Re: Creating a code free RPG using Sable (video 12), by Ebon Sky Studios
Hi,
Sorry for the late reply, as ever thanks to everyone who posted and for the positive comments. . I’ll answer questions below. Since my reply to BGT lover was longer than I expected and is a huge wall of text, my answers are not in the order that questions came in, so that way I could leave the wall of text replies until the end of the post. Again, sorry for all my long replies below, I think I’d obviously had far too much caffeine/cups of tea before I sat down to write my reply hahaha:
-@number 317. it’s not possible in the current version of Sable but it is a good suggestion. Even though it isn’t possible there are still ways you could prevent a player accessing areas until they are roughly a certain level with the current tools in Sable. One method, which I’ve seen in various main stream games, is add an enemy/boss blocking a path to a certain area. When the player first encounters the enemy they very quickly realize the enemy is far too higher level/strong to defeat , and therefore flee the battle choosing a different path and coming back at a point they feel they have leveled sufficiently to successfully battle and defeat the enemy and then be able to access the area the enemy was blocking. The other method is with keys or quests, you can like in the video series set for example a quest where an npc sets you a task and completing that task will grant you access to a certain area or map. As a developer, you should have an idea of what minimum level a player will be for each of your areas ( this will help with providing good balance to battle/enemies in your game), then you can simply make sure the task you need to complete is in an area where the player would need to be a sufficient level to battle the enemies there. Then when you complete the task for the NPC you know the player will be of roughly that level if not higher, since they wouldn’t have survived the battles otherwise. As for choosing item drops based on level, it’s not strictly possible, but again, as mentioned previously you should have an idea of what level your players should be for each level so you can choose the locations of containers/merchants accordingly, also you can specify what enemies drop, so you can set higher powered item drops for higher level enemies. I appreciate they are not exact fixes to what you were after, but wanted to offer some possible solutions. I do like your idea of areas which can only be accessed based on the exact level of the player, it would work also well with a suggestion from threeblacknoises who suggested enemies which level dependent on players level. Again, as ever I can’t confirm whether these will make it into sable , but are definitely good suggestions.
-@ number 309, I completely agree with stirlock, there really is some irony in your name I’ll try and answer some of your questions/points. As for platforms, yes it is windows only, writing cross platform software is time consuming, I also don’t think a design tool like Sable would be effective on a mobile platform, using a touch screen to build an entire game through a menu driven system like sable would just be impractical . we chose windows, simply as it is probably the most widely used system by audio gamers. As for feature creep, as mentioned in my previous post although we’re happy to keep seeing suggestions coming in and make notes of all good suggestions I pointed out they would be unlikely to make it into the initial release exactly because we didn’t want to fall prey to feature creep. as for your comment saying you thought we were being reluctant to discuss specific details on topics such as compiling/how game distribution will work etc. sorry you feel like this, I’ve always strived to be as upfront and open with all posts which have come in. as mentioned in previous posts however we want to avoid discussing anything which isn’t either 100%concrete , or not yet in Sable as sometimes plans can change and the last thing we want to do is over promise or commit ourselves. . Please do remember the current version of Sable is a prototype designed to find out whether people would be interested in a set of development tools like Sable, to give the community a chance to test our current tools and for us to take onboard feedback and suggestions from the community for things you would like to see in Sable. Yes the prototype is written in BGT , this version will be the first version of Sable to be released, but our intention providing the prototype of Sable is well received is to release a non BGT version of sable written in C# (, there are no dates for this, again we want to avoid discussing future plans and focus on what is here and now, which is the Sable prototype, as not only in development can plans change but also feedback from the community can impact and shape development, based on what people want to see in Sable, and how popular our first game title is and how well received the Sable prototype is, I’m sure people will enjoy it, but if no one likes it, then plans would have to change). As for Phillips message from the other week, yes I saw that, but I don’t think he’s officially supported BGT for some while as the last update was many years ago after he made the BGT engine free. Sure, BGT has its limitations, but let’s not forget there are some great games written with BGT such as manimun 1 (and now mannaman 2 as well, which I look forward to playing when I get some time free
You mentioned about menus, I’m not sure how that shows it is BGT , since due to the complex nature of Sable and that its creation is very menu driven I needed as much flexibility with menus as possible so I wrote the menu code/class myself and they are not the default dynamic menus from BGT, In this way I can create whatever style/type of menu I like, so not all menus in sable are edit field to edit field, it just uses that type for some of the ‘creation tools’ menus, since it seemed the most logical and practical approach for those particular menus. Don’t get me wrong All of the built in stuff in BGT is handy, but if you want true flexibility you are always better off writing your own class’s or functions to fit more uniquely with your own projects, rather than just relying on what is built into BGT, this allows much more flexibility and opens up many more possibilities . Again, I appreciate BGT has its limitations and some issues (which is the reason for the move to C# and why only the prototype is written using BGT ), but I think the main thing to remember with BGT was, that I don’t believe it was ever meant to be the be all and end all of audio game creation, it is just a tool, and often the most important thing with tools is how they are used. i also think many people were introduce to coding for the very first time through BGT, and then used it as a stepping stone language to go on and then learn a full language, I’m sure if we never had BGT we may not have some of the developers we now do, as BGT was the inspiration for some people to go learn a new full language. I respect Philips decision to no longer officially support BGT, but let’s not forget all the hard and good work he put into an engine which has been free for years and most people have not paid a penny for. so I take my hat off to Phillip and wish him all the best with his new projects.
@number 312, thanks for your continued enthusiasm towards the project, regarding languages hopefully you’ve seen my answer above.
@number 313, I completely understand there can be mis interpretations when people write in a language not native to their country, but to address your point, this is exactly why we have been reluctant to discuss anything concrete , or things like release dates as the last thing we want is to over promise or commit ourselves and have people feel we are indebted/obligated, sometimes plans change in development, also in personal life too, recently my dad was taken ill and I’ve been back and forward to hospital with him. I only mention this just to point out you just can’t plan for everything in life. Despite everything though, I’ve still managed to make time to carry on working on Sable/crimson eclipse, create and put out videos to let
everyone know we are still working away and also tried to be active on here and answer all questions which have come In, so don't worry we are all still busy working away on Crimson Eclipse, despite what life throws at us.
Again, as ever thanks everyone for the positive comments and continued support and sorry for my wall of text, i promise less caffeine next time i write replies hahaha
Paul
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