Is anyone using this system to make a game? I'm fiddling with it and having a good time.
I've made a half assed Zelda game but got my design process backward. You want to figure out how the 7DayBand engine works FIRST and then slap the theme on, I tried to make a Zelda game with it instead of making a Zelda-Band. No biggie, it was a good way to learn.
Are there any sites or groups using this engine at all?
If anyone is making a game pipe up, I'm going to go over a few of the basics that I've learned below. I'll update this as things pop up.
First Rule: If you know what you are doing then go ahead and just die 20 times, that will open up everything so it's not such a slow progression to unlock all the item types. You might edit the save file thingy to require less deaths to open things up, but I'm not sure that works.
Items
-Weapons: Fits in your 'wield' or 'bump' slot. Has a damage amount, special effect and damage type (note you can specify any number of damage types)
-Armors: Can be worn, passive slot, has a protection amount, I think special effect too...
-Portions: Cause special effect, can be thrown.
-Spell Books: After 20 deaths or so these will pop up. You can activate them from a special menu using the zap ('z') key. Using a spell costs mana, the target can be self or a direction and you can pick an effect radius. Spells can cause any special effect (see below)
-Corpses: The only items monsters drop, they can have a special effect. Provide food by default. Corpses are a very interesting part of the engine.
-Rings? They are mentioned in the save file but I don't see 'em.
-Ranged Weapons? Also mentioned, I don't see 'em though. You can work around this by creating a 'mana bow' out of a 'spell book' item and charging very little mana for a nice straight targetted attack.
Special Effects (most items can have a special effect added to them)
-Heal
-Damage (with damage type as well, like fire, ice, etc...)
-Gain/Lose Mana
-Gain/Lose Food
-Poison/Cure
-Resist/Vulnerable to an element
Elements
-You can make as many damage types as you want, or 'elements'.
Monster Specials (Not sure what they all do, you can add these traits to monsters and the player!)
-Resist element
-Vulnerable to element
-Slow
-Fast
-Vampire: I assume this steals life and heals self?
-Regeneration
-Dig
-Engulf: Like swallow?
-Breeder: Heh...
-Thief: Bubbles in Zelda steal your sword, Monkeys in Brogue...not sure if you can get your stuff back or not.
-Jumps: I'm hoping this is teleport, my Wizzrobes will be using it. :-)
Monster Stats
-Monsters can have the usual damage, hit points and armor stats as well as a variety of behavior profiles.
Level Types: You eventually start to unlock a variety of level generators
-Room and Corridor = Normal Rogue style.
-Cave = Very open
-Dark Cave = Same but dark
-Open Room: Like an Arena? I've not made one of these yet.
-Maze: My favorite alternate so far, no corridors, rooms link with rooms. Like Powder maps.
Statuses
-Health Bar: Very slowly ticks up over time.
-Mana Bar: Spells Books use up this resource, it slowly ticks up.
-Food Bar: Ticks down, refill by eating. You can wait and heal and get your mana up but might run out of food, it's a nice resource management dynamic. Note that starving on the way out of the dungeon can be a real danger.
The Quest
You can choose how long you want the game to be, how many levels, how tough the boss is going to be and his name. The boss will drop the quest item then you need to run up the stairs to make it out of the dungeon. I named my quest item Gannon's Head, which he drops when you kill him. Lol.
Note you can change everything in the game once you've made it by using the x key. Nothing is set in stone that I can tell, maybe alternate level types but I'm sure I can edit game and save files if needed.
Wish List
The one thing I wish I could change about the engine is that once I have a level the way I want the game will still keep giving me prompts to add things to the level. It doesn't look like there's a 'finished' state. Being able to mark a level as 'finished' is going to be important if I ever want anyone to play a game I've made without being bothered by the prompts. It's also an issue as it keeps wanting me to add monsters to level one, I only wanted one new monster per level. I'll keep fiddling, surely I can escapge out of a prompt if I want to add nothing. I guess just having more control of what to add and when would be nice, and an option to halt prompts if desired. It would make it more of a development tool I guess, less of a game.
I guess 'rings' would also be on the wishlist if they aren't already in the game. Another trinket type passive slot would be neat. For ranged attacks you can use spells, so I don't miss ranged attacks.
Now that I'm in wish mode, it would be nice to be able to start the character out with some gear. Let them pick 'fighter' and you can assign that class certain start gear. Heck you could define a TON of classes once you have enough gear in the game. No special class abilities, just some start gear to sorta speed up the early game. This is one I might have to try to code myself.
That's it for now, if anyone has anything to add let me know and I'll edit.
