Ive decided to create my own RPG because frankly, (Im sure Im not alone on this one) most commerical RPGs seem too bland. Not necessarily story-wise, but logic-wise. Ive played too many RPGs that have objects in-game that you cannot interact with, i.e. boats that cant be boarded, trees that cant be chopped down, etc. NPCs that spit out the same old phrase over and over and over. The stale, typical battle systems. And, the ability to just tromp through anyones house and start opening chests and drawers without so much of a second glance. When I decided to make my own RPG to implement these elements, I began thinking: Why havent commercial RPG makers done something like this already? Perhaps having too many interact-able items place too much load on the game? Perhaps theres too much work involved for such trivial improvements? Perhaps players have shown in the past that, as a whole, these types of improvements arent fun? So, I figured I would ask the community to get a general idea of whether or not I should, if its feasible at all, implement these ideas. Interactive environments: Trees that fall when chopped down, combustible items can be burned (if you put your torch on a house, it will burn), any item can be moved or manipulated (rearrange furniture, or board any ship). Realistic NPCs: Will not repeat the same sentence ever. If you pester them too much, they attack or call the guards or something. You must be invited into homes that arent yours or a friends. Relationships are possible, including marriage and children. Im only in the development stages right now, so dont be afraid to completely shoot me out of the water if you feel these things arent necessary in an RPG. Im still not even sure what I want to make it with yet. Right now, Game Maker seems to be my best option, and I will upgrade once Ive learned a language. Thanks!

Consider this: Almost every verb you mention is an animation and almost every noun an object that has to be modeled and textured. You can get a sense of the enormity of what you suggest simply by making a list of each verb and noun and assigning a time cost:

Chop = Chopping animation
Tree = Texture for leaves, bark; models for tree standing, fallen; animation for falling tree

When the tree falls, describe in a matrix the effect of EVERY object it could possibly fall on and what the effect should be: What if it falls on a house? How will you make the house collapse? What if it falls on a wagon? A bridge? Etc. Add those time costs.

Then do the same for programming and add up that time. The time is money, and you're going to be expecting someone to spend all their time (money) on this.

Now, just because you can't make an exhaustive list doesn't mean you shouldn't make any interactions happen. Just know what you're getting into.

For realistic NPCs: If they don't repeat a sentence ever, then how many times can you talk to them? If you can talk to them an unlimited number of times, you will need an unlimited number of sentences. And will any crap sentence do? If not, you'll need a writer. How long does it take a writer to come out with, say, a thousand good sentences in a non-linear game? Dubious, at best.

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You suggest many elements like relationships and families. You'll need to come up with rules about how these work. These rules should have numbers attached to emotions and responses or you can't put them in a computer.

You'll get this advice from everyone who's been there, but my recommendation is to start small and see what you're up against. You wouldn't climb Mount Everest with just a stick of chewing gum and a pen knife, would you?

I see what youre saying. I guess I should have mentioned Im doing this in 2D. I think 2D would help ease alot of the issues with objects. A falling animation for the 4 or 5 different types of trees Ill have in game shouldnt be as hard as doing the modeling for a 3D tree falling. But you do raise an interesting point: I havent considered the effect of a tree falling on another object in game. Ill have to find a way to work that in. Thanks! :D

As far as NPCs go, Im a writer and dont have any worries about the scripting of their responses. But I have considered a player asking an NPC questions over and over and figured I would just have the NPC tell the player to go away if they ask too many, much like it would happen in real life. And if the player persists, the NPC may attack, call guards etc.

As far as family goes, I have yet to get into the specifics of how I will work it, i.e. how much of a role the wife/husband will have after the marriage. But I dont see many obstacles so far. :D

Thanks again for the input!

Non-linearity, a second look this thread goes over the same problem, you can eighter have AI generated world or handcrafted worls, so you can make a world where you can burn houses and do anything but the game wont be able to have any real story or purpose

see morrowind for the ultimate in rpg interactivity with the best in compromises that could be made for playability. also wish (project was canceled) for the mmorpg version.

compromise is the key.

Thanks for the replies! :D

@Kaze: Im not trying to achieve a non-linear storyline. A storyline, by definition, is linear, and something is always lost in its translation to a non-linear form. What Im trying to do is make it so that more options are open to the player as they play. Consider a quest that requires a player to get rid of an orc living in a hut at the entrance to a forest. In most RPGs this is accomplished by just running in there and clicking a button to watch your character hack at it until one of you is dead. In my RPG, a player could just as easily sneak in at night, use a large object to barricade the door, and set the hut on fire.

@qazlop: I have Morrowind and play it occasionally. Its the best RPG Ive ever played. But I want to go beyond that. Not because Morrowind isnt good enough; its good! But I can see room for improvement. Wish on the other hand came as close as Ive seen to achieving my idea of RPG perfection. I signed up for the beta and was only able to play a day or two before they cancelled it. I couldve cried. I actually stopped work on my RPG becase I thought Wish could do the job, but now that Wish is gone, Im back at it. :)

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Original post by Omegavolt I see what youre saying. I guess I should have mentioned Im doing this in 2D. I think 2D would help ease alot of the issues with objects. A falling animation for the 4 or 5 different types of trees Ill have in game shouldnt be as hard as doing the modeling for a 3D tree falling.

Possibly the opposite might be true. A model with a reasonable physics engine might be easy to manipulate in many ways. Whereas a 2D representation will probably have to be painstakingly drawn for each possible situation, over several frames.

As for the realistic NPCs, I think you might be asking a little too much, unless you have a good plan for how to make them all say something interesting? If you're just going to hard-code 3 different responses and have them summon the guards on the 4th conversation, I don't think that adds much to the game. As for 'relationships are possible'... well, it sounds nice, but it's not trivial. When you have an idea for implementation, we can probably discuss it.

I see what youre saying. I only have experience in 2D art for now. I want to transistion to 3D art after I complete all of my 2D jobs though. But since Im stuck with 2D for the time being, I decided to find a way to work around this issue.

A player equips a chopping axe, and when he clicks on a tree, and selects the chop tree option, a timer will start and the animation will switch to a chopping action. The timer will be paused if the player stops chopping for any reason(being attacked, etc.). After the timer goes off, I will switch the standing tree object to a falling tree object with its own animation. I also have the falling tree object check for collisions with any other objects in the area as its falling. If not, the tree completes its animation, then switches itself to a fallen tree object that can also be chopped up for wood.

Im not sure how hard it would be to implement that scenario in C++, say, but with GameMaker its very easy. Animating the falling tree will be the hardest part, but I enjoy making graphics, so its not a big deal to me. :D

As far as NPCs go, all I have planned right now is to give the player a couple of options to ask. (I would rather implement a type of 'sentence builder' for conversation, with keywords to trigger the NPC to say something, much like the PS1 game, The Hive, but Im not sure I could pull it off, though I will research it.) Each option will increase or decrease a players reputation with the NPC. If the reputation falls too low, the NPC will fight or run away. If it goes high, maybe the NPC will invite the player over for dinner(This is the system Ill use for the relationship part. ;) ). Too avoid a player from asking the same question over and over again, Ill just have the NPC avoid the character after so many questions and say 'Youre annoying, go away!' Or 'I have to go now, theres work to be done. Please dont disturb me.'

This is all in theory right now. :) Soon I will build the first building in the game and try out all of my features. If I find I cant pull it off, Ill shoot lower for the main release. :D

Seems like this is a bit roguelikish project. They are usually quite ambitious and complex games (think nethack). Completing a complex game like this takes time and, well, a lot of graphical assets. You better also have good coding skills in the language you're using. Perhaps you could do your game as ASCII, so you can easily get away with the gfx problem?

I think it would be cool, but for the time being it's too much work for any realistic commercial game. I say for the time being, since I think that in the future the players will demand more and more realistic environments, and game creators will have to create more and more realistic environments to keep up. For now, not being able to move a ladder or chop down a tree isn't the end of the world. I don't doubt that all players would enjoy being able to do anything, but they will still play games that are limited.

Of the ideas you mentioned, making the NPCs not repeat themselves seems to be the simplest.
Each NPC needs an Anger/Annoyed value and a list of words. If you don't speak to him for a while the NPC will calm down and talk normally, but if you pester him he'll get more and more upset. An example (He doesn't really have anything important to say):

NPC: Hi. Nice weather we're having
You: Yeah.
NPC: Well.. Nice talking to you
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NPC: Did you want something?
You: Nah.
NPC: Well.. In that case I'll have to go.

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NPC: What do you want?
You: Nothing
NPC: Listen. I don't want to talk to you.

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NPC: What the (insert curse word) do you want?!
You: Nothing/Pester you..
NPC: (Insert curse sentence). Go away.

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NPC: (Insert curse sentence)! Not you again!
You: Tadaa!
NPC: (Insert curse sentence)!

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NPC: (Insert curse sentence) (walks away)

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(the NPC avoids you/calls for guards/attacks you)

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As a "bonus" there's only so many ways of greeting someone, and so many curse-words, so even in Real Life^TM people will repeat themselves, or someone else will say the same thing as some others. Encounter nr 2 and 3 in my example could be one, but with a choice of sentences to say. The curse words and curse-sentences are lists of all the curses and combinations you can think of. They're randomly selected for each encounter.