General Development


debugman18
 Share

Recommended Posts

Thinking about trialling this, so this is my plan.

 

I'll start one of these tonight, and we'll see how things progress. I'll be trying to work in 24-hour blocks (it'll probably be a little inaccurate), 10PM - 10PM in GMT. I'll try to only post major developments, suggestions loads of people like, and images and videos. I'll also keep a To do list up there as well. 

 

For example, for yesterday, I would've posted about there being a few interesting suggestions, a mobs art was finished, we had a loading animation, etc.

This is an awesome idea. Quite a laborious one, but if you're up for the task we'll be in your debt!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What will be the name of our team?

I'm using "Fellowship of the Bean" as a placeholder in the credits screen, but it'd be nice if we could agree on something already (especially since we're producing more and more documentation).

 

I like Fellowship of the Bean, it fits the mod, and we are all LOTR fans, no?

This is an awesome idea. Quite a laborious one, but if you're up for the task we'll be in your debt!

 

Yep, it is. The Football/Soccer match I'm watching will finish ages before I do. :D

 

It's fun though, you catch up on what you've missed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Recap of the Day (so far) - [14/09/2013]:
(This one will be extra-long as I'm making up for a few days here).
At least I hope so. I don't normally have 105 minutes to spare. :3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Fellowship of the Bean" Membership:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lots of discussion has been about becoming a member of the 'Fellowship of the Bean', and it seems to have drawn the main conclusion that the vote should be public. More details look like being decided later tonight, and therefore will be in tomorrow's Recap of the Day.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Creatures:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Artwork: 
- Duckraptor artwork has been finished.

2pzwagw.jpg

 
Animation:
- Beanlet side view is complete.
 
Suggestions:
- Mandarin Duck variant of the Golden Moose.
- Skytrap - Static fauna that only attacks player when near, similar to Tentacles.
- Wilton based living Boon. Killing it drops the item it carries. Can kite.
- Guard for Resurrection Crystals - Living Gnomes - As in the trinket.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
General:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Music: 
- A composer has been found for the mod, thanks to TheDanaAddams.
 
Gameplay:
Title Screen - A Mod start up screen has been created, it's visible when the mod is enabled.
Credits - Mod Credits have been added, everyone on the Google Doc included.
Beanstalk Loading screen - Early tests have been run on a code and animation level. 
 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Items:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:
- Crystal Lamps - Crafted with Crystals, Rope and Storm Ram Horns.
- New Setpiece - has a new turf, contains:
- Cauldron - For Cooking - Increased chance of Wet Goop. Faster, only requires 3 ingredients.
- Eldritchest - Transmutes objects into a similar item. Small chance for Ash. Is reversible.
- Crystal Lamps - Craftable, connect to each other (activiating one, activates them all).
- Thunder Tree and Datura?
- Cumulostone - Uses undecided
- Charged Cumulostone - Provides warmth, creates light
- Potions - Brewed at the Cauldron
- Crystal Pike - Tentacle Spike, damage halved while Static in effect, double during normal.
- Static Blade - Opposite of Crystal Pike, halved in normal, double in Static.
- Doors - Requires key in inventory to enter. Entering without Key, shock or bounce back.
- Mycological's Mushroom Hat
- "Bad" Mushrooms - For you and Raccoons. +Hunger, +Sanity, makes you see things that aren't really there.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Objects:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:
- Resurrection Crystal - Similar to Touchstone, but gives Crystals upon activation. Guarded by Gnomes.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Biomes:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Suggestions:
Swampy Biome - Dangerous, contains rare treasures like Crystals. Has respawning enemies, like the Skytrap (see "Creatures")
Duck Biome? - Contains Longbill, Duckraptor and Golden Geese. During the Static, Duckraptors are more frequent, aggressive, faster and hit harder. This makes Golden Eggs harder to get if they are only layed during static.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Behaviours:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:
Thunder Trees drop Cumolustone when chopped.
Thundering Thunder Trees drop Charged Cumolustone when chopped down.
Owlpeople guard Resurrection Crystals
Raccoons that eat "bad" Mushrooms become aggressive, and hit harder.
A new Shopkeeper behaviour:
 
When you give the salesman 25 (less?) golden eggs he would say this:

"Ah. another Egg."

"How many did you steal from those Geese up there? Like, 25?"
"Wait. 25? That's bad. That's real bad."
"Listen. The cloud world up there is probably falling apart as we speak."
"Those eggs you took must have collapsed the ecosystem."
"Quick, take these. And get rid of the other Beanstalk. That's going to cause some problems."

And then he would give you Golden Beans.

When you go back to the Beanstalk, smaller Beanstalks would rise out of the ground, much like attacking the big Tentacle in the Caves. On top of the Cloud Realm, the Static would start, and mayhem would begin. Mob spawn rates up, temperature plummets etc. The way to destroy the Beanstalk is by killing the top half, which would be swinging around like a Tentacle. Then you can attack the bottom. It would drop a lot of Crystals, including some of the rarest ones, and some of the more interesting Cloud Realm loot. Maybe the drops could be done a la the Ancient Guardian, in a Transmutation Chest.

To make the attacking part more obvious to the player, the in-game character should say something like "Maybe I should weaken the top part first".

How to get back up there? the Golden Beans. After you plant them and get back up, A flower would be blooming on top of the Beanstalk, called the Pandora Bloom. This would be another item to give to the Shopkeeper. When you give it to him, he would say this:

"Ah. I see you planted the Golden Beans. I trust you took out the monster beanstalk too?"
"That Golden Beanstalk will definetly keep that Cloud Realm from collapsing again."
"You know what? I like you. Here, take these."

And then he would give you:

- The Star Callers staff,
- The Lazy Adventurers staff,
- And a Shadow Manipulator.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Crafting Recipes:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:
- Crystal Lamp - 2 Charged Cumolustone, 3 Storm Ram Horns, 3 Rope
- Crystal Lamp - 1 Crystal, 2 Storm Ram Horns, 3 Rope
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Staffs and Gems:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:
- Size Staff - Shrinks and Grows objects, allowing you to carry around a Crock Pot, say.
- Cloud Gem - Used for the White Staff.
- Thunder Gem - Used for Black Staff.
- White Staff - Charges things to Static level. Useful for getting Ram Horns for example.
- Black Staff - Random effects on target, (grow, shrink, static etc.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lifemare's Wall of Text and Awesomeness:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

- Layering the cloud levels by mob difficulty and resource availability is an obvious first suggestion. Most players reaching the cloud realm will most likely have already explored the overworld fully and one or two caves aswell. U&A should strive to offer as many threats as delights. Although obvious, deciding on this would have the immediate effect of reserving more overpowering mobs/items/mechanics for later development, wich is something we haven't discussed.
 
- Fire-extenguishing environment for lv.1, Fire-proof environment for lv.2 and above. This is just my pet idea and i hate to push it, but it's something we should decide wether to include or not soon.
 
- Establishing a more or less cohesive theme for each level. This would allow us to not only give less random suggestions, but also make "what goes where" an easier and more organized decision.
My crappy examples:
lv.1= Jack & the Beanstalk + a little extra from other fairytales
lv.2= less fairytale, more mythological
lv.3= Heavenly realm populated by titans and demigods.
 
- Starting by defining clear biomes with distinct properties and native mobs would be a smarter approach than throwing all the ideas for mobs into one or two all-purpose biomes. Would also be a good way to organize our workflow.
Example:
- Finish default biome with 2-3 creatures, 2-3 flora, 2-3 items, 1 setpiece for alpha release.
- Start biome 2 with similar conditions
- Then biome 3
- Then move on to biome 1 of lv.2
- Repeat
 
- I'm not implying we should pause our organic brainstorm and stop giving off-target suggestions. The last thing i'd want is for us to close U&A in a box before we even release an alpha! This roadmap would just be useful to help us focus on priorities for an eventual release and not get sidetracked with projects that aren't that important for that goal.
 
- So far, things have just been lifting off the ground slowly, and organization hasn't been an issue... Since there's so few things completed and so many in store, whatever we manage to complete is just plain awesome. But i feel that for an alpha release to be a reality we ought to redirect our talents to those things that an alpha can't go without. A list of goals to achieve that is becoming urgent i think.
 
- I find one of the most useful things in the near future about having our own little nook will be opening a bunch of polls for collective decisions on this matter.
 
- Not being afraid to include some mobs that inhabit the overworld (in a creative way of course). In fact, we should activelly pursue this goal, so that this mod offers some elements of familiarity to the player - otherwise it might risk being too different and weird and not really fitting with the rest of DS. Sort of like the caves, where you can find biomes, items and mobs from the overworld and where some things are actually a play on the world above (rabbits/bunnymen).
Example:
Frogs rain from the sky in adventure mode. We should see some in the clouds aswell.
Flying fish, Marshmallow Bees are also good examples. We've been neglecting birds though...
 
- Compile an organized list of essential items for survival up there (after deciding which mechanics will exist of course), and provide sources for them.

 

Edited by ArcticFox789
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Question to all: should skyflies be catchable?

@ArcticFox789

Amazing work! You should create a thread just for those recaps.

 

Firstly, I'm not sure. The player really has no need for light, given that it's perma-dusk. So why would they want to? Alternately, it's almost certain that someone will, so, why not? Unless they give a heat boost or something. If they are of no benefit, then I'd say yes. But if they provide Heat, let's say, I'd say no.

 

I would've but I need membership for that. If I get granted it (as I applied), I'll make one. I'd quite like to be the OPer in that thread.

Edited by ArcticFox789
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Firstly, I'm not sure. The player really has no need for light, given that it's perma-dusk. So why would they want to? Alternately, it's almost certain that someone will, so, why not? Unless they give a heat boost or something. If they are of no benefit, then I'd say yes. But if they provide Heat, let's say, I'd say no.

If they are catchable, the player will be able to take them to the overworld for free light (and, unlike fireflies, they do respawn, and quite frequently). We could make them die outside of the cloud realm, though.

 

I would've but I need membership for that. If I get granted it (as I applied), I'll make one. I'd quite like to be the OPer in that thread.

Oh, right. I agree you should be the OP of that one. Let's wait, then.

EDIT: I think skyflies are an interesting ingredient for recipes, especially potions. What I'm thinking is making them perishable, but having their "freshness" regen during static. That way, they'd die on the overworld as a side effect.

Edited by simplex
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If they are catchable, the player will be able to take them to the overworld for free light (and, unlike fireflies, they do respawn, and quite frequently). We could make them die outside of the cloud realm, though.

Oh, right. I agree you should be the OP of that one. Let's wait, then.

 

I'll transfer the ones I do in the meanwhile when I can create it.

 

I'd suggest catchable then, as one the things @lifemare set out in the unofficial roadmap was the interaction between U&A and the normal world. And that's the perfect chance to start with that.

 

 

Did we ever decide about the day/night cycle?

 

I think we discussed it, and then moved on. But I'm all for perma-dusk. It adds a nice ambience.

Edited by ArcticFox789
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

I think we discussed it, and then moved on. But I'm all for perma-dusk. It adds a nice ambience.

I'm not up for permadusk. The ambience is nice and all but you'd have to consider that we'd still have the sun rising and setting as we're still on the "surface world" so to speak.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Since they produce heat. 

 

Do they? This changes everything!

 

I'm not up for permadusk. The ambience is nice and all but you'd have to consider that we'd still have the sun rising and setting as we're still on the "surface world" so to speak.

 

I know what you mean, but it just makes it more unique. We need ways to make it so it isn't just surface would with new turf and new mobs, and perma-dusk is an interesting idea. Maybe we can sacrifice logic just this once?

Edited by ArcticFox789
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Since they produce heat. should they be catchable with the normal bugnet? Or would they burn trough it?

Requiring a special item to catch them (asbestos-coated bug net? :razz:) would be nice, since it'd solve the balance issue with them being too abundant (and they should remain abundant, since they're a core component of the level atmosphere).

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, and no spam farming them!

 

QRFRavS.jpg

I think the jars should be opaque. That way, they wouldn't be a free and infinite light source when filled. Not to mention it'd save us the trouble of figuring out how to implement in Spriter an animation symbol overridable by the skyfly one. :razz:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I kind of like dusk/night better, with no day (which could be explained by the player being between clouds).

 I'd say day/dusk, mostly because there isn't really anything saying that the player is between the clouds, and it makes more sense to have day/dusk, (You're closer to the sky, so the moon/stars would be brighter. Plus, lugg's post really makes a good point.

 

It's probably just me that has this issue but I severely dislike the idea of using dusk as day. Something about never seeing the mobs in normal light just doesn't sit well with me. But it's probably just me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share