Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - mariodonick

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 20
16
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: March 02, 2015, 09:46:48 AM »
I started to make a copy of the source code where I'm now removing all the story stuff, to have the game's core to start to work with.

So it will be more sandbox-style hacking or with another story?

After a long time, I can answer this question.

LR 1.7 ("Infiltration") will focus on game mechanics, not so much on story, as LR 1.6.4 ("The Book of Stars") did. Of course there WILL be a basic plot (otherwise it would not be my game), but it will be much more straightforward, and quests will not be required to win the game. Basically, it will be like the coffeebreak mode from LR 1.6.4 with a short intro, 2 cutscenes and the end sequence, but in-between it's pure dungeon crawling.

LR:I is set some hundred years before LR:TBoS -- during the war between men and Drekh'Nar. The player can choose between human and Drekh'Nar. As a human, the player has to infiltrate a Drekh'Nar basis to obtain information, as a Drekh'Nar, the player has to prevent the humans infiltrating.

17
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: June 23, 2014, 05:47:21 PM »
My thesis is now (since last week Friday) handed in, i.e. finished, after 4 long years. Now I'm waiting for a letter that states that the "Promotionsverfahren" (a word hard to translate: It means the buerocratic aspects of the process leading to the PhD) is opened. Meanwhile, I'm doing some smaller usability studies and teaching German :)

So -- LambdaRogue, here I come :D

18
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: June 16, 2014, 10:58:34 AM »
and good luck on your own thesis! At some point you will have the feeling that it's done and the time is right to stop writing and improving. Although nothing is perfect and theoretically could be improved infinitely, suddenly a point will be reached when it is done and "feels" right.

Much like programming a roguelike, by the way. :D

Not really. In programming you usually run some tests at that point and it turns out that you were wrong - totally wrong :).


Well, hopefully the tests you run will show you you're NOT totally wrong, otherwise no piece of software (no roguelike) would ever be in a playable, somewhat stable state ;)

The final phases of my thesis were similar, incl. versions I labelled alpha, beta and release candidate, and tests included several iterations of writing, reading and improving, until I came to a state where I could say "okay, let's stop it now."

19
Other Announcements / Re: Tiamyth
« on: June 16, 2014, 10:55:32 AM »
Sorry for the late reply -- just found this thread by your mentioning of it in the LR thread.

Tiamyth was a nice idea, and I had a rudimentary version working, but I got distracted and then simply forgot that I started to do this. :)

20
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: June 16, 2014, 08:42:12 AM »
Thank you, @Getter77 and Zireal,

and good luck on your own thesis! At some point you will have the feeling that it's done and the time is right to stop writing and improving. Although nothing is perfect and theoretically could be improved infinitely, suddenly a point will be reached when it is done and "feels" right.

Much like programming a roguelike, by the way. :D

21
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: June 14, 2014, 07:47:59 AM »
I think this thread will keep as some kind of dev blog. After I've deleted the old LR website/blog, I don't want to start a new one.

Yesterday I finished (i.e. printed and handed-in to the university) my thesis. This means I finally have some "mental space" free for other tasks. I started to make a copy of the source code where I'm now removing all the story stuff, to have the game's core to start to work with.

22
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: April 26, 2014, 06:11:08 AM »
After a long, long time my mind is free for a little bit LambdaRogue.

This has partly to do with the fact that I'm able to enjoy computer games again. Over the last two years, I still played, but only occassionally, and I was not able to real immerse myself into games. I simply had many other tasks, both in terms of job and of PhD thesis, and esp. writing the thesis is finished now (I "only" need to defend it some time in autumn). So I had some time to play games, and this made me think of LambdaRogue again.

I'm not quite sure how to continue, though. I obviously didn't have the money to keep the website up, but the game is still available at Google Code (https://code.google.com/p/lambdarogue/). I started to order a big tileset in the end of 2012, but only about 30% of it are done (the rest needs to wait for more money).

In fact I'm thinking of declaring LR 1.6.4 the final version of the original game, and creating a "fork" based on the game's coffeebreak mode -- i.e. some kind of "LambdaRogue: Core", where all story and all quests get removed and only the game itself is being worked on. Why? Because the story of the current game is finished, the game mechanics are optimized for that story and there is no reasonable way of improving either -- basically the game is finished, and new developments are only possible on a clean basis.

So in a LR:C, I would keep the basic game engine, but reduce the story to a classic one liner: "Go down and kill Eris. She's evil." I would re-create and/or re-arrange items, levels, monsters etc. (I would keep the graphics, though. The small tileset looks good and did cost a lot of money), and I would think about new abilities for player and monsters.


However ... This is quite risky, of course, because honestly so far not the game mechanics were setting LR apart from other roguelikes, but the story. It will be difficult to come up with interesting ideas not already found in other roguelikes. (And I have currently NO idea what has been going on in the roguelike scene. Which are the most interesting games at the moment, the most successful ones etc.)

We'll see. :)

23
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 24, 2012, 01:34:25 PM »
Sounds good, have you decided on whether active NPC's or party members(player created or coming with various decisions in the story) will be a new feature for this expanded direction or will it remain a solo adventure?

Actually I thought about this, because I like how this works in the old BioWare games.

From a technical point of view, it is not very difficult to implement. It's more difficult to flesh out a really working concept and include the party member interactions in the story.

With 3 starting factions I have 3 really different main protagonists, and other party members would need to work with all of them in a believable and logical way, in all situations -- they really need to enhance the story. If they are just "there" and help the player in gameplay, they are boring. They need to make sense in the overall concept.

So while this certainly offers very nice possibilities for interactions within a party (conflicts between party members, love stuff, ...) it makes my work not easier.

So -- maybe. But probably not.

24
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 24, 2012, 09:10:32 AM »
I've written some details about the new game: http://lambdarogue.net/dl-showentry.php?n=264

25
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 22, 2012, 03:22:36 PM »
I know all your arguments very well ;)

Writing "zero" was really meant in comparison to the average roguelike, but Brian pointed out the differences in the definition of "replayability" already rather good.

I will soon write a blog posting, outlining the main elements of the new game, so it will be clear in which direction it will go in terms of game mechanics.

26
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 22, 2012, 11:31:47 AM »
Your WoW example is very good, because different starting points in the game world for the two planned factions are indeed planned.

(If you ask what factions: Men vs. Drekh'Nar. Of course.)

Edit: Disclaimer: The story will not be a WoW rip-off.

27
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 21, 2012, 09:26:17 PM »
Yeah, but of course compared to a roguelike it is much less replayable.

28
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 21, 2012, 07:56:43 PM »
Not really suspense. ;)

It's just that for telling the story the way I want, a roguelike is not the ideal choice. CRPGs work better here, and so I will do one.

This means of course zero replayability, but I hope that I can take on the established story of LR and create a storydriven game which is truly good.

I can already say that the story takes place about 200 years after the events in LambdaRogue (the good ending).

29
Other Announcements / Re: LambdaRogue 1.7 -- End of an Era
« on: October 21, 2012, 06:18:20 PM »
It will use the same engine as LambdaRogue, and probably the interface will be very similar.

But ...

It won't be a roguelike.

30
Other Announcements / LambdaRogue: Infiltration Development Thread
« on: October 21, 2012, 04:19:25 PM »
Edit: 2015/04/07: A new LambdaRogue game, called "Infiltration" is in development. This thread serves as some kind of development diary. First post related to LR:I is this one: http://forums.roguetemple.com/index.php?topic=2752.msg41424#msg41424


-- old post --
I want to provide some updates about the future of LambdaRogue.

As you know, the next update will be 1.7. As most major updates, it will have a name attached, which, in this case, will be "End of an Era". What does this mean?

LambdaRogue 1.7 aka "End of an Era" will tie up some loose ends, both of the story and the game mechanics. This also includes a new questline (a very melancholic one, I can tell you.)
LambdaRogue 1.7 will also include the new 40x80 tileset currently done by Cecilia. (And the tiles that are already finished on my HDD look great!)
But End of an Era also means end of LambdaRogue development.

Yes, that's right, LR 1.7 will be the final update, the "definitive version" of the game. No more updates will come. What are the reasons for this?

LambdaRogue development started in 2006. I devoted more than 6 years to the growth of this game, and it has reached a state where everything I wanted to achieve with it has been done.

LambdaRogue is one of the most accessible roguelikes currently available, and still one of the few roguelikes that somehow manage to have a good balance between random game mechanics and fixed story. The story is complete, the game is stable, it is quite balanced -- it is simply finished.

Is this the end?

Well, I said "end of an era", but not "end of the world", and actually, I have many ideas for expanding the game world and its lore.

So, while LambdaRogue, as piece of software as it is, won't receive any more updates after 1.7, it does not mean that the brave people of Herbstwelt have to cope without their creator (i.e. me ;) ) from now on.

Instead, it's time for something new. For something that gives me all the time and space and scale for telling Herbstwelt's story once again.

Exciting times lay ahead of us. :)

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 20