next »

[loubeasley]

Foreword

Tacklebox is a project I have been working on for a couple of years off and on. The game has been through many iterations, including a complete rewrite after a hard lesson was learned about the importance of backups and how some people have sticky fingers. The original (and most complete) prototype of the game is browser-based and uses Angular 1.x for the UI and JavaScript/Typescript for the core engine.

I hope I can share with you the fragmented ideas rolling around in my head and find some sort of guidance in writing these developments down and receiving feedback.



Idea

The general idea of the game is based around being an angler. Like other incremental games, the entire progression of the game is built on the main resource you are accumulating, which is fish. In order to accumulate more and more fish, you (the angler) will find better rods, bait, lures, and other equipment. Trades can be made with NPCs, whether it be for fish, better bait, or another resource entirely. All the traditional RPG elements will be at your disposal. You will unravel the threads of the world around you in hopes of finding the path to the next pile of fish. Somewhere along the way you will find yourself in the thick of a plot, perhaps causing your original fish-related motivations to blossom into something more profound.



Story (Rough Draft/Ideas)

Fish! Is that all you care about? In the throes of your numbing task to gather all the fish in existence, you forgot what this was all about. You look at the rod you are holding. It belonged to your father; the captain of the most prized fishing vessel and crew in the ranks of the Bibalayan Commonwealth. He gave you this rod the last day you ever saw him. He sailed out into the great blue one last time for some grandiose mission that couldn't possibly be grasped at the time given your age. The more callous folk jested that he abandoned you. They said he 'went out for a pack of fish-sticks' and never intended to come back. You know better than that, yet however important it seemed back then, you never learned the intent of the mission.

The whole world changed around you after a time. The Commonwealth is not the shining beacon of prosperity it once was. The infinitely wise and kind Baron Toad stepped down from his place of power for no obvious reason. He stays shacked up in a quaint little pagoda on the shore, puffing his pipe and ignoring his people. In Baron Toad's absence, the odious Bullfrog King slithered and writhed his way into power. His will, a thick black miasma, seeped out and strangled the land. He ripped and twisted the kingdom into a thrall whose bidding was to line his pockets, fill his belly, and fuel his perversions. You know this all too well considering the copious amounts of fish you pay in 'homage' every week. Is this really a purpose befitting the legacy that is your father's rod? What is a common angler to do?



Generalized Progression

As you toil away fishing I want the world to start to unlock and come alive. You take on a few tasks and meet some NPCs, etc. Get a feel for everything. It becomes obvious that the aforementioned Bullfrog King is a problem. By some twist of fate you manage to usurp him and the kingdom becomes an asset. This will add to your bag of tricks to accumulate fish and other resources. After some gameplay and more story elements, it will become apparent you need to find your father. To do this you must go out to sea. The kingdom will aid you in this task. You will continue to micromanage the kingdom to construct your ship and gather the necessary supplies to survive. The resource accumulation and adventure game elements will come together here due to the fact you will need to go out on your own to wrangle up special items that building a ship requires. Once the ship is built and you decide what to take, the sea will effectively be the end game. Effective planning will ensure you make it to the end where I plan to have some interesting things happen to nicely wrap up the loose ends and have all your efforts come to fruition.














Don't mess with Glovey. He's evil.



Little preview of the story mode gameplay:
http://i.imgur.com/fhClFTR.mp4
Note: there is a side UI that shows resources, I've just left it out for a smaller image.

That's all I can think of to say now. I will definitely flesh this out more later.

Another note: Some ascii art is borrowed or heavily modified from other authors. They will be credited.

[standardcombo]

I really like the premise and concept, except the presence of humanoids. If the kings are Frogs, perhaps all characters are animals, even you. Like an ancient turtle wizard, villainous snake, etc.

About the ascii art. I like it. One thing I personally stay away from is use of alphanumericals. The reason for this is because the brain is so hard wired to recognize language symbols that it overshadows and breaks the form you are trying to convey. I still use them sometimes, when it works it works, but lots of times it doesn't. Also, you could try using ` for example at the bottom of the 5th fishing rod instead of '.


 __________________\\,______________________________________________________
/__/+=======+\_____-{}+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+{}+=+=+=+=+=+{}+=+=+=+=+=+{}+=+=+=+=+=+{}
\|             ||  //`
              //--\
          [==|   |o)
              `---/

[loubeasley]

I have considered that. I think the main reason I haven't gotten rid of the humanoids is my attachment to those two ascii drawings above (the fishmonger and the old man). They are my favorites. I will think more on this.

I agree with your thoughts on using alphanumeric characters. I usually try not to use them. Some of this art is older. Thank you for your input!

What do you think about humanoid animals?

Code:

   
   _     _
  (o\---/o)
   ( . . )
 __( (T) )__
(_ )`- -`( _)
/_/   |   \_\
\_)___|___(_/
  \   _   /
  _)--|--(_
 (___,'.___)


    _   _
   (\)-(/)
  /._____.\
 _\_______/_
(_()' : '()_)
/_/   :   \_\
\_\___'___/_/
 (_)  _  (_)
   )--|--(
  _|__|__|_
 (___,'.___)


    _   _       
   (\)-(/)    ,^.
  /._____.\   |||
 _\_______/_  |||
(_()' : '()_) ===
/_/   :   (/'-(_) 
\_\___'___|`--'o
 (_)  _  |  
   )--|--(
  _|__|__|_
 (___,'.___)

    _____ 
   |_____|
  /(^)-(^)\
  /._____.\
  \_______/
 / )' |+'( \
(-<._ |+  \->
 '-(_)|+__|_|
   |  _  |(_)
   )--|--(
  _|__|__|_
 (___,'.___)

    _____ 
   |_____|
  /(^)-(^)\
  /._____.\
  \_______/
 / )' | '( \
(-<., | .,>-)
 '-/__|__\-'
   |  _  |   
   )--|--(
  _|__|__|_
 (___,'.___)

    
   ()___()
   < O-O >
    |___|  
  __{o_o}__
 / )' | '( \
(-<., | .,>-)
 '-/__|__\-'
   |  _  |   
   )--|--(
  _|__|__|_
 (___,'.___)

       _     _
      (o\---/o)
       ( . . )
       ( (T) )
    .=-<`- -`>-=.
   /.'`(`-+-')'`.\
 _/`.__/  :  \__.'\_
( `._/\`. : .'/\_.' )
 >-(_) \ `:' / (_)-<
 | |  / \___/ \  | |
 )^( | .' : `. | )^(
|  / |`-._:_.-'| \  |   
"-"  | :  |  : |  "-" 
     | : / \ : |
     \ --) (-- /
     |: /   \ :|
     |: |   | :|
     |==|   |==|
    /v-'(   )`-v\
   // .-'   '-. \\
   `-'         `-'

[standardcombo]

I like how you do the clothes. Before get attached to specific art pieces, have you considered the exact grid size of the game, and the different font sizes you'll need for various screen sizes? Aspect Ratios can also range from 5:4 to 16:9

[loubeasley]

I have wondered about tackling that beast. As you can see the views I create are usually pretty large. None of my scenes are bigger than a 123x52 grid of characters. Currently I'm using Courier New at 8x16 pixels. I peeked at your post about this topic and it was a bit mind boggling to be honest. I've also wondered if that's going to be a problem if I don't make every scene exactly the same size due to the fact that I would have empty space if a level is smaller than the maximum scene size.  

I believe this game will definitely need to be played on a computer monitor due to the way I want to lay things out. In addition to the 123x52 character grid there needs to be space for a side panel and a top panel (rough layout below). I guess the thing to do here is design my layout after figuring out the details of font sizes and varying aspect ratios. I'm assuming the total width and height in characters * the width and height of the font need to match a ratio that can be adapted to each aspect ratio by changing to the appropriate font size?

http://i.imgur.com/DQUuFVy.png?1
sketch using your 7x12 font

[JobLeonard]

Since your game is web-based, you might want to check out ROT.js or Unicodetiles.js; they got some nifty helper functions for ASCII in the browser, and can render to canvas for better performance:

http://ondras.github.io/rot.js/manual/#intro

http://tapiov.net/unicodetiles.js/

[loubeasley]

I have played with both extensively! They are very well made. I'm using ROT.js to generate some mines for a little rogue-like side quest.

I'm actually experimenting with moving the game away from the web. So far I've tried out Java and Unity C#. Tonight, I spent a little time making an Ascii Renderer with C++ and SFML. I'm kind of digging C++. I don't understand it very well yet, but SFML allowed me to have my spritesheet of characters held in the GPU and I'm using the ascii character codes to calculate the appropriate position on the character map and then draw it in the appropriate position on the screen. I was able to add a shader to color the foreground and background. Really cool!

[JobLeonard]

You can do all of that on the web too, with WebGL:

http://blog.tojicode.com/2012/07/sprite-tile-maps-on-gpu.html

http://blog.tojicode.com/2012/08/more-gpu-tile-map-demos-zelda.html

Just saying 

[loubeasley]

Yeah I did notice the graphics API with Java and C++/SFML are almost identical to working with html 5 canvas and WebGL. I'm just having some fun trying new things. Thanks for the links, they are very informative!

[JobLeonard]

Ah right, have fun exploring!

I keep forgetting that it's perfectly possible these days to start with HTML5 en WebGL and then move to C++/SFML. Up until few years ago the transition was by almost by definition from the other side!

[loubeasley]

Don't get me wrong, my mind is totally boggled right now. I don't know much about memory allocation, pointers, references, etc. Everything is working so far but lord knows I've probably committed some c++ atrocity. Guess I better do some reading!

[JobLeonard]

My advice is to skip anything that isn't a tutorial for C++0x and C++14 (and enable support for that in your compiler flags).

The reason is that a lot of old tutorial teach you bad practices, whereas tutorials for those explain how to do it better now.

EDIT: You might as well go directly to Bjarne Stroustrup's A Tour of C++, the drafts of which are freely available online. It's a bit dry, but you can avoid learning a lot of "bad" practices that you later need to unlearn if you start here.

[jasontomlee]

Love these ASCII type of games    Keep it up 

[loubeasley]

My advice is to skip anything that isn't a tutorial for C++0x and C++14 (and enable support for that in your compiler flags).

The reason is that a lot of old tutorial teach you bad practices, whereas tutorials for those explain how to do it better now.

EDIT: You might as well go directly to Bjarne Stroustrup's A Tour of C++, the drafts of which are freely available online. It's a bit dry, but you can avoid learning a lot of "bad" practices that you later need to unlearn if you start here.

I will definitely be reading through this, thanks a lot!

Love these ASCII type of games    Keep it up 

  I'll keep at it!