The iPhone Project

[Tireas Dragon]

It's been a whole year since the realm was plagued by natural catastrophes. Earthquakes destroyed the old roads, floods swallowed up valleys and fields and storms ruined cities and towns.
 
Now the realm is recovering and mercenaries are needed to open new trade routes, raid dungeons for resources and defend settlements from invading brigand patrols.
 
But were the catastrophes natural after all... or was there a more sinister cause?

The plot thickens.

[Gan]

That makes a very nice, wide, and strong foundation for a story. We could easily build upon it.


-Gandolf

[Silverwind]

To be honest I think the minimalist the better, as we've already slowed progress considerably whilst discussing it. Here's a really simple plot:

Tired of wandering, a group of travelling merchants settle down. With trades of all sorts New Town is sure to flourish, but only if the area can be made safe.

You must venture forth into the surrounding hills and cleanse the area of monster lairs.

Simple and short, like Yipe! I. There'd only be 1 town in the centre of the map, 1 NPC per craft/trade and 1 dungeon per compass direction (how about mountains to the north, forest east, desert south and something else west).

What say yee mutinous yetis?

[Gan]

Sounds great. Perfect fit.
I'm going to wake myself up with some early morning programming.


-Gandolf

[Gan]

Big question:
Should the npcs move when you move or move on a timer automatically?


-Gandolf

[Silverwind]

I prefer the look of realtime myself, but it makes it much easier to bypass monsters and thus explore dungeons without much hinderance.

My vote goes for turn based, but I'd be happy either way.

[Tireas Dragon]

This is the way I do it. I make it so the monsters move real time but move really fast. I also give them a decent AI so if you don't move they will get to you in about 5 seconds (assuming they are on the other side of the map with obstacles in the way)

[Gan]

Npcs in motion:
http://web.mac.com/avisaria/Npcs-in-motion.swf
Npcs can walk anywhere that isn't occupied by another npc or a blocked tile. The player can walk on top of npcs.
Next big questions: Should I give npcs the ability to travel across maps?
Pros:
-More realistic?
-Possibly funner(Yeah, I know it's not a real word)?
-Better gameplay with npcs that are more interactive with multi map travel?
-I could give npcs the ability to cross maps if they want so if you wanted them to stick in one map, they would. Otherwise they would travel freely.
Cons:
-A player may cross a map and land on top of an enemy... straight into the battle field.
-My timer would need to run multiple maps at a time to process npcs on other maps as well as the map you are on. Or I could just run the map you are on, let the npc cross over and the npc would be in a stand still until the player went to the next map to animate it's npcs.
-Could use a bit more processing power, not sure it'd have much of an effect.
-Possibility that a monster could go out of it's own habitat into another.


-Gandolf
P.S. At the moment, movement is all randomized. I could try out the A* tutorials.

[Silverwind]

This is the way I do it. I make it so the monsters move real time but move really fast. I also give them a decent AI so if you don't move they will get to you in about 5 seconds (assuming they are on the other side of the map with obstacles in the way)

Wow! Any chance of seeing the AI code?

P.S. At the moment, movement is all randomized. I could try out the A* tutorials.

Am I the only one who understood the logic of that tutorial but couldn't figure out how to program it?

btw, those NPC's are awesome Gan.

[Gan]

The A* tutorial looks pretty complication... though I have an idea... ah nevermind.
Edit: Been looking around a bit and a simple, fast, non-resource hogging way to path find is this:

while not at the goal
pick a direction to move toward the goal
if that direction is clear for movement
move there
else
pick another direction according to
an avoidance strategy

Add in a little random-ness with a range of sight and it'll be good. Enemies will be of fair intelligence though if they are behind a large barrier with a player on the other side in close range, they may never find a way around it.

What do you guys think? (Hey TD, I'd love to see that AI code too.)


-Gandolf

[Silverwind]

Sounds good.

[Gan]

I gotta vacuum the house now, then I'll procrastinate on my homework. After my homework procrastination, I'll try building the Npc targeting AI.
Wouldn't it be sweet if two monsters could fight each other?(Or maybe guard vs monster... just a random idea)


-Gandolf

[Silverwind]

Here's a link to a non blurry NPC sprite Gan:



Just incase you lost the original, hehe.

[Gan]

Thanks. I'm going to finish targeting npcs and then go play around with the new Sc.


-Gandolf

[Gan]

Found a bug:
http://screencast.com/t/Vy4iYnQDQp9H
Edit: I'm just going to go ahead and recode bits and parts. See if I can make it more readable. Get rid of a few more leaks and such.


-Gandolf