EDITING CHALLENGE II: Updated 12/11/12 post mortum

[Phitt]

[...]
Does anybody think I should put my dungeon on the workshop & nexus as it is? I think its in need of a few loving touches and I don't want anything I post to reflect on me like its unpolished. Also I think this may be my one and only dungeon I make using the LOG editor. There isn't enough of a drive for smaller community projects unfortunately. I think this is all really clouded by the fact that anyone can release anything on the steam workshop whether its to a reasonable standard or not. I don't really want to spend long hours for something only a few people will play. If I did start another LOG project, it would have to be huge. The sort of project that people would buy the game just to play. I was thinking "Grimrock Infinite" - randomly generated infinite roguelike. If a few requested script functions find their way into the editor it could be possible to an extent. The harder part would be randomly generating everything. You can't store a database of hardcoded items and monsters for an infinite experience. You would have to redefine objects on the fly and generate their stats. The only way I see this being possible is by rewritting the statistical and combat system completely based off of entity hooks and store all the random objects data in script. This does make it open to scope new features such as monsters elemental resistances to name just one. But this is a big job, and its not been prototyped so unforseen hurdles will probably be met. But I massively digress... this has nothing to do with the topic so I'll shut'it now

When I look at the average quality of mods released so far then I think it would be a shame not to release your mod on Nexus/Workshop.

I've modded a long time for ES games and I realized that I don't care how many people play my mods after I started modding Grimrock. All my ES mods combined have more than 200k unique downloads, I can't even hope to get 10% of that amount with Grimrock mods, even if my mods would be really good and if I made lots of them. I certainly wouldn't waste my time modding a game that absolutely no one plays, but as long as at least a few dozen or maybe hundred people enjoy my work I don't mind. The main reason why I mod is the creative outlet anyway, modding doesn't pay my bills, neither do I know anyone personally playing my mods. I hope you will keep modding for Grimrock as it is a good game with a very small, but avid fanbase - and that is all that should matter.

[Neikun]

I would like to see your mod on either the workshop or Nexus, absolutely.
It was fantastic, and the more good we put on these networks, the more good will come out of it, as people will be inspired by the mods they play.
The thing that makes Grimrock Modding so much better than Little Big Planet, is that it's not a popularity contest. So it's not like levels will be directly copied.

[Edsploration]

I updated The Big Friendly Warden to version 1.2 with a bit more polish. This doesn't have to be reflected in contest judging, I just wanted to make it a little less thorny for enjoyment's sake.

Hey, Ed. There's what looks to be a model of a swipe stuck in one of the floor drainages on the balcony.

There are some minor visual flaws (cave in models have large gaps you can see through, the already mentioned swipe model in the drainage, moving objects sometimes look a bit strange due to the limited possibilities of scripting (vs animation)), but overall it was really, really fun to play this mod.

I removed floor drainages from the wallset in 1.2. Should have done this the first time but I was lazy.

I tried 3 methods for the sliding dragons. One used 30 custom alcoves, one for each frame of the dragon's movement. While things lined up nicely that way, it would have taken 100 to 400 custom alcoves for smooth animation. I'd still do it that way if I could dynamically create the alcove assets.

As for the cave-in gaps, yes, it's not elegant. I made them two-deep, added blue lights, set the story to take place at night time, left a comment about it being moonlight, and a "joke" about it being a blue moon (because it was blue light) *nudge nudge*. I also destroy some of the cave-in models during the final escape scene because I was worried about frame rate issues. Someday I'll be brave enough to model, and we can avoid these problems.

Oh no! I got stuck in the cave in. I didn't even dawdle. Wish I had saved D:

Version 1.2 now features a slight bit more time to escape. I didn't realize it at first... but there was a rare "feature" where the cave-in could kill very unlucky players even if they made a full speed dash for the exit. I added a hair more time so escape should be guaranteed if you don't dawdle.

One thing that I thought that did take away from the dungeon was the secret that has 2 green (I think they are called scavengers?) monsters attack you. What felt like an interactive story, then turns it into a desperate attempt to rush into the 2x2 section of floor to dance around the creatures to avoid attacks while your wand comes off cooldown.

I actually completely agree with you. It doesn't fit with the rest of the dungeon, and it's too difficult at that. In my original version which I had a friend test, this battle didn't exist at all, but I decided there should be some sort of fight to relieve the stat-/equipment-focused players from wasting their time. In balance testing I was able to beat 3 scavengers while backed in a corner, so I thought 2 would be fine, but I didn't realize how lucky I was to do that! With version 1.2 I cut it down to just 1 scavenger now, which is closer to the difficulty I originally intended. It should spell death for a few players, but be easily beatable by fast reaction speed, a good build, or by knowing what's coming.

the dungeon was seemlessly doing things that would have appeared to me impossible to script!

Perfect! I was hoping to get that reaction from some fellow modders! I used this project to raise my own modding abilities, and I'm glad I had something to show for it in the end! I'm planning to unleash some of what I learned on the community soon!

Does anybody think I should put my dungeon on the workshop & nexus as it is? I think its in need of a few loving touches and I don't want anything I post to reflect on me like its unpolished.

When I first tried your dungeon I was shocked as well! I thought, "I put so much work into mine, but now I'm going to lose to the only other entry!? It's so much more elegant than mine!" Your warden control puzzles have many mechanics which work so well together. It's true game design. Although it does get a bit tedious and bare towards the end, I highly encourage you to share it more publicly. There are some real great ideas there. My vote goes to you.

[HaunterV]

Great discussions;
If all contestants can pm me their steam id please.

[BeNNyBiLL]

Hey Haunter,

My steam is http://steamcommunity.com/id/BeNNyBiLL/. Don't feel as though you have to give me anything, I only used the competition as an inspiration to create something and to learn the tools for perhaps a bigger project in the future. It was a fun an interesting thing to approach, even if the idea seemed a little daunting at first. Feel free to add me on steam nonetheless as I like to keep in contact with likeminded people and, of course, play a few games

[Xanathar]

@Edsploration

In total the dungeon has 1308 lines of in-editor lua scripting, 840 lines of custom object definitions, 55 timers, and 1 counter. I could release the source if someone is interested... but it's in such a dirty state right now I'm better off releasing snippets of code for individual sections.

I'm interested.. and believe me, I have to seek medical aid as my jaw completely detached from the rest of the mouth. Your dungeon is fantastic and has totally awesome effects!!

[Neikun]

I would love to see your source for two reasons in particular.
Precisely how you handled the doorknock alcove and how you handled the sliding daemon head/dragon statue.

[Edsploration]

Alright well I rewrote the *knock* *knock* door code, made it more versatile, and posted a guide for it in the Useful Script Repository Thread.
viewtopic.php?f=14&t=3099&start=70#p43066

I'm going to have to pass on doing the same for the sliding daemon head and sliding dragon statue unless I find some more time under a rock (with the help of Nana's Staff?). But I'll describe briefly how I did each one.

Vertically sliding daemon head was done... well... like this:

Code: Select all

receptor_1:destroy()
shootProjectile("daemon_head_item", self.level, self.x+0.5, self.y, 0, 0, 0.05, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, nil, false)
playSoundAt("wall_sliding", self.level, self.x + 2, self.y)
timer_7:activate()

And then after timer_7 counted down (timed to 6.31 seconds)...

Code: Select all

spawn("daemon_head_eye_slots", self.level, self.x + 1, self.y, 3)
spawn("eye_socket_left", self.level, self.x + 1, self.y, 3)
	:addConnector("activate", "counter_1", "increment")
	:addConnector("deactivate", "counter_1", "decrement")
spawn("eye_socket_right", self.level, self.x + 1, self.y, 3)
	:addConnector("activate", "counter_1", "increment")
	:addConnector("deactivate", "counter_1", "decrement")
blob_shooter:activate()
temple_wall_text_3:destroy()
spawn("temple_secret_door", self.level, self.x+1, self.y, 3)
spawn("temple_ceiling_lamp", self.level, self.x+1, self.y, 0)
spawn("temple_ceiling_shaft", self.level, self.x+1, self.y, 0)
for e in entitiesAt(self.level, self.x + 1, self.y) do
	if e.name == "daemon_head_item" then
		e:destroy()
		break
	end
end
playSoundAt("wall_sliding_lock", self.level, self.x + 1, self.y)

So really it's just a falling shootProjectile using the daemon head model, playing some sounds, and destroying / spawning stuff at precise timings.

Actually this vertical sliding effect down from the ceiling is very rare, because you can't specify the z-position in the shootProjectile function! There are arguements (offsetX, offsetY, offsetZ), but they're broken... they do nothing. You can get away with decimal (x, y) coordinates with this one function, however. Just no z-position.

The sliding dragon statues were done differently. I had 3 potential ways to do it but that I ended up using dragon statue model items in a fast loop with the :setSubtileOffset function. Because they're items, I can't control the rotation they spawn with, but it was the best I could do at the time.

Getting into a rant here...

I've learned now that if you make a new model in Blender and edit the origin location you can control that elusive z-position and make perfect sliding anything! But it can be difficult to get the units right and insure nothing can collide with the custom projectile. (setting the ignoreEntity object to party has a noticeable effect on reducing the party's hitbox, but for some reason still doesn't prevent collisions with the party at periodic moments of time. Almost Human is doing some fishy stuff behind the scenes!

The 3rd possible method (and the first I tried) was just to make a zillion alcoves and have a dragon statue spawn in each one in turn like a stop-motion animation. It worked, but it was too much work if I just wanted to adjust a tiny thing.

All in all, I've learned a lot more than I thought I could while working on that dungeon. (My next idea is going to go beyond the community's imagination... hehehe.)

So! With all that said and done, here's the source code for The Big Friendly Warden!

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/18420968/LoG/T ... Warden.zip

Sorry it's so dirty in parts. I wrote a lot of that impatiently in my friend's kitchen. I'm at least reworking the NPC Interaction framework and I'll hopefully post it sometime.

Cheers!

[Komag]

You, sir, are one of the masters!

[Neikun]

This should be a good read. Thank you so much for posting it!