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[Slayerhero90]

I think the most difficult part beyond that, AC, would be the supremely sophisticated Radiant AI you would need. The monarchs, Jack and his lackeys, and the denizens would all need very good programming, and likely they would need to have the ability to randomize and change their plans with every session. On top of that, these plans would have to be visualized so that Prospit dreamers could catch glimpses of them through the clouds. Since there is no way to predict what the players will do, clouds and horroterror hints would likely involve glimpses of ways to and locations to earn more power, or hints as to what the bad guys are scheming.

Then, of course, there's the matter of Exiles... and what the game will do if you Scratch it...

Basically, SBURB is a bit too advanced to be created at this time.

[alway]

I think the most difficult part beyond that, AC, would be the supremely sophisticated Radiant AI you would need. The monarchs, Jack and his lackeys, and the denizens would all need very good programming, and likely they would need to have the ability to randomize and change their plans with every session. On top of that, these plans would have to be visualized so that Prospit dreamers could catch glimpses of them through the clouds. Since there is no way to predict what the players will do, clouds and horroterror hints would likely involve glimpses of ways to and locations to earn more power, or hints as to what the bad guys are scheming.

Then, of course, there's the matter of Exiles... and what the game will do if you Scratch it...

Basically, SBURB is a bit too advanced to be created at this time.

Quite the contrary; with the exception of player-player time shenanigans, it's perfectly doable; including information 'from the future.' It's actually relatively easy to steer players somewhere without them noticing they are being steered. Particularly because, if you remember from MSPA itself, they are being steered pretty strongly. Human psychology is also much more predictable than we allow ourselves to believe.

Even something as simple as where lights are placed can lead a large majority of players through a linear path in an otherwise free map layout. There's also the ability to have branching pathways, be they literal pathways or figurative pathways, which lead to the same place through different routes; something which is seen in MSPA with the 'predestination' time shenanigans.

[armeggedonCounselor]

I think the most difficult part beyond that, AC, would be the supremely sophisticated Radiant AI you would need. The monarchs, Jack and his lackeys, and the denizens would all need very good programming, and likely they would need to have the ability to randomize and change their plans with every session. On top of that, these plans would have to be visualized so that Prospit dreamers could catch glimpses of them through the clouds. Since there is no way to predict what the players will do, clouds and horroterror hints would likely involve glimpses of ways to and locations to earn more power, or hints as to what the bad guys are scheming.

Then, of course, there's the matter of Exiles... and what the game will do if you Scratch it...

Basically, SBURB is a bit too advanced to be created at this time.

Quite the contrary; with the exception of player-player time shenanigans, it's perfectly doable; including information 'from the future.' It's actually relatively easy to steer players somewhere without them noticing they are being steered. Particularly because, if you remember from MSPA itself, they are being steered pretty strongly. Human psychology is also much more predictable than we allow ourselves to believe.

Indeed. The more I think about it, the more I realize that SBURB would be a very very linear game. It would give the illusion of free-choice, but making the wrong choice would lead to a doomed timeline.

Hm. Random lightbulb: For some time travel shenanigans, it might be the case that another player doesn't actually get the correct choice until the time player goes back to fix the doomed timeline, possibly because the time player brings something with him that didn't exist yet in the alpha timeline. Maybe not all of them, but certainly some of them. Most, if not all, of the time travel things would have to be preordained by the controller program. I think that's the only way to solve the time shenanigans problem. Of course, that puts a stronger disconnect between Player and Character, which is slightly problematic. Of course, we'd also want to give the players the ability to go off the rails, if they so chose. It would just never actually end in victory.

I think the final iteration of this game would have to be capable of, with proper set-up, playing out scenarios exactly as they happened in Homestuck. With Sessions that are linked inextricably, and players escaping from the Scratch. Now that would be difficult to program contingencies for....

[alway]

I think the final iteration of this game would have to be capable of, with proper set-up, playing out scenarios exactly as they happened in Homestuck. With Sessions that are linked inextricably, and players escaping from the Scratch. Now that would be difficult to program contingencies for....

No, that would be exactly like the rest of the game. The 'sessions' are only thought of as separate because that's how Hussie describes them. From a programmer's point of view, leaving a 'session' is no different from being in one, but with some alterations to the setting and character ruleset. Essentially 'leaving the session' doesn't mean anything more than advancing beyond a certain point in a certain direction.

Nor does the game have to be linear. When it comes to games, soft nudges applied liberally are just as powerful, if not moreso, than a big shove. A robust enough procedural content generation should be able to deal with things which come up.

[armeggedonCounselor]

I think the final iteration of this game would have to be capable of, with proper set-up, playing out scenarios exactly as they happened in Homestuck. With Sessions that are linked inextricably, and players escaping from the Scratch. Now that would be difficult to program contingencies for....

No, that would be exactly like the rest of the game. The 'sessions' are only thought of as separate because that's how Hussie describes them. From a programmer's point of view, leaving a 'session' is no different from being in one, but with some alterations to the setting and character ruleset. Essentially 'leaving the session' doesn't mean anything more than advancing beyond a certain point in a certain direction.

Nor does the game have to be linear. When it comes to games, soft nudges applied liberally are just as powerful, if not moreso, than a big shove. A robust enough procedural content generation should be able to deal with things which come up.

I'd disagree, but possibly only by definition. A proper SBURB game would have only one "correct" outcome. The game being adaptable enough to deal with things coming up would be nice, but it would ultimately undermine the SBURBness of the game. More properly, the game should give the illusion that there is free choice, but only one or maybe two choices actually lead to "victory." It would definitely be a game more for serious roleplayers than serious gamers. And since only 1 in 10 games would complete with an iteration of Bilious Slick being completed, it would definitely be a game you play more for the fun of roleplaying than the thrill of victory.

[Derekristow]

Man, this conversation has great timing.


EDIT: Forgot the download.
Bay 12 exclusive!

I am stupidly tired right now, so I'll let the images do most of the explaining.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The timeline allows you to move through the session, watching planets change/get blown up/what have you.  It's fairly rough around the edges at the moment, but there's still a lot you can do with it.


Each planet, and the session as a whole, has a description field in its XML file that you can use to convey information on the state of what you are currently focused on.


Skaia, when clicked, will not only do the normal zoom-in thing, it will also display the current state of the battlefield.  TimelineEvents with the "PlayerEntry" field set to true will change the file Skaia uses, rather than the file the planet the event is operating on uses.

The most important feature of this program is the ability to make your own session, and configure everything to your liking.  Almost everything is defined using XML, meaning you can modify pretty much everything but the spacing between various things.  Literally no images (excluding fonts) have been precompiled through XNA, meaning they are all available to be edited.  The only thing I feel the need to note about that is that most images probably won't respond well to having their sizes changed.

System Requirements: XNA 3.1 (If you have played Bastion on your computer, it should work out of the box, otherwise install this.)

I haven't really drawn up any kind of documentation, so I'd appreciate anyone who happens to try this out PMing me with any questions.  I'd like messages about bugs too, if you happen to find any.

I also wasn't entirely sure whether or not this deserved its own thread, so I can move it if that would be best.

[Darvi]

That's neat. Like, really neat.

Except for the part where it doesn't work for me. Maybe it's the 64bit OS?

Right, didn't have XML installed.

Also, you got Sawtooth and Squarewave mixed up.

[Derekristow]

Also, you got Sawtooth and Squarewave mixed up.

I never said it was accurate  .  Fixed for whenever I update it next.

[freeformschooler]

Wow that's amazing. It's got some bugs (when I'm in the B1 session, select Wind and Shade and then move the timeline to the purple part it crashes... I don't seem to have a crash log file anywhere either though. Run Win7 x64), but otherwise rad.

[Derekristow]

Wow that's amazing. It's got some bugs (when I'm in the B1 session, select Wind and Shade and then move the timeline to the purple part it crashes... I don't seem to have a crash log file anywhere either though. Run Win7 x64), but otherwise rad.

Thanks!  Fixed the bug, I'll update it now since that's a pretty bad one.  Also, I haven't figured out creating a crash log yet, so there won't be any of those, for now at least.

[Aqizzar]

Wow that's amazing. It's got some bugs (when I'm in the B1 session, select Wind and Shade and then move the timeline to the purple part it crashes... I don't seem to have a crash log file anywhere either though. Run Win7 x64), but otherwise rad.

Thanks!  Fixed the bug, I'll update it now since that's a pretty bad one.  Also, I haven't figured out creating a crash log yet, so there won't be any of those, for now at least.

I was just thinking how awesome it would be to make an interactive Sburb encyclopedia, so this is fantastic (except for not actually working for me).  Congratulations, you've done more to make a real Homestuck fangame than literally the entire rest of the Internet combined.

[freeformschooler]

Wow that's amazing. It's got some bugs (when I'm in the B1 session, select Wind and Shade and then move the timeline to the purple part it crashes... I don't seem to have a crash log file anywhere either though. Run Win7 x64), but otherwise rad.

Thanks!  Fixed the bug, I'll update it now since that's a pretty bad one.  Also, I haven't figured out creating a crash log yet, so there won't be any of those, for now at least.

I was just thinking how awesome it would be to make an interactive Sburb encyclopedia, so this is fantastic (except for not actually working for me).  Congratulations, you've done more to make a real Homestuck fangame than literally the entire rest of the Internet combined.

Dave: Accelerate doesn't count?

[Aqizzar]

A) That was two years ago, and that incredibly promising proof of concept evolved into exactly nothing.

B) I didn't say nobody else ever made anything, now did I?

Yes, I am bitter that we're more than halfway into 2012 and NepetaQuest2011 ("Where makin this hapen!") never materialized.

[freeformschooler]

Yeah, the problem with Homestuck-based projects is SBURB (and even just the Homestuck webcomic) is incredibly vast, so you get a lot of project leads who dream way way too big. Of course, that happens in any programming community.

Heck, even most of my Homestuck projects fizzle out over time.

[Dermonster]

One has to wonder, when Homestuck finally finishes and there isn't any new 'canon' to be revealed, will fan projects experience a renaissance, keep about the same excepting for the typical decline following a finished piece of work, or just kinda sputter out completely.