![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
2:34am - I really should be going to bed, not starting a work post. But I want to do something other than sleep and play games today.
I managed to get GoRogue 3 to work with Godot with help from the person who makes GoRogue, so that was good. Next I just have to figure out what I'm going to do with it.
The Dungeon Creator game I was trying to make before, I was going over my old notes and I didn't have a lot on what the form of the game would actually be. I still remember it, mostly, but I want to quantify it for the future before I get too far into it.
The simple description I gave before was "Basically Viva Pinata but as a Dungeon Sim" which I still think encapsulates the idea pretty well, but it doesn't give a lot of details.
I'm making it like a Roguelike under the hood, which is pretty similar to how Dwarf Fortress works.
I recall having some issues with whether there should be a player avatar in-world managing the dungeon, or if the player should have an overview perspective and minions to do things for them, or a third option of an eye of god view where the player manipulates the world through tools or spells or something.
There's also the issue of the third dimension. In Dwarf Fortress you build your fort as a 3D construction, despite using the style of classic 2D roguelikes. In most Dungeon Sim games you only have one floor of dungeon to work with.
I'd like to implement the third dimension, but that would take something more than GoRogue, so I guess I'm stuck for the moment. I just want to make a prototype first, and see if the game idea is even fun. So I'll start with a 2D dungeon. Dwarf Fortress started in 2D anyways.
3:06am - The roomie came in and started chatting and now I'm too tired to continue. ;.;
I'm going to have to continue this later. I'll leave it open and go to bed.
2:06am the next day - Well Geez, today just flew by and I didn't get to work at all. I'll continue leaving this open and work some more eventually.
5:30am a week later - Well somehow I kept this work post open for a week without giving up on it. I got really busy with playing video games rather than making them. I'm not done playing video games yet either, but I wanted to finally get back to work at least for a little bit.
Of course, it's been a busy week of not doing this, so I've completely lost the thread of what I was trying to accomplish before. I think I was trying to figure out some design problems, though.
The biggest design problem remains, how does the player interact with the world?
The other problem that occurs to me is finding an answer to the question, is this a dungeon management game or a dungeon gardening game?
If it's a dungeon management game, then there should be some purpose and possibly an avatar or minions to control in the world. You would interact with the world by giving orders and having them followed. This would be more like Dwarf Fortress, but for monsters.
If it's a dungeon gardening game, it's more about asthetics and setting up the right environment for monsters to want to move in. You would interact more from an eye of god view and directly sculpt the environment, with no direct control over the inhabitants past attracting them and possibly 'feeding' them by adding resources to the dungeon. This would be more like Viva Pinata, but a dungeon sim, which was the stated goal.
I don't know which one I want to do, and I wonder if I could mix them? You start with an avatar and maybe some minions, and garden the area to attract monsters or whatever else you want. You would interact directly with your avatar and minions, and have some purpose like self defense or following a story or quests. But you would also have monsters you could attract that you don't control directly, or have only limited control over.
That sounds like a good compromise, and a fun and interesting game. So let's go with that for now!
The first and only thing in my TODO list for this project is to codify the project goals, so I'm going to do that now and figure out what I need to do. I'm going to get cozy while I do it too because I've been on my butt all evening/morning playing video games and I want to put pressure somewhere else.
8:14am - I had a bit of a rest and made something to eat besides working, but I did also work and got some project goals stated. I think my next step will be writing a sort of dream project goals text that I can trim down to something reasonable, and something like a 'story of the game' where I describe a session of gameplay, to get the idea solid in my head.
I managed to get GoRogue 3 to work with Godot with help from the person who makes GoRogue, so that was good. Next I just have to figure out what I'm going to do with it.
The Dungeon Creator game I was trying to make before, I was going over my old notes and I didn't have a lot on what the form of the game would actually be. I still remember it, mostly, but I want to quantify it for the future before I get too far into it.
The simple description I gave before was "Basically Viva Pinata but as a Dungeon Sim" which I still think encapsulates the idea pretty well, but it doesn't give a lot of details.
I'm making it like a Roguelike under the hood, which is pretty similar to how Dwarf Fortress works.
I recall having some issues with whether there should be a player avatar in-world managing the dungeon, or if the player should have an overview perspective and minions to do things for them, or a third option of an eye of god view where the player manipulates the world through tools or spells or something.
There's also the issue of the third dimension. In Dwarf Fortress you build your fort as a 3D construction, despite using the style of classic 2D roguelikes. In most Dungeon Sim games you only have one floor of dungeon to work with.
I'd like to implement the third dimension, but that would take something more than GoRogue, so I guess I'm stuck for the moment. I just want to make a prototype first, and see if the game idea is even fun. So I'll start with a 2D dungeon. Dwarf Fortress started in 2D anyways.
3:06am - The roomie came in and started chatting and now I'm too tired to continue. ;.;
I'm going to have to continue this later. I'll leave it open and go to bed.
2:06am the next day - Well Geez, today just flew by and I didn't get to work at all. I'll continue leaving this open and work some more eventually.
5:30am a week later - Well somehow I kept this work post open for a week without giving up on it. I got really busy with playing video games rather than making them. I'm not done playing video games yet either, but I wanted to finally get back to work at least for a little bit.
Of course, it's been a busy week of not doing this, so I've completely lost the thread of what I was trying to accomplish before. I think I was trying to figure out some design problems, though.
The biggest design problem remains, how does the player interact with the world?
The other problem that occurs to me is finding an answer to the question, is this a dungeon management game or a dungeon gardening game?
If it's a dungeon management game, then there should be some purpose and possibly an avatar or minions to control in the world. You would interact with the world by giving orders and having them followed. This would be more like Dwarf Fortress, but for monsters.
If it's a dungeon gardening game, it's more about asthetics and setting up the right environment for monsters to want to move in. You would interact more from an eye of god view and directly sculpt the environment, with no direct control over the inhabitants past attracting them and possibly 'feeding' them by adding resources to the dungeon. This would be more like Viva Pinata, but a dungeon sim, which was the stated goal.
I don't know which one I want to do, and I wonder if I could mix them? You start with an avatar and maybe some minions, and garden the area to attract monsters or whatever else you want. You would interact directly with your avatar and minions, and have some purpose like self defense or following a story or quests. But you would also have monsters you could attract that you don't control directly, or have only limited control over.
That sounds like a good compromise, and a fun and interesting game. So let's go with that for now!
The first and only thing in my TODO list for this project is to codify the project goals, so I'm going to do that now and figure out what I need to do. I'm going to get cozy while I do it too because I've been on my butt all evening/morning playing video games and I want to put pressure somewhere else.
8:14am - I had a bit of a rest and made something to eat besides working, but I did also work and got some project goals stated. I think my next step will be writing a sort of dream project goals text that I can trim down to something reasonable, and something like a 'story of the game' where I describe a session of gameplay, to get the idea solid in my head.
