Indie Game - The Ones Above You

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Thought that I would make a thread so people can follow if they are interested.

So as some of you may know I have been itching to make an actual video game for some time, and I set a goal for July 1st to have a working game done in some sort of order. This was decided in late March to start in April.

So April came around and I did a lot of research on topics, even tried doing a Tycoon game which ultimately failed because I don't have the know-how to do a lot of things in it. So I am working on a Twitch Plays type of game relating to RPG genre.

The idea, is that a player will basically go around in a generated terrain, walking around and do combat with monsters a-la-Dragon Warrior / Pokemon encounter chances. The viewers of the channel will be voting for events or things to do with the character. There will be two types of votes.

First type is a minor vote, which is on-going and is constantly evaluated at regular short intervals as to what the character is doing, that way people can change the characters mind quickly.

Second type is a major vote, which is every X minutes, the character makes a major focus change. I imagine this would be something like, vendoring, eating, leveling etc.

I started working on this about mid April, and in about 2 weeks I have a basic framework going. Currently the game is not in any sort of 'finished state' but quite a few of the fundamental features are in-place.

Obligatory Screen Shot #1

The following is both screens, showing the game on the left, and the right is Unity showing the map generated.

https://i.imgur.com/PKne48D.jpg

The map is generated by a seed, and each 'color zone' is a type of encounter. There are 6 different "encounter types" coded in right now. They return a success or fail based on a random # right now (which is about 10% success rate).

each time a character does battle (Success) they gain XP. I might change this into an actual combat screen later on and allow for more XP, but for now this suffices.

The world is kind of flat, but that might change later as well, it is hard to look at it when there's no real gradient textures on it lol. It's tough.

The twitch chat integration is complete to the point I am ready to accept commands. When a command comes in, it is queued with the users name. And on regular intervals, the queue is processed and the 'poll' area on the right side *grey part* is where the vote options will be displayed. I just have only added text to the box, no numbers yet so not really any point in showing that working since it doesn't actually _DO_ anything at the moment.

The character is controlled by me right now with WASD/Arrow Keys and gamepad etc, like normal. Eventually when I figure out how to get the NavMesh to load, i will be putting in 'focus objects' and the guy will walk towards the closest one, then find another one etc...

Video Record of Development Here

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Update #2

So the next step that I wanted to get done was the Experience / Hit Points and Level display on the UI.

My main problem was that I didn't understand how the World Space UI functioned, so when I watched a video about how it actually worked, it made much more sense. That allowed me to actually have text elements on the UI that is readable in the world space, without being completely blurry.

After I got this working and I had re-done the layout for the UI, I started working on the back end base code for the Stats. Hitpoints, XP, Level, Attack Power as well as leveling up checks and adding XP based on 'mob kills'.

Right now, since there is no combat system in place, it's basically random number, and then different XP based on where the person is to simulate 'different types of mobs'. This will all change later when the Combat system is actually written, hopefully soon.

But like always, here is a video that will go over how everything is done.

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Update #3

So today, Maclone got me worked up cause at one point I go so frustrated with the code, I was glad to go fix someone's computer on a service call just to get away from it.
When I got back it was back to the grind-stone and I was glad I did take a break. I started making headway.

Maclone told me to go learn how to do something instead of doing it the wrong way... so, I did. I thought it was a waste of time, but I'm lazy so... yea.

With that, I bring you the Game Data Editor (For NPC Templates anyway). It doesn't save yet, but at least it reads it properly. Quite fast too.

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Update #4

Ok end of Week 3, and I just managed to get something finished and functional. I am thinking about the Combat System and how I want to handle transitions. So I decided I wanted the old school final fantasy kind of transitions (you know where it did the mosaic zoom rotate etc) kind of effect.

Well, I didn't want to 'copy' it, so I made it mosaic and then split into pieces then shatter to the ground. By the time the combat loads in the background, the scene for combat should be loaded. I can always tweak it when I get to that stage.

So here is a video of it working. This took me a while of searching how to do things, as well as watching a video on Image Shaders. That looks like a whole other ballgame I don't really want to get into right now. Too much to do as it is but, it looks intriguing.

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I am in the process of adding the Inventory and Looting options to the game right now, and I realize that it's going to take me some time to do the items. So I am going to outsource it.
I hope you will all be my Chinese Sweat Shop Laborers

Here is what an item looks like in the code when you add it (This was my dads addition):

ItemDB.Add(new Inventory.Item { ItemID = 9, ItemName = "Axe of the Mad Guitarist", ItemQty = 1, Atk = 3 });

So here is what I have in the code for the item class (What details an item can have):

public class Item {
    public int ItemID;
    public string ItemName;
    public bool isStackable = false;
    public int ItemQty = 1;
    public int Atk = 0;
    public int Def = 0;
    public int HealAmount = 0;
    public int ManaAmount = 0;
}

So all i ask, is if you have an imaginative mind, and want to help out, then just write up a text file with a bunch of entries for items and paste it in a PM to me. You don't have to worry about the ItemID = # part. I can do that later, just names and other things ... go nutz. If you have extra things you want added, add it in and give a description before hand so I know. I can always add item functionality checks afterwards.

So something like BurnDamage = 1

So what the numbers mean, is if it's 1. it is a 1d6 roll. So if you put 2 it will be a 2d6 roll.
If you think that some thing you want an item to have would require say a 1d10 or some odd D&D die roll, then indicate it as you will.

If your item is used, I will add it into the credits for the game some how.

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Update #5

Ok week 5 update. 4 was kind of a wash, but week 5 had lots of things going on.

Things Completed:
Random Dungeon Generation (50 rooms in a 200x200 area currently)
Player AI to walk around killing all monsters in map
Monster AI to walk around aimlessly.

To get the above 3 items to work properly, was a LOT of bug fixing and modifying code to make the terrain work with the NavMesh properly. It was bugging out quite badly, for example, the player would spawn at 0,0,0 for some reason, so I added a check for that, and it would move them to the first room like it normally would. However, the NavMeshAgent wouldn't get moved, so I had to reset it. Now that works.

I will be running it over night, but I got it to run for around 20 minutes+ without crashing fatally where it got stuck. All 'fixes' seemed to keep the game rolling.

Currently, it takes the Player AI around 12-14 minutes to clear a 50 room dungeon with a single mob in it. Next up is Combat system, stats, loot ... yea,