesn't even have any code written yet, or who have an
entire manual for their game but no demo, this sets off a little
warning buzzer in the back of my head. I call it my "Amy Wang Alarm".
On the one hand I don't want to seem discouraging. ShockFrost, ABCGi
NewsMonkey, et al have some good ideas and I'd like to see their games
implemented. On the other hand I feel like handing out all kinds of
discouraging advice. Don't rely upon features that you can't clearly
visualize, don't plan so much at the start that you'll never be able
to finish it, don't add complicated ideas to your game if you don't
even have the simple things done yet, don't put the cart before the
horse, don't count your chickens before they hatch, and for crying out
loud don't put your cart before your chickens before they hatch.
That's the biggest mistake of all.
> "Start small... then you can think
> about the bigger things..."
This is how GearHead, DeadCold, Realm of Sendai, T-CoD, and most of
the other games/programs I've written through the years were
constructed:
Try to get the bare framework for you game running as quickly and
simply as you can. Just include "@" walking around in a random field
of "."s and "#"s. Add elements to your game one by one- random map
generators, items, creatures, NPCs, quests, and so on. As long as you
know in advance how the game will be structured you should be able to
do this without too much trouble. Once you have the basic mechanics in
place you'll be able to start on the really fancy features you have in
mind.
- Joseph Hewitt
--
DeadCold > http://www.geocities.com/pyrrho12/programming/deadcold/index.html
GearHead > http://www.geocities.com/pyrrho12/programming/gearhead/index.html
Joseph Hewitt
> Book? Bah! Learn the basic basics from a book, but immersion is the
> only way to really learn a language. BTW, would anyone be interested in
> a bi-lingual rougelike (Japanese/English) with literature to go with it?
GearHead may someday be avaliable in Korean, if Eunsuk gets off her
arse and I can find a good FPC unit for printing international fonts
in SDL...
Hansjörg Malthaner
> Hansjörg Malthaner <hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote in
> news:3DB518AE...@danet.de:
>
>>ABCGi schrieb:
>>
>>>Hansjörg Malthaner <hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote in
>>>news:3DB50788...@danet.de:
>>
>>[Time consuming creation of GFX]
>>
>>>Being a programmer who is definitely *not* an artist here's how I
>>>hoped my project would go...
>>>
>>>I release game with crappy graphics that I could do quickly or get
>>>for free somewhere. Have easy system for users to replace graphics
>>>with their own. Users send me in their creations and they are added
>>>to next release. Ah the dreams of us optimists!
>>
>>No, it works. I did that before.
>>
>>But it seems to require:
>>
>>1) The project must be mature enough that players trust in its
>>success. 2) At least some high quality GFX to show what is possible.
>>Some eye catchers.
>
> I was thinking of this is regard to other areas. A reasonably generic
> system with editors that read XML text files.
[...]
> There is lots of leg work there (creating editors is a total additional
> workload) but my initial testing shows this isn't *as* technically hard
> as I thought it would be... time will tell I guess.
I use plain text files. IMO they work well, even without the need to
write any fancy editors.
There is a story, it is told in different versions. Briefly:
Americans and russians in the 1960s noticed the problem that astronauts
and kosmonauts need to write notes in zero gravity environment. The
american put much time and money into the development of a zero-g low
pressure workable ball pen. The russians used pencils.
Finally both solutions worked - the difference is that the pencil was
readily available at low cost.
I mean, if you know several solutions, use the simplest that will work
without problems, but nothing simpler. If XML requires you to write an
editor, but a text file does the same with a readily available text
editor, I'd choose plain text. OTOH if your data is complex and plain
text cannot hold it properly, then XML is the right choice.
>>I'm not sure how far Beyond coding is done. Expect a long time
>>without help, but if the project is good, at some point people will
>>even ask you if they may help.
>
> Coding has started again from scratch recently, so not very far, I'm
> being a bit more sophisticated in my approach these days than 1998 so
> one could argue I'm being too ambitious :-) If I become YAUR (Yet
> Another Unfinished Rouge Like) I will still of enjoyed it as a hobby.
This is the approach that is said to have the highest survival rate. As
long as you have fun doing it, you have motivation. Projects that from
start rely on the help/feedback of others will fail much more often. I
know, I have some failed projects on my history. You must be convinced
that you can get it through. If you are convinced and show endurance,
sooner or later other will join - they join because your endurance gives
them certainity that their work is not just for nothing.
> What I'm coding at the moment are: landscape generation, combat, and a
> test of group AI. Also playing with that random river generation
> question someone posted earlier.
I think I know that someone very well ... :)
Let me know if you succeed, and under which constraints your solution
will be useable.
> Of course I am busy with other things
> like running a small software and consulting company :-)
Well, be happy that your company still survives :)
I'm not sure how it is in your place of the world, but here in germany
many small IT companies closed during the last 12 months.
>>For H-World, surprisingly I got an offer for help quite early (roughly
>>after 1 year of development), but my helper lost his job quite soon
>>after that and now has more serious troubles than helping with
>>H-World.
>
> H-World looks really professional, I'm not surprised ppl were impressed
> and wanted to help out :-)
The experience finally pays off. But still development is very slow. C++
isn't a languge that allows fast development, and it's much too easy to
make mistakes.
> I was really impressed by the landscape stuff
> on your site and by Greg's lighting code for Shade (if I'm remembering
> correctly!)
I think the landscape stuff must be from somewhere else.
> Thanks for all your advice :-) I really admire the people here who have
> released their projects (both for the amount of work it takes and the
> guts).
It depends on your mind, some like to show off their achievements,
others like to work in their hidden chamber. Anbis' GenRogue project is
such a myth-woven never seen project :)
I think I'm doing a bit too much advertisement for H-World lately.
c.u.
Hajo
JMH
<hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>There is a story, it is told in different versions. Briefly:
>
>Americans and russians in the 1960s noticed the problem that astronauts
>and kosmonauts need to write notes in zero gravity environment. The
>american put much time and money into the development of a zero-g low
>pressure workable ball pen. The russians used pencils.
>
>Finally both solutions worked - the difference is that the pencil was
>readily available at low cost.
>
This story is bull, by the way.
http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.htm
Isaac Kuo
>Isaac Kuo schrieb:
>>Also, I start with the base assumption of a non-fullscreen window
>>on a 15" monitor (perhaps 700x500 out of 800x600 pixels).
>>Along with the 31 tile height, That is what implies little 8 pixel
>>tall pixel smudges.
>Then I'd really discourage the use of graphics.
I screwed up my math. It's actually 16 pixels tall, not 8. Anyway
my first experiences with graphical Roguelikes used 8x8 tiles on a
640x200 display (Amiga Nethack, Amiga Moria). Those left a negative
impression on me. 16x16 pixels is much better, but on a 1280x1024
display 16x16 tiles are too tiny for much detail.
But I think the issue of screen space is just as important as pixel
count. I'm not thinking of my game as something to take over the
desktop, but rather something to tuck away in a term window. It
should be playable at 640x480 (i.e. a computer attached to a TV),
and tuck-into-the-corner-able at 1280x1024.
>H-World tiles are isometric. The base is a diamond shape with a bounding
>box of 36x18 pixels. The max height is 64 pixels. This allows pretty
>nice detailed graphics. Isometric display is 45 degress rotated against
>the screen axes. Along the screen diagonal 32 tiles fit.
I misunderstood. I thought you meant 15 across on the diagonals.
>32x32 tiles isn't bad, in one dimension it's still 25% more than the
>usual 80x24, and the tiles are pretty large, effectively 32x64 pixles.
32x64 is 8 times as much pixel real estate as 16x16, so much more
detail is possible.
>But now we are in the old "ASCII is better than GFX - no its not!!!"
>fight. I'll stop arguing here. My decision to use graphics is mostly
>fixed, and I still very happy with H-World.
I still think that if you desire the flexibility of quickly adding new
items/monsters, a number of canonical "placeholder" symbolic graphics
can't hurt.
Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing an isometric "@" in there, either. :)
Isaac Kuo
Kornel "Anubis" Kisielewicz
wiadomości news:3db6...@news.alphalink.com.au...
Hell no, God shave the queen!!! ;->>>>>>>>>
I drink an antidote :).
Honestly though -- the first project always dies if you are
overenthusiastic.
Kornel "Anubis" Kisielewicz
news:eedfa948.02102...@posting.google.com...
> > > So. This is what it comes down to.
> > > I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
> > > ...
> > > It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and
you
> > > DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
> >
> > Ok, this thing will die, and I wont feel guilty. Ok, lets be
> > serious --
> > ...
> > there's a "long and winding raod" ahead you.
>
> Anubis has a lot of good advice, and if anyone on this newsgroup
knows
> about overly complex projects which never get finished it's him
> (sorry, man :).
I know, Joseph, I know :-/ *sad smile*
> When I see people trying to drum up publicity for a
> game which doesn't even have any code written yet, or who have an
> entire manual for their game but no demo, this sets off a little
> warning buzzer in the back of my head. I call it my "Amy Wang
Alarm".
LoL. She may have left our newsgroup but she's still in our hearts
*sniff*!
> On the one hand I don't want to seem discouraging. ShockFrost, ABCGi
> NewsMonkey, et al have some good ideas and I'd like to see their
games
> implemented. On the other hand I feel like handing out all kinds of
> discouraging advice. Don't rely upon features that you can't clearly
> visualize, don't plan so much at the start that you'll never be able
> to finish it, don't add complicated ideas to your game if you don't
> even have the simple things done yet, don't put the cart before the
> horse, don't count your chickens before they hatch, and for crying
out
> loud don't put your cart before your chickens before they hatch.
> That's the biggest mistake of all.
Amen, brother. That's the point, that's the hellish point IF I ONLY
KNEW IT something like ... 4 years ago? ;)))
> > "Start small... then you can think
> > about the bigger things..."
>
> This is how GearHead, DeadCold, Realm of Sendai, T-CoD, and most of
> the other games/programs I've written through the years were
> constructed:
>
> Try to get the bare framework for you game running as quickly and
> simply as you can. Just include "@" walking around in a random field
> of "."s and "#"s. Add elements to your game one by one- random map
> generators, items, creatures, NPCs, quests, and so on. As long as
you
> know in advance how the game will be structured you should be able
to
> do this without too much trouble. Once you have the basic mechanics
in
> place you'll be able to start on the really fancy features you have
in
> mind.
That's basically how my side project went. If I could only make myself
do those last finishing touches... ech, the last step's the hardest ;)
ABCGi
>
>> There is lots of leg work there (creating editors is a total additional
>> workload) but my initial testing shows this isn't *as* technically hard
>> as I thought it would be... time will tell I guess.
>
> I use plain text files. IMO they work well, even without the need to
> write any fancy editors.
>
> There is a story, it is told in different versions. Briefly:
>
> Americans and russians in the 1960s noticed the problem that astronauts
> and kosmonauts need to write notes in zero gravity environment. The
> american put much time and money into the development of a zero-g low
> pressure workable ball pen. The russians used pencils.
>
> Finally both solutions worked - the difference is that the pencil was
> readily available at low cost.
>
> I mean, if you know several solutions, use the simplest that will work
> without problems, but nothing simpler. If XML requires you to write an
> editor, but a text file does the same with a readily available text
> editor, I'd choose plain text. OTOH if your data is complex and plain
> text cannot hold it properly, then XML is the right choice.
Well XML is still pretty simple and can be used without an editor. The
thing I like about it is the labelling of all the data in the text file so
that one does not need to know the data structure from somewhere else, and
the tools already available to write and read them. I look at it as a
different form of INI file. For those that don't know;
XML: Extensible Markup Language
<name>
<first>Ronald</first>
<last>McDonald</last>
</name>
Formatting is optional (like indenting) and you can see that every tag
needs a closing tag like HTML. Also every tag is to be lower case only.
Compared to an INI file format,
[name]
first="Ronald"
last="McDonald"
I guess XML is a bit more work but it has some advantages and the ability
to support more sophisticated things that an INI file format can't do well.
>> Coding has started again from scratch recently, so not very far, I'm
>> being a bit more sophisticated in my approach these days than 1998 so
>> one could argue I'm being too ambitious :-) If I become YAUR (Yet
>> Another Unfinished Rouge Like) I will still of enjoyed it as a hobby.
>
> This is the approach that is said to have the highest survival rate. As
> long as you have fun doing it, you have motivation. Projects that from
> start rely on the help/feedback of others will fail much more often. I
> know, I have some failed projects on my history. You must be convinced
> that you can get it through. If you are convinced and show endurance,
> sooner or later other will join - they join because your endurance gives
> them certainity that their work is not just for nothing.
Yes I don't mind if no-one helps me as long as I'm enjoying it. I get a bit
put off by unconstructive criticism unfortuantly.
>
>> What I'm coding at the moment are: landscape generation, combat, and a
>> test of group AI. Also playing with that random river generation
>> question someone posted earlier.
>
> I think I know that someone very well ... :)
>
hehe
I'm also playing around with the formal language expander from Greg's site
( http://puyo.cjb.net/ ). It kinda works like a Thesarus so that if a NPC
has a script to say;
"I need you to go on a quest to return my treasure."
Would be parsed through the TEXTOMATIC and would be different each time for
the player encountering this NPC, it might come out as;
"I want you to complete a job to retrieve my goodies."
Obviously that's a simple example, it might get more sophisticated than
that.
> Let me know if you succeed, and under which constraints your solution
> will be useable.
You can even look at the code :-) I wanted to check something with the
river generation person, the location of the source and destination of the
river are undefined until the player comes across it right???
>
>> Of course I am busy with other things
>> like running a small software and consulting company :-)
>
> Well, be happy that your company still survives :)
>
> I'm not sure how it is in your place of the world, but here in germany
> many small IT companies closed during the last 12 months.
Yeah things are pretty slow.
>>>For H-World, surprisingly I got an offer for help quite early (roughly
>>>after 1 year of development), but my helper lost his job quite soon
>>>after that and now has more serious troubles than helping with
>>>H-World.
>>
>> H-World looks really professional, I'm not surprised ppl were impressed
>> and wanted to help out :-)
>
> The experience finally pays off. But still development is very slow. C++
> isn't a languge that allows fast development, and it's much too easy to
> make mistakes.
>
>> I was really impressed by the landscape stuff
>> on your site and by Greg's lighting code for Shade (if I'm remembering
>> correctly!)
>
> I think the landscape stuff must be from somewhere else.
Well I was impressed by H-World! The landscape stuff was from Amit's game
programming page;
http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/blob-game.png
http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/blob-game-volcano.png
Looks nice hey? Imagine running the random river generator one that mmmm
pretty...
>> Thanks for all your advice :-) I really admire the people here who have
>> released their projects (both for the amount of work it takes and the
>> guts).
>
> It depends on your mind, some like to show off their achievements,
> others like to work in their hidden chamber. Anbis' GenRogue project is
> such a myth-woven never seen project :)
>
> I think I'm doing a bit too much advertisement for H-World lately.
No way! H-World rocks :-)
Greg McIntyre
> I'm also playing around with the formal language expander from Greg's
> site ( http://puyo.cjb.net/ ). It kinda works like a Thesarus so that
> if a NPC has a script to say;
>
> "I need you to go on a quest to return my treasure."
>
> Would be parsed through the TEXTOMATIC and would be different each
> time for the player encountering this NPC, it might come out as;
>
> "I want you to complete a job to retrieve my goodies."
>
> Obviously that's a simple example, it might get more sophisticated
> than that.
Huzzah! :D
When all this damnable uni work goes away, I'm going to sit down and
write a little menu or prompt driven program to play with this. Like...
[t]alk -> a. Fred, b. George, c. Mandy
(initiate dialogue mode with one of the game's NPCs)
[w]ait
(wait for next 'timeout' event to hit)
[m]eet
(meet somebody new)
...
Kind of like a test/play harness to play with the language expansion and
random plot generation. I might need a separate simpler one just to test
language expansion, though, now that I look at it.
How are you going about playing with it?
> > > I was really impressed by the landscape stuff
> > > on your site and by Greg's lighting code for Shade (if I'm
> > > remembering correctly!)
I've finally fixed up the code that gives me a RGB colourspace and
doesn't rely on hardware acceleration. I was just being too complicated
and needed to go back to basics (in this case, a routine which draws a
glyph to the screen buffer in a particular colour with lots of
putpixels). So there'll be a C++, SDL, roguelike display library
next. :) Shouldn't be too hard to put in code to blast pixmaps to the
screen instead of monocolour glyphs (like I want), so people can use it
to swap in tiled graphics later if they want.</rant>
> > I think I'm doing a bit too much advertisement for H-World lately.
>
> No way! H-World rocks :-)
He's got you there Hajo! H-World rocks. :)
--
Greg McIntyre
gr...@puyo.cjb.net
http://puyo.cjb.net
ABCGi
news:eedfa948.02102...@posting.google.com:
> "Kornel \"Anubis\" Kisielewicz" <anu...@felis7.civ.pl> wrote in
> message news:<ap4bk2$3gl$3...@news.tpi.pl>...
>> Uzytkownik "ShockFrost" <Deane...@hotmail.com> napisal w
>> wiadomosci news:cb8231c1.02102...@posting.google.com...
>> >
>> > So. This is what it comes down to.
>> > I need the cheerleaders. Bring it.
>> > ...
>> > It's all you. Let's see some feedback. If this thing dies, and you
>> > DIDN'T post, you may officially feel guilty.
>>
>> Ok, this thing will die, and I wont feel guilty. Ok, lets be
>> serious --
>> ...
>> there's a "long and winding raod" ahead you.
>
> Anubis has a lot of good advice, and if anyone on this newsgroup knows
> about overly complex projects which never get finished it's him
> (sorry, man :). When I see people trying to drum up publicity for a
> game which doesn't even have any code written yet, or who have an
> entire manual for their game but no demo, this sets off a little
> warning buzzer in the back of my head. I call it my "Amy Wang Alarm".
>
> On the one hand I don't want to seem discouraging. ShockFrost, ABCGi
> NewsMonkey, et al have some good ideas and I'd like to see their games
It's true what your saying. Approaching a large vision should be done by
breaking it up into manageable chunks putting the most essential and
easiest parts first.
IMHO - having completed plenty of complex programming projects (but no
RLs!)
It is good to repeat this to people, but the advice becomes a bit
counter-productive when it includes "you won't succeed" - "another
failure coming". i.e. it is helping achieve the warning by draining
enthusiasm. I'm just saying that in general not about you or anyone here
in particular.
I don't see the enthusiasm itself as the cause of this failure but that
it is, as you are pointing out, badly channeled. This is why I replied
with a "cheer" to the poster - it doesn't hurt to encourage and motivate
people. I guess I must just be an optimist!
The "Amy Wang" kind of advice assumes that the release of a game is a
high priority for the developer (usually true) :-) It is generated from
disappointment at seeing a lot of ideas by others not realised. But in
the end, if they don't succeed does it matter? I don't have anything
invested in it. Except listening to interesting ideas ;-)
But that's just how I look at it, I could be wrong...
Hansjörg Malthaner
Well, that site says:
-----------
Origins: The Write stuff lesson of this anecdote is a valid one, that
we sometimes expend a great deal of time, effort, and money to create a
"high-tech" solution to a problem, when a perfectly good, cheap, and
simple solution is right before our eyes.
-----------
I don't care how much the stories background is true. I just wanted to
tell what above paragraph says, too. And it's a nice story to tell this.
c.u.
Hajo
Hansjörg Malthaner
> I still think that if you desire the flexibility of quickly adding new
> items/monsters, a number of canonical "placeholder" symbolic graphics
> can't hurt.
I agree up to a point. For developemnt I often use placeholder first.
Sometimes they are not replaced before I'm doing a new release. If you
look at the inventory images for the leather jacket, pants and shoes,
they all are just upscaled versions of the small varaints that I painted
for the player char.
It's just that, how to say, umm, I like graphics and feel ashamed if I
release something that doesn't meet my own wishes. The inventory gfx are
not immediately visble so they don't really bug me, but i think I'd
rather not release a new version, but one with obvious placeholder gfx
for the map display.
I know, true RL designers care about gampelay first, while I care about
the look first, most of the time. I'm afraid I'm more of a gfx designer
than a game designer ... sorry. Anyways, there are many true RL games in
develoment, so I think I can walk on the genre borderline without
hurting anyone :)
> Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing an isometric "@" in there, either. :)
In Iso-Angband I used this approach. Walls and floors were isometric
graphics, some monsters too, but the majority of things was still ASCII
characters. It worked. It didn't look too bad. Sorry I don't have any
screenshots for reference anymore :(
> Isaac Kuo
c.u.
Hajo
ABCGi
It is a good fable in that it has a moral to the story :-)
That "Urban Legend" site is great though, just been looking through
it...
Hansjörg Malthaner
> pyrr...@hotmail.com (Joseph Hewitt) wrote in
>>On the one hand I don't want to seem discouraging. ShockFrost, ABCGi
>>NewsMonkey, et al have some good ideas and I'd like to see their games
[...]
> It is good to repeat this to people, but the advice becomes a bit
> counter-productive when it includes "you won't succeed" - "another
> failure coming". i.e. it is helping achieve the warning by draining
> enthusiasm. I'm just saying that in general not about you or anyone here
> in particular.
I'm not sure how much we are guilty, but now and then someone pops in
here, post many ideas, at times even says he cannot do it by himself,
and then just vanishes again.
This is what makes many sceptical the next time it happens.
Hmmm ... I'm already guilty of that kind of mistake. I started
Iso-Angabnd (graphical frontend for Angband) load mouthed with a lot of
hype, just to deklare the project stopped a little morte than a year
later on. It's true, if you start overhyped, the project is likely to fail.
DarkGod once said, I shouldn't argue if my solution is better than an
other if I'm convinced that it is good. Just do it, and the people will
see if it's good. One can speak many words, but only the playtest will
tell if the game is good or not.
I think the English say "Talk the talk, walk the walk".
> I don't see the enthusiasm itself as the cause of this failure but that
> it is, as you are pointing out, badly channeled. This is why I replied
> with a "cheer" to the poster - it doesn't hurt to encourage and motivate
> people. I guess I must just be an optimist!
Sorry to repeat this, but ShockFrost will not get anywhere if he does
not create a core or starting base on his own.
You are a step further, IMO, you have made a website, a manual and some
articles of your experience with programming and games programming in
particular. This gives me confidence that you are a serious worker and
can do it if you believe in your ideas.
> The "Amy Wang" kind of advice assumes that the release of a game is a
> high priority for the developer (usually true) :-) It is generated from
> disappointment at seeing a lot of ideas by others not realised.
IMO this isn't true. At times I told about a new idea here, and before I
could implement it in my own project someone else picked it up and
included it in his project.
Some ideas are far flung, and it's pretty clear that they are not doable
easily, but we still like to talk about them, like some people talk
about the dream of a better world.
And anyways, I started two projects because I was not happy with the
existing games, and thought it could be done better. So I really think
if you are not pleased with the existing it's up to you to change it;
change it by doing.
> But in
> the end, if they don't succeed does it matter?
I'm not sure. It surely depends how the project was started. If you just
do it for fun, it doesn't matter if it doesn't succeed as long as you
have fun doing it.
> I don't have anything
> invested in it. Except listening to interesting ideas ;-)
>
> But that's just how I look at it, I could be wrong...
I invest emotion - if the project fails, it leaves a bad feeling. But
that's just me :)
c.u.
Hajo
ABCGi
news:20021024095452...@puyo.cjb.net:
> When all this damnable uni work goes away, I'm going to sit down and
> write a little menu or prompt driven program to play with this. Like...
>
> [t]alk -> a. Fred, b. George, c. Mandy
> (initiate dialogue mode with one of the game's NPCs)
> [w]ait
> (wait for next 'timeout' event to hit)
> [m]eet
> (meet somebody new)
> ...
>
> Kind of like a test/play harness to play with the language expansion and
> random plot generation. I might need a separate simpler one just to test
> language expansion, though, now that I look at it.
>
> How are you going about playing with it?
Well I thought your FME and the BoneEasy methods were a good way to
generate some idil conversation (you know so the GoodWife doesn't always
say the same things). I am thinking of categories that can be assigned to
each substitute so that the FME picks something appropriate for a certain
NPC to say (so the GoodWife doesn't say something about killing Dragons
this morning!).
A simpler substitution thingy could be used to parse my plot text to make
it seem varied each time whilst still getting across the same basic
message.
Combine that with a plot/quest randomiser (but that still follows a theme
like a hollywood script/Myth so that its not just RNG) and I should have a
fairly different experience each time. Basically I loved ADoM but I
eventually got sick of doing the same quests and story each time.
I'm writing both as seperate black box classes in C++ so that I can play
with them on their own. I'm hoping the plot randomiser will be able to pump
out simple text stories with a paragraph per event. If the stories make any
sense I'll know I'm on the right track.
I also liked the idea posted here about a persistant world changing due to
the previous characters actions etc.
>> > > I was really impressed by the landscape stuff
>> > > on your site and by Greg's lighting code for Shade (if I'm
>> > > remembering correctly!)
Not sure how good this idea is but looking at the lanscape "blob" at
http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/blob-game.png
see how small the hexes are? Too small for a single character right? What
if a human size character takes up a number of squares? Much like a dragon
took up four squares in the original "Pools of Radiance". That gives a more
undulating landscape, but there are some difficulties to work out with the
whole 3D ness of it (where does the left and right leg go on a slope etc.)
My RL I want to have landscape of 9 different levels so this was
interesting for me.
>
> I've finally fixed up the code that gives me a RGB colourspace and
> doesn't rely on hardware acceleration. I was just being too complicated
> and needed to go back to basics (in this case, a routine which draws a
> glyph to the screen buffer in a particular colour with lots of
> putpixels). So there'll be a C++, SDL, roguelike display library
> next. :) Shouldn't be too hard to put in code to blast pixmaps to the
> screen instead of monocolour glyphs (like I want), so people can use it
> to swap in tiled graphics later if they want.</rant>
That would be cool. Do you know any RL that have something similiar to your
shadow casting lighting algorithm?
>> > I think I'm doing a bit too much advertisement for H-World lately.
>>
>> No way! H-World rocks :-)
>
> He's got you there Hajo! H-World rocks. :)
:-)
And your stuff rocks too :-)
ABCGi
> Sorry to repeat this, but ShockFrost will not get anywhere if he does
> not create a core or starting base on his own.
I think you're right, its good to encourage SF to build the basics, turn
him/her from the Dark Side toward the Light.
> And anyways, I started two projects because I was not happy with the
> existing games, and thought it could be done better. So I really think
> if you are not pleased with the existing it's up to you to change it;
> change it by doing.
You've done excently doing two at once!
>
>> But in
>> the end, if they don't succeed does it matter?
>
> I'm not sure. It surely depends how the project was started. If you
> just do it for fun, it doesn't matter if it doesn't succeed as long as
> you have fun doing it.
Probably the worst thing would be to get others to pitch in and then
drop it!
>
>> I don't have anything
>> invested in it. Except listening to interesting ideas ;-)
>>
>> But that's just how I look at it, I could be wrong...
>
> I invest emotion - if the project fails, it leaves a bad feeling. But
> that's just me :)
I can see how that would happen :-( I'm not arguing the logic about the
reason for failed projects, I know them all too well :-)
Greg McIntyre
> your shadow casting lighting algorithm?
AFAIK most RLGs implement and use it. If you go scratching around
through the source code you find it tucked away in there. I just wrote
it into a library so people who come along in the future and want the
functionality without the stress can use my library, at least to get a
headstart. It is a very fiddly, reasonably complicated and subtle
algorithm.
I don't know of any RLGs which use it to implement a gradiented
intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical ones.
> And your stuff rocks too :-)
Thanks!
Group hug!! Awww. :D No trolls or flames in this newsgroup, oh no. *wide
eyes*
You have the most extensive manual/design document I've ever seen!! One
of these days I'm going to go through it and use it as a model to see
what I'm forgetting from my own. :)
Gerry Quinn
<hansjoerg...@danet.de> wrote:
>It's just that, how to say, umm, I like graphics and feel ashamed if I
>release something that doesn't meet my own wishes. The inventory gfx are
> not immediately visble so they don't really bug me, but i think I'd
>rather not release a new version, but one with obvious placeholder gfx
>for the map display.
I feel the same - though in any case as a shareware author I can't
really get away with graphics that are *too* primitive.
The most important thing, IMO, is to keep all the graphics on the same
'level', so that none of them are good enough to make the others look
bad. For me, graphic design is about getting the most out of minimal
graphical assets.
If you do some things too well, you will be in trouble, because the
parts that looked okay before will now look bad.
Gerry Quinn
--
http://bindweed.com
Entertainment software for Windows
Puzzles, Strategy Games, Kaleidoscope Screensaver
Download evaluation versions free - no time limits
Björn Bergström
news:20021024201712...@puyo.cjb.net...
> > That would be cool. Do you know any RL that have something similiar to
> > your shadow casting lighting algorithm?
>
> AFAIK most RLGs implement and use it. If you go scratching around
> through the source code you find it tucked away in there. I just wrote
> it into a library so people who come along in the future and want the
> functionality without the stress can use my library, at least to get a
> headstart. It is a very fiddly, reasonably complicated and subtle
> algorithm.
>
> I don't know of any RLGs which use it to implement a gradiented
> intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical ones.
I have a question regarding you gradient intensity shadowcasting. When you
look at the screenshot it is hard to make out which areas that are seen and
which ones that are known. The border between the lit area and the known
area isn't that easy to make out. How do you plan to solve this? I've been
toying around with the use of a different character than the '.' for known
but not seen areas, but that doesn't look good. If you make the known area
dark grey and make the gradient light go from white to medium grey you'll
clearly see the border but the gradient light doesn't look good. Any ideas?
>
> > And your stuff rocks too :-)
>
> Thanks!
>
> Group hug!! Awww. :D No trolls or flames in this newsgroup, oh no. *wide
> eyes*
>
> You have the most extensive manual/design document I've ever seen!! One
> of these days I'm going to go through it and use it as a model to see
> what I'm forgetting from my own. :)
>
> --
> Greg McIntyre
> gr...@puyo.cjb.net
> http://puyo.cjb.net
--
Björn Bergström
L:C++ E+ T- R+ P+ D-- G+ F:V RL-- RLA++
W:F Q+++ AI++ GFX+ !SFX RN+++ PO+ Hp- Re+ S++
Dungeondweller (http://roguelikedevelopment.org/dungeondweller/)
Roguelike Development (http://roguelikedevelopment.org)
ABCGi
>> That would be cool. Do you know any RL that have something similiar
>> to your shadow casting lighting algorithm?
>
> AFAIK most RLGs implement and use it. If you go scratching around
> through the source code you find it tucked away in there. I just wrote
> it into a library so people who come along in the future and want the
> functionality without the stress can use my library, at least to get a
> headstart. It is a very fiddly, reasonably complicated and subtle
> algorithm.
>
> I don't know of any RLGs which use it to implement a gradiented
> intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical
> ones.
I haven't played any RL that gets that gray half lit area or multiple
light sources like yours. Well none that look that good.
>> And your stuff rocks too :-)
>
> Thanks!
>
> Group hug!! Awww. :D No trolls or flames in this newsgroup, oh no.
> *wide eyes*
>
> You have the most extensive manual/design document I've ever seen!!
> One of these days I'm going to go through it and use it as a model to
> see what I'm forgetting from my own. :)
Bits of it are getting out of date, now that I'm coding things I've got
less time to keep the doco up to date :-) Always the way!
Hansjörg Malthaner
[...]
> I don't know of any RLGs which use it to implement a gradiented
> intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical ones.
H-World does. (Don't know if H-World counts as RL) :
http://h-world.simugraph.com/images/new_caves.png
But I'm using a different implementation of shadowcasting.
c.u.
Hajo
Hansjörg Malthaner
>>I don't know of any RLGs which use it to implement a gradiented
>>intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical ones.
>
>
> I have a question regarding you gradient intensity shadowcasting. When you
> look at the screenshot it is hard to make out which areas that are seen and
> which ones that are known. The border between the lit area and the known
> area isn't that easy to make out. How do you plan to solve this?
For H-World, the invisible areas are noticeably darker than the border
of the visible area. There is a sudden jump in lightness. Unrealistic,
but helps to know where the lit area ends.
> Björn Bergström
c.u.
Hajo
Björn Bergström
news:3DB7DC71...@danet.de...
I've implemented gradient lighting in the ASCII version of Dungeondweller
(no new version released yet) and I use this jump in lightness too. I make
an actual use of the gradient light in Dweller. You're less likely to be
seen by a monster if you're lurking in the shadows at the edge of a
lightsource. The problem is that on the screen, the edge of a lightsource
isn't that dark, so it is not as intuitive for the player to hide there as
if the edge would have been really dark. I use an extra lightindicator on
the statusfield too, but I would like to find a solution that made the edge
of a lightsource really dark and still be able to distinguish between known
and seen areas...
BTW, I e-mailed you Hajo about the nice looking gradient lighting that you
use in H-World. How do you create the effect in SDL?
>
> > Björn Bergström
>
> c.u.
> Hajo
Greg McIntyre
> you look at the screenshot it is hard to make out which areas that are
> seen and which ones that are known. The border between the lit area
> and the known area isn't that easy to make out. How do you plan to
> solve this?
This is a problem? :)
This is actually intentional. The gradiented light is involved with the
game mechanics. Creatures who use stealth can sit on the border of
vision and blend in effectively with the 'remembered' colour such that
the player is less likely to notice them. Yes, it does involve the
player's and the player character's perception, but I actually quite
like that sort of thing -- I find it quite involving.
Colours in the game resemble what clothes a person is wearing. So if you
want to go stealth, you wear dark clothes and it actually does make you
harder to see. You don't have to carry a light source, either. So you
can dodge from shadow to shadow and remain pretty much invisible (you
have a marker to show where you are, for convenience). Of course... it
doesn't help when somebody turns on a flashlight to flush you out...
There are all sorts of tactics involving light I'm planning. For
example, different items provide different arcs and ranges of light. A
torch provides a long forward-beam and a lantern provides a short
radius, and combining the two gives you the benefits of both but leaves
you short-handed. There are other cool items like miner's hats with
lights on them, etc.
This may have possibly come about from me watching Pitch Black one too
many times. :)
Greg McIntyre
> > intensity falloff as I'm going to. Possibly some of the graphical
> > ones.
>
> H-World does. (Don't know if H-World counts as RL) :
Of course! I actually had it in mind but wanted to include a few others
of which I couldn't remember the names. Sorry I forgot to mention it.
> But I'm using a different implementation of shadowcasting.
Recursive!
Sami Jarvinen
> XML: Extensible Markup Language
> <name>
> <first>Ronald</first>
> <last>McDonald</last>
> </name>
>
> [name]
> first="Ronald"
> last="McDonald"
(name
(first "Ronald")
(last "McDonald"))
Something like that, you know, in Lisp-style :) Much better
than XML, IMHO.