Hi, I posted a thread on what makes RTS''s good or bad. In that I got people saying they wanted more information on the project I was doing. Well I went away to do more on the design doc but then i came up with a different idea ( I did it quickly just to explain my idea so there might be some mistakes ) here go''s: Title: The Uprising (maybe) Genre: RTS/RPG Setting:Different places around Europe and the middle east Time span:Late middle ages Graphicsrobaly 2d or 3d (very) Basic idea: You control one unit (in a Diablo like view ) and try and get people or whole villages to follow you by, for example, talking to people, doing what they ask, helping them defeat an enemy or paying them. If builders follow you, you can order them to build, mine or repair. If warriors follow you then they can fight, If traders follow you, you can get them to trade and so on. But you only control the one person and have to order your followers about. For example, you select to talk to one of your builders and you select the message " Hey I want you builders to build something". He replies, "What would you like me to build? " (the buildings menu pops up), you select the building and where you want to build it, and all available builders come and build it. Same with mines, you ask a guy to build it but only he goes and mines. You have to tell the others to mine for you. Like Diablo, you have an inventory with, for example. weapons, armour, your bag and whats in it, etc. I will probally put in the idea how you advance in "skill" levels by doing things and a day/night cycle. Units, Buildings and others: some of the buildings at the moment are: Fire, tent, camp, horsepen, house, village centre, barracks, training centre, mill, mines, animal farm, plant farm, walls, towers and Castles . Some of the units at the moment are: Swordsmen, archers, horsemen, chariots, catapults, battering rams and mercenaries. Some of the other things in the game are: Trees, gold, silver, stone, animals, caves, brick paths and birds. Storyline: You are a traveller, trying to get rid of an EVIL! king who is oppressing all the people. (Cut back about 10 years) - It is all happy, the land is ruled by a good king (just being good). Until one day he hears about bands of invaders attacking the small villages down south. He immediately marches his whole army south. Meanwhile, the evil king''s army is taking over from the north. The people try to withstand the army but are slaughtered or have to retreat. The evil king takes the good king''s castle and quells any more uprisings. Meanwhile down south the good king''s army have won, and upon hearing the news about his old kingdom he marches the army back north to fight off the evil king. Upon getting there, he realises that they are out numbered, but believes they have a cause and can win. He attacks the castle but half way through the battle he is hit by an arrow. The army have a wounded leader and lose morale, and they are all slaughtered. Only 5 of his best fighters escape. Just before the good king dies, he says there will be a young person who will save them one day. Gameplay: (I will try to show the gameplay by showing what you would do in a level) objectives: destroy an enemy base in the south, the game starts off and you got three guys behind you (on your team) a builder, a scout and a warrior. You move south and find a pack of animals, so you decided this is the place to build a base, wait you don''t have enough resources to build a village center, so select the talk button and click the builder, the writing comes up "what would you like me to do" and 3 options come up like "build something for me", "gather something" or "nothing", You select "build something for me" and the builder says "what would you like me to build?" and a build menu pops up, you select a tent (worse than a village center but better than a fire) and place it above the animals and your builders gos off and kills them and brings them back to the tent, later you tell your guy to get wood and after a while you have enough for a to upgrade your tent to a village center. (to be continued)

All I want is some feedback on if you like it or not and what I could do to improve it.

Sounds cool. Good luck on everything.

Please could people just reply to tell me the views on the design document, I don''t mind a bit of critisizm as long as its about the design, Thanks

I have to inform you that from now on my lead designer/webmaster is taking on the name "Overload" and I have completed the final phase of being named "Lord_jonbon" If you find a post by Overload it will be my web master or i will tell you if it is me.

Overload, just FYI, it may take people time to reply to your thread. Best to let it just sit and check periodically.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Edited by - Wavinator on November 17, 2001 12:13:29 AM

Some feedback:

Pros:
- I think it''s a great idea, a mass-combat/roleplay RTS game. The concept certainly isn''t saturated on the market, so should be a fresh arrival once its released.
- Leading individual, characterized NPCs makes for better depth in a game. If you give characters personality, you go a long way to making them fan-favorites in future releases.
- Perhaps permit assignment of characters in-game to lead groups of NPCs to perform certain tasks (like scouting unexplored map areas, gathering resources) until you give them new tasks or re-delegate.

Cons:
- Some ideas for the backstory... the concept of a remote evil king attacking a virtually abandoned neighboring warring kingdom is hard to swallow... Would King Good leave his home if his neighbor was breathing down his neck? I would talk about characters such as deceitful spies that urged King Good southward, perhaps an assassination as he was headed back home after being ambushed by King Evil''s men. It would certainly make for a more interesting game plot if you had to keep an eye over your shoulder for spies.
- Careful that you don''t make the game too tedious, where you have to find and talk to people to get things done all the time. If you can figure out some sort of AI, automated societal tree structure whereby underlings manage affairs as necessary (for example, the (example) Resource Advisor you choose in the game would automatically assign woodsmen to cut down trees if your town''s supply became low.

This sounds like a very interesting project. Good luck with it!



MatrixCubed
http://MatrixCubed.cjb.net

the same ol idea...

(always anonymous)

Hi, (it''s me Overload, my lead designer/web guy is using the name overload)

Thanks, MatrixCubed. About the storyline: I wrote it quickly just to give people the idea of what happened before the game. (I think there should be some more violince and trechory). About these "lead groups", I already mentioned that there would be builders, scouts, traders ect. Also I like the idea of a kind-of resource advisor, because I wanted as least micro-management and more of a "people doing what there supposed to"

Anyway thanks, Thats about all I can post on (more later) if you need to email me for some reason email me at: wheres_jonny_gone@hotmail.com

P.S (we have a url but the sites only started, i''ll tell you it later)

Ditto the backstory suggestion, remember that even though you''re using some novel ideas, your players still have to care about the kingdom. It will be hard to get them to care if it isn''t believable.

What exactly do you expect of the player''s character? Does he/she have any fighting abilities?

The interface you''ve designed doesn''t imply the presence of singularly enormous battles. The attitude you generate seems to be "me and my buddies" which is not the kind of force you''d send against King Evil''s armies.

Take a peek at Black & White, it uses a simple system to reflect spreading influence. You might want the Player character to be an actual combatant, and gain influence by killing monsters that may terrorize a particular town, or by hunting for food for the townsfolk.

George D. Filiotis
Are you in support of the ban of Dihydrogen Monoxide? You should be!