The Magic Editor

Mystic dream features quite a hefty magic and ability system. I wanted an easy way to create powers and abilities not only for myself but for the players as well. My magic editor does exactly this. Using a simple interface and a point and click control system users can manipulate objects to build the desired effect they want painting each object with its own unique animation sequence and applying sounds. The editor also allows users to add and modify the effects of a spell. A list of different types of effects is loaded and users simply click the ones they want. The effects are then added to a list so they can be tweaked and manipulated to the users desire. Powers can then be exported into a special magic file that is read in and understood by the game engine. This editor offers great power and speed to any user it is proving to be a valuable asset to myself even though I'm still perfecting its design.

Non linear questing

Recently I talked about interaction and briefly about quests. In order to create a new experience for users the quest or task based systems should be non linear and should be story driven. But how can we accomplish this with the time and resources available. I feel firstly that most quests involve killing and/or collecting of items as a main focus. This will not expand our gaming experiences in any way. Exploring new options like helping to rebuild a colony, fulfilling a job in a certain town I.E. serving as a smith or fisherman for example, conquering and ruling your kingdom and many other paths. If we open up our minds and view anything as possible we can make it happen in our own virtual worlds. I aim to include as many non linear or unique quests in my project Mystic Dream as possible but I also give my users the tools to create experiences that I couldn't even imagine. Let me know your thoughts and feelings on this.

User created content

User created content and game customisation are definitely features which set one game a part from another. Role playing games have been allowing players to create their game character for many a year but now some games are allowing even more in depth control. Items, environments, weather conditions even game mechanics are opening up new ways to interact in a game world and allowing new experiences from old ones. So how far could this go and when should developers say this level of control is too much? What sorts of ways can we allow users to have their impact on a game? Just things to think about I would love your comments on this topic.

Mystic Dream Progress 6/11/07

Well I though this would be a good time for another update on my project. All is coming along nicely the core functionality of the game engine is coming together and im nearing an announcement to reveal just what my engine can do. I have rebuilt how weather and locations are loaded and handled by the system also adding in support for sky types which include both day and night although I have yet to devise a system to transition between day and night skys yet. All the player to non player interactions are complete but i still have to re implement my quest system and add the improvements. Items have been redesigned and added to the engine although there is a bit of work to be done with them before I would call it complete. So the last task will be finishing quest system, items and of course my magic system.

The Universal editor

The key to any sucessful game is the design and implementation of appropriate editors to develop that game with. The content and arrangement of this content must easily and quickly be layout out and the information saved into a suitableformat. My project in a bid to maintain ease of use yet still hold great control over the system has condensed all control into a master editor. Users can add characters, items and objects to the world with a simple drag and drop interface. By using this system anybody can change the gaming experience and it also means the game can be developed fast. There can be great benefits from indies and pros using external tools to develop their games with.

Video replay in games

With halo3 released and on of its main features being the recording and replay of users games I want to know people feelings towards this. There is no doubt about it everybodys game experience is different when they play the same game. Sharing the bizarre, amazing and funny moments during a players game can be great fun. Not only that but having videos of certain functions in action developers can more readily fix bugs and glitches rather than trying to find out what the problem is.

I feel that developing a system to record worldly data and use it to reconstruct all of my users game experiences could be of great value not only for me but for other computer games as well. If I made the system open enough and flexible enough it could be adopted as a common way of handling video replay. Feel free to contribute your views on this as I will take your input into consideration.

Interaction in Mystic Dream

The biggest part of my engine and one of the most important features is how the player interacts with both the world and the other characters and creatures within it. My system although still under development has the basics in place so that I may talk about them. Flexibility and complexity have been my key focus with this system. Players should be able to have long complicated conversations with npcs which will alter based on how the player chooses to respond. The system is controlled by lua based script files containing instructions on how characters will react, what they can say, what sorts of answers the player is permitted to reply with and how they are dealt with. My desire is for players to be able to create their own characters and script them exactly how they would like them to be even create quests using the same system.