Gameplay ?

To effectively create a game, one of, if not THE most important thing in a game is gameplay. So I was wondering what kind of gameplay we could create. Are the battles going to be turn-based, real-time action, strategy? How extensive is the menu going to be etc.

Please post your thoughts.

Yea, we're playing around with that. I was in the precess of creating a job system similar to tactics. If you read my blog you can see what little I've established. I'd like a sort of simple menu system for our first go, and I'm still up in the air about turn-based or real-time. Magixion and I talked about it being a lot like tactics, and thats turn based. We could have a vote I guess. *shrugs*

I like turn based like in FFT, but I'm biased. I really can't help much with game mechanics, so I'll leave it to those who actually have to do the programming decide.

I'm a big fan of turn-based, but I'm also a big fan of Zelda's system.

Well, it really depends on what direction the game is in. Real-time means that most of our time and resources is spent making a more complex physics system, and limiting the number of other additional features. Having a full-scale turn-based system means that there is going to be restrictions in how much creativity we can pour into the gameplay, making it more like other rpgs.

It all boils down to what kind of focus the game has: one with a strong narrative, or one with deep interactivity.

I'm thinking narrative for now. That's just my $0.02. People are not going to care as much about minor flaws if the storyline blows you away. Amirite?

I am a bit torn between the road we should head down as far as the battle system and all that goes. I am a big fan of the FFT battle system and think it could be utilized in a way that we can get a great story along with it (through cut scenes, scripted events, etc.), but then again a more action-oriented gameplay like Secret of Mana can be quite fun. So, perhaps we start something weighing all the pros and cons and then vote on how we think it should be done?

I'm definately a big fan action-adventure/action-rpg type of games. The problem is, like I mentioned before, that a real-time engine requires real-time physics. Zelda games, for example, have a scripted use for each item that creates a unique effect on different enemies, on which other objects in the immediate area should react to. It runs even deeper than that, but it's definately much more of a hassle than a classic Final Fantasy, which lets every kind of move run from the same script, and only checks the unique odds of the target to determine the effectiviness of the move. (sorry if that sounded complicated)

Like I said, I'm all for a solid action game, but I definately think turn-based is the least complicated.

I don't care either way. I swing both ways

That was a naughty choice of words.

I'll vote turn-based. As has been said Action Reality is complicated and requires fixing of physics as well as usually giving more functions to other buttons.

IMO, battles work fine in Turn, but you must make sure the good guys and enemies can't do anything the other can't do. If the main characters can team up for a two-fer, the enemies can too. If the enemies can team up for a six-way, the good guys can too. The battlefield has to be even when it comes to tactics. I've always hated getting clobbered because the monsters are able to scud that I couldn't.

As for action, I think it should be incorporated into the environment. You can program an ASK into any area that LOOKS like it can be accessed by simple means. Like, if you only need to jump a couple of feet, you can examine the area and it will ASK you if you want to. Same with jumping down... actually you can jump a lot farther down than up. Let's not put anything in that's not humanly possible. If anyone can jump higher than a human, I would assume it's that Homonculus Beej came up with.

If we go the route of turn-based, what system are we gonna use? Is it gonna be like FFT or FF7 or what?

I haven't been able to get past the first half-hour of Tactics. I'm okay with a system that requires positioning and numbers rather than a line of allies and a line of foes, but I feel that the Tactics system itself was slow. Whatever the fastest Tactics system available is, probably use that.

But Tactics was sweet! Who cares if every battle takes at least an hour

1st of all, does anyone know where to get a Tactics skeleton? No matter what our end choice is for gameplay, we should be using a preconstruct rather than working from scratch. Pretty much nobody does that anymore. Since it seems as though we're at least as close as possible to deciding this RPG will be styled similarly to Tactics, I imagine it's the best source base for the project.

2nd: Programmers aware of bug solutions? In case of incidents in which bugs in the system cause loops, glitches, or crashes, it's best to have a camera setup nearby to record it in order to observe what lead up to such situations and perform a surgical strike. I read that in a book. Mostly, Testers will end up doing something like this, but just for when we reach that stage, I'd suggest trying it ourselves.

Not sure if you guys have decided on an engine yet but, an option would be to use mine. I have been working on a 2D engine using C++ , Win32 API for graphics and FMOD for sound and I plan for it to be done within two to three weeks from now. My goal is to have a robust code base skeleton that can be formed into any kind of 2D game. If we use mine me and any another programmers on this project can team up and write the code to form this skeleton into the RPG system that we want.

On the FF7 vs FFT battle system I would actually vote for something similar to the FF7 battle system. I have played tactics briefly a while ago but from what I can remember it is more complex. I'm not sure of the skills sets here but that kind of battle system may be difficult to implement resulting in longer research and development times. Plus from a player point of view they may grow impatient with the long battle and quit playing especially because this rpg will not be a widely known professional game and people may not cut it as much slack. Plus FF7 battle system would be better for narrative since a player will not have to wait long chunks of time just to see what will happen next in the story. Just my take on that...

For bug busting techniques I would suggest fixing bugs ASAP after they are discovered because the time to fix the bug will go up exponentially the longer it is put off. Code pieces at a time and test after each piece as opposed to codding a huge program or chunk of code at one time without testing often. Repositories are good as well because they allow programmers to access earlier versions of the code to where a bug was first introduced. Repositories are hard to setup and aren't really needed to get by but are useful.

Thank you so much for your generous offer. Tell your buddies to come and join too maybe. ^___^ That's two users offering engines already, in addition to Danny's that he is making.

I really think we should go the route of 2d turn based rpgs

One thing that could really help us out, is creating a list of pro's and cons of all the engines that we have available. If I recall correctly, we have 3 engines that are possible to use, correct?

Okay, I need to know if we've decided on the basic party size. If it's four then I'm going to have to take that into account in the game script, especially if we don't have a feature that allows the player to swap in and out characters if the number of playable characters is more than the party size.

With FFT the number of active party is generally five, with a maximum roster well above that but certain characters are required in certain boss fights.

With say FFVII the active party is three, with a maximum of six on the bench.

I'd say we stick with simple 4 like FF1. That just me though...

Are we including a feature to swap characters in/out of the party?

I would like to. I can see us having a sizable team which might make it a bit more interesting for the player if they can choose their own warriors.

I hope so as well. The game script will be more difficult if we constantly have to have characters come and go in a revolving door fashion to keep the party size down to four.

Agreed. I envision at least 6-7 people as being a part of the team. We can go higher if we need to, but I think that is the least that we should have.

But think about it from the programming perspective ;____;