Added A Level Select Screen

I have tentatively titled the campaign Ganithracks Malice, mostly because it is what I came up with when I wanted to test the title bar and also because it doesn't contain a V, which I haven't implimented yet.  I only have one level Icon right now, so I just put down Earth --which has clearly been rendered in the highest of detail-- three times. 

The greyed out ones are not yet selectable as you've got to beat Earth before you can move on to Earth 2 and then you have to beat Earth 2 before you can do Earth 3.  The cool thing is you can do arbitrary dependencies which should allow for fun and varied campaigns with multiple paths.  With this additional menu, it seems much, much more like a game.

-Liam

There is Nothing Quite Like

The feeling you get at the end of a good rpg.

-Liam

Silent Protagonist + Chrono Cross

Silent protagonists are pretty awesome, but they don't happen nearly as much as they used to.  That's kind of too bad.  RPGs seem to be built around ever talking protagonists.

Anyway I was skimming SMPS' Chrono Cross Review again. and I noticed this bit and I figured I'd pass it on:

"Chrono Cross is the rare post-SNES JRPG that can accurately be called a role-playing game. Even though the term RPG continues to be used in regard to Final Fantasy, the Tales series, Xenosaga, etc., but there is actually very little role-playing to be found in most of these games. As soon as an RPG's player character begins speaking on his own or making decisions independently of the person holding the controller, the term "role-playing game" becomes a misnomer.

This is why the silent protagonist device is such an effective tool in video games. When the player's character in the game's interactive narrative -- and technically, every video game is an interactive narrative -- is incapable of exercising any autonomy of supplying his own voice and thoughts, there is that much less of a boundary between the player and the world of the game. In Chrono Trigger, the player is Crono, and vice versa (up until the Ocean Palace disaster, anyway). Conversely, in Final Fantasy X, the player really only acts as Tidus's arms and legs, and only when the game cedes control to him. There is no role-playing; Tidus and the player are totally seperate entities. The player nudges Tidus along and views events from mover his shoulder rather than through his eyes.

Chrono Cross uses this tool to a more daring end. Chrono Trigger was designed to be a fantastic adventure in which the player vicariously leads a life of daring action and heroism through Crono. It's a blast, but fairly typical video game fare. Chrono Cross, however, is a story that's less about saving the world from disaster than Serge's quest for identity and meaning. Because Serge and the player are inextricably bound, Serge's existential struggle becomes the player's own."

The review itself is a really awesome read and I suggest you check it out even if you've never played Chrono Cross.  It's long, but it provides a really relevant discusssion about story in video games.

-Liam

Foxlike: Scenery, a Fancy Camera, Intros and Outros

I added a bunch of little things in the past couple days.

The coolest is a slightly more cinematic camera that can be put at any point in the level.  This works pretty well for any beginning exposition or ending recap.   This can be seen in the first couple screen shots.

Also of note, things don't have to be in space anymore and the sky can be colored and ground can be generated.

The other cool thing is the edition of scenery.  I added some code to allow the drawing of anything you can model.  They don't have much - if any - game logic or collision detection attached to them, but they can work pretty well for beefing up the environment.  Usually they'll be to the side of the level adding ambiance or in a place that doesn't matter too much.

Finally a found a pretty large collection of creative commons music I like as well as a large collection of creative commons character portraits, so those are in there now.  The portraits can be seen in the screens, the music cannot.

Anyway it's very game like now and you can even string levels together one after another.  That's pretty cool in my books.  There is no transition between them or anything, but it works.  Right now the first 'level' loops forever.

The next big thing is to come up with a boss for the first level and a few more enemy types.  Then I can start thinking about asteroids for the obligatory asteroid level.

I'm also ruminating on a potential plot.  Honestly there doesn't need to be one, but it was suggested to me once that the characters literally always talk and I like that idea a fair bit.

-Liam

Pillar-Tastic

Foxlike now has obstacles.  Pillars to be precise.  Why they are in space, I can't really tell you, but getting them in there was relatively quick and painless.

I also implemented some functionality which allows the level to control the speed of the ship.

Twas a good day for development.


-Liam

Added Some "Particle" Effects

Particle in quotes because I'm pretty sure there are better ways to make this happen. I'm sure full blown particle system would use some textures to great effect, but I kinda wanted to see what I could do with some triangles alone and this was the result:

Now you have an engine trails which looks pretty cool and when you destroy enemies they explode in a cloud of debris.  Some larger enemies will shed debris as you hit them.

Kinda cool. Not sure what the next step is, but it was fun to get back the game for a bit and make it better.  I like it.  There is a beautiful simplicity with only using colored triangles as particles.

It also fits with the old-school motif that I might be going for?

-Liam

Dragon Age 2: Wayward Son Glitch Workaround

I can confirm this works and I've been playing along happily ever since.  I mentioned it in my last post.

1. Enable the console.  There are several guides to do this out there.  Most of them can be found here.
2. Use the command "runscript zz_dae_debug" - this should bring up a menu of options.  You will not to able to see the command as you type it.
3. Click on Plot Jump -> core/critical path -> investigate -> circle plots  -> wayward son -> more options -> the cave on the wounded coast  
4. This will set the quest to the wounded coast stage and teleport you to the cave entrance
5. Head on in and finish the quest.
   

There is related to the solution posted here, but avoids skipping over any major part of the game.  Ideally this should leave your other quests untouched.   The biggest benefit is you can still finish the quest as planned and make your choices.

Hopefully this works for people.  On a related note, these two posts have gotten me more hits than ever before.  This means the problem must be pretty common, hopefully bioware will put out a fix soon.

-Liam

UPDATE:
I don't see why this wouldn't work for other similar bugs: give it a go and explore the menu.  There also maybe other scripts for various DLC

Dragon Age 2: Wayward Son Quest Glitch + Workaround?

Update: Here is an improved workaround.  It should allow you to complete the quest and not effect the rest of your game.

Or how I learned to stop playing and get some work done.

I recently purchased Dragon Age 2 and was having a pretty good time playing it.  I know some people have some gripes with the game and while some the the choices Bioware made are disappointing, they aren't really deal breakers - at least for me.

Interesting Dichotomy

But unfortunately,  I literally cannot finish one of the main quests required to complete the game.  I'm pretty sure loot-able corpses fall through the floor of the levels after a few seconds - or otherwise disappear.  One of these corpses has a map which I needed to move to the next stage of the quest.  I can no longer get it.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident.

 I sent an email off to EA's support and they said that they don't know any way to solve the problem and they suggested I post the glitch on their boards to try and get their attention.

They ended their canned response by saying the glitch may never be fixed.

Seriously?

Games have bugs, all the time.  But they usually aren't show stoppers and even then they're usually fixed.  They must have put DA2 through testing.  How could they not catch a glitch that makes the game unplayable?

Anyway, there may be a workaround using the console - if you're on PC, so I would look into that.

One particular command zz_dae_debug can let you change your state in the plot, but I'm kind of hesitant to use it because I don't want the choices I made to be wiped clean.

Anyway, that's me on Dragon Age 2.  Fun to play - if you can.

-Liam

Quite Possibly the Best Thing about JRP'S

It's not the style, the plots, the characters, the world or the battle system.

It's the character themes. They'd hit at just the right moment and it would rock so hard.

Here is a couple good ones. It may be hard to understand the context. I seriously suggest playing the games the music comes from to see how it really meshes together. These are chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI related







Of course twas the days of 16 bit, So they didn't really sound quite like this:



but more like this:



They really had the music down.

I think this is kind of missing from western RPGs. I can't really think of one with defined themes for the characters. It would be really cool. Especially since they can do cool stuff with the characters themselves.

When someone bursts in, says something awesome or even charges off, they should have a theme, and that theme should be blaring.

-Liam

Dragon Age II

Could be total crap, I don't know; I'm too busy playing it.

It also contains Gwen Cooper! 10 points to Dragon Age!

-Liam