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[JasonPickering]

hey guys, I know we already have some stuff posted about rpg design including the one button one thats way below, but i need some help.

So I am trying to make a super simple RPG. I am basically trying to breakdown an rpg into its main components of fighting monsters to get stronger and achieve a goal. I was using the card game Munchkin (http://www.worldofmunchkin.com/game/)as my origin basis. so here was my original plan:

the player is in a hallway and basically wants to move to the end to fight the boss.


he has the standard RPG stuff.
- health points
- attack power
- and two spells a heal and a fire.

he battles the enemies they do not move to attack. simply stand in his way. any attack on them cause them to attack back. the player can pay money to upgrade his life, attack, and spells and also to heal at an Inn. but each time he does the price goes up. if he dies he returns to the inn. the inn price is reset as is the dungeon, meaning he will need to defeat the line of guys all over again. he will however keep any upgrades but lose all his cash.

the monsters are selected from a "deck the player builds before hand. 5 monsters, 1 boss, and then 5 extra loot/trap cards. after a boss is defeated the game is won and a code is output. so you can give it to your friends. if they input the code (ex. 000-00000-00000) they will play against the same "deck" but it will of course be shuffled differently maybe they will get through it with only 1 death where as you had 4.

other examples
blacksmith: 20 dollar upgrade to attack power.



stats: attack, life max, and gold.


so my questions to you are.
1. do you guys see any ways I could simplify this game as it is or do you think its already simple enough.
2. do I need a heal spell or is being able to walk back to the inn without penalty good enough.
3. would you use the deck building feature and share with friends.
4. would you play this game longer then 5 minutes.

I guess I am really looking to get the rpg to its base elements. i think the plethora of RPGS in the last competition really helped. so let me know what you think.

[Skofo]

do you guys see any ways I could simplify this game as it is or do you think its already simple enough.

You can make it one-dimensional.

[deathtotheweird]

It's hard to say if I'd play it for more than 5 minutes since it's just an idea, but I'd say yeah.

If the deck building feature was part of the game, I'd use it. I don't think I would have much interest sharing decks. That's just me.

It sounds like a good idea, you should just make it. Through prototyping you could probably find the answers to most of your questions, such as the heal spell your simplicity question.

[baconman]

OMG, it's Izuna 2! lol

You want simple? Drop the "Level Up" system altogether. Have two build-up matches, each outcome allowing a growth of your HP, MP, or AP; followed by a boss. Beating the boss gives you a selection of 3 spells, which are allowed once per battle, from that point on. While normal battles are random, like cards; the bosses are set in sequence, and each has a couple of valid strategies necessary to beat them - you can't just damage-race them. (Except maybe one or two, where that IS the strategy.)

Build a funny-but-terrible plot around that. Dating is a great, valid option; as is gathering resources for a simple RPG game (even a one-button one!). Oh, and one more thing?

NO SAVE POINTS! You win or you lose.


Now that there... is simple.

[JasonPickering]

wow guys keep it coming.

allen: prototype is almost done.

baconman: i dont have a level up system really, baddies drop gold for you to buy more life and attack power. but I kind of like the idea of getting rid of that. right now I only have a simple menu if you leave to go back to "town". i like the idea of simplifying the "level" up feature, but I am worried about doing boss strategies. i think that would probably just over complicate things. and i am limited so far for attacks so boss strategies would be hard to do.

also i dont get the izuna reference.

[Vulf]

so my questions to you are.
1. do you guys see any ways I could simplify this game as it is or do you think its already simple enough.
2. do I need a heal spell or is being able to walk back to the inn without penalty good enough.
3. would you use the deck building feature and share with friends.
4. would you play this game longer then 5 minutes.

1. I think you've pretty much got it.

2. Being able to run back to the inn is enough most of the time, especially in a one character game.

3. Yes. Yes I would.

4. See 3.

I think you're onto something here. See where it takes you.

[Tumetsu]

I think you have simplified it pretty long already. I guess Inn would make Heal useless. Instead of Heal, I think you could add some other offense spell or something for fights. I also think that it's good idea that after each boss player can learn new spell which would replace one of the existing ones if wanted. This way game could be kept simple but would also have some more depth. I imagine you could combine this to boss strategies mentioned, either in a way that each spell ease defeating spesofoc bosses or are even required for beating them. With latter one it would be somekind gamble can the player defeate the boss of next deck. Not sure if it's any good design idea but had to throw it anyway

And about decksharing and editor: Yes, I would probably use editor but probably not share them as snippets. Instead I suggest you to enable possibility to upload these short snippets to the server and put somekind "Random deck" button to your game which then chooses one deck randomly from your online database. And since snippets would be so short, you could pretty much handle whole thing with little PHP and txt files without too much hassle. I think that would both encourage deck creation and playing as a new challenge is easy to take with just one button press. Another choice is of course procedural deck generation.

[JasonPickering]

so I did some more work last night and the game now looks like this:


after an enemy is defeated the player is given 4 options. they can upgrade their attack, their spell, their life or heal. so the player will need to take the chance that they can survive several attacks to upgrade their attack power. I put more thought in to the different spells, but I don't really know what the differences would be. right now an attack might do 1 damage but a spell will do 5. so how does a fire spell differ from an ice spell.

Tumetsu: the online idea is a good idea, but I don't think I would be able to do that. I have no idea how. right now when you go to load a window pops up and you can paste right into it. so you don't have to type each number in, its literally copy and paste.

P.S. yes that is the dreaded Goblin Pig Rider

[Tumetsu]

Tumetsu: the online idea is a good idea, but I don't think I would be able to do that. I have no idea how. right now when you go to load a window pops up and you can paste right into it. so you don't have to type each number in, its literally copy and paste.

Well, I don't know what tool/engine/language you are using. I myself have used Game Maker to create online hiscores with method mentioned. Basically program first opens webbrowser with www - address of the database page and inserts certain parameter to the browser (hiscore, level code etc.) When page loads, it's simple php script reads assigned parameters, and saves them to the txt-file. You also need Mysql database enabled from your web service provider if I remember correctly. When you want to load scores/data, you just basically load the txt file from the server and read it in your program. It depends on your engine, how you can (or is it possible to do that at all) do this. With GM, one has to use dll extension to download files from the server. So if your tool can use dlls or c++ you may either code it yourself or try to find somebody willing to code that for you or find existing ones. I don't know details of how hard it is to make with c++ but what I have heard it isn't really that big thing for anyone experienced coder so you may have luck to find one willing to code it for you Same actually goes with php too. And in the case you are actually using GM, I can point you to some tutorials and extensionsfor this 

About spell thing, well either they can have different side effects (though probably would get too complicated) or simply have some elemental bonus against certain enemies.

[JasonPickering]

actually I am using gamemaker so feel free to send that stuff to me. I don't have a website, but I can probably find something.

on the spell front originally the characters had either a fire/water/plant type and they were very rock paper scissors. sadly I have expanded my enemy roster so its hard to figure out where certain enemies go. perhaps I will have fire, water, and plant, getting bonuses against certain spells. for example fire does 3 damage to a fire, 2 to water and 4 to plant. however some enemies such as zombies or goblins are just normal and have no bonuses. also I have been entertaining the idea of several different landscapes and effecting enemies that way too. so fire monsters in a volcano dungeon will be stronger. this encourages people to use specific monsters in specific locales when building decks.

[vadersb]

Hi, Jason! I really like the idea, and graphics look just sweet! 

I suggest don't limit the design to the reference board game, try to find some more elements to plug into the game, while keeping it super simple. I like the idea of short game time - I think the sweet spot will be something like 5-10 minutes. And it should be highly, really highly replayable! Like I should expect to have a new, unique experience each time I press Start. One more thing - maybe it is worthy to make some game elements subtly affect the next game play. Just a primitive example - during a first time you play and die by hand of second monster. Next time you start you'll find a skull there. (This is just a rough  example to describe the idea). Such things shouldn't ruin the balance though...

Keep up the great job!

[Tumetsu]

Okay, if you use Game Maker this should be fairly easy then. I suggest using this as a template: http://64digits.com/games/index.php?cmd=view_game&id=2142
It's originally intended to be online hiscore table but it should serve you well. Actually you could enable player to give a name for their deck as well by assigning it to where score owner's name was intended. Then just download score/data to your game by the moethod demosntrated in the example gm6 file.

Drawbacks are that each time player wants to submit their deck browser needs to be opened but IMO that's okay. Also the system is relatively easy to hack in a way to submit any score but I guess it's not too big problem if you build somekind error check in to your game.

The webhost setting should be easy enough. I remember just uploading them to my space in awardspace.com and editing a bit php file with notepad to give it access to mysql or something. Can't remember details, but if you need guidance with it I could look how I set up them from my webspace

EDIT: And btw, the terrain idea sounds nice. And if you are preserving Heal spell, maybe it could have bonus damage against undead like in Final Fantasies?

[JasonPickering]

well just finished the prototype, will probaly post later. and the game is really hard or really easy. if enemies do damage even when you kill them, you cant get past the second guy. if they dont do damage if you kill them then the game is way to easy. especial with the upgrade after every death. so i am adding money into the game. so enemies drop random coins and you can buy your upgrades and upgrades increase in price so +1 attack costs one coin. next time it costs two coins. i am hoping that fixes the upgrade system and now I just need to work on the battle mechanics so the second guy doesnt waste you. it might be as simple as giving you more health to start with.

[Doktor_Q]

I envy your ability to do art, and the fact that you came up with this before me.

It seems like a decent time waster of sorts, but at a glance I'd say it might be a bit too simple. Something to add more of an element of strategy could be nice (fog of war, multiple paths to move down?), but it looks pretty nice at it's base.

[JasonPickering]

thanks kikaru I have been working at art for a long time. and it is way to simple so I chucked everything out and started over, copying code from earlier builds. so here is my new design spawned from reading one person pen and paper RPGS. (P.S. this is all built and works quite well)

you enter the dungeon. each space is then randomly chosen to be a monster, treasure or potion.
- treasure: each treasure space is either 1 coin, 5 coins, +1 attack, or +1 life max.
- potions: each potion space is either 1 potion, 3 potions, or 5 potions.
- monsters: on a monster space you battle the monster. you can attack, where the monster will always hit you back. and you can drink potions. each potion heals you 1 life point.
- upgrades: after you defeat a monster you are given the option to upgrade. you can buy more attack, more life, or potions. attack and life price increase each time you buy one and potion price increase each time you go a floor lower.
- floors: the last option on the upgrade menu is to go to the next floor. you will immediately be healed and then you battle on the next floor.

each floor has different percentages for what enemies, treasure and potions you can get. the main goal is to reach the 8th and final floor to fight the boss. the strategy comes in to the fact that you want to save your potions for the boss. so as you go through each floor you want to get as low as possible before you go to the next floor. but you don't want to push yourself cause it sucks when you think you can take the next guy and then you find you need to use 5 potions to stay alive.

i have played through several times, died many, and won several. my favorite was when i defeated the boss with 1 life left and no potions, total play time about 10 minutes.

I will need to post all my stuff. and I am thinking about moving this to the devlog section.

P.S. between each floor. a page comes up with some generic (on purpose) story item.
example - " our hero descend into the bowels of the evil lair................ he he he bowels."

[KM]

Well, if you want to be technical, every game could be considered an RPG as you play a role in every game. (Even puzzles where you play the hand of a diety who magically alters objects in a world to some end.)

It's just a heck of a lot less complicated to call a game an RPG based on it's play mechanics.

[JasonPickering]

yeah I guess my game is aiming more towards Final Fantasy then dragons age.

[Doktor_Q]

I've done a great deal of investigation into procedural/random/dynamic RPG stories.

Some ideas for your thing:
- [item X] needs to be retrieved for [reason] (your king, your country, to save your hometown, to win a war, etc.)
- [boss] must be slain because [reason] (he killed your family/hometown/someone important, he is trying to destroy/take over the world, is menacing the town, for glory etc.)
- [dungeon] must be conquered to [reason] (to liberate the ruins of evil, to move in, to unearth the ancient history, etc.)

You can add a whole list of generic plot items that it will randomly pick from, too.

[TwilightVulpine]

4. would you play this game longer then 5 minutes.

I don't wanna sound like a jerk, but I believe the "R" in "RPG" stands for "roleplay", so even if you're going for a very minimalistic approach, I think you need to have some kind of story with choices in there!

You are a warrior that have to kill things, what do you do?

[JasonPickering]

Kikaru: yeah I am trying to figure out how to do the procedural story right now. It will be created off boss and dungeon selection. but I am having trouble doing it procedurally. I am trying to figure out a good way to display it. right now its looking like simple sentences that will be centered in the middle of the screen

Example:

The King has summoned you
Monsters are emerging from the crypt
You must find the cause
Save the kingdom.

its odd now, almost like bad poetry, so I still need to work on it.