It's definitely not on the App Store, but surely you've heard of Diablo 2 I disagree, sometimes throwing the armor to damage an enemy and then moving in for a one hit kill is better than taking one or two hits with the armor on. That is, if you don't have any other throwables. I also think throwables should have their own unique 'throwing' damage, for instance throwing a dagger should be more effective and have a higher chance to hit than throwing a long sword, but a long sword thrown should have a higher chance of a critical if it hits. And heavy armor should do more damage than say a robe for sure but the robe has a chance of blinding the enemy for a turn, while a helmet should be very accurate.... Personally I like the throwability of everything idea, as long as it is a carefully thought over design decision. Wow that's a really great effect!
I don't think it does significant damage. Balance it with annoyance of scrolling through the whole inventory every single time to use throwing knives or damaging potions - which is by contrast, very frequently useful. Silhouette shapes idea is awesome and would ramp up tension very nicely, indeed!
Are enemies always as plentiful as in that picture with all the Mineko clones? Also, how did Mineko know that there were more monsters farther down? I understand how she sees the massive blob right next to her, but the map also reveals some more monsters farther down.
Diablo 1 & 2 didn't have randomly generated dungeons though, which was the main point I was getting at. That image there is mainly just a stress test and shadow test to make sure his engine can handle that much. (It can.) In the final game it probably won't get that dense. Probably. Again, just stress testing to show that everything is in place. Keep in mind this is all very early stuff you're seeing, like, pre-pre-pre-alpha stuff, so everything is subject to change and not everything you see will be in the final game.
I've recently (yeah, I know, late to the party) been playing around with 100 Rogues and think there are a couple of neat concepts to borrow from in there! 1) Basic Skill Trees: I'm not necessarily saying theirs is ideal (a little too many dependencies IMHO, while there need to be some not ALL skills should reply on earlier skills). I also think I'd like a more uniform system for the Skill Points. I'd say 1 point per experience level but have some skills cost up to 5 so you'd need to save up a few levels to get (in addition to whatever dependencies might exist). 2) Differentiated Weapons: No longer are all weapons merely a range of damage, but daggers, swords, and axes all have some unique properties in chance to hit, critical, and maybe other aspects just by being part of a given weapon family. 3) Neutral Items: I can't think of a better term for this but, as CD knows from some of our previous discussions, I love the idea of an item that can be vitally useful but comes at the cost of a nasty side-effect that will make you think twice before using it (the great example I saw in 100 Rogues was the Rotten Meat which will satiate you but lower your strength in the process...when starving can you afford to be that picky?). 4) Alternative Uses: I know that CD and MG are fans of this as well in their games, but stuff like 100 Rogues' ability to either drink an Energy Potion or toss it as an explosive grenade was so clever since not are these two different ways to use the item, they're not even in the same league of thought...it's as if the devs are asking you to make a call, "Do you want to restore some mana or blow stuff up?" So There!
Yes, I was hoping to get that effect, and I think it is starting to come together nicely now! As for an eventual sequel, it definitely helps me to know that anything I "cut" now is not so much "cut", as it is saved to make sure the sequel is as cool as the first game. Thank you! I thought about using some monsters in that shot, but I want to keep you all in suspense Seriously though, I will start providing peeks at more and more things as I get closer to completion... Hard for anyone to not be familiar with Diablo II On throwing equipment and objects of various types... In other games from this field there are some interesting rules. In Rogue (and Rogue Touch of course) throwing armor or non-throwing type weapons usually resulted in only 1 point of damage to the enemy, unless you're exceptionally strong. FYI- play as "Hulk" in Rogue Touch if you want to fling suits of armor around for massive damage! Pretty much mirrors your idea of a separate "throwing damage" vs "wield damage"! Shiren the Wanderer allowed you to throw a spent staff (0 charges left) and get one last effect from the impact of the staff on a monster. I'm probably going to be borrowing ideas from both of those games... I do like the idea of having some unique effects for throwing certain types of items (as you mentioned with the robe above). Already have a couple of things like that in mind too This is a key issue, accessibility to items, and ease of use... whether that is throwing, drinking, wielding, etc! Right now I don't have one killer solution to this problem, but do have a number of ideas to help alleviate it a bit. Silhouettes really did make the difference from my tests! Before implementing that, you could much more easily tell if a monster was hiding nearby due to the contrasting color on the hard edge of a shadow. Now monsters blend into shadows well enough that they can occasionally surprise you Thanks smirnoffsky! I can't wait either, the ideas started last fall, artwork and sprite animations started over the winter, but work on programming only started heavily this spring! As a one man show, it's tough going, but I promise to make it worth the wait The photo, and accompanying demo code I that I used for that picture was designed to "stress test" the ability for me to handle AI and animation for up to 100 enemies on a level. Under normal circumstances you will never have to fight that many at once, but of course there are abnormal circumstances at certain stages in the game The reason she knows the positions of ALL monsters in the photo is simple- because I let her, it was a test program, so I needed to track the position and motions of all the enemies even in unseen portions of the dungeon and make sure they were behaving as expected. Little tidbit for you- The few monsters at the lower part of the mini-map area had not detected Mineko, and were still sleeping. That was part of the test as well! ---- Mindfield- Haha! you actually responded to this as well, just as I was wrapping up my huge wall of text! For those who are curious, I've obviously been talking with Mindfield in more detail about the game. He has lots of interesting ideas
Heh, Mindfield and LordGek online and posting at the same time that I am... it's a Rogueapalooza party in here LordGek- I need to chat with you again at some point, drawing on more of your extensive gameplay background, send me an e-mail sometime! I'll be responding to your comments (as well as some made by Isilel the other day) shortly
Today on Spirit Hunter Mineko.... I am working on more graphics and story dialog! Some of the important early parts of the game were never drawn up before. Things like tile-sets for Mineko's home, where the adventure technically begins, will be rendered with the in-game engine. Right now with all my test environments I've just been dumping her straight into a dungeon, but we really need to start doing it right and following the flow of the story
Oops! I missed that completely, sorry about that aznriceboi13! As you can probably tell by all the talk on the last page: yes you can throw pretty much anything, and get a variety of results depending on what you did throw. An item that "gives curses" will definitely transfer the ailment to something that it hits, and potions that hit enemies will have a greater variety of effects that you can exploit. Some items will even have effects on the world around you when thrown! More info on that and magic items will be coming
Hi Isilel, I told you I'd finally get back to this! So yes, you're correct, the plan is to have various status effects be temporary, so your game is not completely ruined due to a run of bad luck with the random number generation. Of course the duration of some effects may still be pretty long, we can't make things TOO easy for the player The concept of curses here on weapons and armor will be different than seen in Rogue Touch, and will be more like you describe... an item that seems wonderful, but has some unwanted side effects when in use. This piece of equipment will be up to you to use, it won't be stuck *forever* in your hand until you find a remove curse scroll. You'll be able to unwield it immediately, or within a certain number of turns at worst. The combinations will prove to be interesting I think. Imagine a sword that is designed to do extra damage to Dragons, but has a nasty side effect: whenever you reach a floor containing one, the sword shouts "I SMELL DRAGONS!" so loudly that it wakes up every sleeping monster on the floor! Regarding unified ammo- yes I believe that for simplicity and fairness that ammo will be generic. Or I'll just make sure everyone else who shoots wields a crossbow too Ranges for any attack (thrown/shot/otherwise)- I'm designing with the iPhone and iPod in mind at the moment, and think that you should have a fair chance of hitting anything that is visible on screen. That only means about 4 grid squares left or right, and 5 squares up and down. Beyond that, where is the cutoff? If you can't see the monster on screen, normal attacks will be much less likely to hit, and wont travel too many more squares outside visual range (this will help balance the ease of access to your ranged weapon). Magic attacks however will probably keep going until they hit *something*. I have several ideas on ways to organize and present your inventory better, so hopefully these will help people use all their loot more efficiently in-game
lol that's pretty cool idea you could have the whole floor rumble and what not, I'd like a sword that would talk
Still a ways off I'm afraid. I've only just started my part in the project (audio/music) which is going to be done concurrent with development of the game at particular areas and milestones so as to make sure the audio meshes well with everything else to provide a seamless and engaging experience. Which basically means me writing something and Kevin going, "No, no, more like this," and then me changing it and Kevin going, "Yeah, yeah, that's pretty good, but it needs more cowbell!*" and then me punching him in the arm. Rest assured though that everything is progressing nicely. * There will be no cowbell. Ever.
Mindfield has some pretty specific visions for the audio that we have discussed at length, and I'm going to do my best to guide him with a minimal amount of getting punched in the arm... sorry, no cowbell guys! Despite the general view that you can release quickly and patch repeatedly in the App Store, I prefer to take the old-school Shigeru Miyamoto mindset: "A delayed game is eventually good, while a bad game is bad forever"... basically I only have one chance to get this right, and by golly it's going to be right! Originally when I started the project I thought "How long could it possibly take? Maybe three months?". Now I think, "How much longer could this possibly take? Maybe three months?". Unfortunately past history shows I can't estimate game development time very well, so I will refrain from picking a date out of thin air. I can say it's more than a month from completion, but how much more depends on many things.
