Game Characters Options

[Sparrowsmith]

I'm not against voice acting, though if we do use it we should save it for special scenes.
No matter how trained your voice actor is though, some people just find voice acting to be grating. They prefer to read dialogue. I enjoy it when it's done well, but I can't speak for everyone.

I feel like we're losing pace here....

[MEands]

We are definitely slowing down in progress.

Hm, if we do want voice acting maybe we should only have it in Layer 3, maybe layer 2 if it's really necessary..

Lets just see how popular the first installments get and then we'll see how much effort we want to put into it.

[Sparrowsmith]

that seems like a good idea.

I figure we should list everyone who offered to volunteer, then get working on layer 1. We atleast need sprites, maps, a detailed plan of the battle system.

[MEands]

Ya think we should use the sprite generator for layer 1? Since it is the most RPG Maker like stage.

Currently I have my hands pretty full with creative projects and so I can't work on designing maps, but I think we have some solid plans for them.
I think the layer 1 battle system should be the standard RPG style battle.

[Sparrowsmith]

What about skill trees and the like?
We discussed it, but now we need to start thinking what it will look like.

I think everyone's a bit busy now (probably why we've slowed down.) but if we all pitch in a little we'll still make progress.

[bulmabriefs144]

Hrmmm, what about this?

(Tree of Life from Fullmetal Alchemist)



You have various skills, and some of them might connect with each other. You start with only being able to unlock the top and the bottom (Crown is spirit for magical stats, Kingdom is physical for vit/def). Each circle controls either hidden stat (Beauty lowers shop prices as raised for instance, Understanding/Wisdom combine to give you hints on easier puzzles if you're high enough, Judgement raises intimidation ability, Mercy raises charisma) or a battle stat (Foundation is HP, Victory is strength, Glory is Agility). You can either develop a circle adding 1 per level on these up to 8, or develop skills by connecting lines (each costs 1 as well). For instance, Crown and Kingdom both have three lines, giving you three attack skills, and three heavy magic skills. In order to open the ones nearer center requires more lines (2, 3, 7, and 8 need one line, 4 and 5 need to be linked on two sides, and 9 needs three lines toward it. 6 needs lines surrounding it, and that faded out circle where Crown is only activated after all lines are linked (it automaxes and gives some bonus points), as do the two dotted pillar links (ultimate skills).

Oh, and the stat circles are more or less the same (although character values aren't), but skills linked vary from person to person. Skills need to connect on both sides to learn, but only on one side to connect to other ones. Since there are about twenty lines, this means you have to be at least level 40 to learn all skills, and you'd need to sacrifice some stats or skip some lines, because you couldn't max both. Kinda a ripoff from the Kaballah but the skill tree design isn't.

And yea, this is just an example. If it inspires some other system, this is fine.

This post has been edited by bulmabriefs144: Oct 1 2012, 08:50 AM

[Sparrowsmith]

I like it.

The question is do we carry it on into layer 2?
How much do we have it affect the story? (increasing charisma makes characters less likely to get mad at you?)
And how do we go about making this?
I'm not a scripter, but I could possibly provide simple art assets.

[bulmabriefs144]

Vacant Sky tried something like this out, you'd have choices where it was like...

Choice A - Surrender
Choice B - Fight him
Choice C - Intimidation: Scare him
Choice D - Charisma: Talk him out of fighting

Not just battle either, some events might involve negotiation.

Ummm, I have no idea whether this holds up for layer 2.

These screens don't actually need script. We have a screen that you teleport to (probably on a level up, but making it key activated is better), and key even that exits to a memorized place if cancel if pressed on that screen. The screen is basically the art by background. The only other issue is changing the hero graphic to a finger pointer, and back when you leave. Oh and making sure it fades in and out quickly and smoothly (parallel and auto works differently for teleports).

Basically, if you can make a simple (alot of ppl do the whole teleport by variables, but actually you can just do this by moving a cursor character around the screen) party change screen, you can do this.

This post has been edited by bulmabriefs144: Oct 2 2012, 04:43 PM

[Sparrowsmith]

Okay, I'll trust you to sort this. You clearly know what you're talking about.

I like the intimidate, negotiate thing.

[bulmabriefs144]

Nah, I'm gonna teach you it, so you can do it too. The whole "teach a man to fish" principle.



So, you talk to someone and they have a party menu event.



Party menu event. This looks way more complicated than it is, because I have a weather system, and have to pause the weather to run the event. Mainly, the event is just memorizing current location, fading out, turning the hero into a pointer, teleporting to the party switch map (or in this case, a skill tree map), and fading in. Oh yes, and you may have to switch the KeyPress system to the one called PartySwitchKeyPress.



The background of this map is transparent, divided into passable (O) and non-passable (X) tilesets. Wherever you don't want the pointer to go is of course non-passable. In a custom menu, events are usually Action Key and below hero. (Here, it basically teleports you back and forth between the top and bottom sections, while selecting characters)



If Cancel/Menu is pressed, this fades out, teleports to memorized location, returns pointer to hero graphic, and fades in. The KeyPress also has to be switched back. (The party menu is a bit more complicated, since you have to store party order)

So, for Skill Trees, you basically make a custom menu, and have stuff where it turns switches on if the linking parts are chosen by spending AP, and if the switches are on in a circle (or it's a starting circle), you can spend AP on them too.

The most complicated part of this is awarding AP for a level up, and entering the menu in the event of a level up. I've never done levelup awards, so I can't really say.



Here's what it looks like (the ugly grassy part it the border where stuff is non-passable, it would be made transparent later). There's various lines crossing each other making this a bit confusing, but about half of these events can be removed. It's essentially just a bunch of Below Hero Action Key events.

This post has been edited by bulmabriefs144: Oct 3 2012, 06:59 AM

[Sparrowsmith]

That's really quite ingenious, and it makes a lot a sense.
Couldn't parallax mapping be used to reduce the number of events?

[bulmabriefs144]

It is parallax mapping. That's what I was trying to say. The number of events is basically just the number of "buttons" on the screen for you to push with the action key (not one of these are actually parallel process). And yes, it should be reduced, since enough events on the screen starts to lag it. Also, this was compressed to fit on a screen 320 x 240, which is why all the buttons are scrunched together. The actual picture could probably fit more neatly on two pages of height with alot less overlap.

This post has been edited by bulmabriefs144: Oct 6 2012, 06:23 AM

[Sparrowsmith]

excellent, I'm glad we got all that covered then.

Doing it this way I'm pretty sure it won't matter what engine we use, which is a huge plus.

Let's talk battle systems.

I've been thinking we should make certain buffs/debuffs into double edged swords.
You can either give yourself a minor protection against x, or a minor weakness against y.
OR you can give yourself a major protection against x and a major weakness against Y at the same time.

So let's say you're fighting a fire based monster, so you cast an ice shield on your party. Now, all fire attacks will do very little damage, but ICE attacks will do extra damage. This also works the other way around though, you could cast an ice shield on the enemy and ice attacks will now do extra extra damage.
We can then have mage enemies who when given a buff/debuff cast the opposite buff/debuff on themselves. So if you cast ice shield on them, they'll cast a fire shield on themselves. So to beat them, you have to trick them by casting the opposite attack to the one you need, and then they'll weaken themselves for you.

Example:
You have specialized one of your mages to deal MASSIVE fire damage, and the other to do buffs/debuffs.
You encounter a mage enemy.
If you use the Fire attack straight away, then the mage will put up an Ice Shield and that will be that.
However, if you use an Ice Shield first, then the mage will anticipate you're going to use an ice attack and cast a fire shield on himself.
THEN you use the fire attack and instantly kill the mage with no hassle.

If we play it like this, then battles aren't just about picking the right attacks, it's about tricking your enemy.
I've got a few other ideas. maybe we should start a battle thread?

[bulmabriefs144]

Yea I was thinking more a Rock Paper Scissors style thing where fire enemies are weak to water and ice, but water enemies are then weak to lightning. The shield thing would have to be done using a system that not 2k3 because that doesn't allow two way immunity. Anyway I'm not sure about that so much as just a gap in shielding where you can't cast both ice and fire shield because they cancel out.

And yeah, maybe make a battle section, especially for boss planning.

[Sparrowsmith]

I think rock paper scissors systems are over done.
They're too easy to use, which takes all the difficulty out of it. We want the game to be difficult.

We'll still have fire monsters being weak to ice, but if you use an ice attack then they'll retaliate with a very strong attack.
So the trick is to make them even weaker to ice first, and then use your ice attack, which kills them outright or negates the attack in some way. If the enemy is intelligent (a mage, a warrior, whatever) then they're capable of predicting your next move some of the time.
I can see this being fairly easy to do. In fact, I might try and create a simple battle simulating it soon, just to try it out.

[bulmabriefs144]

I still think three elements is better than two tho.

[Sparrowsmith]

Well the system would have more than fire and ice, I just imagine them being opposed instead of being round.

Hit a water enemy with lightening, it hurts them a lot.
Hit a lightening enemy with water, it hurts them a lot.

It's not about trumping them, it's about reaction.

So heat beats cold and cold beats heat.

[MEands]

Hm possibly, but in a way this could just result in a stalemate where both sides have their strength equally increased.

EDIT: Ugh I hate being the negative nancy here, sorry for just being negative.

If we do it with the idea of barriers and such it would work. I suppose the point of the battle would be figuring out what enemies have what special skills, then planning your barriers around this.

This post has been edited by MEands: Oct 14 2012, 12:46 PM

[bulmabriefs144]

Yea, more a barrier idea than some sorta shifting thing. Should it be like a status thing? (Like Oil and F. Shield) Or more like lowers/raises defense where you can sort of fight with the enemy on whether they're weak or strong?

So, opposing rather than circular, huh. How many elements are there?

(Probably Fire<->Cold, Thunder<->Water, Light<->Dark, Earth<->Air. Any others?)

[MEands]

What about armor. Like, lightning armor will raise your attack if you are hit with a lightning attack, but water will cause you to take massive damage.