Really need a name for this thing...

Since my last post, I've been implementing the UI that Terri designed. With games where team orders are important it gets pretty tough to keep the interface easy to understand while still keeping it from getting cluttered but I think we've got something that'll work. We'll release an alpha version within the next month and get everyone's feedback on it before we move too far ahead with the other features.

After some discussion with Terry, we've decided to modify one aspect of the game slightly. Dungeons will no longer be completely randomly generated. Instead, we will define custom templates for zones that will determine how a zone looks, what creatures and loot it contains as well as which heroes can spawn in it. This will make it easier to give zones a unique feel and create quests that feel real. For those of you who have played MUDs before, this is the kind of effect we'd like to go for with zones. The location of zones in the world, which zones appear in a world and the layout of dungeons will still be randomly generated though, nothing has changed there.

Next, I'll be starting work on enemy AI. Hopefully, after the weekend, enemies will be roaming around (alone or in groups) and attack you on sight. They will also pursue you / flee based on a set of randomly generated characteristics.

Announcing [Insert Name Here]

As promised, today is the day we divulge some details about the new game. This last week we've been spending a lot of time on getting the game architecture down to prevent rewrites on a large scale later on. But what exactly is this game?

Four adventurers taking on two spiders and their handler, an orc warrior.

The game can best be described as a procedurally generated Dungeon Siege. Your game begins with you controlling a lone adventurer. As you explore the world, you meet other adventurers who will join your party. Some of them will be eager enough to join that they'll allow you to recruit them for free. Others, like a pervy rogue will tell you he'll only join if you have enough women in your party. Or maybe a wandering bard will ask you to retrieve his stolen harp from a band of banshees before he'll join.

The game will also feature a legendary character for every class. If you are lucky enough to happen upon one of them you'll notice that they always have the same name and backstory. They are much stronger that average characters and they will also join your party already equipped with an item unique to them.

The game will feature dozens of classes with randomized stats. Examples of these classes are knights (sword and shield), warriors (two-handeds sword), archers, wizards (lighting spells), priests, bards (stat boosters), rogues, deathmages (summoners), sorcerers (fire spells), witches (animal control) and many, many more.

Each character will have an ability unique to his class and one equipment slot for items to further specialize him or her with. Examples of items are a trinket that  has a chance to reflect projectiles, a small vial of fire that adds burning damage to every attack and a songbird that frequently boosts a random stat for every member in your party.

The world will be generated with different areas serving various purposes. You might happen upon a small village in a murky swamp where you can recruit new members, buy and sell items or just chat with the locals. Or maybe you'll find a forest littered with signs warning adventurers of an evil monster lurking within. The possibilities are endless which makes each playthrough exciting and unique.

We will have more information regarding a date for an alpha version soon so be sure to check back soon for updates on progress.

The Final Secret

The wait is nearly over. This weekend, Terri and I will officially announce exactly what this new game entails and we promise, you're going to be as excited as we are.

Check back soon!

It's been a good run

Before you go into a shock-induced coma; no I haven't stopped developing games. After many years of being a major proponent of writing my own engines, I have succumbed to the enticing call of Unity 3D.

The decision came while I was working on our new game (the secret one). I was busy writing a 'shader' in JS for the canvas that would allow us to use overlay blending for lights. Except for the fact that it took too long to generate the resulting image it was working fairly well. It was at this point that I realised just how often I was faced with this kind of issue. As much as I would like to continue developing my own engines, I hardly went a day without needing to resort to some kind of hack to achieve something simple.

So I've moved over to Unity. The choice of game engine was a fairly simple one: I could still easily deploy my game (even more so), development is still very speedy (again, more so) and unlike many other game engines where the work of the programmer devolves to scripting events I could still feel like I was achieving something. Even though Unity supports JS scripts, I've opted to rather code in C# (if you're going to do something, do it right).

I've spent the last week learning Unity and it's been a rocky road but I feel I'm at a place now where I am no longer hampered by my lack of knowledge and development on the secret game can recommence at full speed (we'll reveal exactly what it is very soon, we promise).

Here's a screenshot of how the game looks in the Unity player. The overlay blending on the lights is working now and we think the effect is amazing.

More Secrets

We've been messing around a lot with the lights. Terri and I dearly wanted them to use overlay blending and since the canvas doesn't support blending modes (yet) I wrote a function that does it manually. It turned out to be too slow to use in practice so for now, we'll use regular blending. The effect isn't nearly as cool but it works well enough.

If you look carefully, you can see a slight radial gradient on the secondimage that gives the impression that things get darker as they get further away from you.

For full info on what exactly this game is going to be, you'll have to wait another week or two. Until then, watch out for more teasers!

Spontaneous dying

Some variation in floor and wall tiles

A new character and different candle sprites

Alright, who killed the new guy?

What happens in fight dungeon, stays in fight dungeon!

Secret Project

Terri and I started on a new project yesterday. Not going to divulge anything about it right now but here are some teasers.

Bobblehead Running

Testing out different tiles

Tiles are tinted randomly at generation time