TIGSource Forums

LOG

000 28/06/10 - Case decision, Topic creation, Idea conceptualization
001 04/07/10 - Name change: Caravan->Desert Freaks, work officially begins

What a wonderful idea. Will each caravan member have special abilities? Also, it'd be great if you could chat with them. It'd add a lot of personality.

A desert caravan roguelike in the post-apocalyptic would be awesome.

Good luck with this one ,JMickle  :) :handthumbsupR:

I had my eye on this one as well.  Looking forward to how your game turns out!

Thanks guys!

I'm really enjoying designing this game. I'm gonna be out of own til friday, which is good because I get to design it all on paper, without bogging down in code until it's all done.

It's also an idea I've wanted to make for a very very long time, primarily inspired by Mount&Blade (although it would be hard to detect the influence). Any ideas from everyone would be very much appreciated! Get yourself a name in the credits :)

At the moment I'm seeing it as a roguelike rpg with a party of 5, with randomly generated levels. The characters in the party will have some simple stats, hp attack defence and speed, and battles will be vastly dice-based, much like >Fighting Fantasy. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_Fantasy) Each character will also have a special trait, which can be good or bad. Every time you level up you gain a small amount of health, and get a trait/stat reroll. I didn't want grinding to be something much too useful, and I think this is a good way to counter it. So it means you can play very quickly, or you can grind to gain a party to suit you, but still not be much more powerful than someone who doesn't.

I'm slightly sorry about not putting in water/food and general desert survival as a main mechanic of the game, so I am trying to think of ways to put it in and linking it up with the rest of the mechanics. Still early days.

I'm thinking I will put in a story, but I'm not too sure about it yet, or what it will be. Gotta think about that.

Inanimate - That's a brilliant idea, and I'm most likely going to put it in :D Yes, as i said there are going to be special unique traits. I am also going to make randomly generated stories for all the characters, so there's something nice to read about everyone. Also I'll try to get it linked to the stats and items they spawn with, to give much more personality.

Melly, belbeeno - As soon as I saw the cart I knew it was the one for me :) I instantly stopped looking and made the topic.

Saker - Thanks :)

JMickle, perhaps each character has a randomly chosen "personality" from a set that dictates what they say when you talk to them? For instance, when they level up with the personality "Brave" they say "I feel like I can protect you even better now!", but with the personality "Nihilist" they say "No matter how strong I get, it's probably futile."

My plan was already something along those lines. Great minds, eh?  ;)

(http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/2575/robitsmallest.png)(http://i.somethingawful.com/forumsystem/emoticons/emot-respek.gif) (http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/661a91ca20da15aa1a907a4b3c2be05a.png)

The vision I had for the cover was a trading game, where you go from town to town setting up shop and sell your wares.  You would accumulate wares from exploring dungeons (lawful alignment), defending against robbers and collecting their equipment (alignment independent) or enslaving the innocent (evil alignment).  Your alignment determines the sort of crowd you attract who would have personality as mentioned by Inanimate (good guys may not be capable fighters but good traders, bad guys may be good fighters but kleptomaniacs).

The goal of the game would be to accumulate enough traders and mercs following you and enough money to build a settlement.  If your followers decide to settle, they build shops if they are traders or go on quests if they're mercs.  World map would be top down, and in town/dungeon would be side-scroller, like in Zelda 2.

Sort of an ambitious idea, but I couldn't move away from it.  Ultimately that's why I decided not to do it; if I started trying to birth this idea would probably never end.   :shrug2:

I'm back off holiday and I'm gonna get straight into spriting, mockups will come soon.

This sounds freakin' awesome. It would be really cool if you could work survival mechanics in there, too. Not enough survival mechanics in post-apocalyptic settings, if you ask me.

(though this does sound sweet even without them)

If this works out well I could do a whole series of them, with all different settings. Which would be nice (Y)

Planned character classes (subject to change):
>Matador
>Body Guard
>Nun
>Child
>Geek
>Dentist

 :monoclepop: Oh my, that must be the best character classes I've ever heard about in a video game! Would be cool if you could choose a mix of two of them, I'd be Matador Dentist every day!

Perhaps the previously discussed "personalities" could be integrated into the class names?

"Cowardly Matador", "Brave Dentist", "Melancholic Geek", "Irascible Nun", "Awkward Body Guard", "Nihilist Child" are examples.

It would just go "(Personality Adjective) (Class Name)"

That's an idea. I was considering doing dual classes after Canute's comment, but personality could be the extra boost I was looking for to vastly increase the variety of characters.

i.e
>Matador
>Body Guard
>Nun
>Child
>Geek
>Dentist = 6 classes

>Matador
>Body Guard
>Nun
>Child
>Geek
>Dentist
plus
>Precarious
>Irritating
>Exciting
>Interesting
>Ferocious
>Resourceful = 36 classes.

I can just go to 10 types of class and personality and get 100 different outcomes.

Will your party members be AI based or be controlled, or just be passive?

My basic idea is that you control a party of up to five in a (probably) procedurally or randomly generated "dungeon" (just terminology) set in the desert. You fight and hopefully the vicious monsters of the desert in turn-based battles, where you yourself control the whole party. The main character, the one you start off with, has about twice as much health as his party members, and is the only one needed to be defeated to lose the game. Because of the way I worked out the battle system I don't think I could make the other party members AI controlled. The most control they have over themselves is in one of the special traits "Passive", meaning they won't attack. Nuns start out with this trait, but they are still a valuable member of the party. (no they don't heal party members, where's the realism in that :P)

Anyway as far as working on the ACTUAL game I have been busy with music commissions so I'll maybe have something done only by tomorrow or if I'm lucky by the end of today.

Excellent, there aren't enough rogue-likes with full control over the party.

How are you going to make personalities affect characters, then? Stat bonuses?

Something like that. I'll look for something more interesting though, like something to do with survivability or something. We'll see.

name change: desert freaks

work has officially begun.

Nice new name, can't wait to see the gameplay.

Unfortunately, gameplay will come last. BUT I (think) I am close to finishing up the databases for items/characters, and just need to do the one for monsters, then I'll begin level generation.

Character generation is completely complete! Here are a few examples:

Gulo the Feisty Athlete
Tuppounker the Weak Matador
Idrew the Passive Nun
Cheno the Weak Geek
Quogigo the Bloodthirsty Chef

I could pull up the stats that these characters have, based on their personality and class, but I just haven't created an output for them yet. It's all there behind the scenes though, trust me :)

I love the names, how do you generate those? Is there a list that it randomly chooses from?

I've got 2 lists of 40 words it picks randomly from, all with different amounts of syllables to make it less obvious. Only slightly less, though.

I did put in a few reference ones as well, like in the first list there is the word Spel, and in the second there is the word unker :P
I've put is Spelunker, Quote, Ip and Lemeza this way.

And I'm guessing the the adjectives buff or nerf certain attributes?  I love 'bloodthirsty chef'

Yeah, the adjective is a trait that can either change stats or give a special (good or bad) ability, and the occupation changes stats a lot.

The classes are purposefully not balanced, because I want the player to have to take on weak characters at times for strength in numbers, without farming for the best team.

I like this idea, and the purposeful mis-balancing. I really can't wait to see how it affects the overall picture and stuff.

This is probably one of my favorite games in the competition right now! Keep up the great work.

 :-* This sounds awesome.

Thanks guys! It's really encouraging to hear that :) I SHALL WORK TEN TIMES HARDER JUST FOR YOU GUYS!

Work ELEVEN times harder--I like it too!  ;)

I remember seeing this case art and considering it for a brief moment. The possibilities seemed quite intriguing. I've wanted to do a Caravan based trade game for awhile.. or at least PLAY one.  A Caravan based rogue-like... now that is pretty damn awesome for your idea.

(http://imgur.com/trHHw.png)
wip character sprite. Using the C64 palette, just for fun.

Ooh! This game is going to be pretty.

haha don't get your hopes up too much :) i'm no artist

I would play it just for the music to be honest, haha.

Out of all the competition entries this is the one I'm most looking forward to. Let's hope it goes well!

You can always use Assemblee art assets when you're in a pinch.

hopefully i'll be alright.

(http://imgur.com/SWHSL.png)

Delicious gradiation... :addicted:

Yeah right, 'I'm no artist'. That's great looking!

oh you guys  :-[

I agree, it looks pretty nice for someone that says he's got no art ability. It's obviously no Arne/Lurk, but who is? As long as the graphics are readable, I'm fine with it.

ok there's pretty much no way i'm gonna have this done by the deadline. I'm gonna carry on working on it because I love the idea and I do want to finish it, but I'm going away next week and coming back with about 4 days before the end of the month.

This game WILL be done, just not for this competition.

Graphics look very Pokemanly, which is a good thing.  Also, I'm always in for some good roguelike action. Throw in an unusual setting and mechanics and I'm excited.  ;)

I like the art a lot, although the person's feet look a little funny, since their soles are not outlined in black like everything else.

Based on what I've read, I'm looking forward to this.  Do you think you will have some sort of build before the deadline?