Announcing a rogue-like RPG for the Atari Jaguar

[Arcadia]

7 hours ago, phoboz said:

I will see if I can find a good way to use it, any suggestions?

Perhaps to select/equip items?

Sure, toggle weapons and items is a good use for the keypad. Maybe also more mundane things usually found in options menus, like muting music, or changing the HUD, switching the camera view, those kinds of things. 

 

Or what about switching fighting styles, like say the character can switch between aggressive/defensive (aggressive dealing more hit points, with the risk of suffering greater damage to himself, I'm just spitballing here), or ice/fire or whatever, depending on what kind of monsters he encounters? That's probably way too advanced though, I'm not a programmer myself so I wouldn't know. 

[PFG 9000]

Very cool!  I'm not huge into RPGs, but that didn't stop me from playing through Wyvern Tales and loving every second of it. I'm looking forward to sitting down with Kings of Edom as well.

[Welshworrier]

It does remind me very much of the old mainframe game rogue mixed with a bit of temple of apshai.

 

This is a good thing.

 

One thing I did notice in video was room items popup as you were moving - leave item in room, move to next and item disappears though room remains on screen. Item then reappears when you move back towards first room. Its an inconsistency as, if you can see the full set of walls of a previously visited room, why wouldn't you see what you had left in there too.

[phoboz]

21 hours ago, Welshworrier said:

It does remind me very much of the old mainframe game rogue mixed with a bit of temple of apshai.

 

This is a good thing.

 

One thing I did notice in video was room items popup as you were moving - leave item in room, move to next and item disappears though room remains on screen. Item then reappears when you move back towards first room. Its an inconsistency as, if you can see the full set of walls of a previously visited room, why wouldn't you see what you had left in there too.

It is because the items, as well as the monsters move out of the line of sight of the player. The items, and the monsters stay in the same place when the move into the line of sight of the player again.

 

However, if the map would be unrevealed once you leave a room it would be very hard to find the gateway to the next level, because you wouldn't know which areas you had previously visited.

 

It doesn't have to be 100 percent realistic (because it's a game), you can think of the unrevealed map as a fog-of-war you usually have in strategy games. 

Edited October 27, 2020 by phoboz

[Rick Dangerous]

Ooooo....this reminds me of Wyvern Tales for the Lynx which was awesome.

 

Count me in! 

[agradeneu]

On 10/25/2020 at 10:22 PM, Arcadia said:

Sure, toggle weapons and items is a good use for the keypad. Maybe also more mundane things usually found in options menus, like muting music, or changing the HUD, switching the camera view, those kinds of things. 

 

Or what about switching fighting styles, like say the character can switch between aggressive/defensive (aggressive dealing more hit points, with the risk of suffering greater damage to himself, I'm just spitballing here), or ice/fire or whatever, depending on what kind of monsters he encounters? That's probably way too advanced though, I'm not a programmer myself so I wouldn't know. 

 Sounds fiddly.

[Mikebloke]

Looks like a cool game, I like the graphics in the video, they are absolutely fine and look like they fit in nicely. 

 

I really enjoy fatal labyrinth and it's master system cut down version dragon crystal, but their graphics just felt a bit off. This looks much nicer. 

[agradeneu]

 The artwork/animations of the characters are high quality, look at those cute trolls and bats.

[Arcadia]

4 hours ago, agradeneu said:

 Sounds fiddly.

Why? 

[agradeneu]

56 minutes ago, Arcadia said:

Why? 

No need for 10 buttons for that kind of game. Also, I think a rule is to keep controls as simple as possible and let the game do the micromanagement.

[phoboz]

[Update] Kings of Edom now featuring a little bit more 'interactive' environment.

 

Edited November 1, 2020 by phoboz

[JagChris]

We love your whole vibe @phoboz

[phoboz]

11 hours ago, JagChris said:

We love your whole vibe @phoboz

@agradeneu is now also helping out with some pixel art, so credit should go to him as well.

[JagChris]

@agradeneu is pretty cool. Good job.

[agradeneu]

Thanks, I helped with some additional ground tiles and the popping mushrooms.

[Mikebloke]

14 hours ago, phoboz said:

[Update] Kings of Edom now featuring a little bit more 'interactive' environment.

 

Looking good! Will rocks be pullable or do we just need to be careful and not block overselves in! No promises I wouldn't do that lol.

 

The tall grass would be nice if its foreground with a shuffling animation. 

 

I think with all these demands I better buy the game when it comes out!

[phoboz]

I am adding doors/gates to the open areas, and you cannot push a block trough such gateway. This decreases you chance of getting stuck, as a block might easily get you stuck in a small path between 2 open areas.

I will see if I additionally add a pull move, but it isn't there yet.

[tripled79]

Can anyone explain that this new term "rogue like" means?

[roots.genoa]

2 minutes ago, tripled79 said:

Can anyone explain that this new term "rogue like" means?

It's supposed to be a game akin to Rogue (1980). Usually it means it features procedurally generated levels and permadeath.

[phoboz]

Yes, the game Rogue (1980) set the standard for rouge-like games.

Basically the core idea is that this game is supposed to be a graphical variant Rouge (oppose to ASCII, as in the original)

 

There has been similar games in the past, most notably Fatal Labyrinth (SEGA Genesis), and Dragon Crystal (SEGA Master System)

This game plays very similar to those, but recently I started to add new elements, such as destructible, movable blocks etc.

 

There are also games considered to be rouge-lite, which deviates further from the Rouge (1980) formula e.g. Dead Cells, the Binding of Isaac.

However, if combat is turn based (similar rules to Dungeons & Dragons), the levels are randomly generated, monsters, and items are only visible in the line of sight of the player, and the map is gradually revealed I would count it as rouge like.

Edited November 3, 2020 by phoboz

[youxia]

Permadeath+random generation is what makes a true roguelike. Everything else is optional.

 

It's great to see one in the making for the Jag, retro platforms definitely need more non-twitchy homebrews

Edited November 3, 2020 by youxia

[agradeneu]

Random level generation is obviously the choice for rogue games, but also has some downsides, e.g. a level designer could make much better and nicer levels with a tile editor. It also limits the number of tiles the engine must process.

Edited November 3, 2020 by agradeneu

[Mikebloke]

Some rogue like games do have a mix of random and pre set maps. Azure dreams ps1 had set maps, usually story based but occasionally pre set ones turn up, the rest randomised. 

 

Other console rogue likes include the pokemon mystery dungeon series and even Final Fantasy took a try with the FF X-2 characters as a post game storyline. 

Edited November 4, 2020 by Mikebloke

[phoboz]

14 hours ago, youxia said:

It's great to see one in the making for the Jag, retro platforms definitely need more non-twitchy homebrews

I wanted to do this game for a long time. I started many years ago for the PC, but motivation faded due to the large number of high quality rouge-likes already available on that platform. Many of these games are now also available on modern game consoles (thanks to the big companies recent embracement of indie game deveopers). So to release this one on a modern console, it would risk getting lost in the masses.

 

Then I discovered that Jag, which I think is a wonderful platform for 2D sprite games. It has a dedicated community. Sadly the demand for 3D games at the time that Jag was released was so high, so we probably lost a few high quality 2D games for the system due to market considerations.

 

Obviously it's not trivial to make a game like this, so I am hoping to be able to release it in a forseeable future. I think most of the obstacles has been overcome. One of them being that I am not an excellent pixel artist myself. I think that we are on track now to give you a game that you can enjoy for a long time (if you care for this type of games)

[youxia]

16 hours ago, agradeneu said:

Random level generation is obviously the choice for rogue games, but also has some downsides, e.g. a level designer could make much better and nicer levels with a tile editor. It also limits the number of tiles the engine must process.

Most roguelikes have tile mode as well, it works fine in random generators. Once you start designing levels by hand the game becomes a normal RPG because lack of replayable/unpredictable levels eliminates the whole RL gameplay loop.

 

3 hours ago, phoboz said:

(if you care for this type of games)

I do indeed: https://archive.org/details/ArchiveRL.7z ;)