Bones -- how far can you go with them?

[mushroom patch]

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?

[NON]

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!"'

[watabou]

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

[mushroom patch]

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..."

[Rickton]

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.

[Quendus]

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.

[Zireael]

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

[Z]

IIRC you can resurrect a bone character in IVAN.

[guest509]

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. :-)

[Rickton]

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.

[miki151]

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.

[guest509]

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?"

[joeclark77]

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.

[mushroom patch]

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.

[Rickton]

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.