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Messages - vultures

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16
Player's Plaza / Re: RLs and strategy
« on: March 13, 2015, 12:48:02 AM »
Strategy, rather than diplomacy, is a mindgame of the battlefield. Relying on your subjects, you're oughta master your opponent's game and beat him to it whilst struggling to maintain your own ranks. Rather than thinking Astral Masters, think spinning plates with a few dogs running amongst the poles. You either make it complex, or play it smart. And safe.

On the other hand, tactics are closer to "playing the good cards" of your character. Putting immediate resources at use, taking cover whilst exploiting the terrain's corridors only to comply with skills honed to pair with perks and traits - it develops a combat style. Remember classes in perpetual RLs? Waves of enemies are as strong as their weakest of kin, but your character is the keeper of the light. Or an unholy unicorn slayer commanding legions of the undead, but that's just your playing preference.

'nough being said 'bout the classics, RLs nowadays offer a vast choice of non-combat "activities". Elona has breeding whilst CataDDA shows you how to pimp your ride into oblivion. UnReal World is a whole'nuther example -- you can avoid trouble at any instance and have a wonderful run. Nowhere close to HoMM3, don't you think? :)

17
Design / Felon, the video game
« on: March 13, 2015, 12:13:58 AM »
Lemme just point out I'm offering a concept for all of us to discuss, not an ongoing project or an existing game. To ensure the validity, I'm gonna offer an approximate time(guide)line which represents the general order to the frames describing this concept. What it means is that I've been thinking about the game for a while, summing up some of the ideas, and I would like to share them with you with high hopes for some feedback and/or insight.

A while ago this team of german programmers published a game called The Sting!. It was appealing to different crowds and altough it didn't achieve that much of a mainstream success, it lived through another sequel. By the time I was enjoying this another instance I was ecstatic about the concept of roleplaying a whacky character who's attempting to solve timebound puzzles with nothing less than burglary and theft.
I guess there's no explaining to do when it comes to corellation with RLs; simply, you loot a dungeon in order to become a hero of your own cause. The Sting! 2 had no random content to be considered a Rogue descendant, but it had its perks that spoke to me how, perhaps, there are people who've seen the value in this concept and have attempted to expand on it since.
I was dubbed wrong.

However, one or two (german) aspiring indie devs have elaborated on the idea. They've released some kind of a build based on their work and released the work under an all-open license of sorts. The project lifespan was short and the idea was back in the chest deep down in the dungeon, where it came from. Oh, I'm sure. :)
I've decided not to discuss GTA series at this point. Not because of the suspicious morals to the game series nor the mistaken sense of humor that comes from the authors' attempt to embue simulation elements on the top of an arcade game, but for the sheer amusement of ignoring the series' producers. The total 2% of the fun left from the initial concept was overrun with hardware requirements and an endless flood of media atention riddled with YouTube videos made by 9yos. No thanks.



I've never really written a concept for Felon. I thought about making it an acronym of sorts, but then my thoughts floated about and far away; I was really excited imagining it from the bottom up. Altough I have half a dozen games pending, half of which I'm sure will wait quite a while until I give them breath and some wind under their wings so anyone can see them - this one I feel is closest to the core concept Rogue and its incarnations had; such is the reason for sharing this.


The plot

I though somewhat rustic enviroment should be relative to the absurd of the story. I've really meant for it to keep the looks of a Northern American town, somewhat central-western portion of the States. Thoughts of economic uncertainty of such small communities led me into picturing some Eastern-European, ex-USSR half-abandoned apartment blocks, but I've already imagined a storyline to myself. Our character is a yankee-doodle and it must stay that way. :)
An accountant for a small enterprise, he/she (see, it's a roguelike! :) ) got into deep trouble with some murky characters. A small debt from betting on a local college basketball team, mixed with wrong connections and a shift in power in the underground layers of the lead character's home community ended really badly; a couple'a thousand $ was easily mistaken for several tens of thousands of $ worth of loan debt to some really shady individuals. Life or death situation, it was time to skip town and start from scratch. But wait...
Who would've perceived they would've tracked his (let's stick with him for a while) whereabouts in such short notice? A god-forsaken nothing-of-a-town couldn't keep him safe for a week, and there it was - a letter. Details of rebel youth sent chills down his spine as he started remembering the old high, the vice he'd forgotten about... the score he kept and the fence he looked across to make it work. He was a felon, a deviant locksmith; even though he burried this youthful way of life the recent shift he's made to his habits made him realize how easy it was for him once. Or maybe triple-dozen-twice. :)
The next, and final letter was an eye opener; if he was to keep his limbs intact, he should take interest in what they have to say. And they are a train station locker key, with a deposit due within a week. 1000 $ should kick it in, but only through their fence who should visit him in a day or two.
Did I say it's a dungeon? No? Or a torment? Neither?! Perhaps because it's even tougher? Let's see...


The Setting

Our character rents a place in a town of several thousand souls. With some skills and a basic toolset at his disposal he's oughta scout downtown & suburbs for ripe pickings. After planning & timing, it's a go.
What's very important here is - an era our character exists in. I've been looking into reasons why some RLs choose 80s and 90s as inspiration for their plots, and the reasons for these decades being their rightful choices are the same - the sheer knowledge of the mentioned settings. But, there's more to it.
See, we're living in a cuberpunk era when it comes to "cracking vaults". Codebreakers, hacking panels and encryption algorithms have replaced crowbars and lockpicks, smoke screens and batons. In 2000s and 2010s your ninja burglar would prolly have his ass caught in a web of surveilance, GPS tracking -- or worse. Creating such a game based on a modern-era setting would look like a mindgame-puzzle, whereas we're asking for a tactical / action approach to this dub.
So cross the precipice between the 80s and the 90s in the continental USA. Feel the breeze, sense the spirit of the age. Hear the dog barking in the backyard and think what would it take to divide his attention. Pick the lock, try the window. No, wait - see if there's an alarm. Find the wires and play with them. Sharpen your senses and hone those skills. Take a look down the lane, maybe there's someone passing by. Is there a red-and-blue reflection on nearby buildings? Perhaps it's time to bail, just-grab-what-you-can sort of thing. The time's ticking...


Is That All?

Besides different game modes, such as Storyline (main), Random Raid (quick run) and perhaps some other challenges with adjustable difficulty, an *Unlocked* mode should exist. Only if certain requirements are met should the player be allowed to enter this hardcore dungeon meant for master rogues - or thieves, if you prefer. An ancient oriental Dragon Eye stone, or a priceless historic document kept within the most secret vault - you place the treasure, and the game generates the code for the lock you've put there.
Even though one particular raid should last one or two coffeebreaks, those difficulty changes should drastically improve the replay value and offer near-impossible puzzles with some really thoughtful planning on the player's end.

Oh yeah, one last thing - the game should be allowed a 2x timescale, which is a double of real-life speed of occurences. I thought that adjustable difficulty should work well within these boundaries.
That's it for now. Feel free to comment and expand on the concept!

18
Quote from: Avagart
I cannot find satisfactory answer.
:) :) :)

Ready.
_



Btw, feel free to download Angband and read through its docs; I'm sure it explains how it picked up on Moria, or Rogue for that matter.


Cheers,
vultures.

19
7DRLs / Re: Outlaw Space [7DRL 2015]
« on: March 12, 2015, 10:05:55 PM »
Please give us the name of designer /concept/ of title screen, because it's heavenly.

Really, the deed is done. That's one hell of an approach to color and vision, and I know what I'm talking about when I'm saying that.

20
7DRLs / Re: Void Sanctum (formerly Elements of Void) - 7DRL 2015
« on: March 12, 2015, 09:59:22 PM »
God, where's my console ('~') 'cuz I wanna type in Diablo.exe and get 999 lives! :)

Cudos for that screenshot, dudes! :)

21
Off-topic (Locked) / Handmade Hero, the project
« on: March 12, 2015, 09:43:08 PM »
This site called Tig Source just popped out whilst relaxingly surfing.
I wouldn't have said anything 'bout nuthin yet - I found a gem. And gems I find in dungeons are shared amongst friends. :)

The Handmade Hero project by Casey Muratori is a double-edged nordic sword for your sheath; it's both a game built from scratch in C++ and a video log on YouTube. The announcement video should wake up that codewarrior inside you, and the rest, by TigSource's saying, should extend into year 2016.


Good riddance to all'y'alls,
vultures.

22
Player's Plaza / Re: Rogue-likes and Diablo 3
« on: March 11, 2015, 09:37:05 PM »
Two days back, I saw this young champ tweeting on his Windows Phone in his SUV-crossover, having a soft drink whilst he's waiting to get greenlit on this boulevard near my apt. I wouldn't have noticed him if he hadn't forgotten about, like, three cars behind him so they had begun to honk like hell - but nevermind that. :) What's important is that a minute ago I was SMSing a guy I know about CataDDA's new build and I thought to myself how this guy, the guy behind the wheel, prolly never knew what's a roguelike.
Altough I don't really care, I'm pretty sure he's only heard about Diablo3 and pretends to know, more or less, everything about it.

I guess RLs stick to people who care about what other people know about.

23
Development Process & non-technical / Re: Online social roguelike
« on: March 10, 2015, 08:45:25 PM »
I think I get your views, and have respect for 'em. Naturally, I'm a bit dazzled with a few points - but not 'cause I plainly disagree:
Quote from: Omnivore
...  Add in the general lack of procedural generated content giving rise to endless grinding of the same old same old, physics limitations combining with human nature to limit gameplay design to a narrow scope which has all of them feeling pretty much the same past newbie land, and bleh.

As for most retro-culture fans, it keeps bugging me where the skin broke and, if I may express myself, "people steered their view off great value in simple things and begun their appreciation towards what is merely superficial".
Then I remembered - people are not all that smart. And, the world is indeed a vast and complicated place.

Just to be sure, the web interface which was perfected by the end of 90s wasn't meant for entertainment needs. The way I see it, and I admit being gravely subjective on this matter, it matched both computer capabilities and people's habbits, respectively. Many adopted the blunt, comformist resolve - it defined what internet was made for. Then, a hobby-worth of dungeon crawling simply haven't evolved along. Needless to say how I've proven your very point, people started paying for "magic internet beans" simply because they were eager to find out what the heck everyone's been talking about.

Calling it for now, and simply because I didn't get to be the one who "says everything" - besides getting my head around dipping into ToMe some more, I wish this topic many ideas redone and good memories recalled.

24
Since everyone seems to enjoy this game very much, I just dropped by to say the above post was only relative to driver problems, and it was never an error on the developer's end.
There are a lot of forums sharing just about the same discussion, about RL/indie titles and incompatibility with certain driver software. For example, hundreds of people have flooded Minecraft forums, complaining they couldn't start the game due to some OpenGL error.
See, that's a driver issue. Both M'craft and P'Dungeon use Java, which relies on up-to-date OpenGL drivers. However, both these games fail to start (miserably) if your GPU drivers are locked on Generic (Windows), or OpenGL 1.1 to be certain.

The issue was solved the minute I've tracked down the driver problem (Vista) and installed more recent drivers.
Sorry, and thx for understanding.

25
Classic Roguelikes / Re: Deep Roguelikes on iOS and Android?
« on: March 09, 2015, 07:36:17 PM »
So then, a Linux-driven tablet and an Android phone, or a turntable on these two? :)

26
Design / Re: 7DRL challege advice tips idea
« on: March 09, 2015, 07:30:56 PM »
Yup, Darren's right - and someone at the admin team's smart! :-)

27
What everyone enjoys on their coffebreak:
..and then I spilled his gut, another orc shouted but I managed to escape. I've hidden at the end of the next corridor, flanked the whole group and went behind the back of this mean little shaman and slit his throat!
..oh, the next big town's great. I sold ALL the things I didn't need, spent my XP and gold on training AND there was some left for those materials I haven't been able to find back in the dungeons.

What's everyone's dislike in RLs:
..maaan, it's dull now! I'm a 22nd level druid, and there is no hint whatsoever where I should find the only quest item I'm lacking.
..it keeps killing me when I try toreach the 10th rune in this dungeon, and they won't let me into this town to ask for advice because they simply don't like my character's race/class!

28
Development Process & non-technical / Re: Online social roguelike
« on: March 09, 2015, 07:01:38 PM »
I don't wanna be lighthearted nor do I wanna encourage you; the thing about your idea is simply - appealing on so many levels.
And now what? :)

We've all heard about so many different indie titles. I don't wanna imply any royalties are bound to their names, simply because those are not lucrative businesses. Altough MMO is the coalmine of the present, I agree on jim's assessment regarding decades old MUDs at the internet's counterpart - your neighbor's BBS. Recalling that, I can only picture them as brilliant and fun - and even though from today's perspective that opinion "ain't for real" , MUDs were ahead of their lifespan and are stuck to just as many hearts as you can imagine.

Now, let's look at that difficulty curve from current perspective. The way I perceive it, majority of indie titles follow this logic:
Challenge --> Modding --> Expansion --> Modding --> Challenge --> Modding --> Expansion --> ...
This obviously lacks structure and flair.

That MMO game that's in my mind now, the one you've begun with, would have to feature a much better equasion; only then should an average RL player attempt to solve the problem that the proposed game has to offer. Instead of playing one RL title on his desktop and another two indie (or $$) MMOs online, he would probably leap into a dungeon to solve with his friends.
Let's expand on UnReal World, shall we? It's a perfect setting for a community-driven game. Tribes, territories, complex skills and simple economy revolving around items and services - you could easily drop 100+ players into this nordic setting. I asked myself more than once - why isn't it the case with this game, why isn't it spinned and made into multi-fun?
Can anyone on RT answer this question?
If I was to pick another MP or MMO title, with or without a leash keeping it with a social network, the answer would've been fairly simple - someone had an idea how the game would look like right at the instance when it reaches the optimal number of participants. So, what are those players doing in "our MUD re-creation" six months from its release? Are they joining efforts to overcome an obstacle on so many levels that it can be tracked only via XP pool, or are they slamming into 99th dungeon level, spawning for the fifteenth time on the surface? Are they flooding their IM for someone to give them a hand in-game, or are they starting to grind resources simply because they've bailed out of that same effort?
It's not a murky, torch-lit vision of yet-to-come mediocre game title; it's a note to anyone's attempt towards designing a challenging, effective, branching difficulty curve which exists just because the game is in essence a MMO roleplay.

29
Another thanx, I'm having a blast with good ole' Morr. I've even started tracking newsgroups for fresh info on recent fan efforts.

Live long, Die Balrog. :)

30
Design / Re: my recent thoughts
« on: March 08, 2015, 02:31:08 PM »
Back to the bronze ages and AD&D basics, let's revisit the 2nd edition as WotC meant it.
Though it had been perfected since, the omnipotent rule for determining if a low-level char can harm a high-level hero was the opportunity attack check. What it meant was that it sorts out if an action (that particular) hero makes provokes such an attack. If you ever wondered if a petty goblin can drive a shaft through Lich's skull because he/she is swinging his/her staff wide, this is your answer.
Now, playing AD&D through these types of rules required a hefty ammount of luck to accomplish Davidian tasks such as this. You should roll a d20/20, another d20/20 (it's AD&D 2, remember?) and then fortify it with that crucial 96-00 roll on percentile dice to make it a potentially lethal blow.

The way I see it, even a demigod character could open a door into pitch black and fall down into a spiked trap. Endgame for everyone! Even if, being put this way, it's a game-buster it shows that DM must favor all forces that be, not just Player Characters. A personal side-note on my end had always been, at least when ruling a tabletop is the topic, that in order to get favors from the universe, player has to be in contact with magic and/or divinity so that he/she may absorb enough karma to overcome the peril.

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