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[chaoticag]

Since we're talking about deserts, I thought I should mention, there are different sand colors you can use to spice things up. Way back when, my dad was in Spain and was in charge of a display. The sand was actually shipped for the display from the UAE. Since people haven't seen anything like it before, more sand had to be shipped in as people kept taking it.

[finka]

Regarding the dev goals for languages you briefly mentioned in video 1:  it's another one of those silly fantasy tropes that each species has a language.  A better starting point would be to associate a language to each culture. 

Even that's an oversimplification: when a culture influences another (through economic prestige or the like), the influencing culture might spread its language to the other; on the other hand, even if a culture conquers and absorbs a second, the language of the second culture might stick around in its former territory.  Or either of these sorts of situations can yield multilingualism across most of the population (e.g. there's a language used about the home and a language used to interact with the traders / rulers).  Etc.

Overall, I'd think language tracking would be a natural step to include in the culture spread part of worldgen.

[Lord Dullard]

finka: Good points. I do feel that I need to be careful not to get too crazy with language, mainly because making it a necessity for the player to figure out could prove to be really boring/frustrating. OTOH, I've thought about allowing the player to hire/recruit 'translator' NPCs, or just allow them to unlock languages via having their character learn them in some abstract manner (one thing with Cult - I don't think I'll really limit the PC to learning a certain number of skills because of some hardcoded skill limit or allocation system; I'd rather have players with crazily overlearned PCs than players who can't utilize 90% of the game's skills and actions - of course, for most skills, it will be much easier to find somebody else who already knows it and recruit them than to spend long hours honing it yourself).

As it stands, a species can form multiple civilizations, which means multiple languages. I'm nowhere near the point with civs for them to be doing things like integrating with other species or forming multi-species society-structures yet, so that'll have to wait until more basic things are finished, but it's definitely something to think about.

[chaoticag]

Maybe a linguistics skill that can help you identify languages and learn them faster? People can learn languages a lot more faster than we give them credit for. My dad's uncle knew at least seven.

Also, if there is a powerful nation, there would be a chance it's language will become common place. Sir Issac Newton wrote his books in French for a reason, and knowing Latin at the time of the Roman Empire would help, even throughout parts of the medievel age, as someone educated was bound to know it. Also, Pantomiming can get you places.

[Lord Dullard]

Well, this is pretty cool. Thanks to Alex Poysky and his friend Ben, to whom I have just been introduced: http://www.reddit.com/r/IndieGaming/

[Knight of Fools]

It's looking great so far.

One little nit-pick about shadows: Shadows from the clouds shouldn't overlap with tree shadows. And a random idea: If you wanted to give a sense of a 3D world in the region maps, you could have clouds move less than the land as you move the screen around, making them seem closer to the screen. I have no clue how easy that would be, though.


If the player is meant to get emotionally connected with the character, is the game going to be as fatal as other rogue-likes? I know that I wouldn't waste time getting to know a character I knew could die due to bad luck or a poor choice, and I don't know many people that would. In fact, the only character I'd spend time getting to know and develop is one that I would be able to play the entire game through. If I were to turn a corner and die, I'd take comfort know that I could reload the game to a previous save or simply get knocked unconscious.

[Neonivek]

Though I will say that when death is pernament and frequent it covers up the game's flaws very well.

[Lord Dullard]

Yeah, I've been meaning to fix a couple of things with the shadows, I just haven't gotten around to it quite yet. They're still pretty basic, and it takes a while to figure out exactly how to best create dynamic shadows in a 2D all-text world.

As far as characters and death, I think there'll be a few options for players. The game will default to a save/reload system, since I think most people will be choosing that. There will be a hardcore mode available with permadeath, however. And that mode will have two subtypes - 'true' hardmode, wherein if you die you're permanently done for, and then a 'genetic continuation' (don't quote me on that name) that will allow you to play on as your character's offspring, if they have any, by fast-forwarding their life to the point where they're old enough to begin adventuring on their own. The latter will come as I have time to include it, of course, and will also depend on whether people show any interest, but I thought it could be a potentially interesting mechanic if you want to end up seeing how the world changes as history marches on (both independently of your bloodline and because of it).

[Mephansteras]

That might be challenging, but the ability to play as your offspring would be awesome.

[Lord Dullard]

'Challenging' is my middle name.

<sub>Mothers shouldn't name their children while they're still in labor...

Sorry, feel free to *brick* me...</sub>

[nenjin]

As far as characters and death, I think there'll be a few options for players. The game will default to a save/reload system, since I think most people will be choosing that. There will be a hardcore mode available with permadeath, however.

Thank you, for this. It kills me that hardcore games like DF and Dungeon Crawl refuse to add this as a legitimate option. When I started writing up design docs for games I want to make, that was one of the first bullet points I put in. I like hardcore, but I want the option. And I hate juggling save files. And sometimes, you just want to see the next bloody area without having to go into autistic mode just to survive.

I think there are a lot of great hardcore/ironman games out there that many people never bother to fully explore, because they simply don't have the will/energy to die the requisite number of times to get there. It's a real problem to me when games are so demanding by design that half of people who play them never see more than 15% of the content.

[Knight of Fools]

That's exactly how I feel, Nenjin. That's what kills most rogue-likes for me.

Yes, even Dwarf Fortress: Adventure Mode.


Another thing that made me very happy was the lack of limitations to your skills. I almost squealed. The power gamer inside of me actually did.

[Neonivek]

Not to mention that a load and save option actually gives you the ability to prepare for something without needing to start the game all over again. It also allows you to see a new mechanic the game throws at you without you needing a Wiki in order to prevent restarting the game.

For example lets say you are playing and all of a sudden you face your first Archmage for the first time. He just outright kills you. A new player could just restart and now they know that Archmages are sort of a big deal and can experiement to see how to defeat it, instead of just reading the Wiki. Especially since you never know how tough an enemy is until you fight them.

It's a real problem to me when games are so demanding by design that half of people who play them never see more than 15% of the content

Actually it has other effects too. For example with a normal game, mechanics that get you pointlessly killed are considered a bad thing. In roguelikes the pointless death are considered a feature because the game is "Like totally uber tough yo".

It is one of the things I was refering to when I said "constant pointless death hides flaws really well".

In IVAN I once challenged the entire fanbase to beat it fully, as there is an easy out, without any strategy that requires knowledge you need the wiki for (For example Sci-talk, the materials of high grade items, and certain exploits that you actually cannot find out) and they outright said it wasn't possible (Which makes sense for IVAN mind you, it is the most exploit ridden roguelike ever). The best roguelikes get are when everything makes sense and you immediately know what you did wrong within 2-3 tries and playing further gives you strategies that helps smooth over the early game but doesn't become a requirement to get there.

Anyhow Nenjin "Ironman" games (games designed to be ironman) tend to have a problem outside of being ironman. More that they have a problem with just being outright unfair to the players. They don't have the ability to be fun under their own power so they just super ramp the difficulty... Which works VERY WELL! I'd give examples but they would be controvercial. It is what I call the "Lazyman's Difficult Game" Syndrome. Can't make a game good? well make it hard and no one can tell the difference... Afterall it is boring BECAUSE it is so hard.

[nenjin]

Spoiler'd since Cult won't have these issues.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I don't know if I necessarily agree with that characterization of hardcore/ironman games generally. Sure, there are UBERCORE games where that level of difficulty is considered a feature. But for quality games (Project Zomboid, Dungeon Crawl, Liberal Crime Squad, ect....) that are fun under their own steam and have shite loads of content (the ones we care about) their problem is that it's almost an ethical stance to them. They can't put in a save mode. Because it breaks some internal rule for them about how games are supposed to be. Or that their whole concept of what's challenging falls apart if it's not a permanent consequence every time.

I'm not knocking that, we all got those kind of rules and I respect the belief that choices have to matter and permanence is one way to ensure that they do. But that particular belief, that death needs to be permanent, is misguided to me. Because honestly, how does it negatively impact anyone's game not do that? Especially when it's a choice and it's easily reversible. It takes less effort to say "No" to reload and start a new game than it does to file swap.

So. I respect the ethic but it gets taken too far in the name of purity. And I can be a rabid purist, believe me. But if time was spent to make content, that content should be accessible without it having to be a badge of honor. I can't even imagine how many hundreds of hours it would have taken me to reach the Elven Halls or anything that deep in Dungeon Crawl, without save-scumming. I almost don't play Dungeon Crawl to enjoy, I often feel like I play solely for the things I haven't seen, because I've gotten so tired of encountering things that, even with savescumming, are pretty much impassable.

I made a list of mottos as a header to game design docs I make, to remind me about my own version of ethics I'd carry into each project. One of the primary ones is "Games should be challenging, but they should never try to fuck you." Even if I'm designing a game with, say, instant kill events (something I actually dig in the right setting), I'd still put a save feature in there. Because to me, writing something where it randomly kills you and deletes your save isn't challenging, it's just outright fucking the player over and calling it gameplay. If Sierra had pulled that shit, we wouldn't even know the name King's Quest. And yes, I realize that sounds pretty nasty on the DF forums, but, I know plenty of discerning gamers who won't touch DF because of Toady's particular brand of game design. Ironman isn't so odious to me that I can't work around it. But there are days I want to play and then I remember how having to file swap can make an unpleasantly challenging experience bad enough that I don't even want to play. So I don't.

[Neonivek]

I am saying it is a problem not that it is super pervasive.

Also I am thinking of reposting my "Magic as a technology" post. Though I guess people could have saw it but didn't have an oppinion.