[gameprogrammer] COMMENTS PLEASE, CCRPG-[intro]

howdy all,

alot of people out there are commenting on the
programming side of the game, as in giving me advice
on which programs to use so that i can begin
programming. that's been a great help, but now i need
some advice on what you think of my game.

over the next month, i'll be putting out two posts a
week about different aspects of my game concept and i
would really apprectiate it if you could comment and
tell me what you think.

the posts will be labled like this:

CCRPG-[SECTION]

where [SECTION] would be the title of the subject that
i would be posting.

eg. CCRPG-[intro] : would give an overview of of the
basic game concept and why i'm going to produce it.
(notice i said 'am going to', it will be out there one
day)

well here we go.....

introduction.

why another role playing game?

well first because i have always wanted to make a role
playing game on the computer. i used to play D&D, Role
Master, MERP and a couple of other paper and dice role
playing games when i was a teenager, and i never
really got sick of them.

secondly, all of the computer role playing games out
there seem to have major restrictios that really tick
me off. like diablo, why can't a barbarian learn an
amazon skill? in the first chapter, you hang around
with an amazon in town, but she never teaches
anything, just sits there and gives you quests. pretty
lame. if diablo had had a skill tree that could be
filled with player choice actions that could be learnt
during the different chapters, wouldn't that have been
cool? then you could have a wizard who used a bow, or
a barbarian who could chuck out a few fire bolts on
unsuspecting critters.

thirdly, there never seems to be any real attachment
of the platers to the characters. if your character
dies, you just resurect them and away you go. (i know
that there are a few games out there that don't do
this, but i haven't played all the games, so don't
bite, ok?)

fourth and finally, it really seems to me that there
is too much of this dependence on leveling of the
character. players compare levels of the character
rather than compare the abilities of the character.
also leveling systems like that in D&D games are too
far beyond belief. yes the characters are 'chosen' by
the gods, favored in some way, but does that justify a
human character having 100 hit points when the average
populous has less than 10? i don't think so.

SO.... one of the ideas for my game would be to
elliminate levels. scary because then a character
could get killed with just one shot from an arrow or
one cut/thrust of a sword, but then the characters
should develop skills that protect themselves from
things like this, yes? also, the fact that characters
can develop themselves but normal populous cannot,
represents the 'favor of the gods' aspect from other
games.

for starting characters this concept is particularly
troublesome, since this is when they are at their most
vulnerable. however, this situation exists in every
RPG ever made. it's hard to get past the first couple
of 'levels' of character development without dying.

the 'hit point' debate is a big one and one i am still
considering options, so please let me know what you
think. in the next section, where i describe the
characteristics and statistics, it will become clearer
(hopefully).

the next big thing is that the game would be based
around CHARACTER ACTIONS ACTIVATED BY PLAYER GESTURES.

that topic i'm going to leave to next post because
it's the biggest, scariest and hariest part of the
game.

bye for now, i really appretiate your comments.


craig chambers


                
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