Temple of The Roguelike Forums
Development => Design => Topic started by: mushroom patch on April 11, 2014, 01:39:39 PM
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Some roguelikes, e.g. nethack and crawl, allow the character to encounter old, dead characters. This can be a source of great fun, especially in multiuser systems that allow spectating.
Since there's been a lot of discussion surrounding death and roguelike apostasy, I pose the following: What if you could revive these characters somehow -- say by some difficult process that kills your current character or massively complicates their attempt to actually win -- and the bones character became yours to play? Good or wack?
I kind of presuppose this is a multiuser system thing (i.e. public telnet or similar) and I'd be completely fine with requiring that the original player of the bones character cannot do the reviving. Good clean fun or dangerous departure from established norms?
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Just a random idea: When you die you get an option to leave some message, anything you want, just constrained to a certain length of course. If other players encounter your ghost, it can then speak this message. Typically players would write something about how they died, but could be anything at all.
'The ghost of NON says: "Paralyzed by a damn floating eye!"'
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Just a random idea: When you die you get an option to leave some message, anything you want, just constrained to a certain length of course.
I predict spamming ghosts :)
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The ghost of DR EZEKIAL MUHAMMAD says: "This message may seem strange to you for we have not met personally nor in correspondence. I am DR EZEKIAL MUHAMMAD, son of the late Prince NOBORU of ZAIRE. I hope you will take the utmost confidence into these urgent business proposals..."
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More likely they'd all just shout "PENIS" constantly.
I like the resurrecting ghosts idea, especially on a multiuser system where you're limited to just resurrecting someone else's ghost. It'd have to be balanced to be hard enough to not be the obvious choice, but easy enough that it's also not the obvious choice not to do it.
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Just a random idea: When you die you get an option to leave some message, anything you want, just constrained to a certain length of course. If other players encounter your ghost, it can then speak this message. Typically players would write something about how they died, but could be anything at all.
'The ghost of NON says: "Paralyzed by a damn floating eye!"'
Elona more or less does this. If you die, you can type the character's last words. If you're online, these are broadcast through the message log to all other players who are connected to the internet.
The result is not nearly as bad as the speculation of the last two posts. The volume of death messages is low, and I've never seen spam, scams, or even bad language. Possibly there is some filtering and throttling to ensure that players don't see undesirable last words and to limit the rate.
It only becomes spammy if you leave the game running while AFK. When you return the last 5-20 messages will be other players' last words. Most players just use a randomly chosen default line, rather than bothering to type one of their own.
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Resurrecting ghosts and death messages are cool ideas.
I'm making progress on a bones implementation for Veins, so I think I'll grab those ideas :P
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IIRC you can resurrect a bone character in IVAN.
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It might be cool to be able to capture old ghosts and in so doing be able to continue your old dead characters.
I do like the idea of saving a level that a character dies on and mixing it into the level generation later. So that as you play, your game will get harder. Once you beat a specific bones section it goes out of rotation or at least decreases in frequency.
Have the game build a game based on your old games. :-)
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It might be cool to be able to capture old ghosts and in so doing be able to continue your old dead characters.
Your choice of words, "capture," made me think of a necromancer-type character who could actually capture and control the old characters' ghosts.
Or a ghostbuster class.
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I wanted to add a feature that your character is sometimes captured instead of killed, under the right circumstances. He is then left locked somewhere deep in the dungeon. So if you loose a really cool character this way, you can start playing new games with the goal of freeing him. When you do you can go back and start playing him again.
I need to revive this idea.
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It might be cool to be able to capture old ghosts and in so doing be able to continue your old dead characters.
Your choice of words, "capture," made me think of a necromancer-type character who could actually capture and control the old characters' ghosts.
Or a ghostbuster class.
Thanks. Now I can't get that song out of my head..."when there's something strange...who ya gonna call?"
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Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon. It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.
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Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon. It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.
Agreed, especially characters who had interesting lives or deaths. I've never heard of ghost promotion, but player ghosts are some of the worst things to run afoul of in some games already.
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Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon. It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.
That'd be cool, especially if the weapon was an artifact with powers based on how that character played. If they killed a lot of orcs, maybe it does extra damage vs. orcs. If they also had fire magic, maybe it's a fire sword.
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That'd be cool, especially if the weapon was an artifact with powers based on how that character played. If they killed a lot of orcs, maybe it does extra damage vs. orcs. If they also had fire magic, maybe it's a fire sword.
That's a cool idea.
It might be interesting to be able to appease ghosts in some way. Like, if they were killed by a monster, you hunt it down and avenge them. If they starved, you offer food at their grave. If they died during a quest, you finish it on their behalf, and so forth.
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A feature of my current project is along these lines; when a character dies, if there is an available slot there is a chance he is saved as a rescue. Level progression is like DoomRL, in that there is a linear series of levels, with optional side levels. One type of side level is a jail, in which the player can rescue the old character (sans equipment, of course). Once rescued, a character cannot be captured again (he just dies).
I'll have to add in some of the ideas here; fight the restless spirit of the former hero, or find his legendary blade (take a piece of equipment he had equipped and add appropriate bonuses to it).
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Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon. It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.
That's an EXCELLENT idea!
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What if you could revive these characters somehow -- say by some difficult process that kills your current character or massively complicates their attempt to actually win -- and the bones character became yours to play? Good or wack?
I kind of presuppose this is a multiuser system thing (i.e. public telnet or similar) and I'd be completely fine with requiring that the original player of the bones character cannot do the reviving. Good clean fun or dangerous departure from established norms?
Shiren the Wanderer (at least, the DS version) had something very much like this. When you died, you got a code that you could give to somebody else with a copy of the game, who could then go to the level that you died on and 'rescue' you (which I think meant they got a code to give back to you which would resurrect your character - I'm not sure because I never actually did it).
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Are there any games in which bones files can be recycled, in the sense of, once the player kills the ghost, the ghost gets a THIRD existence either as a more powerful undead being, or alternatively as a more subtle memory (for example, you might find a sword with his name on it, or he might be mentioned in a random "bad luck" message during certain phases of the moon. It would be nice to think about how we could permanently weave dead characters into the game, without the game getting too cluttered.
That's an EXCELLENT idea!
That would definitely be interesting. It would probably be wise to cap how many ghosts are allowed to exist at any given point. Not all characters are memorable, but the game could elect to store them based on criteria like high scores or turn counts, big kill lists, exceptional wealth etc. As you start out with the game, you'd get "low level" ghosts, eg. if your very first character dies to a giant rat in the first sewer level, your third or fourth might encounter the restless spirit of the first, who assigns a quest to kill a giant rat. As more playthroughs raise the bar for what's deemed exceptional, ghosts would grow in power: One could assign a difficult quest with a high reward, another could show up as an evil undead overlord.
On a related note, I think it could also be interesting to have the option to retire certain characters. They would then become NPCs, who might provide services to future PCs, eg. as shopkeepers or nobility. I think it would have to be balanced so that the player needs to decide whether it's worth it to retire a character, or take the risk of going on another adventure (success would mean a greater payoff when finally retiring, failure might in worst case store the bones to use as a vengeful spirit against future heroes).
I guess a game that makes extensive use of bones and/or retirement might warrant to "reset the world" after a certain amount of playthroughs, clearing it of ghosts and retired past heroes. Or vice versa. Maybe there is a main plot that "Hell is boiling over, and Heaven is full", and as you play the game many times, the world just slowly gets overcrowded with ghosts.
In any case. Bones are exceptionally cool in themselves, and certainly a mechanic which hasn't been thoroughly explored. Or are there good examples of existing games using mechanics like the ones discussed in this thread?
As always,
Minotauros
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Neat related mechanic from an old game. In AvP for the Jaguar, if you played the Xenomorph, you could cocoon up to three enemies, and when you were killed you'd respawn at the most recent one. It was a really interesting mechanic, individual Xenomorphs were fairly fragile, but it was about maintaining momentum rather than preserving any particular life.
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Recursive ghosts already happen in nethack.
Someone finds a bones level. It has the named ghost of a former adventurer, the former adventurer's (cursed) equipment stack, and a lot of nasties which killed that adventurer. New person dies, leaving a new bones level. New bones level contains the new named ghost, the new adventurer's (cursed) equipment stack, plus a lot of nasties which killed that adventurer - including the former named ghost and the former (cursed) equipment stack.... Rinse, repeat. There have been bones levels with as many as four player ghosts. I don't know if there's any limit, except that the chance of leaving a bones level is never 100%.