Found in store: AD&D Dungeon Hack
JSwing
looks like an attempt at Rogue w/ the AD&D rules.
Single player, 6 races, 12 classes, 4 billion dungeons. Spells, items, etc.
Oh, it's got a 1st person point of view rather than overhead (looks like the
Wizardry games w/ 256 VGA graphics).
I haven't played it yet, and I won;t bother with a report, but they did have
some interesting options you can set prior to starting. It has slider bars
for the following:
Dungeon depth
Monster amount
Treasure amount
Food availablilty
Illusionary walls
Key Frequency
Magic Traps
Pit Frequency
Hints -- I'm not sure what these are
Water level (yes/no)
Multi-level puzzles (yes/no)
Encounter Undead (yes/no)
Food consumption
Monster difficulty
Magic power
poison strength
Death Real (yes/no) - this deletes save files when you die if set to yes
Enemy spells (yes/no)
Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
commercial Rogue-likes.
JSwing
Cody Hatch
rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Wed, 13 Oct 1999 01:42:18 GMT:
>Heh. Pretty funny. It's a 1993 computer game for the PC produced by
>SSI. It looks like an attempt at Rogue w/ the AD&D rules.
<snip>
>Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
>commercial Rogue-likes.
Ha! Ever heard of Castle of the Winds? Epic Megagames released it (also in
1993), and it's quite a bit more roguelike than Dungeon Hack, IMHO. It's
essentially Angband Lite, with graphics. Sorta like a toned down version of
the Tk versions. You couldn't shoot or throw stuff, and there was only one
type of character (who used both spells and weapons), but it had a VERY
advanced drag and drop inventory system. Had multiple towns, a complicated
plot...great fun.
http://www.epicgames.com/castle.htm
First episode is shareware, second needs to be registered.
Cody
--
"There can be no sin as great as the failure
to have the courage of your convictions."
--Bane, Lord of Chaos
Graeme Dice
>
> Heh. Pretty funny. It's a 1993 computer game for the PC produced by SSI. It
> looks like an attempt at Rogue w/ the AD&D rules.
>
> Oh, it's got a 1st person point of view rather than overhead (looks like the
> Wizardry games w/ 256 VGA graphics).
<stuff snipped>
>
> Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
> commercial Rogue-likes.
I've played that one. Its actually not that bad, the interface is half
decent, and it is almost fun.
Graeme Dice
--
"I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." J. Robert
Oppenheimer (1904-67), US physicist. Quoting Vishnu from the
Gita, at the first atomic test in New Mexico, 16 July 1945.
Brian C Robinson
: Heh. Pretty funny. It's a 1993 computer game for the PC produced by SSI. It
Actually, SSI had a game using the same engine that was more of a
typical dungeon crawl, but with a plot and everything. It had
preprogrammed levels, etc. It was called Eye of the Beholder, one of the
best games I've player. There were also two more or less forgettable
sequels.
I don't think the people who made Dungeon Hack purposefully based
it on a Roguelike game, because it was just using the old engine. Its a
lot of fun to play, though. I still break it out every now and then to
give it a whirl.
: Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
: commercial Rogue-likes.
:
Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
floating around.
--
BOBBIE BATTISTA: And if only we could eat the Earth's crust.
BILL NYE, SCIENCE GUY: We do in a sense, you know.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jagged Alliance 2 FAQ: http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~bcr19374/ja2faq.htm
Gwidon S. Naskrent
Robinson) wrote:
> Actually, SSI had a game using the same engine that was more of a
>typical dungeon crawl, but with a plot and everything. It had
>preprogrammed levels, etc. It was called Eye of the Beholder, one of the
Hated it, and explained why a couple of times both here and on r.g.r.a
>best games I've player. There were also two more or less forgettable
>sequels.
To wit, EoB 2 and 3 :-)
> I don't think the people who made Dungeon Hack purposefully based
>it on a Roguelike game, because it was just using the old engine. Its a
>lot of fun to play, though. I still break it out every now and then to
>give it a whirl.
Yeah, it was somewhat easier to play since you didn't have to split
your attention and mouse-aiming skills among four characters.
>: Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
>: commercial Rogue-likes.
It's not exactly a roguelike, although the maps might qualify as such.
Gwidon S. Naskrent (nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl)
GSNband - http://artemida.amu.edu.pl/~naskrent/index.html
GEU/J d- s+:+ a-- C+++ ULB++>++++ P- E W++ N+++ o? K? w+ O-- M-- V--
PS++ PE- Y PGP->++ t-- 5-- X- R* tv- b+ DI-- D++
pete_t...@hotmail.com
Robinson) wrote:
*snip*
>: Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
>: commercial Rogue-likes.
>:
> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
>floating around.
>
I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
something else
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com * The Internet's Discussion Network *
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Dark Fiber
S. Naskrent) wrote:
>On 13 Oct 1999 14:22:34 GMT, bcr1...@pegasus.cc.ucf.edu (Brian C
>Robinson) wrote:
>
>> Actually, SSI had a game using the same engine that was more of a
>>typical dungeon crawl, but with a plot and everything. It had
>>preprogrammed levels, etc. It was called Eye of the Beholder, one of the
>
>Yeah, it was somewhat easier to play since you didn't have to split
>your attention and mouse-aiming skills among four characters.
>
>>: Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
>>: commercial Rogue-likes.
>
>It's not exactly a roguelike, although the maps might qualify as such.
>
i have the game. kinda nifty. kind funny in parts. you can get "spacy"
type graphics.. didnt really gel with me :> made me think of how crap
wizardry + mm became later on =) ugh.
i'd consider ssi's DH more roguelike than diablow ever was.
-df
[ Dark Fiber <dfi...@ihug.com.au> Running FreeBSD 3.2 ]
Main Homepage
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Brian Robinson
>> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
>>floating around.
>>
> I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
> something else
>
Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
ASCII graphics
Randomly generated maps
Lots of spells and items
A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
who knows. Any comments?
--
Brian Robinson
brob...@ist.ucf.edu
Institute for Simulation and Training
keni...@my-deja.com
Brian Robinson <brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
> pete_t...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other
examples
> >>floating around.
> >>
>
> > I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it
into
> > something else
> >
> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
> IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the
defining
> characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
I would say that the fact that Diablo is real-time is more of an issue
as far as its "roguelikeness" is concerned.
>
> ASCII graphics
> Randomly generated maps
> Lots of spells and items
>
> A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason).
So,
> who knows. Any comments?
Technically the most roguelike game is rogue, and all other roguelike
games are less roguelike depending on how much they differ from rogue.
>
> --
> Brian Robinson
> brob...@ist.ucf.edu
> Institute for Simulation and Training
>
Ken
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Drakmere
<7u55dk$2a...@news1.newsguy.com> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 01:55:00p did bestow the
following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>pete_t...@hotmail.com wrote:
>>> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
>>>floating around.
>>>
>
>> I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
>> something else
>>
> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
>IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
>characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
>
> ASCII graphics
> Randomly generated maps
> Lots of spells and items
>
> A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
>who knows. Any comments?
QtNethack, Crossfire, and the Tk*Angbands come to mind.
--
All spellings are not guaranteed accurate.
ICQ: 8869737 Yahoo: Drakmere Aim: drakmere9
The irony is that Bill Gates claims to be making a stable operating system
and Linus Torvalds claims to be trying to take over the world.
If anyone has an extra organs lieing around, pickle them in a jar and send
them to me.
If you can't say something nice, post it on Usenet.
Juho Snellman
> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
>IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
>characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
>
> ASCII graphics
So... Does Angband turn from roguelike to a generic CRPG when
the tile-graphics are turned on? Was the EPYX version of Rogue
less a Rogue than the Unix-version just bacause of the graphics?
> Randomly generated maps
This is the hardest one to argue against. Though some games like
Omega, Adom and Zangband have significant amounts of pre-generated
areas/maps, the meat of the games is mainly in the random areas.
On the other hand, how random does random need to be? Would
glueing together maps made of 10 pre-generated parts in
random arrangements be random enough? Would you object to
the map staying constant from game to game, while the
monsters and items are created and placed randomly?
> Lots of spells and items
I absolutely disagree with this. I mean, how many items did
*Rogue* have? I was juggling with experimental roguelike
ideas a while back, and one of the less radical ones was
a minimalistic roguelike. The general idea was to make a
rogulike that would have the smallest possible amount of
object- and monster types while still being playable. Do
we really need more than three or four weapons, a couple
of armours and a few magic items to beat on five monster
types?
If I had to choose a single attribute which transforms a
roguelike to something else for me (mileage certainly
varies in this), it would be any sort of realtime aspect.
Crossfire and Mangband didn't *feel* like roguelikes
despite having most of the characteristics. Heck, even
a generic CRPG like Nahlakh felt more like one.
--
Juho Snellman
"C:stä on kehitetty Massachusettsin teknillisessä korkeakoulussa kieli
nimeltä BCPL."
Aleister Crowley's Cat
<brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
>pete_t...@hotmail.com wrote:
>>> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
>>>floating around.
>>>
>
>> I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
>> something else
>>
> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
>IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
>characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
>
> ASCII graphics
No.
> Randomly generated maps
Yep.
> Lots of spells and items
Immaterial.
Don't also forget you *could* also make an argument for
'turn-based'...
Regards,
Dave
WWW:http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Alley/5885/index.html
(The Legions of the Black Moon - the unofficial Bal-Sagoth homepage)
====================================================================
"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" - Aleister Crowley
Brian Robinson
>> ASCII graphics
> So... Does Angband turn from roguelike to a generic CRPG when
> the tile-graphics are turned on? Was the EPYX version of Rogue
> less a Rogue than the Unix-version just bacause of the graphics?
>
Personally, I think that ASCII graphics are essential for a 'true'
rogulike. Say I have a ham sandwich, then I remove the ham and insert
some fake ham in its place. The fake ham might taste better to some
people but the sandwich is no longer a ham sandwich.
Maybe ASCII graphics are just my persoanl preference, but I really
like the way they look. I don't think graphics add much to the game.
>> Randomly generated maps
> On the other hand, how random does random need to be? Would
> glueing together maps made of 10 pre-generated parts in
> random arrangements be random enough?
>
Actually, yes. I had thought of doing this in a game I had
thought about writing. And it was to be a Roguelike
> Would you object to
> the map staying constant from game to game, while the
> monsters and items are created and placed randomly?
>
Its hard to say.
>> Lots of spells and items
> I absolutely disagree with this. I mean, how many items did
> *Rogue* have?
>
I think that most Roguelikes now have many spells and items, even
if Rogue itself did not. Angband, Nethack, Crawl, all of these fit the
category. I'm not familiar with Adom so I can't comment.
> If I had to choose a single attribute which transforms a
> roguelike to something else for me (mileage certainly
> varies in this), it would be any sort of realtime aspect.
> Crossfire and Mangband didn't *feel* like roguelikes
> despite having most of the characteristics. Heck, even
> a generic CRPG like Nahlakh felt more like one.
>
Well, that certainly says what is a Roguelike, but of course all
turn based games are not rogulikes.
Maybe my thinking has been wrong. Maybe instead of saying "what
is a roguelike?" I could have said, "What are the most common
characteristivs of roguelikes?"
Timothy R Evans
> brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu (Brian Robinson) in article
> <7u55dk$2a...@news1.newsguy.com> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 01:55:00p did bestow the
> following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>
> >pete_t...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >>> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
> >>>floating around.
> >>>
> >
> >> I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
> >> something else
> >>
> > Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
> >IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
> >characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
> >
> > ASCII graphics
> > Randomly generated maps
> > Lots of spells and items
> >
> > A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
> >who knows. Any comments?
>
> QtNethack, Crossfire, and the Tk*Angbands come to mind.
How about defining `roguelike' as a scale rather than a boolean value.
This means that ascii-mode nethack is _very_ roguelike (i.e. its
almost exactly like rogue) while Crossfire (multiplayer, realtime, no
grid, ...) is slightly roguelike. If we could come up with a set of
points on which something is marked than a score could be generated
for each game. Something where 100 is rogue and 0 is games that have
no roguelike features at all. Any ideas for what attributes a game
should be scored on?
--
Tim Evans
Drakmere
<c757lkp...@pc142.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 08:47:19p
did bestow the following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>points on which something is marked than a score could be generated
>for each game. Something where 100 is rogue and 0 is games that have
>no roguelike features at all. Any ideas for what attributes a game
>should be scored on?
I'm not criticising, but what would be the point of that?
JSwing
>Juho Snellman <jsn...@iki.fi> wrote:
>>> ASCII graphics
>
> Personally, I think that ASCII graphics are essential for a 'true'
>rogulike. Say I have a ham sandwich, then I remove the ham and insert
>some fake ham in its place. The fake ham might taste better to some
>people but the sandwich is no longer a ham sandwich.
> Maybe ASCII graphics are just my persoanl preference, but I really
>like the way they look. I don't think graphics add much to the game.
>
Graphics are useful if they provide more information at a glance than pure
text would. Or if you can derive some information that would not be available
otherwise.
I'm thinking of the way Nethack colors its monsters red for firey ones, purple
for kings, etc. It conveys information about the monster.
Similarly, I would expect graphics to be useful if they tell me more about
a monster than I might otherwise know. If I can tell a monster is wounded
just by looking at it then that's a good thing. If I notice it's got a big
sniffer I might guess that invisibility is of limited use around it.
Otherwise graphics are just attention grabbing and often entertaining. But
you;re right that they generally don;t add to the game function.
JSwing
Dustin Ragan
<tr...@pc142.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
>How about defining `roguelike' as a scale rather than a boolean value.
>This means that ascii-mode nethack is _very_ roguelike (i.e. its
>almost exactly like rogue) while Crossfire (multiplayer, realtime, no
>grid, ...) is slightly roguelike. If we could come up with a set of
>points on which something is marked than a score could be generated
>for each game. Something where 100 is rogue and 0 is games that have
>no roguelike features at all. Any ideas for what attributes a game
>should be scored on?
Or how about recognizing that gameplay determines classification, and
not graphics?
--
"But your total distance was 30 miles
back and forth over your lawn."
--Vadim Ponomarenko, My Calculus Teacher
Timothy R Evans
> tr...@pc142.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz (Timothy R Evans) in article
> <c757lkp...@pc142.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 08:47:19p
> did bestow the following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>
> >points on which something is marked than a score could be generated
> >for each game. Something where 100 is rogue and 0 is games that have
> >no roguelike features at all. Any ideas for what attributes a game
> >should be scored on?
>
> I'm not criticising, but what would be the point of that?
Oh, I imagine it would be of about as much use as this thread is every
time it occurs. I've seen the same discussion (with no resolution) at
least twice before on r.g.r.n.
--
Tim Evans
Cody Hatch
babble this in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Thu, 14 Oct
1999 20:11:05 GMT:
>brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu (Brian Robinson) in article
><7u55dk$2a...@news1.newsguy.com> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 01:55:00p did bestow
><the
>following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>
>> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
>>IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the
>>defining characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
>>
>> ASCII graphics
>> Randomly generated maps
>> Lots of spells and items
>>
>> A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
>>who knows. Any comments?
>
>QtNethack, Crossfire, and the Tk*Angbands come to mind.
Never played the first two, but Tk*Angbands are definelty roguelike. The only
difference between AngbandTk and Angband is...what? They both have tiles.
keni...@my-deja.com
jsn...@iki.fi (Juho Snellman) wrote:
> <brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
> > Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
> >IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the
defining
> >characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
> >
> > ASCII graphics
>
> the tile-graphics are turned on? Was the EPYX version of Rogue
> less a Rogue than the Unix-version just bacause of the graphics?
I'd agree with Juho's point. We could make arguments that strictly
speaking, true ASCII graphics aren't allowed to use colors. Characters
just happen to be preferable to pixelated blobs since there's no
arguing that a "k" is a "k" as opposed to figuring out what exactly a
black and blue smear is. Graphics, when they're done, have to be done
right.
>
> > Randomly generated maps
>
> This is the hardest one to argue against. Though some games like
> Omega, Adom and Zangband have significant amounts of pre-generated
> areas/maps, the meat of the games is mainly in the random areas.
I'd say that a lack of randomly generated maps makes a game less
roguelike, but a game could certainly still be roguelike without
randomly generated maps.
>
> On the other hand, how random does random need to be? Would
> glueing together maps made of 10 pre-generated parts in
> random arrangements be random enough? Would you object to
> the map staying constant from game to game, while the
> monsters and items are created and placed randomly?
>
> > Lots of spells and items
>
> I absolutely disagree with this. I mean, how many items did
> *Rogue* have? I was juggling with experimental roguelike
> ideas a while back, and one of the less radical ones was
> a minimalistic roguelike. The general idea was to make a
> rogulike that would have the smallest possible amount of
> object- and monster types while still being playable. Do
> we really need more than three or four weapons, a couple
> of armours and a few magic items to beat on five monster
> types?
Bingo. The standard for all discussions concerning what constitutes a
"roguelike" should always be rogue. The important thing about items is
how they're used and how they're managed. Item persistance is
important. They shouldn't just disappear if you decide to drop them on
the floor, for instance.
>
> If I had to choose a single attribute which transforms a
> roguelike to something else for me (mileage certainly
> varies in this), it would be any sort of realtime aspect.
> Crossfire and Mangband didn't *feel* like roguelikes
> despite having most of the characteristics. Heck, even
> a generic CRPG like Nahlakh felt more like one.
Well, technically speed chess is still chess, but any game becomes
completely different when time becomes a significantly more important
factor. With enough time pressure, hand-eye coordination becomes more
important than strategy.
If people have to give silly ratings as far as "roguelikeness" is
concerned, they should just count the similarities to rogue. Most
games traditionally considered to be roguelikes do vary significantly
from rogue- BUT I don't really understand why some people feel that
being less roguelike is necessarily a bad thing.
Rogue didn't have a town level. That makes games like Omega, Angband,
Moria, etc... less roguelike. Are they worse games for it? In my
opinion, no. Rogue doesn't have multiple quests- that makes
practically all recent roguelikes less roguelike. Is having only one
quest something we need to get back to? I don't think so.
My guess is that there are some people who want to be able to rate
their favorite roguelikes as being better by inventing a silly
roguelike scale, but they want to be able to claim objectivity, so
definitions like "how much I like this roguelike" are out.
That's pretty much the reason why there will never be a real way of
rating roguelikeness- the people who care about such things can't be
objective enough to come up with a reasonable way of measuring such a
thing.
>
> --
> Juho Snellman
> "C:stä on kehitetty Massachusettsin teknillisessä korkeakoulussa kieli
> nimeltä BCPL."
>
Ken
Drakmere
<8E60C219Cc...@news.canterbury.ac.nz> on Fri 15 Oct 1999 01:56:54a
did bestow the following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>drakmere@DON'TCCREPLIESTOMEalt-teens.org.INVALID (Drakmere) was heard to
>babble this in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Thu, 14 Oct
>1999 20:11:05 GMT:
>
>>brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu (Brian Robinson) in article
>><7u55dk$2a...@news1.newsguy.com> on Thu 14 Oct 1999 01:55:00p did bestow
>><the
>>following nugget of wisdom upon rec.games.roguelike.misc:
>>> ASCII graphics
>>> Randomly generated maps
>>> Lots of spells and items
>>>
>>> A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
>>>who knows. Any comments?
>>
>>QtNethack, Crossfire, and the Tk*Angbands come to mind.
>
>Never played the first two, but Tk*Angbands are definelty roguelike. The
>only difference between AngbandTk and Angband is...what? They both have
>tiles.
>
>Cody
Qt Nethack is Nethack with tiles. Crossfire has tiles and no randomly
generated maps.
Brian Robinson
> On 14 Oct 1999 17:55:00 GMT, Brian Robinson
> <brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
> No.
>
Well, you're pretty biased, seeing as you're trying to pass
off your graphical program as a roguelike.
> Don't also forget you *could* also make an argument for
> 'turn-based'...
>
I know, I know. I forgot to put that one in.
Aleister Crowley's Cat
<brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
>Aleister Crowley's Cat <mango...@my-dejanews.com> wrote:
>> On 14 Oct 1999 17:55:00 GMT, Brian Robinson
>> <brob...@moses.ist.ucf.edu> wrote:
>>> ASCII graphics
>
>> No.
>>
> Well, you're pretty biased, seeing as you're trying to pass
>off your graphical program as a roguelike.
>
True :-)
but are you then saying TKangband isn't a Roguelike because it uses
tiles?
Shadowdale uses randomly-generated maps, has lots of items & spells
(well, will have), and is turn-based....also plays like a RL as
well...
>> Don't also forget you *could* also make an argument for
>> 'turn-based'...
>>
> I know, I know. I forgot to put that one in.
>
Don't do it again... :-)
bskin
: >> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
: >>floating around.
: >>
:
: > I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
: > something else
: Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
: IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
: characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
:
: ASCII graphics
I would say perhaps 'graphical tiles' is more accurate. Remember, even ASCII
roguelikes have graphics, they're just using graphics to represent them. If
you make a roguelike game non tile-based, it certainly loses the feel quite
a bit. OTOH, not having ascii tiles also makes it lose the feel quite a bit,
but i wouldn't necessarily say it makes it not a roguelike.
: Randomly generated maps
Randomly generated object types could be a big one, too. Are there any major
roguelikes out there(not counting diablo and its ilk, since there's quite a
bit of argument over whether it truly counts as a roguelike) that don't
have random object types?
: Lots of spells and items
Hm. One could conceivably make a roguelike with no spells. In fact, they
did, it was called 'rogue'. So i'd say this isn't a good criterium.
: A guy on there disagreed with the first two (for no reason). So,
: who knows. Any comments?
Well, I'd add at least two other major ones: turn-based, and death is final.
Now, lots of people will bring up things like Mangband, but i'd argue that
it's still turn-based even if things happen if you do nothing. Not to
mention projects like mangband are more an attempt to merge roguelikes with
other genres of games than to create a true roguelike. As for death being
final, i'd say this is really key. It just isn't a roguelike if you can just
save your game and continue back where you were when you die. It's part of
the whole appeal, since you tend to get more attached to your chars.
Now, it's not to say that games that *don't* have all these characteristics
aren't roguelikes, but these seem to be the baseline case. Personally, I
think the *biggest* thing that makes a game a roguelike is the author's
intent. Just lifting a few concepts from roguelikes and turning them into
a neat game isn't the same as setting out to make an enhanced roguelike, like
AngbandTK or other attempts to make roguelikes more flashy and modern. It's
the heritage that goes into the game, and the fact that some authors
consciously think about other roguelikes when designing them. Games like
diablo may share characteristics, or even be influenced, by roguelikes, and
they may be the sorts of games that people who play roguelikes enjoy, but
i'd say they're not ones simply cause they don't claim to be one. Being
influenced by a genre isn't the same as being a part of a genre.
--b.(hoping not to needlessly perpetuate a potential flamewar)
--
'I love it when somebody's own sig describes how much they suck so much
more concisely and elegantly than I possibly ever could.'
-- The Honourable Mister Piranha
Brian Robinson
> If people have to give silly ratings as far as "roguelikeness" is
> concerned, they should just count the similarities to rogue. Most
> games traditionally considered to be roguelikes do vary significantly
> from rogue- BUT I don't really understand why some people feel that
> being less roguelike is necessarily a bad thing.
>
that I don't play or even dislike games that aren't Roguelike. I don't
think I've even ever played Rogue! However, it bugs me that many of the
links on the RL News site lead to games that look a lot more like
Ultima clones than Roguelikes. And when I want to play the type of
game -I- call a Roguelike, I don't want to play an Ultima clone.
I guess there's a degree of subconscious bias here. I feel
like if someone makes a game using ASCII graphics, they really spent
a lot more time designing the gameplay than the graphics, which in my
book is "a good thing." But if I play a game similar to an text-based
game but that is graphical, I think that they spent quite a lot of
time on graphics that could have been spent on gameplay, items, etc.
I'm obviously more forgiving to commercial games, since they can
have a guy or two or ten that work exculsively on gameplay and then
have some other guys doing art and rendering. But most Roguelike's, at
least in the first version, come from the mind of one person.
Brian Robinson
> but are you then saying TKangband isn't a Roguelike because it uses
> tiles?
>
graphics, not an exclusively graphical program. But after the debate
here, I've concluded like the others that you can't really peg any
game down as being exclusively RL or not RL.
Gwidon S. Naskrent
drakmere@DON'TCCREPLIESTOMEalt-teens.org.INVALID (Drakmere) wrote:
>Qt Nethack is Nethack with tiles.
AND KDE interface (which is horrible, but YMMV)
>Crossfire has tiles and no randomly
>generated maps.
But it has several dozens pregenerated ones :-)
Gwidon S. Naskrent
(Aleister Crowley's Cat) wrote:
>Shadowdale uses randomly-generated maps, has lots of items & spells
>(well, will have), and is turn-based....also plays like a RL as
>well...
And you can't save... LOL, that's like building a house from the roof
down.
Do note that Shadowdale is heavily Windows-dependent, yet True
Roguelike Players (tm) favour U**ix (and hence ASCII mode).
Gwidon S. Naskrent
>Randomly generated object types could be a big one, too. Are there any major
>roguelikes out there(not counting diablo and its ilk, since there's quite a
>bit of argument over whether it truly counts as a roguelike) that don't
>have random object types?
That's not accurate. Every major roguelike has some items that are not
randomized - artifacts, special spellbooks or whatnot.
>Hm. One could conceivably make a roguelike with no spells. In fact, they
>did, it was called 'rogue'. So i'd say this isn't a good criterium.
But then there were no races and classes either.
>Well, I'd add at least two other major ones: turn-based, and death is final.
Specifically: the savefile gets erased (or blanked) after use. It
appears that, since *bands don't delete the file, it's possible to
resurrect the character in wizard mode. That's of course cheating, but
less impeding than savefile backups.
>Now, lots of people will bring up things like Mangband, but i'd argue that
>it's still turn-based even if things happen if you do nothing. Not to
Basically, yes. You can't change a turn-based game (cf. various turn
strategies) into a real-time, since the engine would break down.
>final, i'd say this is really key. It just isn't a roguelike if you can just
>save your game and continue back where you were when you die. It's part of
>the whole appeal, since you tend to get more attached to your chars.
I'm not sure each and every roguelike out there has it, but it's a
strong element.
>AngbandTK or other attempts to make roguelikes more flashy and modern. It's
>the heritage that goes into the game, and the fact that some authors
>consciously think about other roguelikes when designing them. Games like
>diablo may share characteristics, or even be influenced, by roguelikes, and
>they may be the sorts of games that people who play roguelikes enjoy, but
Diablo's designers admitted being influenced by Moria/Angband, or so
do people say.
Cybernard
Cody Hatch wrote:
> JSw...@NOSPAMWport.com (JSwing) was heard to babble this in the group
> rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Wed, 13 Oct 1999 01:42:18 GMT:
>
> >Heh. Pretty funny. It's a 1993 computer game for the PC produced by
> >SSI. It looks like an attempt at Rogue w/ the AD&D rules.
>
> <snip>
>
> >Amusing, I think. I bought it to remind myself that folks have made
> >commercial Rogue-likes.
>
> Ha! Ever heard of Castle of the Winds? Epic Megagames released it (also in
> 1993), and it's quite a bit more roguelike than Dungeon Hack, IMHO. It's
> essentially Angband Lite, with graphics. Sorta like a toned down version of
> the Tk versions. You couldn't shoot or throw stuff, and there was only one
> type of character (who used both spells and weapons), but it had a VERY
> advanced drag and drop inventory system. Had multiple towns, a complicated
> plot...great fun.
>
> http://www.epicgames.com/castle.htm
>
> First episode is shareware, second needs to be registered.
>
> Cody
Or you could just go to www.gamingdepot.com
Castle of the Winds... my first RPG :)
Aleister Crowley's Cat
S. Naskrent) wrote:
>On Fri, 15 Oct 1999 17:39:18 GMT, mango...@my-dejanews.com
>(Aleister Crowley's Cat) wrote:
>
>>Shadowdale uses randomly-generated maps, has lots of items & spells
>>(well, will have), and is turn-based....also plays like a RL as
>>well...
>
>And you can't save... LOL, that's like building a house from the roof
>down.
>
Not yet....that feature will be in....though I'll probably make death
final...
>Do note that Shadowdale is heavily Windows-dependent, yet True
>Roguelike Players (tm) favour U**ix (and hence ASCII mode).
>
Meow...
keni...@my-deja.com
nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl wrote:
> On Fri, 15 Oct 1999 17:39:18 GMT, mango...@my-dejanews.com
> (Aleister Crowley's Cat) wrote:
>
> >Shadowdale uses randomly-generated maps, has lots of items & spells
> >(well, will have), and is turn-based....also plays like a RL as
> >well...
>
> And you can't save... LOL, that's like building a house from the roof
> down.
>
> Roguelike Players (tm) favour U**ix (and hence ASCII mode).
I think that the games that survive are the ones that make some attempt
to be platform independent. Curses and C are the reasons that
roguelikes persist. A game that doesn't leave its original platform
tends to die with that platform.
That's not to say that passing from platform to platform in the exact
same form forever is any kind of life- more like unlife, if you ask me.
>
> Gwidon S. Naskrent (nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl)
> GSNband - http://artemida.amu.edu.pl/~naskrent/index.html
> GEU/J d- s+:+ a-- C+++ ULB++>++++ P- E W++ N+++ o? K? w+ O-- M-- V--
> PS++ PE- Y PGP->++ t-- 5-- X- R* tv- b+ DI-- D++
>
Ken
Aidan Ryder
pete_t...@hotmail.com writes
>On Sun, 17 Oct 1999 12:56:51 +0100, Aidan Ryder
><Ang...@broomlee.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>In article <7u55dk$2a...@news1.newsguy.com>, Brian Robinson
>>>pete_t...@hotmail.com wrote:
>>>>> Well, there's Diablo, too. I'm sure there's a few other examples
>>>>>floating around.
>>>>>
>>>
>>>> I just cannot consider Diablo to be a roguelike, graphics turn it into
>>>> something else
>>>>
>>> Yeah, I do tend to agree with you. A guy came on the #roguelike
>>>IRC channel (irc.pfnet.org) the other day and said, "What are the defining
>>>characteristics of a Roguelike Game?" And I said:
>>>
>>> ASCII graphics
>>> Lots of spells and items
>>>
>>>who knows. Any comments?
>>
>>graphical tiles. IMHO Diablo was simply a step beyond that,
>>unfortunately at the cost of most of the depth of a roguelike.
>>
>
>A lot of them do have graphical tiles, but most of those were
>originally ASCII based, and had tiles added at a later stage, nethack
>is the only roguelike I play which has tiles, and I play with them
>switched off.
>
But the game continues to be a roguelike even when using tiled graphics,
therefore ASCII graphics cannot be needed for a game to be roguelike.
>Freak Boy
>
>* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com * The Internet's Discussion Network *
>* The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free! *
--
Aidan Ryder - "Confutatis maledictis, flammis acribus addictis"
"There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant
number of users want fixed. The reason we come up with new versions is not to
fix bugs. It's the stupidest reason to buy a new version I ever heard." - Bill
Gates on Windows and it's 10,000 reported bugs.
Aleister Crowley's Cat
>In article <380a3f97...@news.tpnet.pl>,
> nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl wrote:
>> On Fri, 15 Oct 1999 17:39:18 GMT, mango...@my-dejanews.com
>> (Aleister Crowley's Cat) wrote:
>>
>> >Shadowdale uses randomly-generated maps, has lots of items & spells
>> >(well, will have), and is turn-based....also plays like a RL as
>> >well...
>>
>> And you can't save... LOL, that's like building a house from the roof
>> down.
>>
>> Do note that Shadowdale is heavily Windows-dependent, yet True
>> Roguelike Players (tm) favour U**ix (and hence ASCII mode).
>
>I think that the games that survive are the ones that make some attempt
>to be platform independent. Curses and C are the reasons that
>roguelikes persist. A game that doesn't leave its original platform
>tends to die with that platform.
>
>That's not to say that passing from platform to platform in the exact
>same form forever is any kind of life- more like unlife, if you ask me.
>
>
>Ken
>
>
>Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
>Before you buy.
If I had a Linux Machine, and when Delphi comes out on Linux I would
consider porting Shadowdale to Linux...(well X-Windows or
whatever)...and if I ever get the game done...
There's a lot of Ifs there however...
Dave Simmons
keni...@my-deja.com wrote:
> Technically the most roguelike game is rogue, and all other roguelike
> games are less roguelike depending on how much they differ from rogue.
>
Surely Rogue is just that: Rogue. A Roguelike is something that is like
Rogue... :)
~Dave
Gwidon S. Naskrent
Tanksley) wrote:
>>No, because it has a separate ASCII mode.
>
>Ragnaroc is roguelike, and it has no seperate ASCII mode. Give it up --
Oh, it has an ASCII mode after all, and that's something :-) It's
Ragnaro_k_, BTW.
>there's no hard and fast definition for a genre which is simply defined as
>being "like" Rogue. Omega is Roguelike in spite of having two-way dungeon
>travel and outdoor travel which is seperate from outdoor combat; AngbandTk
>is roguelike in spite of being hardwired for graphics.
I see no problem with outdoor travel/combat as long as dungeon stay
the key places. This is really a different issue from being
'hardwired' (by which you probably mean 'written predominantly for')
tiles.
>>Hm, maybe.
>
>True. Of course, for all the graphics it was more Roguelike than the
>plainest-text version of Moria, let alone Angband.
You seem to be confusing rogue(6)-like and Roguelike (similar to a
specific game, or being part of a genre).
In comparison, DooM was the first real FPP shoot'em-up. Yet no one
requires later FPPs to be limited to the same set of features DooM had
- one can quote looking in different directions, flying, underwater
combat etc.
>>It was a commercial product after all, and roguelikes are
>>freeware by definition (except for a few crooked cases...)
>
>By WHOSE definition? That's utterly preposterous.
Well, all but one RL games have been freeware, and all but a few are
available in source. Can you see a rule here?
>Randomness is important, but so is a merging of strategy and tactics --
>there's no seperation in Rogue between exploring and combat. Omega has a
>seperation (when you're in the countryside), so it's less Roguelike
>because of that. (I'd say that Omega is one of the least Roguelike of the
>Roguelikes.)
That depends on your meaning of 'roguelike', like I outlined above.
>>Wouldn't it become boring too quickly? Of course if it's easy to add
>>new monsters/objects/dungeons, then it probably won't.
>
>I'm not sure that it would -- just as with simple graphics, people who are
>used to complex graphics assume that text is boring. In reality, the
>simplification of text allows the author to put more effort into other
>things, and the result is a better game.
With five monsters? Don't exaggerate, please, the simplicity of RL
design is that you actually add _many_ more monsters than in
commercial games. Just think how much time you save which would
otherwise be wasted on rendering 3D models...
>In a game with fewer types of monsters, I would expect the monsters to act
>more distinguishably, if not more cleverly.
AI level has nothing to do with the amount of monster races you put
in. A well-defined AI can adapt to a significant number of cases.
>More monsters is a fine thing, but as with more graphics, you have to
>balance the time you spend on them -- more monsters means less programmer
>time spent on each monster. Eventually you wind up using the computer as
>a mass monster factory, like Angband.
Well, I like that, and you surely exaggerate by comparing Angband to
be nothing but a bunch of monsters randomly thrown together for
general fun and carnage. And I can't say they're badly designed,
either (they could be better made, but at the expense of each m_ptr
containing a copy of the monster flags and the resulting save file
bloat).
>>Yes. We're no longer in the year 1983, I'm afraid. I don't uphold
>>lavishness in memory management, but we don't have to squeeze
>>every byte as well.
>
>Sounds like a person defending graphics.
Well, how can a person that can't draw defend graphics, especially in
Angband, where the tiles quality is far inferior to NH's?
>>If I wanted ""three or four weapons, a couple of armours and a few
>>magic items to beat on five monster types" I'd reach for a commercial
>>game like Ultima 1 :-)
>
>Um... Or, say, Ultima VII?
Or Ultima X, same thing (only the monsters are rendered better).
>I have to admit that multiplayer doesn't seem very much like Rogue to me.
>even MAngband fell far from the Roguelike tree (although it's still a
>Roguelike, if only by parentage).
Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
keni...@my-deja.com
nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl wrote:
> On 17 Oct 1999 15:12:33 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
> Tanksley) wrote:
>
>
> You seem to be confusing rogue(6)-like and Roguelike (similar to a
> specific game, or being part of a genre).
>
> In comparison, DooM was the first real FPP shoot'em-up. Yet no one
> requires later FPPs to be limited to the same set of features DooM had
> - one can quote looking in different directions, flying, underwater
> combat etc.
FPS (first person shooter) is not synonymous with "Doom-like" even if
most FPS's are a lot like Doom.
Saying that rogue-like and Roguelike are different is splitting hairs.
It seems to me that lots of people want to rationalize having a laundry
list of what doesn't constitute "rogue-like."
I think that if there were a better term for "rogue-like", we would use
that. Creating a term based on common features would give us longish
names like "overhead, turn-based, hack n' slash, dungeon exploration
game" which would still be incomplete in terms of describing a
rogue-like.
>
> >>It was a commercial product after all, and roguelikes are
> >>freeware by definition (except for a few crooked cases...)
> >
> >By WHOSE definition? That's utterly preposterous.
>
> Well, all but one RL games have been freeware, and all but a few are
> available in source. Can you see a rule here?
If someone sold an unaltered public domain roguelike (this is legal,
BTW), I really don't see how that roguelike would suddenly become less
RL.
>
> >Randomness is important, but so is a merging of strategy and tactics
--
> >there's no seperation in Rogue between exploring and combat. Omega
has a
> >seperation (when you're in the countryside), so it's less Roguelike
> >because of that. (I'd say that Omega is one of the least Roguelike
of the
> >Roguelikes.)
>
> That depends on your meaning of 'roguelike', like I outlined above.
>
> >>Wouldn't it become boring too quickly? Of course if it's easy to add
> >>new monsters/objects/dungeons, then it probably won't.
> >
> >I'm not sure that it would -- just as with simple graphics, people
who are
> >used to complex graphics assume that text is boring. In reality, the
> >simplification of text allows the author to put more effort into
other
> >things, and the result is a better game.
>
> With five monsters? Don't exaggerate, please, the simplicity of RL
> design is that you actually add _many_ more monsters than in
> commercial games. Just think how much time you save which would
> otherwise be wasted on rendering 3D models...
I would hardly call "green bat, red bat, black bat, gray bat, white bay,
invisible bat, zombie bat, vampire bat, emperor bat, etc..." to be 9+
monsters. In most RLs, there is maybe just as few monsters (or fewer)
as in a commercial game.
While rendering 3D models is silly if all the monsters have the exact
same behavior, creating a laundry list of monsters that differ only in
terms of hit points and damage dealt could be viewed as being just as
much a waste of time.
>
> >In a game with fewer types of monsters, I would expect the monsters
to act
> >more distinguishably, if not more cleverly.
>
> AI level has nothing to do with the amount of monster races you put
> in. A well-defined AI can adapt to a significant number of cases.
>
> >More monsters is a fine thing, but as with more graphics, you have to
> >balance the time you spend on them -- more monsters means less
programmer
> >time spent on each monster. Eventually you wind up using the
computer as
> >a mass monster factory, like Angband.
>
> Well, I like that, and you surely exaggerate by comparing Angband to
> be nothing but a bunch of monsters randomly thrown together for
> general fun and carnage. And I can't say they're badly designed,
> either (they could be better made, but at the expense of each m_ptr
> containing a copy of the monster flags and the resulting save file
> bloat).
I'm not sure that there really are all that many monsters in Angband.
Basically there are just a few flags and lots and lots of different
names. If you go through the monster list, you'll notice that most
monsters are so similar that they can be broken down into a few major
types.
[snip]
>
> >I have to admit that multiplayer doesn't seem very much like Rogue to
me.
> >even MAngband fell far from the Roguelike tree (although it's still a
> >Roguelike, if only by parentage).
>
> Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
Exceptions don't prove rules. They proof rules. And if an exception
shows that a rule doesn't always hold, the rule is no good.
>
> Gwidon S. Naskrent (nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl)
> GSNband - http://artemida.amu.edu.pl/~naskrent/index.html
> GEU/J d- s+:+ a-- C+++ ULB++>++++ P- E W++ N+++ o? K? w+ O-- M-- V--
> PS++ PE- Y PGP->++ t-- 5-- X- R* tv- b+ DI-- D++
>
Ken
William Tanksley
>On 17 Oct 1999 15:12:33 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
>Tanksley) wrote:
>>>No, because it has a separate ASCII mode.
>>Ragnaroc is roguelike, and it has no seperate ASCII mode. Give it up --
>Oh, it has an ASCII mode after all, and that's something :-) It's
>Ragnaro_k_, BTW.
Huh? Are we thinking of a different game? Ragnarok is a DOS game,
graphics mode only (although it's got the best graphics mode I've seen,
since it also displays alphabetic characters for monsters). Is the
alpha-monsters display what you're thinking of?
>>there's no hard and fast definition for a genre which is simply defined as
>>being "like" Rogue. Omega is Roguelike in spite of having two-way dungeon
>>travel and outdoor travel which is seperate from outdoor combat; AngbandTk
>>is roguelike in spite of being hardwired for graphics.
>I see no problem with outdoor travel/combat as long as dungeon stay
>the key places. This is really a different issue from being
>'hardwired' (by which you probably mean 'written predominantly for')
>tiles.
I agree that it's a different issue -- but they both impact Roguelikeness.
Keep in mind that Omega is my favorite Roguelike (I'm the maintainer, it
better be!), so I'm not dissing it.
Outdoor travel in Omega is not Roguelike because it's a special case with
respect to combat. In Rogue, combat is the same as normal travel -- there
are no special keys or display modes. In Omega, an outdoors encounter
switches modes. This IS a very serious impact on its Roguelikeness.
Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical version
of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient to play).
>>>Hm, maybe.
>>True. Of course, for all the graphics it was more Roguelike than the
>>plainest-text version of Moria, let alone Angband.
>You seem to be confusing rogue(6)-like and Roguelike (similar to a
>specific game, or being part of a genre).
No, I'm not. I'm identifying them as being the same thing. The
alternatives are either to claim that some one person has the ultimate
authority to judge Roguelikeness, or to claim that there is no
Roguelikeness except in the mind of each person.
I reject emphatically the first possibility; nobody on the scene now has
any credibility WRT that. The second possibility is vaguely reasonable,
but lacks applicability -- we have to choose some basis to limit
discussion in the r.g.r.* newsgroups.
>In comparison, DooM was the first real FPP shoot'em-up. Yet no one
>requires later FPPs to be limited to the same set of features DooM had
>- one can quote looking in different directions, flying, underwater
>combat etc.
Pardon, but you're wrong on every count. Doom was not the first;
Wolfenstein3D came well before it, and there were low-tech first-person
shoot'em'ups before that (although the tech was SO low that they arguably
belong in a different genre). Even with that, the name of the genre is
NOT Doomlike, so of course one judges games by how much they involve first
person shooting.
>>>It was a commercial product after all, and roguelikes are
>>>freeware by definition (except for a few crooked cases...)
>>By WHOSE definition? That's utterly preposterous.
>Well, all but one RL games have been freeware, and all but a few are
>available in source. Can you see a rule here?
I see a regularity -- but Rogue (for the PC) itself was not freeware, but
rather commercial. The _rule_ I see is that the Roguelike model isn't
commercially attractive (a fact I find rather pleasant).
A commercial Roguelike would still be Roguelike.
>>Randomness is important, but so is a merging of strategy and tactics --
>>there's no seperation in Rogue between exploring and combat. Omega has a
>>seperation (when you're in the countryside), so it's less Roguelike
>>because of that. (I'd say that Omega is one of the least Roguelike of the
>>Roguelikes.)
>That depends on your meaning of 'roguelike', like I outlined above.
That's what I'm explaining, isn't it.
>>>Wouldn't it become boring too quickly? Of course if it's easy to add
>>>new monsters/objects/dungeons, then it probably won't.
>>I'm not sure that it would -- just as with simple graphics, people who are
>>used to complex graphics assume that text is boring. In reality, the
>>simplification of text allows the author to put more effort into other
>>things, and the result is a better game.
>With five monsters? Don't exaggerate, please, the simplicity of RL
>design is that you actually add _many_ more monsters than in
>commercial games. Just think how much time you save which would
>otherwise be wasted on rendering 3D models...
Why NOT exaggerate? Everything else about Roguelikes is exaggerated! I
think it just might be great fun to really go to town making a few REALLY
different monsters.
>>In a game with fewer types of monsters, I would expect the monsters to act
>>more distinguishably, if not more cleverly.
>AI level has nothing to do with the amount of monster races you put
>in. A well-defined AI can adapt to a significant number of cases.
And a great artist can make five hundred distinct images for monsters!
But great artists don't seem to congregate around Roguelikes. And when it
comes down to it, some great artists seem to prefer simplicity for simple
things, and grand detail only for complex things.
I find the *gameplay* (how I deal with the monsters) to be far more
interesting than the sights (what the monsters claim to look like).
A balrog is like a lesser balrog. Except (yawn)... Oh, no mistake, I'd
want my monsters to scale in power well, and probably take different
titles as they did so. The game would be too short otherwise. I simply
wouldn't claim that those are somehow different types of monsters.
>>More monsters is a fine thing, but as with more graphics, you have to
>>balance the time you spend on them -- more monsters means less programmer
>>time spent on each monster. Eventually you wind up using the computer as
>>a mass monster factory, like Angband.
>Well, I like that, and you surely exaggerate by comparing Angband to
>be nothing but a bunch of monsters randomly thrown together for
>general fun and carnage.
And if I've exaggerated, then your re-exaggeration of my statement is
surely a new realm for appreciation. (I don't care for your
mischaracterization of my statements. Please stop.) Angband is one of my
favorite games -- OAngband in specific.
>And I can't say they're badly designed,
>either (they could be better made, but at the expense of each m_ptr
>containing a copy of the monster flags and the resulting save file
>bloat).
*So much* could be added to it as well by making the flags mean different
things for different types of monster. Or by making the different types
actually behave differently. Or... Instead you have a game where
monsters are SO much of a sameness that they can be churned out of a huge
text file with only a few bytes for each different type of monster. Know
the monster's resistances, spells, and speed? You know the monster
type completely.
More or less hitpoints? No big deal -- HP is generally random anyhow; a
higher-level orc could randomly happen to have as many hitpoints as a
lower-level orc.
This stuff isn't BAD. But it could be far better. Each type of monster
could react uniquely to different stimuli depending on what
resistances/spells/etc it had. Something as little as printing different
text could have a positive effect on gameplay.
>>>Yes. We're no longer in the year 1983, I'm afraid. I don't uphold
>>>lavishness in memory management, but we don't have to squeeze
>>>every byte as well.
>>Sounds like a person defending graphics.
>Well, how can a person that can't draw defend graphics, especially in
>Angband, where the tiles quality is far inferior to NH's?
Didn't claim you were -- I said that you were using the same arguments.
Look at that paragraph and just imagine it taken out of context. The
simple presence of resources does not imply their consumption.
The fact that I have a computer does not stop me from playing Go.
>>I have to admit that multiplayer doesn't seem very much like Rogue to me.
>>even MAngband fell far from the Roguelike tree (although it's still a
>>Roguelike, if only by parentage).
>Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
The question is first: what's the rule? We seem to agree that a rule
exists. You say it's text-mode turn-based freeware; I say it's proximity
to Rogue.
>Gwidon S. Naskrent (nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl)
--
-William "Billy" Tanksley
Josh Fishman
<mango...@my-dejanews.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 19 Oct 1999 02:43:15 GMT, keni...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> >In article <380a3f97...@news.tpnet.pl>,
> > nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl wrote:
> >> Do note that Shadowdale is heavily Windows-dependent, yet True
> >> Roguelike Players (tm) favour U**ix (and hence ASCII mode).
> >
> >I think that the games that survive are the ones that make some attempt
> >to be platform independent. Curses and C are the reasons that
> >roguelikes persist. A game that doesn't leave its original platform
> >tends to die with that platform.
> >
> >That's not to say that passing from platform to platform in the exact
> >same form forever is any kind of life- more like unlife, if you ask me.
We have VT emulators so we can play terminal games[1] on our PCs.
If Shadowdale looks good enough (and it sounds pretty cool so
far) I'd try WINE, and even consider double-clicking on the
VMware icon on my desktop :-)
> If I had a Linux Machine, and when Delphi comes out on Linux I would
> consider porting Shadowdale to Linux...(well X-Windows or
> whatever)...and if I ever get the game done...
Maybe by then Linux will be a compiler target option to Delphi.
-- Josh
[1] according to ``top'', my favorite is either ``bash'' or ``vi''
--
``Our relationship started going south when he had my middle name
legally changed to "EXPERIMENT-NUMBER-ONE".'' -- Oasis, sluggy.com
Brian Robinson
> Pardon, but you're wrong on every count. Doom was not the first;
> Wolfenstein3D came well before it, and there were low-tech first-person
> shoot'em'ups before that (although the tech was SO low that they arguably
> belong in a different genre). Even with that, the name of the genre is
> NOT Doomlike, so of course one judges games by how much they involve first
> person shooting.
>
to hold all the doom clones that came out in the couple of years after it
was released. I later changed the directory name to 3d after things were
not so muhc like doom, though.
Gwidon S. Naskrent
Tanksley) wrote:
>Huh? Are we thinking of a different game? Ragnarok is a DOS game,
>graphics mode only (although it's got the best graphics mode I've seen,
>since it also displays alphabetic characters for monsters). Is the
>alpha-monsters display what you're thinking of?
Yes, exactly. There's a small window in the bottom of the screen; too
bad it doesn't contain all the top panel.
I don't think it was put there by accident.
>Outdoor travel in Omega is not Roguelike because it's a special case with
>respect to combat. In Rogue, combat is the same as normal travel -- there
>are no special keys or display modes. In Omega, an outdoors encounter
>switches modes. This IS a very serious impact on its Roguelikeness.
Come on, it can't matter that much. It's the same in ADOM, and yet no
one complains about it.
>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
>graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical version
>of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient to play).
But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
>No, I'm not. I'm identifying them as being the same thing. The
>alternatives are either to claim that some one person has the ultimate
>authority to judge Roguelikeness, or to claim that there is no
>Roguelikeness except in the mind of each person.
There must at least be some objectivity in the definition. I'm not
giving up finding it :)
>Pardon, but you're wrong on every count. Doom was not the first;
What does it matter? Change 'DooM' to 'W3D' in the previous sentence,
the meaning is the same. Angband is to rogue(6) as Quake is to W3D,
yet they both keep (some of) the spirit of their predecessors.
>belong in a different genre). Even with that, the name of the genre is
>NOT Doomlike, so of course one judges games by how much they involve first
>person shooting.
Why, I was commonly encountering this work in computer games press.
>>Well, all but one RL games have been freeware, and all but a few are
>>available in source. Can you see a rule here?
>
>I see a regularity -- but Rogue (for the PC) itself was not freeware, but
>rather commercial. The _rule_ I see is that the Roguelike model isn't
>commercially attractive (a fact I find rather pleasant).
Yet, the original version of rogue(6) was both freeware and available
in source (per being posted to comp.sources IIRC). It's the BSD rogue
that got licensed.
>A commercial Roguelike would still be Roguelike.
There will be no such thing, or it will be a tile- and turn-based CRPG
(albeit I don't think any sane gaming company would risk that).
>Why NOT exaggerate? Everything else about Roguelikes is exaggerated! I
>think it just might be great fun to really go to town making a few REALLY
>different monsters.
Which you will then pound to a messy pulp? Come on, you'd get bored
with them sooner than you think.
>>AI level has nothing to do with the amount of monster races you put
>>in. A well-defined AI can adapt to a significant number of cases.
>
>And a great artist can make five hundred distinct images for monsters!
>But great artists don't seem to congregate around Roguelikes. And when it
>comes down to it, some great artists seem to prefer simplicity for simple
>things, and grand detail only for complex things.
I'm not denying it. Besides, what's the analogy to AI here?
Complex detailing, especially for the AI, is a thing I dislike in
coding. A game engine has to be robust and responsive, not supported
on numberless small crutches and exceptions.
>I find the *gameplay* (how I deal with the monsters) to be far more
>interesting than the sights (what the monsters claim to look like).
Of course, since we don't have much choice in presenting them...
although I'd like to have two-coloured monsters in *bands (pulsating
lights, and whatnot).
>A balrog is like a lesser balrog. Except (yawn)... Oh, no mistake, I'd
>want my monsters to scale in power well, and probably take different
>titles as they did so. The game would be too short otherwise. I simply
>wouldn't claim that those are somehow different types of monsters.
Ah, so that's what you thought. Well, five different genres of
monsters, even numbering dozens of species, would still be boring
after a while.
>>>time spent on each monster. Eventually you wind up using the computer as
>>>a mass monster factory, like Angband.
>
>>Well, I like that, and you surely exaggerate by comparing Angband to
>>be nothing but a bunch of monsters randomly thrown together for
>>general fun and carnage.
>
>And if I've exaggerated, then your re-exaggeration of my statement is
>surely a new realm for appreciation. (I don't care for your
>mischaracterization of my statements. Please stop.) Angband is one of my
>favorite games -- OAngband in specific.
So, OAngband's good despite having > 500 different crittens, and other
*bands are not? I don't understand this.
>*So much* could be added to it as well by making the flags mean different
>things for different types of monster. Or by making the different types
>actually behave differently. Or... Instead you have a game where
>monsters are SO much of a sameness that they can be churned out of a huge
>text file with only a few bytes for each different type of monster. Know
>the monster's resistances, spells, and speed? You know the monster
>type completely.
Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
in NH).
>More or less hitpoints? No big deal -- HP is generally random anyhow; a
>higher-level orc could randomly happen to have as many hitpoints as a
>lower-level orc.
Of course, that's the whole deal of random HP.
>This stuff isn't BAD. But it could be far better. Each type of monster
>could react uniquely to different stimuli depending on what
>resistances/spells/etc it had. Something as little as printing different
>text could have a positive effect on gameplay.
I did something liike that with elemental attacks in GSNband, so that
it doesn't say '<foo> resists' all the time.
>>Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
>
>The question is first: what's the rule? We seem to agree that a rule
>exists. You say it's text-mode turn-based freeware; I say it's proximity
>to Rogue.
Incidentally, all text-mode turn-based freeware games (and a few
others) claim descendancy from rogue(6). Our definitions are just the
same thing.
Gwidon S. Naskrent
>I'm not sure that there really are all that many monsters in Angband.
>Basically there are just a few flags and lots and lots of different
>names. If you go through the monster list, you'll notice that most
>monsters are so similar that they can be broken down into a few major
>types.
For example?
The spells monsters have alone number over 90 (some variants having
raised the amount to the max value of 96). Monsters can have over a
hundred different flags, or any combination thereof (although some
combinations are plain contradictory).
And the good thing is, people are planning to add more :-)
>> Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
>
>Exceptions don't prove rules. They proof rules. And if an exception
>shows that a rule doesn't always hold, the rule is no good.
Why, I know this adage to be spurious, yet couldn't resist partaking
in its commonplaceness :-)
Cody Hatch
this in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Fri, 22 Oct 1999
11:08:55 GMT:
>On 20 Oct 1999 10:16:57 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
>Tanksley) wrote:
>
>>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
>>graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical
>>version of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient
>>to play).
>
>But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
Better yet, what about the Tk versions of Angband?
>>A commercial Roguelike would still be Roguelike.
>
>There will be no such thing, or it will be a tile- and turn-based CRPG
>(albeit I don't think any sane gaming company would risk that).
Castle of the Winds? It's VERY roguelike, was produced by Epic Megagames, and
cost money. Very nice game, actually.
>>*So much* could be added to it as well by making the flags mean
>>different things for different types of monster. Or by making the
>>different types actually behave differently. Or... Instead you have a
>>game where monsters are SO much of a sameness that they can be churned
>>out of a huge text file with only a few bytes for each different type
>>of monster. Know the monster's resistances, spells, and speed? You
>>know the monster type completely.
>
>Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
>to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
>in NH).
I think there's a VERY strong case to be made AGAINST exceptions. Nethack went
that route, and displays a lot of the problems with it. And a lot of the
benefits too, but that's neither here nor there. :-)
Ross Morgan-Linial
> > Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
>
> Exceptions don't prove rules. They proof rules. And if an exception
> shows that a rule doesn't always hold, the rule is no good.
The word "prove" in that saying is used in the sense of "test", so the
saying is correct. Almost always used incorrectly, but correct. :-/
--
Ross Morgan-Linial rmo...@jetcity.com
This space intentionally fnord left blank.
Gwidon S. Naskrent
wrote:
>>>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
>>>graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical
>>>version of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient
>>>to play).
>>
>>But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
>
>Better yet, what about the Tk versions of Angband?
Nothing. You can switch to ASCII mode all the time. You can even
switch the font to your favourite one (monospaced only).
>>There will be no such thing, or it will be a tile- and turn-based CRPG
>>(albeit I don't think any sane gaming company would risk that).
>
>Castle of the Winds? It's VERY roguelike, was produced by Epic Megagames, and
>cost money. Very nice game, actually.
It was shareware, which meant the company wasn't risking as much.
Besides, it was released in 1992 IIRC, and it was too far from
top-of-the-line games at that time.
And no, it's not roguelike IMHO. Neither is Dungeon Hack BTW.
>>Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
>>to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
>>in NH).
>
>I think there's a VERY strong case to be made AGAINST exceptions. Nethack went
>that route, and displays a lot of the problems with it. And a lot of the
>benefits too, but that's neither here nor there. :-)
That's another problem. I asked what's wrong with defining a monster
by resistances, spells used and speed.
Ben Goetter
says...
> Incidentally, all text-mode turn-based freeware games (and a few
> others) claim descendancy from rogue(6).
Startrek? Empire? Adventure? Wumpus? DND? Dungeon?
Cody Hatch
17:27:01 GMT:
>On 22 Oct 1999 12:58:56 GMT, co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch)
>wrote:
>
>>>>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is
>>>>fully graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the
>>>>graphical version of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more
>>>>inconvenient to play).
>>>
>>>But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
>>
>>Better yet, what about the Tk versions of Angband?
>
>Nothing. You can switch to ASCII mode all the time. You can even
>switch the font to your favourite one (monospaced only).
In AngabandTk?! Ummm...wanna bet? :-) How, exactly, do you switch it to
ASCII mode?
>>>There will be no such thing, or it will be a tile- and turn-based CRPG
>>>(albeit I don't think any sane gaming company would risk that).
>>
>>Castle of the Winds? It's VERY roguelike, was produced by Epic
>>Megagames, and cost money. Very nice game, actually.
>
>It was shareware, which meant the company wasn't risking as much.
A.) How are they risking any less than with any other commercial distribution
model?
B.) Shareware or not, it's still commercial.
>Besides, it was released in 1992 IIRC, and it was too far from
>top-of-the-line games at that time.
Again, irrelevent. The latest version of Angband is far from top-of-the-line.
>And no, it's not roguelike IMHO. Neither is Dungeon Hack BTW.
I haven't played Dungeon Hack, but I *HAVE* played Castle of the Winds, and I'd
like to here one reason why AngbandTk is a roguelike, but Castle of the Winds
isn't. In fact, I could even think of some reasons why Castle of the Winds is
MORE like Rogue than AngbandTk.
>>>Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
>>>to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
>>>in NH).
>>
>>I think there's a VERY strong case to be made AGAINST exceptions.
>>Nethack went that route, and displays a lot of the problems with it.
>>And a lot of the benefits too, but that's neither here nor there. :-)
>
>That's another problem. I asked what's wrong with defining a monster
>by resistances, spells used and speed.
That's what I was saying--there's nothing wrong with that--the alternative is
to try and make special cases exceptions for each monster. It's what Nethack
does, and IMHO, it's not as good as the Angband method of using a combination
of flags.
William Tanksley
>On 20 Oct 1999 10:16:57 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
>Tanksley) wrote:
>>Huh? Are we thinking of a different game? Ragnarok is a DOS game,
>>graphics mode only (although it's got the best graphics mode I've seen,
>>since it also displays alphabetic characters for monsters). Is the
>>alpha-monsters display what you're thinking of?
>Yes, exactly. There's a small window in the bottom of the screen; too
>bad it doesn't contain all the top panel.
>I don't think it was put there by accident.
I have to conclude that you're trying to communicate something different
from what I've been hearing. I have NO idea what you're trying to say,
though.
>>Outdoor travel in Omega is not Roguelike because it's a special case with
>>respect to combat. In Rogue, combat is the same as normal travel -- there
>>are no special keys or display modes. In Omega, an outdoors encounter
>>switches modes. This IS a very serious impact on its Roguelikeness.
>Come on, it can't matter that much. It's the same in ADOM, and yet no
>one complains about it.
Was I complaining? I was stating a fact. Let me re-state it. Outdoor
travel in Omega is NOT Roguelike, and it reduces the roguelikeness of the
game.
If I were to remove 'encounters', it would be Roguelike. If every fight
in Omega were like a wilderness encounter, Omega would not be Roguelike in
any substantial way.
>>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
>>graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical version
>>of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient to play).
>But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
Not a stitch.
>>No, I'm not. I'm identifying them as being the same thing. The
>>alternatives are either to claim that some one person has the ultimate
>>authority to judge Roguelikeness, or to claim that there is no
>>Roguelikeness except in the mind of each person.
>There must at least be some objectivity in the definition. I'm not
>giving up finding it :)
That's my point. The only objective definition is one based on the word
itself -- "Rogue like". There's only one standard for Roguelikeness --
Rogue itself.
>>belong in a different genre). Even with that, the name of the genre is
>>NOT Doomlike, so of course one judges games by how much they involve first
>>person shooting.
>Why, I was commonly encountering this word in computer games press.
Then why didn't you use that word yourself? You called them FPP games (or
something like that). If the genre is "first person perspective", one
judges the game simply by whether is _has_ FPP. Black and white, yes or
no. If the genre is "Doomlike" one has to judge membership according to
how much like Doom the game is.
>>>Well, all but one RL games have been freeware, and all but a few are
>>>available in source. Can you see a rule here?
>>I see a regularity -- but Rogue (for the PC) itself was not freeware, but
>>rather commercial. The _rule_ I see is that the Roguelike model isn't
>>commercially attractive (a fact I find rather pleasant).
>Yet, the original version of rogue(6) was both freeware and available
>in source (per being posted to comp.sources IIRC). It's the BSD rogue
>that got licensed.
So? Did that make Rogue itself not Roguelike?
>>A commercial Roguelike would still be Roguelike.
>There will be no such thing, or it will be a tile- and turn-based CRPG
>(albeit I don't think any sane gaming company would risk that).
You're begging the question.
>>Why NOT exaggerate? Everything else about Roguelikes is exaggerated! I
>>think it just might be great fun to really go to town making a few REALLY
>>different monsters.
>Which you will then pound to a messy pulp? Come on, you'd get bored
>with them sooner than you think.
You're not thinking about this, clearly. That's fine, you don't have to.
The point isn't that anyone is about to make this; the point is that the
result would be Roguelike, contrary to what some have said.
>>>AI level has nothing to do with the amount of monster races you put
>>>in. A well-defined AI can adapt to a significant number of cases.
>>And a great artist can make five hundred distinct images for monsters!
>>But great artists don't seem to congregate around Roguelikes. And when it
>>comes down to it, some great artists seem to prefer simplicity for simple
>>things, and grand detail only for complex things.
>I'm not denying it. Besides, what's the analogy to AI here?
I haven't said a word about AI. You're the only one who brings it up.
I've only said that I'd like to have different monsters act differently.
>Complex detailing, especially for the AI, is a thing I dislike in
>coding. A game engine has to be robust and responsive, not supported
>on numberless small crutches and exceptions.
Non sequitur -- we're talking about a very small number of monsters
precisely so that all the detailing can take place without having to rely
on numberless small crutches and exceptions.
>>I find the *gameplay* (how I deal with the monsters) to be far more
>>interesting than the sights (what the monsters claim to look like).
>Of course, since we don't have much choice in presenting them...
I'm talking about the text decriptions, actually. That's why I said,
"claim to look like." I prefer having colorful text describing the
monsters, but wouldn't it be cool if the monsters actually acted like
their text described them?
>although I'd like to have two-coloured monsters in *bands (pulsating
>lights, and whatnot).
That would be cool. Multihued is nice, but it's a hack.
>>A balrog is like a lesser balrog. Except (yawn)... Oh, no mistake, I'd
>>want my monsters to scale in power well, and probably take different
>>titles as they did so. The game would be too short otherwise. I simply
>>wouldn't claim that those are somehow different types of monsters.
>Ah, so that's what you thought. Well, five different genres of
>monsters, even numbering dozens of species, would still be boring
>after a while.
Or so you imagine, without evidence of any kind.
>>>>time spent on each monster. Eventually you wind up using the computer as
>>>>a mass monster factory, like Angband.
>>>Well, I like that, and you surely exaggerate by comparing Angband to
>>>be nothing but a bunch of monsters randomly thrown together for
>>>general fun and carnage.
>>And if I've exaggerated, then your re-exaggeration of my statement is
>>surely a new realm for appreciation. (I don't care for your
>>mischaracterization of my statements. Please stop.) Angband is one of my
>>favorite games -- OAngband in specific.
>So, OAngband's good despite having > 500 different crittens, and other
>*bands are not? I don't understand this.
I've already expressed my distaste for this argument tactic. Please
discontinue it. Stop, desist, and cease. I've now repeated many times
tha Angband is one of my favorite games. How many more will it take to
make you stop claiming that I said it's bad?
>>*So much* could be added to it as well by making the flags mean different
>>things for different types of monster. Or by making the different types
>>actually behave differently. Or... Instead you have a game where
>>monsters are SO much of a sameness that they can be churned out of a huge
>>text file with only a few bytes for each different type of monster. Know
>>the monster's resistances, spells, and speed? You know the monster
>>type completely.
>Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
>to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
>in NH).
Nothing's wrong with it. But much more is possible.
>>More or less hitpoints? No big deal -- HP is generally random anyhow; a
>>higher-level orc could randomly happen to have as many hitpoints as a
>>lower-level orc.
>Of course, that's the whole deal of random HP.
My point exactly!! This is also why I despise the idea of adding races
which duplicate another race exactly except for stat adjustments, because
stats are by definition random. A race with +5 to CON could wind up with
less CON than another race with -1.
>>This stuff isn't BAD. But it could be far better. Each type of monster
>>could react uniquely to different stimuli depending on what
>>resistances/spells/etc it had. Something as little as printing different
>>text could have a positive effect on gameplay.
>I did something liike that with elemental attacks in GSNband, so that
>it doesn't say '<foo> resists' all the time.
That's a cool start. Crawl also varies the messages, and it also varies
the gameplay.
>>>Treat it as an exception proving the rule.
>>The question is first: what's the rule? We seem to agree that a rule
>>exists. You say it's text-mode turn-based freeware; I say it's proximity
>>to Rogue.
>Incidentally, all text-mode turn-based freeware games (and a few
>others) claim descendancy from rogue(6). Our definitions are just the
>same thing.
I didn't say anyhting about descendance; I said proximity (presumably I
meant in game-space). Even granting that, our definitions differ
fundamentally -- I would allow non-turnbased or non-text-mode or
non-freeware, while you wouldn't allow any of those.
Someone else pointed out that a lot of games fulfill all the requirements
you listed (Adventure, Wumpus, etc.) but don't claim to be Roguelike. I
know what you meant, I think -- you're saying that there's a bullet list
of which a game has to fulfill EVERY feature or not be Roguelike.
I disagree -- there is a bullet list we could design, but leaving out one
feature doesn't make a game non-Roguelike, it only makes it less
Roguelike. The features would have to be weighted, so that turn-based
(for example) was worth more than with-magical-scrolls.
William Tanksley
>nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl (Gwidon S. Naskrent) was heard to babble
>>On 20 Oct 1999 10:16:57 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
>>Tanksley) wrote:
>>>Graphics is FAR less severe -- the Macintosh version of Omega is fully
>>>graphical, yet NO less Roguelike (for that matter, the graphical
>>>version of Rogue is fully Roguelike, although a bit more inconvenient
>>>to play).
>>But is there no ASCII mode on the Mac?
>Better yet, what about the Tk versions of Angband?
They actually have an ASCII mode! Only monsters can be thus displayed,
but that's enough for me; monsters are exactly what I want to see in
ASCII. Treasure is already represented by obscure symbols, it can now be
represented by less symbolic ones.
>>>*So much* could be added to it as well by making the flags mean
>>>different things for different types of monster. Or by making the
>>>different types actually behave differently. Or... Instead you have a
>>>game where monsters are SO much of a sameness that they can be churned
>>>out of a huge text file with only a few bytes for each different type
>>>of monster. Know the monster's resistances, spells, and speed? You
>>>know the monster type completely.
>>Something wrong with that? All RLs give resistances, spells and speed
>>to monsters, besides a few other things (such as possible body parts
>>in NH).
>I think there's a VERY strong case to be made AGAINST exceptions. Nethack went
>that route, and displays a lot of the problems with it. And a lot of the
>benefits too, but that's neither here nor there. :-)
It's the #1 Roguelike -- clearly they did _something_ right. The problems
Nethack displays could be alleged to involve its convoluted code --
perhaps a game with fewer monsters could achieve the good things without
the bad. Certainly the inside jokes aren't related!
>Cody
--
-William "Billy" Tanksley
Cody Hatch
in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Sat, 23 Oct 1999
>On Fri, 22 Oct 1999 11:08:55 GMT, Gwidon S. Naskrent wrote:
>>On 20 Oct 1999 10:16:57 GMT, wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William
>>Tanksley) wrote:
>
>>>belong in a different genre). Even with that, the name of the genre
>>>is NOT Doomlike, so of course one judges games by how much they
>>>involve first person shooting.
>
>>Why, I was commonly encountering this word in computer games press.
>
>Then why didn't you use that word yourself? You called them FPP games
>(or something like that). If the genre is "first person perspective",
>one judges the game simply by whether is _has_ FPP.
Actually, I suspect the acronym was FPS, standing for First Person Shooter.
But it doesn't change the meaning from what you guessed, so it's rather
irellavent.
>>I did something liike that with elemental attacks in GSNband, so that
>>it doesn't say '<foo> resists' all the time.
>
>That's a cool start. Crawl also varies the messages, and it also varies
>the gameplay.
I think a LOT of rogelikes vary the messages. Many of the newer *bands do,
certainly.
>I didn't say anyhting about descendance; I said proximity (presumably I
>meant in game-space). Even granting that, our definitions differ
>fundamentally -- I would allow non-turnbased or non-text-mode or
>non-freeware, while you wouldn't allow any of those.
His argument would rule out Utumno, AngbandTk, Rogue (some versions), and
Castle of the Winds, to name but a few. All of which are obviously (well, sort
of) very much "like Rogue", and so presumably "roguelike".
>Someone else pointed out that a lot of games fulfill all the
>requirements you listed (Adventure, Wumpus, etc.) but don't claim to be
>Roguelike. I know what you meant, I think -- you're saying that there's
>a bullet list of which a game has to fulfill EVERY feature or not be
>Roguelike.
>
>I disagree -- there is a bullet list we could design, but leaving out
>one feature doesn't make a game non-Roguelike, it only makes it less
>Roguelike. The features would have to be weighted, so that turn-based
>(for example) was worth more than with-magical-scrolls.
I agree. He appears to be trying to come up with a set of rules to quantify a
games "rogueishness". Since his current set of rules implies Rogue itself
isn't roguelike, I think we can safely say they're flawed, at least as far as
you assume "roguelike" means "like Rogue". Which isn't an automatic asumption.
When you get right down to it, Angband (for example) isn't very "like Rogue".
Angband has a host of features you wouldn't find in Rogue--things like
character classes, races, stores, non-permenant dungeons, different types of
magic, uniques... You could make a VERY convincing argument that Castle of the
Winds was quite a bit more roguelike than Angband.
I think a fundamental problem is that "roguelike" is too broad a term, and
everyones got there own personal opinion on it's exact meaning. Everone
probaly agrees Moria is a roguelike, despite it's many differences from Rogue.
Obviously, if Moria is, Angband must be one too. Obviously, if Angband is,
Zangband, Kamband, and Jangband must be as well--and yet we're starting to get
a bit far afield. Quests aren't very roguelike, are they? Equally, you could
hardly include Jangband and excude, AngbandTk, Utumno, Mangband and Tangband,
right? And if Utumno, then Diablo. And if Diablo, then Warcraft III and
Diablo II, right? You have to draw the line somewhere. The term isn't broad
enough to cover ALL of those games. Gwidon might have a point--as currently
used, the term "rogulike" has about as little to do with Rogue as it does with
Diablo. It seems to me that any sensible definition of the term will either
have to exclude Rogue (and other games of it's ilk) or exclude Angband (and
other similarly complex games).
Gwidon S. Naskrent
wrote:
>>Nothing. You can switch to ASCII mode all the time. You can even
>>switch the font to your favourite one (monospaced only).
>
>In AngabandTk?! Ummm...wanna bet? :-) How, exactly, do you switch it to
>ASCII mode?
When you first run the game you can choose several tiles
configuration. Two of them have 16x16 and 32x32 sized ASCII chars
insread.
How to get to that dialog from inside the game is left as an exercise
to the reader :)
>>It was shareware, which meant the company wasn't risking as much.
>
>A.) How are they risking any less than with any other commercial distribution
>model?
They didn't have that big costs, being a small company and all, and
more importantly, not spending lots of $$$ on marketing and promotion.
And they could shape the second episode basing on reactions from the
first one, freely available.
>B.) Shareware or not, it's still commercial.
No, it's not. I define 'commercial' as separate from 'shareware'.
Shareware is a peculiar form of software distribution that has nothing
commercial and big-scale in it. YMMV.
>>Besides, it was released in 1992 IIRC, and it was too far from
>>top-of-the-line games at that time.
>
>Again, irrelevent. The latest version of Angband is far from top-of-the-line.
Not so if you consider that the authors made money out of it, so they
had to size up to commercial games somehow.
>>And no, it's not roguelike IMHO. Neither is Dungeon Hack BTW.
>
>I haven't played Dungeon Hack, but I *HAVE* played Castle of the Winds, and I'd
>like to here one reason why AngbandTk is a roguelike, but Castle of the Winds
>isn't. In fact, I could even think of some reasons why Castle of the Winds is
>MORE like Rogue than AngbandTk.
The answer is simple: Angband Tk overlays an earlier roguelike game,
while CoW had no such background. It's the same as 'why is Linux a
True Operating System (tm) and Win95 is not'.
I agree that CoW may be in some slight respects roguelike, but nothing
indicates that it was explicitly based on other RL games.
>That's what I was saying--there's nothing wrong with that--the alternative is
>to try and make special cases exceptions for each monster. It's what Nethack
>does, and IMHO, it's not as good as the Angband method of using a combination
>of flags.
Obviously :-)
Gwidon S. Naskrent
wrote:
>His argument would rule out Utumno, AngbandTk, Rogue (some versions), and
>Castle of the Winds, to name but a few. All of which are obviously (well, sort
>of) very much "like Rogue", and so presumably "roguelike".
You forgot about Diablo. Yes, yes and yes, Utumno is not a roguelike
either, since it's real time. Sue me if you think otherwise :-)
>I agree. He appears to be trying to come up with a set of rules to quantify a
>games "rogueishness". Since his current set of rules implies Rogue itself
>isn't roguelike, I think we can safely say they're flawed, at least as far as
>you assume "roguelike" means "like Rogue". Which isn't an automatic asumption.
Where have I said rogue(6) isn't roguelike? Its features are the very
core of any subsequent game, namely: text mode with letter monsters,
single character play, dungeon settings, and possibly also being
freeware, although I don't rule out ADOM only because TB demands a
postcard for his, er, efforts.
>When you get right down to it, Angband (for example) isn't very "like Rogue".
>Angband has a host of features you wouldn't find in Rogue--things like
>character classes, races, stores, non-permenant dungeons, different types of
>magic, uniques... You could make a VERY convincing argument that Castle of the
>Winds was quite a bit more roguelike than Angband.
No - CoW was more simple (in gameplay if not in design), but it's
nowhere nearer rogue(6). Like William said, I test any candidate to
RLhood by examining the bullet list of 'has-tos'. If it fails to
fulfil all of the conditions (and they are simple and clear-cut), it's
not RL no matter how much you whine. And I see nothing wrong with
that. I enjoyed CoW too. Not every good game has to be roguelike.
>I think a fundamental problem is that "roguelike" is too broad a term, and
>everyones got there own personal opinion on it's exact meaning. Everone
Yes. That's why it's hard to form an universal standard.
>Obviously, if Moria is, Angband must be one too. Obviously, if Angband is,
>Zangband, Kamband, and Jangband must be as well--and yet we're starting to get
>a bit far afield. Quests aren't very roguelike, are they? Equally, you could
How so? If you mean there were no quests in rogue(6), you're right,
but I see no problem with them being _an addition_ to the core rules,
not replacing them. Got it?
Cody Hatch
this in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Sun, 24 Oct 1999
14:28:42 GMT:
>On 23 Oct 1999 19:59:57 GMT, co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch)
>wrote:
>
>>>Nothing. You can switch to ASCII mode all the time. You can even
>>>switch the font to your favourite one (monospaced only).
>>
>>In AngabandTk?! Ummm...wanna bet? :-) How, exactly, do you switch it
>>to ASCII mode?
>
>When you first run the game you can choose several tiles
>configuration. Two of them have 16x16 and 32x32 sized ASCII chars
>insread.
Yes...but that's not even CLOSE to what I'd call ACII mode. It's graphical.
It's got PICTRES. Sorry, but no dice. :-)
>>>It was shareware, which meant the company wasn't risking as much.
>>
>>A.) How are they risking any less than with any other commercial
>>distribution model?
>
>They didn't have that big costs, being a small company and all, and
>more importantly, not spending lots of $$$ on marketing and promotion.
>And they could shape the second episode basing on reactions from the
>first one, freely available.
Your spliting hairs here. For one things, try and explain to me a substantive
difference between the shareware model, and the demo system? And as far as I
know, they released both episodes simultaneously.
>>B.) Shareware or not, it's still commercial.
>
>No, it's not. I define 'commercial' as separate from 'shareware'.
>Shareware is a peculiar form of software distribution that has nothing
>commercial and big-scale in it. YMMV.
It's a preculiar form of COMERCIAL software distribution. A lot of more
"normal" comerical distribution models also aren't very big-scale. I
downloaded the free part of the game, liked what I saw, and payed money to get
the entire thing. I did the same thing for, say...War INC. It's the exact
same process.
>>>Besides, it was released in 1992 IIRC, and it was too far from
>>>top-of-the-line games at that time.
>>
>>Again, irrelevent. The latest version of Angband is far from top-of
>>-the-line.
>
>Not so if you consider that the authors made money out of it,
So in other words, it was commercial?
>so they
>had to size up to commercial games somehow.
They were competing with the other games available, both other commercial
games, as well as free games such as Angband (or would that be Moria, back
then?). If absolutely no one played Angband, you think the variant maintainers
would still be going strong? Would YOU have made GSNband if you'd known that
you were going to have a player base of 3, if you were lucky?
>>I haven't played Dungeon Hack, but I *HAVE* played Castle of the Winds,
>>and I'd like to here one reason why AngbandTk is a roguelike, but
>>Castle of the Winds isn't. In fact, I could even think of some reasons
>>why Castle of the Winds is MORE like Rogue than AngbandTk.
>
>The answer is simple: Angband Tk overlays an earlier roguelike game,
>while CoW had no such background. It's the same as 'why is Linux a
>True Operating System (tm) and Win95 is not'.
Irrelavent. You have to judge each game on it's own merits. You're trying to
make an exception for AngbandTk because even though your "rules" say it isn't,
you "feel" that it is. CoW is closer than AngbandTk to your "rules", but you
say it ISN'T a roguelike. I'd still like to hear even ONE feature of CoW that
makes it less "like Rogue" than AngbandTk.
>I agree that CoW may be in some slight respects roguelike, but nothing
>indicates that it was explicitly based on other RL games.
Let's be serious here! You start a character with a bit of gold and equipment.
You then go to some stores, buy better equipment, and start diving into the
nearby mines (with randomly generated levels, no less). Each trip you go
deeper, and deeper, encountering nastier creatures each time. You collect all
the equipment, sell what you don't need, and use the proceeds to buy new stuff.
What sort of things do you buy? The same sorts of things you buy in Angband.
Wands of lightning bolt, boots of speed, potions of cure critical wounds,
spellbooks, scrolls of rune of return, potions of detect monsters, scrolls of
magic mapping, cloaks of protection, gauntlets of slaying, amulets of wisdom...
And what do you fight? Gelatinous Glob's, Ancient Green Dragons, Vampires,
Giant Rars, Wolves, Fire Giants, Theives, Trolls, Goblins, Kobols, Zombies...
And as you advance you gain spells. Identify is VERY important, of course, but
you also get some elemental attacks. Things like lightning bolts and cold
balls. Many monsters resist certain elemental attacks, so you have to choose
them wisely. Of course, the lowly Magic Arrow is often the best...very good
damage to cost ratio. And, of course, it's always a VERY good idea to keep
enough mana for a few emergency teleports, lest you get swarmed under. Phase
door is cheaper, of course, but often lacks the range to get you far enough
away to be safe.
And if your really lucky, you might find special weapons and armour with cool
enchantments on them deep in the dungeon (or, rarely, in certain stores,
although they're VERY expensive). You might discover a sword which gives
resistence to cold, boosts your intelligence, and does extra damage to
giants...or a flail which gives reistence to drain life, and has a hefty
magical bonus to hit and to damage...
And the eventual goal of the first half of the game is to retrieve a certain
amulet from a powerful unique foe. And in the second half, you need to
retreive a crown from another pwerful unique foe.
<heavy sarcasm>
No, I don't see ANY relation to ANY roguelike games here, nope... Can't
imagine what I was thinking of...
</heavy sarcasm>
On a slightly more serious note, can you actually point out a feature of that
description which would have been different if I'd been describing a so-called
"real" roguelike game?
Cody Hatch
this in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Sun, 24 Oct 1999
>On 23 Oct 1999 23:56:19 GMT, co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch)
>wrote:
>
>>I agree. He appears to be trying to come up with a set of rules to
>>quantify a games "rogueishness". Since his current set of rules
>>implies Rogue itself isn't roguelike, I think we can safely say they're
>>flawed, at least as far as you assume "roguelike" means "like Rogue".
>>Which isn't an automatic asumption.
>
>Where have I said rogue(6) isn't roguelike?
I dunno about THAT, but you've said both that it HAS to have a text-mode, and
that it has to be freeware. Some versions of Rogue were pure graphics (on the
Mac), and others were licenced.
>>When you get right down to it, Angband (for example) isn't very "like
>>Rogue". Angband has a host of features you wouldn't find in Rogue-
>>-things like character classes, races, stores, non-permenant dungeons,
>>different types of magic, uniques... You could make a VERY convincing
>>argument that Castle of the Winds was quite a bit more roguelike than
>>Angband.
>
>No - CoW was more simple (in gameplay if not in design),
Of course it is! It simpler than Angband (barely), and more complex than Rogue
(much). But if you accept Angband as roguelike, then you can't use "too much
complexity: as an argument against CoW, since Angband is even MORE complex.
Equally, you can't use "too litle complexity" since Rogue is even SIMPLER. So
IOW, if Angband and Rogue are considered roguelike, then CoW must be as well,
unless you can come up with another argument than complexity.
>but it's
>nowhere nearer rogue(6).
Of course it it. Rogue didn't have multiple races and classes. CoW doesn't
have multiple races and classes. Angband has multiple races and classes. CoW
is more like Rogue than Angband is, on that measure. We get the same result on
a host of other measures. Angband has non-permenant dungeons--Rogue and CoW
have permenant dungeons, once generated. Angband has LOTS of artifacts and
uniques. CoW and Rogue have very very few. Angband...I'm sure you get the
point.
>Like William said, I test any candidate to
>RLhood by examining the bullet list of 'has-tos'. If it fails to
>fulfil all of the conditions (and they are simple and clear-cut), it's
>not RL no matter how much you whine.
Of course since your system excludes some versions of Rogue, I think we can
probably say the system is flawed. And you don't even apply the system evenly!
You say a game has to have a text mode, yet you admit AngbandTk and exclude
CoW, when neither have a text mode.
>And I see nothing wrong with
>that. I enjoyed CoW too. Not every good game has to be roguelike.
Indeed! I really like Stars, and it's not Roguelike by ANY stretch of the
imagnation. But nevertheless, CoW is at least as "like Rogue" as Angband, and
arguably quite a bit more.
>>Obviously, if Moria is, Angband must be one too. Obviously, if Angband
>>is, Zangband, Kamband, and Jangband must be as well--and yet we're
>>starting to get a bit far afield. Quests aren't very roguelike, are
>>they? Equally, you could
>
>How so? If you mean there were no quests in rogue(6), you're right,
Yes, but more than that. They're not randomly generated--and having randomly
generated levels is one of the core features of Rogue.
>but I see no problem with them being _an addition_ to the core rules,
>not replacing them. Got it?
Okay...but it makes the game less like Rogue. Any change or addition does.
And what about race and class selection? They're a replacement, not an
addition. And having different realms of magic? And arena's? And a town?
And multiple towns? And...
William Tanksley
>On 23 Oct 1999 23:56:19 GMT, co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch)
>wrote:
>>His argument would rule out Utumno, AngbandTk, Rogue (some versions), and
>>Castle of the Winds, to name but a few. All of which are obviously (well, sort
>>of) very much "like Rogue", and so presumably "roguelike".
>You forgot about Diablo. Yes, yes and yes, Utumno is not a roguelike
>either, since it's real time. Sue me if you think otherwise :-)
I disagree -- Utumno is the least like Rogue, but it still has at least
the general plot. In fact, some of the leftover Roguelikenesses are the
very reason why Utumno didn't work.
>>I agree. He appears to be trying to come up with a set of rules to quantify a
>>games "rogueishness". Since his current set of rules implies Rogue itself
>>isn't roguelike, I think we can safely say they're flawed, at least as far as
>>you assume "roguelike" means "like Rogue". Which isn't an automatic asumption.
>Where have I said rogue(6) isn't roguelike?
When you claimed that no commercial game was roguelike.
>Its features are the very
>core of any subsequent game, namely:
"Any subsequent game." That's a lot of games.
>text mode with letter monsters,
>single character play, dungeon settings, and possibly also being
>freeware, although I don't rule out ADOM only because TB demands a
>postcard for his, er, efforts.
This is not true. The features of Rogue aren't the _core_ for all future
Roguelike games; rather, they're the defining points of Roguelikeness.
You can implement LESS than Rogue did and still be Roguelike -- if only
you're like Rogue.
>>When you get right down to it, Angband (for example) isn't very "like Rogue".
>>Angband has a host of features you wouldn't find in Rogue--things like
>>character classes, races, stores, non-permenant dungeons, different types of
>>magic, uniques... You could make a VERY convincing argument that Castle of the
>>Winds was quite a bit more roguelike than Angband.
>No - CoW was more simple (in gameplay if not in design), but it's
>nowhere nearer rogue(6). Like William said, I test any candidate to
>RLhood by examining the bullet list of 'has-tos'. If it fails to
>fulfil all of the conditions (and they are simple and clear-cut), it's
>not RL no matter how much you whine.
You mean, "in opposition to all logic and reason, Gwidon insists that any
game not matching his laundry list isn't Roguelike."
Face it -- you're making up rules, pulling them out of thin air because
you happen to like them. It's just as valid to point out that Rogue
doesn't have a magic system! Why, that disqualifies everything but The
Ministrel's Song.
>And I see nothing wrong with
>that. I enjoyed CoW too. Not every good game has to be roguelike.
That's an important point, one that some people sometimes miss :-). We
can enjoy other games, we just can't greate newsgroups for them under
r.g.roguelike. :)
>>I think a fundamental problem is that "roguelike" is too broad a term, and
>>everyones got there own personal opinion on it's exact meaning. Everone
>Yes. That's why it's hard to form an universal standard.
True. It's pretty easy to ask people to see the rational interpretation,
though -- everyone may have a laundry list of features they like, but
there's only one laundry list which is universally valid, and only Rogue
itself clings to it perfectly. That's why our favorite games are called
"Roguelike" rather than simply "Rogue".
>>Obviously, if Moria is, Angband must be one too. Obviously, if Angband is,
>>Zangband, Kamband, and Jangband must be as well--and yet we're starting to get
>>a bit far afield. Quests aren't very roguelike, are they? Equally, you could
>How so? If you mean there were no quests in rogue(6), you're right,
>but I see no problem with them being _an addition_ to the core rules,
>not replacing them. Got it?
But what's a Core Rule? Are scrolls of Scare Monster a core rule? If
ASCII is a core rule, then isn't graphics mrely an addition to that rule
rather than a violation? How about upstairs?
Erik Max Francis
> Actually, that's not true. Stars! is vaguely roguelike in that it's
> turn-based. :)
Sounds like you'd enjoy Interstelen (http://www.interstelen.com/).
--
Erik Max Francis | icq 16063900 | whois mf303 | email m...@alcyone.com
Alcyone Systems | irc maxxon (efnet) | web http://www.alcyone.com/max/
San Jose, CA | languages en, eo | icbm 37 20 07 N 121 53 38 W
USA | Sun 1999 Oct 24 (50%/950) | &tSftDotIotE
__
/ \ Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
\__/ Oscar Wilde
pi...@shore.net.death.to.spam
<nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl> wrote:
>nowhere nearer rogue(6). Like William said, I test any candidate to
>RLhood by examining the bullet list of 'has-tos'. If it fails to
>fulfil all of the conditions (and they are simple and clear-cut), it's
>not RL no matter how much you whine.
First off, nobody's whining. Second, you seem to be the only one who
defines what's roguelike this manner, and third, as Billy has pointed out,
your bullet list doesn't even really work, because it has exceptions in
it. Why don't you just admit that apparently nobody else has the same
set of criteria for defining roguelikes as you, and quit trying to force
your opinion on us?
>>I think a fundamental problem is that "roguelike" is too broad a term, and
>>everyones got there own personal opinion on it's exact meaning. Everone
>Yes. That's why it's hard to form an universal standard.
And yet, you insist you've done so, repeatedly. You've clearly defined
one: "a bullet list of 'has-tos'[...]" that a game must meet all of.
You're talking in circles now.
>How so? If you mean there were no quests in rogue(6), you're right,
>but I see no problem with them being _an addition_ to the core rules,
>not replacing them. Got it?
So all of a sudden, a game may add features that aren't in rogue, but
still be roguelike. I fail to see any logic in your reasoning, Gwidon.
If I take game 'x', that you and I can both agree is roguelike, and add
graphical tiles, by the definitions you've just put forth, you must admit
it's roguelike--it meets all of your has-to bullets, but it also has
extra features. Now, if I take out the character mode, suddenly it's not
roguelike, simply because of that one missing bullet. But nothing else
about the game has changed. Doesn't make sense.
--
pixelATshoreDOTnet - http://www.shore.net/~pixel
Assistant Forum Manager, MSN IE forums
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety
deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin
pi...@shore.net.death.to.spam
>Indeed! I really like Stars, and it's not Roguelike by ANY stretch of the
>imagnation.
Actually, that's not true. Stars! is vaguely roguelike in that it's
turn-based. :)
--
Ben Goetter
co...@lordbane.freeserver.com says...
> They were competing with the other games available, both other commercial
> games, as well as free games such as Angband (or would that be Moria, back
> then?).
Moria. CoTW predates Angband by a few years. And we were all playing
quite a bit of Moria back then. The author of CoTW himself describes it
as "basically Moria with a GUI".
Ben (I'm on the credits screen)
Cody Hatch
rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Mon, 25 Oct 1999 06:32:59 GMT:
>While prying the lemmings from hir ankles,
><co...@lordbane.freeserver.com> wrote:
>>Indeed! I really like Stars, and it's not Roguelike by ANY stretch of
>>the imagnation.
>
>Actually, that's not true. Stars! is vaguely roguelike in that it's
>turn-based. :)
Good point, there. :-) And those PRT's are a LOT like races...and you
could even draw parrallels between LRT's and classes. Plus, Gwidon tells
us that shareware isn't commercial, and the early versions of Stars were
shareware. And then the low level of graphics isn't too far off
either...and for that matter, by default there aren't save files either,
although you can MAKE it give them if you really want... Yep, I'd say
Stars has got a LOT of roguelike features... :-)
Cody Hatch
the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Mon, 25 Oct 1999 20:03:46
GMT:
>In article <8E6A48AD3c...@news.canterbury.ac.nz>,
>co...@lordbane.freeserver.com says...
>> They were competing with the other games available, both other
>> commercial games, as well as free games such as Angband (or would that
>> be Moria, back then?).
>
>Moria. CoTW predates Angband by a few years. And we were all playing
>quite a bit of Moria back then. The author of CoTW himself describes it
>as "basically Moria with a GUI".
Ah? I always wondered about that. I became hooked on CoTW LONG before I'd
ever heard of roguelikes. I could never imagine why this great game didn't
have dozens of imitators--of course, it DID (or visa versa, but what's the
difference?), I just wasn't looking in the right places. :-) Anyhow, after I
finally discovered Angband, I suspected that the authors of one MUST have been
using the other game as source material, but I never knew which.
>Ben (I'm on the credits screen)
Hmm...so you are. Along with...*choke*...Jeff McBride? Now THAT'S
interesting...
Ben Goetter
co...@lordbane.freeserver.com says...
> Anyhow, after I
> finally discovered Angband, I suspected that the authors of one MUST have been
> using the other game as source material, but I never knew which.
Turn out that both used Moria as source material. Angband even used it
as "source" proper....
> Along with...*choke*...Jeff McBride? Now THAT'S
> interesting...
The success of STARS blew me away. (I don't get it: where are the orcs?)
More power to Jeff.
Ben (a CRAWL fan nowadays)
Cody Hatch
the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Tue, 26 Oct 1999 04:36:35
GMT:
>In article <8E6B8AC9Dc...@news.canterbury.ac.nz>,
>co...@lordbane.freeserver.com says...
>> Anyhow, after I
>> finally discovered Angband, I suspected that the authors of one MUST
>> have been using the other game as source material, but I never knew
>> which.
>
>Turn out that both used Moria as source material. Angband even used it
>as "source" proper....
Bah! Cody not clear! Bad, Cody, bad! :-) By my comment, I was reffering to
Moria. It was just that when I discovered Angband, I didn't know about Moria.
As far as I can tell, there's a LOT less difference between Moria and Angband
than there is betwen Angband and Zangband, and since I discovered Angband
before Moria, I tend to refer to that entire branch of roguelikes as "Angband".
:-) Anyhow, getting back to the point, what I *REALLY* always wondered was
whether Moria borrowed from CoTW, or the other way around, since AFAIK neither
had an obious similar predecesor.
>> Along with...*choke*...Jeff McBride? Now THAT'S
>> interesting...
>
>The success of STARS blew me away. (I don't get it: where are the
>orcs?) More power to Jeff.
Hmmm...I always name my chaff designs "Greater Hell Beast"...maybe I'll start
naming ALL my ships after roguelike monsters... It'd be different, anyhow. :-)
>Ben (a CRAWL fan nowadays)
Hmm...never could figure Crawl out, personally. It just seems so...pointless.
Start a character, die on dungeon level two or three (which look exactly like
dungeon level one, as near as I can tell). Is that all there is to the game?
Freak Boy
darkened room, and having been kept on a steady diet of barbituates,
co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch) was in no state of mind to
lie when they said:
In recent versions there seems to be some slight differences between
the way the different levels are generated, eg. one level may consist
of corridors, another may be mainly large, open areas. But once you
get a little practice in the game and start to get down to dungeon
level 5-6 there are side dungeons which are vastly different, and it
gets much more interesting.
BTW Which roguelikes do you play, considering you don't like the
straight dungeon crawling variety?
Freak Boy
*The only way to play a game properly is to treat it deadly serious, but the*
*only way to live your life properly is to treat it like a game. *
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com * The Internet's Discussion Network *
* The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free! *
Cody Hatch
group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Tue, 26 Oct 1999 12:37:18 GMT:
>co...@lordbane.freeserver.com (Cody Hatch) was in no state of mind to
>lie when they said:
>
>>goe...@angrygraycat.com.xyz (Ben Goetter) was heard to babble this in
>>the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Tue, 26 Oct 1999
>>04:36:35 GMT:
>>
>>>Ben (a CRAWL fan nowadays)
>>
>>Hmm...never could figure Crawl out, personally. It just seems
>>so...pointless. Start a character, die on dungeon level two or three
>>(which look exactly like dungeon level one, as near as I can tell). Is
>>that all there is to the game?
>
>But once you
>get a little practice in the game and start to get down to dungeon
>level 5-6 there are side dungeons which are vastly different, and it
>gets much more interesting.
Ahh. Might have to try and get a little deeper. Incidentally, I seem to
ALWAYS die to my own ghost. Is that common?
>BTW Which roguelikes do you play, considering you don't like the
>straight dungeon crawling variety?
Angband. I *LOVE* Angband. Or more specifically, Kangband, Kamband, and
Oangband, and I'm looking forward to the soon-to-be-revamped Drangband.
Much more interesting, much less boring, and seemingly far more tactical
(even strategic), IMHO.
Brian Robinson
> Hmm...never could figure Crawl out, personally. It just seems so...pointless.
> Start a character, die on dungeon level two or three (which look exactly like
> dungeon level one, as near as I can tell). Is that all there is to the game?
>
a few characters this first time you played Angband or whatever RL you
like? Crawl has all kinds of neat features, like religions, a great magic
system, lots of weird monsters, lots of variety in levels, a varied skill
system, etc. I would encourage you to give it a try, especially when we
release the next version, which will be very stable and polished.
--
Brian Robinson
brob...@ist.ucf.edu
Institute for Simulation and Training
Gwidon S. Naskrent
>it. Why don't you just admit that apparently nobody else has the same
>set of criteria for defining roguelikes as you, and quit trying to force
>your opinion on us?
Am I? :-)
>And yet, you insist you've done so, repeatedly. You've clearly defined
>one: "a bullet list of 'has-tos'[...]" that a game must meet all of.
>You're talking in circles now.
How so? The has-tos are objectively defined IMO and naught can alter
them.
>So all of a sudden, a game may add features that aren't in rogue, but
>still be roguelike. I fail to see any logic in your reasoning, Gwidon.
>If I take game 'x', that you and I can both agree is roguelike, and add
>graphical tiles, by the definitions you've just put forth, you must admit
>it's roguelike--it meets all of your has-to bullets, but it also has
>extra features. Now, if I take out the character mode, suddenly it's not
>roguelike, simply because of that one missing bullet. But nothing else
>about the game has changed. Doesn't make sense.
Yes, it does.
If you take any ISO regulation set/standard, it usually assumes a
level of minimum requirements something, be it a machine, a technical
invention or a production line, must fulfil in order to be standard.
If it fails to, it may still be good, but it is not standard. For
example, if I write a French text in ISO-8859-1 in which I arbitrarily
assign one of the diacritics to another code, is the text in any way
standard? Of course not. It's just my own proprietary format.
Let me repeat and ETT: all the roguelike games (NOT clones written for
a SPECIFIC platform/purpose, such as *bands or the MacRogue must have
all of the certain characteristics that define a game as roguelike,
these being:
(1) overhead view
(2) alternate turns for player and monsters (not real-time and not
AP-based)
(3) 'you are the @', 'monsters are letters' and 'items are
non-letters' principles, which entails text mode (text, not ASCII,
because extended characters are fine - cf. DOS NetHack, DOS Angband,
Alphaman)
(4) being set in a dungeon or equivalent (sewers, caves - cf.
Alphaman)
(5) (probably) distributed for free with no charges and warranties
(6) (probably) being wholly available in source code which others are
able to modify (ie. not obsfucated)
(yes, the two last conditions are not met by ADOM, but I choose to
ignore this since it's the result of the author's whim and not the
nature of the game).
Optional features:
- a system of supernatural invocations, be it magic or Christian
prayers
- wilderness and all things pertaining thereto
- quests and NPC/monster interaction
- many more factors, doubtless
I reject Diablo and CoW since they don't fulfil (3) (and Diablo also
violates (1) and (2)). Note that *bandsTk are clones of a game, not
separate games, and have to be judged according to the merits of their
parent(s). If they happen to have a limited ASCII mode, so much the
better. So, there is no contradiction in my outlook, like Cody
reproached.
Jesse Welton
Gwidon S. Naskrent <nask...@artemida.amu.edu.pl> wrote:
>
>How so? The has-tos are objectively defined IMO and naught can alter
>them.
They're *objectively* defined *in your opinion*? I can't help but
sense a problem, right there.
>Let me repeat and ETT: all the roguelike games (NOT clones written for
>a SPECIFIC platform/purpose, such as *bands or the MacRogue must have
>all of the certain characteristics that define a game as roguelike,
>these being:
Why are clones not judged on their own merits? How do you determine
whether a given program is a clone or an original game?
>(1) overhead view
>(2) alternate turns for player and monsters (not real-time and not
>AP-based)
>(3) 'you are the @', 'monsters are letters' and 'items are
>non-letters' principles, which entails text mode (text, not ASCII,
>because extended characters are fine - cf. DOS NetHack, DOS Angband,
>Alphaman)
>(4) being set in a dungeon or equivalent (sewers, caves - cf.
>Alphaman)
>(5) (probably) distributed for free with no charges and warranties
>(6) (probably) being wholly available in source code which others are
>able to modify (ie. not obsfucated)
Okay, you've selected 6 particular features of Rogue that you consider
most important. But in the selection of those features you've ensured
that your bullet list is not objective. Take your number 3: How do
you come to that particular level of abstraction? Why isn't the
proper abstraction that all entities are represented by recognizable
symbols displayed on a rectangular grid? Why is it too restrictive to
require all the monster names to match up letter-for-letter with those
in Rogue? How on earth can you say this particular choice is
objective?
Another feature of Rogue (graphic ports aside) is that all dungeon
levels fit on a single screen. Why isn't that on your bullet list?
Another feature of Rogue is that if you don't keep diving, you'll
starve to death. Why isn't that on your bullet list?
Another feature of Rogue is that when you kill monsters, they
disappear rather than leaving messy corpses. Why isn't that on your
bullet list?
(Any discrepancies between these statements and the actual feature set
of Rogue are accidental. I've only played a couple of versions, which
may not have matched the original in every detail, and not for very
long, and it's been a while at that. In any case, the point should be
clear.)
>(yes, the two last conditions are not met by ADOM, but I choose to
>ignore this since it's the result of the author's whim and not the
>nature of the game).
You ignored these conditions by choice, so even if your bullet list
were objective, your application of it would not be.
>I reject Diablo and CoW since they don't fulfil (3) (and Diablo also
>violates (1) and (2)). Note that *bandsTk are clones of a game, not
>separate games, and have to be judged according to the merits of their
>parent(s).
Why, oh why, are not graphical derivatives judged on their own merits?
If AngbandTK is to be judged the same as Angband, doesn't that imply
that the important thing is really the engine and the gameplay, and
that the graphics don't actually change how roguelike a game is? Why
would AngbandTK become less roguelike if Angband ceased to exist?
-Jesse
William Tanksley
Yeah, Cody -- Crawl is really, really good. It has more variety and
creativity than most games I've seen -- its spells don't give the
impression of just being a call to generic_bolt_spell(BOLT_FIRE) or some
such; everything behaves in an interesting way.
The religion system is also facinating; instead of having prayers help
you, they consecrate what you're doing to your deity. To sacrifice a
monster, you pray and then kill it.
>Brian Robinson
--
-William "Billy" Tanksley
Cody Hatch
in the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Wed, 27 Oct 1999
19:41:22 GMT:
>On 26 Oct 1999 13:59:26 GMT, Brian Robinson wrote:
>>Cody Hatch <co...@lordbane.freeserver.com> wrote:
>>> Hmm...never could figure Crawl out, personally. It just seems
>>> so...pointless. Start a character, die on dungeon level two or three
>>> (which look exactly like dungeon level one, as near as I can tell).
>>> Is that all there is to the game?
>
>> Heh. If you play it or only five minutes or so. Didn't you lose
>>a few characters this first time you played Angband or whatever RL you
>>like? Crawl has all kinds of neat features, like religions, a great
>>magic system, lots of weird monsters, lots of variety in levels, a
>>varied skill system, etc. I would encourage you to give it a try,
>>especially when we release the next version, which will be very stable
>>and polished.
>
>Yeah, Cody -- Crawl is really, really good. It has more variety and
>creativity than most games I've seen -- its spells don't give the
>impression of just being a call to generic_bolt_spell(BOLT_FIRE) or some
>such; everything behaves in an interesting way.
Some of the *band variants (I'm thinking of Pern) probably have just as
different magic. Anyhow, I'll give it another go. I've tried maybe 10 or
so tries, but do to icompetence and/or bad luck, never got anywhere, so I
assumed there was nowhere to go. After all, in most other roguelikes, I
die just as often and early, but theres more of a hint that the game has
some depth.
>The religion system is also facinating; instead of having prayers help
>you, they consecrate what you're doing to your deity. To sacrifice a
>monster, you pray and then kill it.
Interesting.
Millenium Couch
> decent, and it is almost fun.
Key word: almost. I've played it too, but it's not as good as a lot of
other roguelikes.
--
Millenium Couch
Just another tester of Intel
Currently testing the Excelsior 64-bit processor
So much better!
http://drakalor.freeservers.com
For my page
Josh Fishman
<jme...@boi.hp.com> wrote:
> Cody Hatch (co...@lordbane.freeservers.com) wrote:
> : wtan...@hawking.armored.net (William Tanksley) was heard to babble this
> : >Yeah, Cody -- Crawl is really, really good. It has more variety and
> : >creativity than most games I've seen -- its spells don't give the
>
> : so tries, but do to icompetence and/or bad luck, never got anywhere, so I
> : assumed there was nowhere to go. After all, in most other roguelikes, I
> : die just as often and early, but theres more of a hint that the game has
> : some depth.
>
> become apparent until you hit dungeon level 5 or 6. That's when
> interesting branches start showing up. The temple, orcish mines, elven
> halls, vaults, crypts, hells, pandemoniums, labyrinth(this doesn't work
> in some version of crawl which I can't recall right now), hall of blades,
> snake pit, slime pit, jelly pit, hive, abyss, lair, etc. You'll encounter
> shops, random artifacts, named monsters, etc. It's just that the first
> couple levels of the dungeon are usually pretty boring.
I'll third that. I've finally got Crawl running on my Linux box (a 2-line
comment fix in a place I'd not thought to look until I was told) and it's
taking up an inordinate amount of my time. Crawl seems to impliment almost
all of the features I'd been fantasizing about for My Very Own Pet Rogue-
like (shallow water for wading, many spells, a diverse pantheon, etc.) --
but better. The only things that really annoy me are interface issues, for
example the picking-up-some-items-from-a-large-pile method needs help, but
that's fixable.
> And remember, in Crawl, death is always right around the corner.
Is it ever. O, the frequent mortitude.
-- Josh
--
``Our relationship started going south when he had my middle name
legally changed to "EXPERIMENT-NUMBER-ONE".'' -- Oasis, sluggy.com
Brian Robinson
> but better. The only things that really annoy me are interface issues, for
> example the picking-up-some-items-from-a-large-pile method needs help, but
> that's fixable.
>
tried to do, but I just scrapped it. Maybe I'll try it again from a
different approach, though. Very cumbersome task.
Cody Hatch
the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Thu, 04 Nov 1999 20:46:53
GMT:
<snip>
>and it's taking up an inordinate amount of my time. Crawl seems to
>impliment almost all of the features I'd been fantasizing about for My
>Very Own Pet Rogue- like (shallow water for wading,
I just can't resist pointing out that mnay Angband variants have this.
>many spells, a
Ditto. In some instances, you can get sick numbers. A Pernband Sorcerer
can cast any spell from any realm, assuming he's high enough level. At
four major realms at nine books each, and five minor realms at four books
each, you looking at a total of 56 books. And at more than 7 or 8 spells
per book... :-) Of course, a sorcerer can only carry 23 books, and of
those there will be a few repetitons, but that's still easily more than 100
different spells!
>diverse pantheon, etc.)
Ditto as well.
Dustin Ragan
wrote:
>fis...@ext.rlab.cs.nyu.edu (Josh Fishman) was heard to babble this in
>the group rec.games.roguelike.misc on or about Thu, 04 Nov 1999 20:46:53
>GMT:
>
><snip>
>
>>and it's taking up an inordinate amount of my time. Crawl seems to
>>impliment almost all of the features I'd been fantasizing about for My
>>Very Own Pet Rogue- like (shallow water for wading,
>
>I just can't resist pointing out that mnay Angband variants have this.
>
>>many spells, a
>
>Ditto. In some instances, you can get sick numbers. A Pernband Sorcerer
>can cast any spell from any realm, assuming he's high enough level. At
>four major realms at nine books each, and five minor realms at four books
>each, you looking at a total of 56 books. And at more than 7 or 8 spells
>per book... :-) Of course, a sorcerer can only carry 23 books, and of
>those there will be a few repetitons, but that's still easily more than 100
>different spells!
>
>>diverse pantheon, etc.)
>
>Ditto as well.
I always thought the Angband universe was sans dieties, at least ones
that did anything.
--
...and because of this, in order to minimize
the weight of your books, you should always
walk slowly and carry your books over your head."
--Gordon MacAlpine, My Physics Professor