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Game Discussion => Early Dev => Topic started by: roguedjack on May 18, 2010, 09:54:30 PM

Title: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on May 18, 2010, 09:54:30 PM
Please see Alpha 3 thread instead.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: Chex Warrior on May 18, 2010, 10:48:26 PM
Great, I can't wait to play.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: getter77 on May 18, 2010, 11:53:53 PM
Fantastic sounding slate of improvements, DEFINITELY keep at it!   8)
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: FaerĂșth on May 19, 2010, 08:59:24 AM
Hmm, I typed the code, clicked download, a new page opened and... nothing happens  ???

According to the feature list the game is awesome, but can't download it.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on May 19, 2010, 09:22:13 AM
Hmm, I typed the code, clicked download, a new page opened and... nothing happens  ???

According to the feature list the game is awesome, but can't download it.

Forgot to add you must click "Commencer le téléchargement..." (Begin downloading)
Sorry about that.

---
If people have problems downloading tell me, I'm not 100% confident about this file hosting site.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: Chex Warrior on May 20, 2010, 03:12:30 AM
So far I've had some great games...  mostly involving me abandoning my followers to grizzly deaths...

I can't believe that the people I'm saving steal my wooden planks and then attempt to barter for my pistol with them. Its just rude. Any chance that you can attempt to give orders to your followers? You could make them barricade, break furniture, etc, etc.

Secondly, have you considered adding some sort of weather system? Fighting zombies in a snowstorm sounds awesome.

Keep up the great work.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: FaerĂșth on May 20, 2010, 07:06:32 AM
That's really a fun game, great work  :)

One small bug I found so far: When trying to pick up an item and all inventory slots are used, the game regards the inventory as full, even if the item can be put on an existing stack (like planks).

EDIT: And a NPC just built a barricade on the tile I was standing on
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on May 20, 2010, 12:27:33 PM
Any chance that you can attempt to give orders to your followers? You could make them barricade, break furniture, etc, etc.

Secondly, have you considered adding some sort of weather system? Fighting zombies in a snowstorm sounds awesome.
Ordering followers & weather are planned feature.  8)


One small bug I found so far: When trying to pick up an item and all inventory slots are used, the game regards the inventory as full, even if the item can be put on an existing stack (like planks).

EDIT: And a NPC just built a barricade on the tile I was standing on
Nice spotting, will fix in 2.1.

Thanks both of you for the usefull comments!
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: Chex Warrior on May 20, 2010, 02:14:35 PM
Something else occurred to me... maybe you should have the option to attack other survivors. Obviously this would have some negative effects: possibly being killed, followers who don't agree would abandon you and so on. What do you think?
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on May 20, 2010, 03:47:00 PM
I prefer to keep the player and the survivors as the "good guys" and the only practical reason I see to attack other survivors would be to get their items. You can't now, but later I'll add "gangs" which will be basically "evil" survivors which you can attack and will attack others as well. The game support a factions concept so maybe I'll add the ability to join the evil guys.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: kulik on June 04, 2010, 12:59:59 PM
Hello,
i started a thread on bay12games forum about your game, the people like RogueSurvivor a lot!

One bug i found:
When you drop stackable items and the ground is full they will vanish.

Couple of ideas of things i would like to see in the feature:

1. I like how followers have their own mind, but some orders would be great. When to sleep, when to eat, when to run, when to barricade...
2. Ammo. Guns should be really scarce, ammo should be more common ...yet still pretty scarce.
3. Im not sure, but the stuff in shops seems like its geting respawned. If yes, in options to be able to set how often and how much should respawns or not respaw at all.
4. Its too easy to kitte zombies-  Most zombies have a speed of .66.  That means that they miss every third move.  So move back and forth a space from them until they move twice in a row, moving next to you on the second move.  Attack them then move away.  Repeat. (credits to mainiac) ...perhaps add some randomness to the speed.
5. Zombie and human population moving between districts- humans fleeing from zombie horde zombies follow them. (levels of zombie infestation differs and changes from district to district resulting in districts deserted and some infested or safe)
6. Encumberence to have impact on speed and stamina.
7. Not sure if this is possible but i would like to see humans and groups of humans buiding safehouses and going for scavengeruns and returning to safehouse to get some sleep. Ai works fine btw but lacks some long time planning.  ...on the other side im playing with max population and the game is very quick, congrats on that.
8.Aiming, a round spending aiming could raise chance to hit. Possible only when not hungry sleepy and out of breath.
9.In options a chance to get infected when hp gets low. -antidote in CHAR buildings.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on June 04, 2010, 01:46:05 PM
Hello!

Quote from: kulik
One bug i found:
When you drop stackable items and the ground is full they will vanish.
Will be fixed.

Quote
Couple of ideas of things i would like to see in the feature:

1. I like how followers have their own mind, but some orders would be great. When to sleep, when to eat, when to run, when to barricade...
Alpha 2.1 has directives (eg: do/dont take items, sleep/don't sleep...) and orders (only "barricade this door/window" for now).
Players will have to test if the way I do directives/order is ok to use before adding more.

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2. Ammo. Guns should be really scarce, ammo should be more common ...yet still pretty scarce.
Ammo items will be done in later versions. Good idea about balancing them.

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3. Im not sure, but the stuff in shops seems like its geting respawned. If yes, in options to be able to set how often and how much should respawns or not respaw at all.
Items don't respawn. What you think is new is probably dead people inventory.

Quote
4. Its too easy to kitte zombies-  Most zombies have a speed of .66.  That means that they miss every third move.  So move back and forth a space from them until they move twice in a row, moving next to you on the second move.  Attack them then move away.  Repeat. (credits to mainiac) ...perhaps add some randomness to the speed.
Alpha 2.1 has fast enemies.

Quote
5. Zombie and human population moving between districts- humans fleeing from zombie horde zombies follow them. (levels of zombie infestation differs and changes from district to district resulting in districts deserted and some infested or safe)
There is already populations variation with refugees/invasions, I'm not sure more is necessary or would be a good thing.

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6. Encumberence to have impact on speed and stamina.
You really need items, I don't want to penalize the player for carrying stuff.

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7. Not sure if this is possible but i would like to see humans and groups of humans buiding safehouses and going for scavengeruns and returning to safehouse to get some sleep. Ai works fine btw but lacks some long time planning.  ...on the other side im playing with max population and the game is very quick, congrats on that.
That's the problem. Better AI = more CPU time. I can do planning. But I prefer to keep a lot if simple AIs than a few clever AI that the player will probably never notice anyway. Also the game should be playable on low end CPU like mine  ;D
Also the advantage of simple AIs is that each type of actor has a very recognizable behaviors, rather than a generic clever one, which imho is good for gameplay.

Quote
8.Aiming, a round spending aiming could raise chance to hit. Possible only when not hungry sleepy and out of breath.
9.In options a chance to get infected when hp gets low. -antidote in CHAR buildings.
Good ideas.

Thanks for the feedback.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: kulik on June 04, 2010, 02:40:26 PM
And thanks for your reply.

Just one thing to the AI planing. (i have no idea how coding works so this will be probably rubbish) Wouldn't it be possible to do the whole planing not every turn but only once per day? Like try to move to this house or baricade this room and then leave the rest to your directive AI that would gravitate to this objective (more move directives or more baricade directives) but no more AI calculation would be needed?

You dont have to reply its most likely nonsense.  :-X
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on June 04, 2010, 02:52:48 PM
Just one thing to the AI planing. (i have no idea how coding works so this will be probably rubbish) Wouldn't it be possible to do the whole planing not every turn but only once per day? Like try to move to this house or baricade this room and then leave the rest to your directive AI that would gravitate to this objective (more move directives or more baricade directives) but no more AI calculation would be needed?

You dont have to reply its most likely nonsense.  :-X

It ain't nonsense at all.  :)
Some sort of high level planning (do this today) then leave the details to low level AI (orders etc...).
The kind of planning you describe works well in a static environement (eg: if the map wouldn't change much during a day) but doesn't work well in a dynamic environement (eg: the map changes a lot during the day, because of broken doors, new enemies, people dying etc...).
The risk is the AI persisting in what would appear dumb behaviors during a whole day (eg: keep trying to barricade this zombie infested house).
I could add AI triggers to re-check the plan during the day, but then that would defeat the whole purpose of the pre-planning optimization.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: Deon on June 04, 2010, 03:48:21 PM
Right now I write a little game too so I know what you mean. All the A* pathfinding is already enough.

But could you make it for district simulation? I.e. when you're in a district, it shouldn't load your CPU too much because of that, but when you enter districts and already wait for a significant amount of time, why not to simulate some safehouses being built and survivors gathered inside with stuff and guns?

Actually I once I saw a guy barricaded in a gun shop with a bunch of food, but it could be random.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: kulik on June 04, 2010, 03:50:46 PM
Just one thing to the AI planing. (i have no idea how coding works so this will be probably rubbish) Wouldn't it be possible to do the whole planing not every turn but only once per day? Like try to move to this house or baricade this room and then leave the rest to your directive AI that would gravitate to this objective (more move directives or more baricade directives) but no more AI calculation would be needed?

You dont have to reply its most likely nonsense.  :-X

It ain't nonsense at all.  :)
Some sort of high level planning (do this today) then leave the details to low level AI (orders etc...).
The kind of planning you describe works well in a static environement (eg: if the map wouldn't change much during a day) but doesn't work well in a dynamic environement (eg: the map changes a lot during the day, because of broken doors, new enemies, people dying etc...).
The risk is the AI persisting in what would appear dumb behaviors during a whole day (eg: keep trying to barricade this zombie infested house).
I could add AI triggers to re-check the plan during the day, but then that would defeat the whole purpose of the pre-planning optimization.

I see. I understand that control of so much AIs is a big CPU killer so the objective is probably not "make them smart" but "make them look like they are smart".
Well, there could be a trigger that would negate the objective and switch AI to theirs basic "improvise" mood. Like if direction "run away from zombie" is triggered too often it could asses the environment as too dangerous and go back to normal mode or too little "break furniture" directions could cancel barricading and go to normal (no additional calculations needed). Maybe after plan is negated a new one could be created instead if CPU can handle it. Actually it could be build upon like too many negated plans of "move to" could lead to barricade plan and backwards.
For CPU sakes, not every civilian could have plan for every day, but it would help to raise immersion if you meet a survivor from time to time and he would tell you, that he has a plan to move in this building and barricade it and he would actually do something similar to what he described.  

Not so long ago i read a dev. diary about AI of Subversion (game from Introversion creators of Defcon and Darwinia). And the guy has solved some AI issues (too many unimportant AI plans that shuttered the cpu) by letting the unused CPU output work on the background on those not so important AIs. And since RS works in turns and sometimes you have to stop and think what to do now, couldnt the time be used to calculate some advanced AI actions? ...again, i have no idea what im talking about.  :-\
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on June 04, 2010, 05:10:23 PM
But could you make it for district simulation? I.e. when you're in a district, it shouldn't load your CPU too much because of that, but when you enter districts and already wait for a significant amount of time, why not to simulate some safehouses being built and survivors gathered inside with stuff and guns?
Full simulation is already too slow and that is with doing the AIs as it is now. Alpha 2.1 has partial simulation (skip AI frames) to speed up simulation.
I guess I could do these things you describe when simulating, but I don't like the idea of making special stuff happen out of the player reach.
Scripted events like this are possible, I can find a way to make them happen in the same map as the player with no additional AI, but with some sort of "cheating".

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Actually I once I saw a guy barricaded in a gun shop with a bunch of food, but it could be random.
Yes random. Its like the monkeys writing hamlet on typewriters thing  ;D
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on June 04, 2010, 06:18:05 PM
Quote from: kulik
For CPU sakes, not every civilian could have plan for every day, but it would help to raise immersion if you meet a survivor from time to time and he would tell you, that he has a plan to move in this building and barricade it and he would actually do something similar to what he described. 
I have plans to have uniques NPCs (eg: special survivors or zombies). I could write special AI for them to do things like that.

Quote
Not so long ago i read a dev. diary about AI of Subversion (game from Introversion creators of Defcon and Darwinia). And the guy has solved some AI issues (too many unimportant AI plans that shuttered the cpu) by letting the unused CPU output work on the background on those not so important AIs. And since RS works in turns and sometimes you have to stop and think what to do now, couldnt the time be used to calculate some advanced AI actions? ...again, i have no idea what im talking about.  :-\
I don't know about the article but for my game I see the same problem as with pre-planning. Those actions would be calculated from a specific game situation, and by the time it is the AI turn to act the situation has probably changed and the thinking done is probably useless.

BTW I wrote a blog entry about the AI in RS, you can find it here it you are interested : blog link (http://roguesurvivor.blogspot.com/2010/06/ai.html).
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: roguedjack on June 05, 2010, 06:50:17 PM
Alpha 3 out, check new thread.
Title: Re: Rogue Survivor Alpha 2
Post by: kulik on June 06, 2010, 04:33:48 PM
The new version is awesome.

Actually THE zombie game that many people were waiting for and its so good, that people started to be really enthusiastic and are suggesting things like crafting, farming on city outskirts, persistent world (like dwarf fortress) and similar stuff. It would be great if you would somehow describe some kind of plan or vision for this project. How far are planing to go with this? And last but not least, is there a way to support you? (Other than to say that you're doing great.)  :)

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moved to new tread