Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Detocroix]

-

[Orange Wizard]

Looks interesting, I suppose. PTW.

[Ricky]

As a huge sucker for roguelikes, this looks amazing. PTW. cant wait to see how this develops

[Elephant Parade]

I love the art style—it manages to be gritty without being gloomy, if that makes sense.

Also, I don't think I've seen a roguelike in which the goal is to get to a place; generally, you're trying to grab some sort of item. Happy to see a game try something new!

Definitely going to follow the game's development.

Trailer of sorts: https://www.youtube.com/embed/vyK3ko3F8X4 (if I can embed this, let me know!)

SMF (this forum's version of it, at least) doesn't support embedded video, I'm afraid.

[Elephant Parade]

There's a typo in the description of 'Krinkrin the Trader', by the way. Its, not it's.

Also, you should probably hyphenate "scar decorated". You might want to hire a proofreader, if it isn't too expensive.

[zaimoni]

Right, everything except permadeath in the main game (Diurnal Delve is the roguelike bundled with the main game).  But as that is the MacGuffin, it is only barely roguelite.

[nenjin]

I'm not going to weigh in on classifying what this is; that seems like a waste of effort.

I like the pixel art and the fact you animated this stuff. So many 2d tile-based games like this just skip on animation because it's easier and faster.

I'll be keeping an eye on this.

[Detocroix]

There's a typo in the description of 'Krinkrin the Trader', by the way. Its, not it's.

Also, you should probably hyphenate "scar decorated". You might want to hire a proofreader, if it isn't too expensive.

Yeah, we'll definitely get stuff proofread at some point (closer to release), but at current stage, with so many things changed here and there and more stuff added constantly, it would be a bit too expensive Sorry about that, I do try to re-read stuff I write to spot errors etc, but they still bleed though!

[Detocroix]

Right, everything except permadeath in the main game (Diurnal Delve is the roguelike bundled with the main game).  But as that is the MacGuffin, it is only barely roguelite.

If any feature that carries over to multiple plays switches a roguelike (like Rogue) to a roguelite (a knockoff), then by that definition even Nethack isn't safe!

But yeah, it is not a pure roguelike because its not ASCII/ANSI, it has graphical features that don't exist in roguelikes games, it has a bigger overarching metagame element (like Elona, Dungeonmans etc), health is to be represented more indepth than just a value, and so forth. Our core is traditional, at least as far as Roguetemple and -basin definitions go, but I agree it is growing further from there and do not respect all the core values of the Rogue. Then again, majority of Roguelikes expand from Rogue

The access to the phantom Eden will be limited, it's not like Diablo where you always have bunch of one shot town portal scrolls, the portals will be rare and they stay where you place one (for that run obviously, the dungeon is going to be much alike ADOM with hand build content and generated mixed in).

Do tell me, please, what or why do you think it destroys the whole roguelike concept? I do want Phantom Eden to be truly a roguelike, something that cherishes the genre instead of mocks it.

[forsaken1111]

Looks nice! PTW

[Tawa]

Looks pretty neat. Will have to keep my eye on this.

The eponymous "phantom eden" feature sounds like a really good idea. My biggest beef with traditional roguelikes is how a couple of bad rolls can completely wreck your latest and most successful bid for the Amulet of Yendor or what-have-you and forcing you to start back from square 1. This mechanic sounds like an excellent way to ensure that death is not always equivalent to wasted time.

[zaimoni]

Right, everything except permadeath in the main game (Diurnal Delve is the roguelike bundled with the main game).  But as that is the MacGuffin, it is only barely roguelite.

If any feature that carries over to multiple plays switches a roguelike (like Rogue) to a roguelite (a knockoff), then by that definition even Nethack isn't safe!

Yes, Nethack had to put in some design work to make it work.  The inventory of the deceased found on the graveyard levels implemented via bones files, is not only not guaranteed-accessible with sufficient gameplay (let alone at game restart!), it is both trashed and has a proven-strong guardian.

But yeah, it is not a pure roguelike because its not ASCII/ANSI, it has graphical features that don't exist in roguelikes games, it has a bigger overarching metagame element (like Elona, Dungeonmans etc), health is to be represented more indepth than just a value, and so forth. Our core is traditional, at least as far as Roguetemple and -basin definitions go, but I agree it is growing further from there and do not respect all the core values of the Rogue. Then again, majority of Roguelikes expand from Rogue

Of which only the metagame element is the flinch point.  And it's advertised as the central game mechanic (the game win condition is based on it).

The access to the phantom Eden will be limited, it's not like Diablo where you always have bunch of one shot town portal scrolls, the portals will be rare and they stay where you place one (for that run obviously, the dungeon is going to be much alike ADOM with hand build content and generated mixed in).

That was not clear in this thread.  [I have gone ahead and rechecked the main sites linked; it is strictly implied on the Steam advertisement.]

Thus, if there was an option to start a completely new game (ground zero, reset the progress in enhancing Phantom Eden), then the absence of permadeath would not compromise the roguelike play experience; that would be playing a series of squads of size one.  Reconciling this with Pay To Win is hard to visualize.

[That's what turned me off to Frontline Tactics on Steam; when I wanted to reset the game progress completely on this X-COM-like because I had finished learning the game mechanics and wanted to switch to ironman (delete each soldier on first fatality), there was no such in-game option.  I only noticed that the denial of this option was a direct consequence of the Pay To Win structure of the game.]

[SharpKris]

ptw can we get hairballs occasionally as catfolk? just to throw at monsters for no real effect

[Orange Wizard]

~~~

It doesn't precisely match Rogue, so it can't be a roguelike!

[Elephant Parade]

~~~

It doesn't precisely match Rogue, so it can't be a roguelike!

To be fair, Phantom Eden does seem to eschew some traditional roguelike aspects; significant carryover between games (emphasis on significant; yes, many roguelikes have ghosts, but that's very different from Phantom Eden's, uh, Phantom Eden) is the big Thing That Makes This Game Arguably Not A Roguelike, and the lack of ASCII also contributes.

Still, I'd say that Phantom Eden is pretty much a roguelike. It doesn't perfectly match every aspect of a traditional roguelike... but by that logic, you could say "Well, any game with pre-generated levels isn't a roguelike, since roguelikes are supposed to have randomly-generated levels!", and that would remove pretty much every major roguelike from the category.

It's a bit early to judge, but as a Person Who Has Played Loads of Roguelikes^TM, I'm willing to declare Phantom Eden "probably a roguelike", since it definitely isn't a roguelite. I guess we could bust out "roguelike-like", but even that seems a bit too far; maybe we should just cut off half of "like", making it a "roguelike-li"? Except that that sounds dumb.


Detocroix: Have you considered adding some kind of "grid overlay" button? Judging distance might be a bit of an issue, otherwise, since the boundaries between tiles aren't clear.