Roguelike-inspired game for Neverwinter Nights
John Harris
rec.games.roguelike.development, for what I hope will be obvious
reasons.)
I've put off posting about this for quite some time now, but a gentle
prod from one player convinced me to get off my duff about it....
The summer before last, when Neverwinter Nights had just been
released, I created Neverogue (Neverhack was taken), a module for it
with Roguelike games as its primary inspiration.
For those of who who are not familiar with it, Neverwinter Nights is a
computer RPG created by Bioware with, as its primary selling point,
extensive user-accessable development tools and module creation
possiblities. Some of the homespun modules for the system are pretty
slick, and the tools are flexible enough that there are a good number
of interesting things that can be put into such a game.
Among the advantages: built-in multiplayer and networking (up to 64
players in one game), monster AI, all graphics issues taken care of by
the server, excellent graphics besides, a ready-made library of D&D
3rd edition items, a system by which more can easily be created,
general D&D 3rd edition compliance and an actual interface outside of
double and triple duty for many letters of the alphabet.
Disadvantages include: Having to custom-code a Roguelike item
identification system (possible, but difficult), a lack of special
command possibilities, the lack of facility for random dungeon
generation (Neverogue uses a large number of pre-made levels that are
stocked and mixed up somewhat randomly), and the frustration of
dealing with a language that wasn't designed to be quite *this*
flexible.
Anyone who's played Diablo and thought "this would be cool if it were
more like a real Roguelike" should be interested in this project. If
you guys are interested I'll post more, but for now I'll just wait and
see if you guys care about my silly little creation (which I still
quite proud of -- there's some neat ideas in there I'd say).
Graeme Dice
> (Cross-posted between rec.games.roguelike.misc and
> rec.games.roguelike.development, for what I hope will be obvious
> reasons.)
<snip>
> Anyone who's played Diablo and thought "this would be cool if it were
> more like a real Roguelike" should be interested in this project. If
> you guys are interested I'll post more, but for now I'll just wait and
> see if you guys care about my silly little creation (which I still
> quite proud of -- there's some neat ideas in there I'd say).
>
> http://www.hiddenglade.com/neverogue/
I've always like the idea of taking NWN or Morrowind and making a
Roguelike out if them. Kudos to you.
Graeme Dice
--
"READ THIS BEFORE OPENING PACKAGE: According to certain suggested
versions of the grand unified theory, the primary particles
constituting this product may decay to nothingness within the
next 10^32 Years."
-- Engineering warning labels.
Andres Zanzani
> Anyone who's played Diablo and thought "this would be cool if it were
> more like a real Roguelike" should be interested in this project. If
> you guys are interested I'll post more, but for now I'll just wait and
> see if you guys care about my silly little creation (which I still
> quite proud of -- there's some neat ideas in there I'd say).
>
> http://www.hiddenglade.com/neverogue/
Great, Truly Great
but... i must download from neverwinter vault, 'cause file isn't on your
site.
i just read varius comment on neverwinter vault... awesome
waiting for next release !
best regards
--
Andres Zanzani
Rimini, Italy
La Mia NUOVA Pagina DIVX http://www.64k.it/andres
Try Easyband http://web.tiscali.it/majerle
John Harris
possible I forgot to reupload the ZIP. My apologies, I'll get it
fixed right away.
- John H.
"Andres Zanzani" <maj...@hotpop.com> wrote in message news:<bqkor9$24bhq3$1...@ID-42314.news.uni-berlin.de>...
John Harris
it before.
Here's a question for everyone here. I have a certain list of
qualities that I feel are essential to all Roguelikes, that I've
designed Neverogue around. Such elements such as ASCII graphics and a
complicated keyboard interface may be traditional to Roguelikes, but I
do not consider them essential. Nethack itself now has versions with
okay graphics, and the Falcon's Eye variant has a full point-and-click
interface. However, Diablo and Diablo II, while having many aspects
common to the genre, I don't consider to be "Roguelike enough."
I consider Neverogue to be "Roguelike enough," or rather it will be
once all my ideas for it are in place. What would those be?
* Randomly-generated dungeon.
* Randomized items, in generation and in description. (Magic items of
a certain description always do the same thing in a game, but that's
unknown before the game begins and must be discovered by the player.)
* Gameplay in which knowledge of the game world is a scarce resource.
This means at least dungeon layouts, item purposes, but may include
other things as well.
* Challenging gameplay.
* Tactical combat.
* An unusually deep model of the game world, including substantial
non-combat challenges.
* Permanent character death.
Purposely left off the list are the absence of multiplayer or
real-time play, turn-based play, ASCII graphics and a complicated
keyboard interface.
Does anyone here know of something that should be added to (or removed
from) the list? I *think* it's fairly complete.
Ray Dillinger
>
<clip>
> Purposely left off the list are the absence of multiplayer or
> real-time play, turn-based play, ASCII graphics and a complicated
> keyboard interface.
>
> Does anyone here know of something that should be added to (or removed
> from) the list? I *think* it's fairly complete.
I think turn-based-ness is essential to the roguelike genre.
But that's just me. It's not like there's an approval process
for games based on how roguelike they are. Bottom line: It
doesn't really matter whether the game you're writing conforms
to someone else's idea of what "roguelike" is. What matters is
whether it's a good game.
Bear
Mark Engle
The only mechanical point that would be questionable would be the lack
of turn based play. But given the characteristics of the engine you
are using this is unavoidable. This is a great implementation, in my
opinion.
Mark
Andres Zanzani
> I've got Neverogue back up at my website, sorry about the problem with
> it before.
>
> Here's a question for everyone here. I have a certain list of
> qualities that I feel are essential to all Roguelikes, that I've
> designed Neverogue around. Such elements such as ASCII graphics and a
> complicated keyboard interface may be traditional to Roguelikes, but I
> do not consider them essential. Nethack itself now has versions with
> okay graphics, and the Falcon's Eye variant has a full point-and-click
> interface. However, Diablo and Diablo II, while having many aspects
> common to the genre, I don't consider to be "Roguelike enough."
>
> I consider Neverogue to be "Roguelike enough," or rather it will be
> once all my ideas for it are in place. What would those be?
>
> * Randomly-generated dungeon.
a must
> * Randomized items, in generation and in description. (Magic items of
> a certain description always do the same thing in a game, but that's
> unknown before the game begins and must be discovered by the player.)
desiderable but not essential (considering how many items are already
present)
> * Gameplay in which knowledge of the game world is a scarce resource.
> This means at least dungeon layouts, item purposes, but may include
> other things as well.
> * Challenging gameplay.
> * Tactical combat.
nice, but not essential (but challenging gameplay)
> * An unusually deep model of the game world, including substantial
> non-combat challenges.
no. if any just basic quest (as kill 4 ogre at level 2)
> * Permanent character death.
>
yes, but i want a "wizard mode" ; )
> Purposely left off the list are the absence of multiplayer or
> real-time play, turn-based play, ASCII graphics and a complicated
> keyboard interface.
turn based is a must
>
> Does anyone here know of something that should be added to (or removed
> from) the list? I *think* it's fairly complete.
true, fair complete. Could be possible implementing vary options ( as
zangand = ) ?
Thanks
John Harris
essential, and how they're currently implemented in Neverogue.
> > * Randomly-generated dungeon.
Yep, essential, and incredibly hard to make in Neverogue. The build
tools included with the game do a lot of the work for the game engine
behind the scenes, making it impossible to make a good
dynamically-created dungeon. There are three other solutions I can
come up with:
- Use "placeables," which can't be moved through but do not block
line-of-sight either, to create the dungeon laboriously room by room
on a large, blank map.
- Use many "mini-maps" which are dynamically connected at run-time.
- Use large pre-gen maps with many blocked passages, some of which are
cleared at run-time by the script.
Currently I use a mix of these techniques. I made twenty very large,
complicated maps, but they game randomly choses which order they're
encountered in. The scripts then populate the maps with stuff
appropriate to the role the map must play in the current game. I'd
dearly love to have true random maps, but this is one area I've had to
make serious compromises. (Sorry if you guys thought I had come up
with a really great random map algorithm. Neverwinter Nights isn't
that flexible.)
> > * Randomized items, in generation and in description. (Magic items of
> > a certain description always do the same thing in a game, but that's
> > unknown before the game begins and must be discovered by the player.)
I consider this even more essential than random dungeons, and this is
why I don't consider Diablo a true Roguelike. Roguelikes, to me, are
as much about the things the player does when he's not fighting as
when he is. Again, NWN doesn't make this easy, but I think I have a
good workaround in mind. These aren't implemented yet.
> > * Gameplay in which knowledge of the game world is a scarce resource.
> > This means at least dungeon layouts, item purposes, but may include
> > other things as well.
This is the defining characteristic of Roguelikes, I believe, that
knowledge of the game world is limited and must be discovered.
> > * Challenging gameplay.
> > * Tactical combat.
Neither of these things are truly essential, yeah, but Roguelikes are
designed to maximize replayability, and these help it along.
> > * An unusually deep model of the game world, including substantial
> > non-combat challenges.
I should explain what I mean by this. I don't consider a "deep world"
to mean it has an in-depth world history, or character relationships,
or plot. It means that the game environment has a character all its
own, that there are things in the game that behave according to
logical rules and can be manipulated accordingly. Like how even in
Rogue, monsters refuse to walk over a scroll of Scare Monster. Like
blessing things with holy water in Nethack. Nethack, in particular,
makes great use of this principle, which is why I think it's great,
but all Roguelikes do it to some degree.
> > * Permanent character death.
This is essential because of the limited-knowledge aspect of the game.
Players are able to take knowledge of past plays into saved games,
making them something of a cheat if allowed in the form that
practically all other RPGs allow.
> > Purposely left off the list are the absence of multiplayer or
> > real-time play, turn-based play, ASCII graphics and a complicated
> > keyboard interface.
People have said that being turn-based is essential, but I really
don't think it is. True, any currently-existing Roguelike played in a
real-time capacity would be very difficult, but if the game were
designed around the possibility I think it could work. Any
multiplayer Roguelike would be very difficult to do in a traditional
turn-based style. At any rate, Neverogue isn't turn-based, and yes,
in the context of Neverwinter Nights that'd be almost impossible.
From Andrea Zanzani:
> true, fair complete. Could be possible implementing vary options ( as
> zangand = ) ?
Actually Neverogue has an almost absurd number of configurable
options. I think I kind of went overboard with them....
- John H.