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[Araph]

Like a bad entry in a Hollywood franchise, Warden refuses to die. It really is it's own unkillable B-movie monster, in a sense. That being said, I've been thinking about it and I'm gonna JUST DO IT NOT LET MY DREAMS BE DREAMS take another shot at it from scratch, hopefully avoiding the pitfalls I fell into last time I tried this.

Where gonna make this hapen.

Overview
For those of you who weren't around for the ride last time, Warden is a multiplayer survival-horror game that pits one player (controlling a demon) against all the other players (controlling the titular Wardens). Each game is over when either all of the Wardens are dead or all of the demonic altars have been consecrated. However, each time an altar is successfully restored, the demon shifts into a new, completely different form. In order to survive, the Wardens will need to understand what they're up against before it can catch them off guard.

Objectives
The demon's goal is to kill all of the Wardens. The Wardens' goal is to cleanse the evil altars scattered across each map.

Spoiler: The Wardens (click to show/hide)

The Wardens
The Wardens are split into three classes: the Vindicator (formerly the Tank), the Abjurer (formerly the DPS), and the Seer (formerly the Seer. Still the seer now, but he was then too).

The Vindicator's job is to keep the demon away from his teammates. He wields a fiery lasso and a short-ranged blast of flame with high knockback. In addition, the Vindicator can place Shield Wards: proximity mines that create an impassible barrier of - you guessed it - fire! Fire is a big thing for the Wardens.

The Abjurer is the team's glass cannon. With his long-ranged and high-damage attacks, he's the only one who can reliably force the demon back into the shadows. He can also place Explosive Wards, which cause high damage and high knockback when triggered.

The Seer can use darkvision, which allows him to both see through the blackest of shadows and uncover the demon's tracks and wards, but only within a short radius. Each demon form leaves a trail in one way or another, making the Seer invaluable for spotting traps. To support his teammates, the Seer can place Slow and Blind Wards, which (as you might expect from the names) temporarily slow and temporarily blind the demon when triggered.

Spoiler: The Demon (click to show/hide)

The Demon
The demon is bound to the material world by multiple altars tucked away in the dark corners of each map. Each time an altar is destroyed, the demon 'dies' and respawns in a new form, wielding powerful new abilities in its hunt for the Wardens.

In general, each form has two phases: the preparation phase, and the attacking phase. During the preparation phase, the demon is incorporeal and cannot be seen by the Wardens, allowing it to prepare fiendish traps before attacking. During the attacking phase, the demon manifests (with various failsafes to prevent them from spawning on top of a Warden) and begins its hunt in earnest. The attack phase has a timer, and when that timer hits 0 seconds, the demon returns to the preparation phase. The time left in the attack phase can be reduced by the Wardens dealing damage to the demon - meaning that the Abjurer can significantly reduce the amount of time the demon has left to attack before it needs to recuperate.

All of the following forms are tentative at best. After considering the areas Warden's monsters seemed to fail during testing last time, I've tried to make the forms both more distinct and more fun to play (both as and against).

The Mimic
Preparation Phase: During the preparation phase, the Mimic places a multitude of inanimate objects around the Wardens. It can teleport to and hide within any of the props it places, as well as place pairs of Repeater Sigils. When triggered, the first sigil teleports the unfortunate Warden to the second sigil's location, allowing the Mimic to both split the team and keep at least one Warden trapped in its minefield of props.

Attack Phase: When attacking the Wardens, the Mimic can leap out of any of the props it placed during the Preparation Phase (the prop in question is destroyed by doing so) and set upon our heroes. After taking damage, the Mimic will be forced back into a different prop and repeat the cycle. This form is the demon's weakest, but it makes up for it by being able to rapidly attack the Wardens from many directions.

The Mimic has two timers during the attack phase, both of which are decremented by taking damage. Timer 1 tracks the total amount of time left in the attack phase. Timer 2 tracks how long the Mimic has left until it's forced back into a prop.

The Mimic tracks the Wardens by always knowing where they are, predicting where they will head next, and preparing traps.

The Banshee
Preparation Phase: The Banshee's preparation phase is unique in that the Wardens can see the Banshee during the phase. In this form, the demon appears to be a floating, crying woman in white, and can track the Wardens using a form of echolocation. When the Banshee cries out, any moving players become visible through walls - leaving the Wardens with a very short window of opportunity to progress before they must freeze in place.

Attack Phase: This is the most powerful form the demon has. The Banshee's screams deal tremendous damage, can hit from a distance, and are difficult to avoid. However, the Banshee's attack phase is relatively short to compensate for this.

The Hound
Preparation Phase: The Hound can place Baying Sigils, which can be activated at-will during the Attack Phase. Baying Sigils play the Hound's howling sound effect (which the Hound can also play at-will during the Attack Phase), useful for either herding fleeing Wardens towards the demon or for tricking Wardens into thinking the demon is in a different location.

Attack Phase: In this form, the Attack Phase's timer does not decrement automatically. The Hound can only be forced back into the Preparation Phase via direct attacks.

The Hound tracks by scent trails, which Wardens leave behind when walking. The Hound cannot climb or even jump well, allowing Wardens to take shelter on ledges and rooftops. However, if the Hound stays to puppy-guard (ba-dum, tshhh), it leaves itself vulnerable to both the Abjurer's ranged attacks and the Vindicator's lasso. From there, the Wardens must decide whether to make a break for it (and if so, what their escape strategy is) or to stay and fight.

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Wondering why I'm still bashing my head up against this game? Let me know! Sorry if the descriptions are worded poorly in this post; it's late and I'm kinda braindead right now.

In the near future, I'll be posting concept art, dumb lore bullshit, and monster ideas as I finish the flowchart. Then... Then the real work begins.


Just a Reminder
Previous version's IndieDB page

Warden was not a small project. It was not an idle pursuit. For the sake of my blood pressure, check out the videos on the IndieDB page and maybe even download the demo to see the state the game was in when it was abandoned before posting anything in the vein of 'think about your limitations/try making a smaller game first'. If you don't, the rustling of my jimmies will echo throughout eternity.

[FallacyofUrist]

Good idea. If you're working by yourself, it might be a bit difficult to do with "good" graphics, though.

[Araph]

Spoiler: From the previous attempt at Warden (click to show/hide)

The graphics weren't the best last time around, but I've gotten somewhat better. We'll have to see how it turns out, I guess.

[FallacyofUrist]

Well those graphics are downright wonderful if you're working by yourself.

I like the contrast between the Wardens and the Demon.

Instead of multiple demon types, why not only have one demon type with a variety of Runes and Minions to use that shift randomly each time it dies?

[flame99]

WOO! It's back!

Nothing really to be said as far as suggestions go from me, but out of curiosity, what engine are you building it in?

Also, I'm sort-of-not-really-passable as far as programming goes; if you need an extra pair of hands on the project, I'm willing to work pro-bono.

[PrimusRibbus]

Hey man, it's pretty obvious you're a talented dude and after watching these threads for a number of years I wanted to throw some constructive criticism your way. You've cancelled Warden (and a game similar to Warden) 3-4 times fairly abruptly, and prematurely thrown up a Kickstarter and Greenlight. That's not an unusual thing and I was super guilty of it myself for many years, so I'm not faulting you for it.

Take some time, step back from coding, and create a software development plan. Figure out your project's scope based not on what you think you can do, but on what you have done in the past. If you burnout or life gets in the way after a certain amount of time into a project, define a scope that can be completed in 80% of that time (this can be tough to estimate, so err on the side of conservative scope). Be honest with yourself: No excuses for why it didn't get done, and no saying that there's no possible way the project can get derailed this time. Plan for the worst case scenario.

Your game plan currently covers how the game will work, but it doesn't cover how you will work on the game. Create milestones for yourself, and break them down so that you can meet them regularly. Don't be afraid to work on features and meet milestones in such a way that your game doesn't feel like a game at all sometimes; coding rock-solid foundations will help you more in the long run than making a game fun as soon as possible. Put extra time into making your features as generic and modular as possible; when you're making a feature, keep asking yourself how hard it would be to rip it out entirely (an ideal scenario is to have a part that can be commented out completely and not have the game fail fatally, even if ripping it out means the game isn't fun for the time-being... helps a lot to prevent coding yourself into a corner). Easier said than done, I know...

It's better to complete something that shows a fraction of your vision than to let your dreams get so big that they overwhelm the entire project. If you've coded in a well documented, generic, and modular way, you can use that tech demo as a spring board later. There's zero shame in building a simple but complete v1.0 and adding to it later.

Absolute best of luck to you! Project management is genuinely the hardest part of software development. You've got great ideas and the skills to realize them, so keep on rocking it! 

[Aseaheru]

 Well, I know theres interest in it, as I occasionally get hits on old videos for warden asking things. Mostly about servers.

[Puzzlemaker]

Hey man, it's pretty obvious you're a talented dude and after watching these threads for a number of years I wanted to throw some constructive criticism your way. You've cancelled Warden (and a game similar to Warden) 3-4 times fairly abruptly, and prematurely thrown up a Kickstarter and Greenlight. That's not an unusual thing and I was super guilty of it myself for many years, so I'm not faulting you for it.

Take some time, step back from coding, and create a software development plan. Figure out your project's scope based not on what you think you can do, but on what you have done in the past. If you burnout or life gets in the way after a certain amount of time into a project, define a scope that can be completed in 80% of that time (this can be tough to estimate, so err on the side of conservative scope). Be honest with yourself: No excuses for why it didn't get done, and no saying that there's no possible way the project can get derailed this time. Plan for the worst case scenario.

Your game plan currently covers how the game will work, but it doesn't cover how you will work on the game. Create milestones for yourself, and break them down so that you can meet them regularly. Don't be afraid to work on features and meet milestones in such a way that your game doesn't feel like a game at all sometimes; coding rock-solid foundations will help you more in the long run than making a game fun as soon as possible. Put extra time into making your features as generic and modular as possible; when you're making a feature, keep asking yourself how hard it would be to rip it out entirely (an ideal scenario is to have a part that can be commented out completely and not have the game fail fatally, even if ripping it out means the game isn't fun for the time-being... helps a lot to prevent coding yourself into a corner). Easier said than done, I know...

It's better to complete something that shows a fraction of your vision than to let your dreams get so big that they overwhelm the entire project. If you've coded in a well documented, generic, and modular way, you can use that tech demo as a spring board later. There's zero shame in building a simple but complete v1.0 and adding to it later.

Absolute best of luck to you! Project management is genuinely the hardest part of software development. You've got great ideas and the skills to realize them, so keep on rocking it! 

I gotta agree with all of this.

[FallacyofUrist]

Hey man, it's pretty obvious you're a talented dude and after watching these threads for a number of years I wanted to throw some constructive criticism your way. You've cancelled Warden (and a game similar to Warden) 3-4 times fairly abruptly, and prematurely thrown up a Kickstarter and Greenlight. That's not an unusual thing and I was super guilty of it myself for many years, so I'm not faulting you for it.

Take some time, step back from coding, and create a software development plan. Figure out your project's scope based not on what you think you can do, but on what you have done in the past. If you burnout or life gets in the way after a certain amount of time into a project, define a scope that can be completed in 80% of that time (this can be tough to estimate, so err on the side of conservative scope). Be honest with yourself: No excuses for why it didn't get done, and no saying that there's no possible way the project can get derailed this time. Plan for the worst case scenario.

Your game plan currently covers how the game will work, but it doesn't cover how you will work on the game. Create milestones for yourself, and break them down so that you can meet them regularly. Don't be afraid to work on features and meet milestones in such a way that your game doesn't feel like a game at all sometimes; coding rock-solid foundations will help you more in the long run than making a game fun as soon as possible. Put extra time into making your features as generic and modular as possible; when you're making a feature, keep asking yourself how hard it would be to rip it out entirely (an ideal scenario is to have a part that can be commented out completely and not have the game fail fatally, even if ripping it out means the game isn't fun for the time-being... helps a lot to prevent coding yourself into a corner). Easier said than done, I know...

It's better to complete something that shows a fraction of your vision than to let your dreams get so big that they overwhelm the entire project. If you've coded in a well documented, generic, and modular way, you can use that tech demo as a spring board later. There's zero shame in building a simple but complete v1.0 and adding to it later.

Absolute best of luck to you! Project management is genuinely the hardest part of software development. You've got great ideas and the skills to realize them, so keep on rocking it! 

I gotta agree with all of this.

Seems good.

Demon powers summary:
Two phases: preparation and assault
During Preparation, has Runes and Minions
During Assault, has Powers and Minions
Minions can be plain summoned during assault, but placed in soul crystals that can be triggered(or broken by the Wardens) during preparation.
Minions aren't like mooks, more like tougher things which take a few hits before going down
Powers are things like Fire Spray, Electric Burst, Flash Step, Slime Mortar, Illusion Duplicate.
Runes are traps planted ahead of time like Barrier, Explosion, Withering, Slickness, and Teleportis.
Runes and Minions can be selected before game start, more powerful Runes cost more and can be used less times.
Minions are similar, but each minion is only useable once.
Powers are randomly assigned each assault phase.
When the demon dies, it loses one of its lives(out of 3)
(Note that when a Warden reaches 0 hit points, unconsciousness(not death) follows and the demon must finish the Warden off before the other Wardens revive him)
Just suggestions.

[Araph]

Nothing really to be said as far as suggestions go from me, but out of curiosity, what engine are you building it in?

Also, I'm sort-of-not-really-passable as far as programming goes; if you need an extra pair of hands on the project, I'm willing to work pro-bono.

Unity 5. And I appreciate the offer, but right now the best thing to help would be suggestions and looking for pitfalls!

Take some time, step back from coding, and create a software development plan.

That's what I'm doing. That's the whole point of that flowchart.

Figure out your project's scope based not on what you think you can do, but on what you have done in the past.

Everything in the list has been done before. Wardens and demons, networking, the level editor; it was all in the game already. I'm redoing it because, now that I know where it didn't work well, I can go back and do it better.

Your game plan currently covers how the game will work, but it doesn't cover how you will work on the game. Create milestones for yourself, and break them down so that you can meet them regularly.

I have milestones. On a small scale, every item in that flowchart is a milestone. Every branch is a larger milestone. Every section is an even larger milestone.

If you burnout or life gets in the way after a certain amount of time into a project, define a scope that can be completed in 80% of that time (this can be tough to estimate, so err on the side of conservative scope).

Last time I spent around eight months before the game was remotely playable. I spent another eight months working on it after that. The game didn't reach v1.0 because I felt the gameplay's ideas weren't solid enough, but it wasn't an idle project that was given up after a month out of boredom.

Absolute best of luck to you! Project management is genuinely the hardest part of software development. You've got great ideas and the skills to realize them, so keep on rocking it! 

Thanks!

Demon powers summary:
Two phases: preparation and assault
During Preparation, has Runes and Minions
During Assault, has Powers and Minions
Minions can be plain summoned during assault, but placed in soul crystals that can be triggered(or broken by the Wardens) during preparation.
Minions aren't like mooks, more like tougher things which take a few hits before going down
Powers are things like Fire Spray, Electric Burst, Flash Step, Slime Mortar, Illusion Duplicate.
Runes are traps planted ahead of time like Barrier, Explosion, Withering, Slickness, and Teleportis.
Runes and Minions can be selected before game start, more powerful Runes cost more and can be used less times.
Minions are similar, but each minion is only useable once.
Powers are randomly assigned each assault phase.
When the demon dies, it loses one of its lives(out of 3)
(Note that when a Warden reaches 0 hit points, unconsciousness(not death) follows and the demon must finish the Warden off before the other Wardens revive him)
Just suggestions.

...I appreciate the suggestions, but that sounds like an entirely different (but very similar) game.

Shapeshifting demons and altars are guaranteed to be in the game. Changing that would alter the core premise of the game, which is not going to happen. Most of what you're saying is pointlessly reshuffling and restating ideas (minions are practically the same as demon forms, just with slightly different mechanics; runes are literally the same as the demon's sigils; losing lives is the same as an altar being destroyed).


If anybody has doubts about my ability to remake Warden, I suggest you take a look at the old game's IndieDB page and watch two videos: Shapeshifting Hellbeasts and You and the level editor demonstration.

[FallacyofUrist]

Hm. Okay. If demon forms are going to be a thing, however, I think you might need a lot of them.

Note: A fourth class for the Wardens might be a good idea. Perhaps a Cleric with melee specialty and healing abilities?

[My Name is Immaterial]

PT read this later.

[Araph]

...I think you might need a lot of them.

I completely agree on that point. Because I was planning on having the demo map have three altars (meaning only three forms could be shown in a single round), I figured three was a good number to start at. That said, I'm not set in stone on the current three (although I have a couple reasons I chose these ones that I'll explain in more detail later on), so if you have any ideas, let me know!

Perhaps a Cleric with melee specialty and healing abilities?

In one of the previous versions (after specific classes were added, but before they were whittled down to the current three) there was a healer class. I decided to take it out because I felt that giving the Wardens a reliable way to heal in between run-ins with the demon would take away too much tension, turning it into even more of an action game rather than a horror game.

Spoiler: Super Rough Warden Concepts (click to show/hide)

It's not much, but I've been tossing around designs for the different classes and these are the current choices (definitely going to make a few tweaks as time goes on, though). I settled on a red and brown color scheme: red because of the whole 'fire magic' thing they've got going on and brown because I want them to be able to blend in fairly well (the original description of the game was 'a deadly game of hide-and-seek with the devil'). I'd like to make hiding a viable strategy, but only if you know which form you're up against. The most prominent example is how the Banshee can't really see you in the shadows if you're staying still, but there would need to be some way to hide from the Mimic and Hound. I think for the Hound, having scent trails only show up after a certain amount of time has passed would create a window of opportunity to hide (as long as the Wardens keep moving), but I'm still not sure about the Mimic. In theory, creating overlapping scent tracks by repeatedly backtracking would also be useful for throwing off the Hound, but that'd be up to the players.

The Vindicator, being the tank who needs to keep the demon's attention, is the only one with shiny metal armor, while the Abjurer has only a few metal buckles and the Seer has no specular highlights whatsoever. The Seer also has more muted reds and browns than the others. Once I get to the point of adding animations into the game, the different classes will have correspondingly different sound effects: the Vindicator will clank when he walks, jumps, and climbs, the Abjurer will have muffled cloth rustling, and the Seer will be practically silent.

[FallacyofUrist]

In dungeons and dragons, mages have to prepare their spells and whatnot instead of infinite casting.

If you want to balance the Cleric and ramp up the horror feel, place limits on the usable magic(limited number of uses).

Do you intend to program light and darkness and whatnot, making torches, lanterns, and fire magic more valuable against the demon? (naturally I think the demon should have dark vision.)

Also... here's one demon idea: The Troll. Despite looking... trollish... the Troll compensates... er I'll just summarize the idea.
Troll like demon, large and strong.
Slow but effective in melee, has shockwaves. (can't jump very high)
Longer attack phase than normal, compensates by slowness.
Much faster and can jump higher in preparation phase. In the preparation phase the Troll is invisible, but can see further and should use that to its advantage.
The troll can choose when to come out of the preparation phase. If the timer is decremented.
To balance that the troll show up as a shimmer in light while in the preparation phase, making it possible to detect.
The troll can place Troll Oil in the preparation phase, which explodes when stepped on and either slows movement or makes the ground slippery.

[GentlemanRaptor]

So this is a thing again. Great!