After hitting a wall, I decided to start over with more of a plan and less of a
, so I'm dusting off this Devlog and working on it again. I've made a few major changes pretty much scrapped what I had before and started over. The first post has been changed to reflect some of this.
I'm currently brainstorming skills for the protagonist - whom I'm thinking of calling Phoebe for the time being - to acquire over the course of the game. I'm doing this by building a deck of cards with the following information:
Name The name of the ability
Type The type of skill it is. Currently I'm going with 5 different types:
- Movement - Affects the character's movement somehow (increased speed, teleportation, etc
- Attack - Affects existing attacks, or grants new ones. Attack and Defense
- Defense - Affects Phoebe's defenses in some way, or grants new ones
- Support/Utility - generally useful skills to have
- Handicap - Reduces Phoebe's capabilities somehow, but grants some kind of bonus in return
Rank - Denotes the ability's power level, complexity, and approximately when in the game the player can obtain it. There are 6 Ranks: Rank 1 skills are basic things that are obtained early in the game. Rank 5 skills are obtained near the end of the game. Rank 6 skills are crazy (not necessarily overpowered) and can only be obtained by discovering secrets in the game.
Aspect - There are 8 Aspects, each representing a facet of magical power: Fire, Eart, Water, Air, Lightning, Arcane, Shadow, and Light. An ability may or may not be associated with one of these aspects
Description What the ability does
Cost How much Power the ability costs to equip
Restrictions/Requisites I'm considering having some of the abilities have restrictions or requisites before they can be equipped. Restrictions might be things like 'Cannot be equipped if the player has any Light Aspect skills equipped'. Requirements would be things like 'Requires 5 Power equipped in Fire Aspect skills'.
So, for example, Phoebe's basic movement and starting shot abilities look like this:
Name - Walk
Type - Movement
RankAspectCostRestrictions/RequisitesDescription - Allows the player to move left and right along the home row
Name - Arcane Arrow
Type - Attack
Rank - I
Aspect - Arcane
Cost - 0
Restrictions/Requisites - None
Description - Shoot arrows of magical energy that damage enemies on impact
As the player progresses through the game they will acquire new Skills - either by buying them, as rewards for completing levels, by discovering secrets, and so forth - and increase their Power, which will then allow them to change Phoebe's build to suit their playstyle or make certain challenges easier (or harder).
I don't have a fixed number of abilities to put in the game, but I'd be very interested in any ideas that folks might think would be interesting to add.