Hi Dark, I've thought of doing this many times, but as has already ben said the problem is time. I could spend x hours thinking of nifty ways to hide items, to add unlockable content, etc but unfortunately most users will have solved the puzzles in a week reducing the replay value of the game.
For instance, all of the Tomb Raider games are good about putting items in very unusual locations.Sometimes items are hidden inside other items such as a med kit hidden inside a saramic jar. Either that or there is a maze of sorts required to locate a certain item such as: climb a stone wall to a ledge, run and jump onto a hire ledge, then jump from that ledge a few feet away, and look in a niche to find an artifact or weapon. That's cool, but how many hours did the programmers spend thinking up and then coding all that extra content into the game just to get that one specific item. Its not beyond an independent developer's abilities to do, but it will take a lot more extra time to think up and then program. The other issue is how to draw a blind gamer's attention to the secret stash. In games like Tomb Raider the niche is visible, but fits into the background so well that a person may miss it a few times when playing. In addition there are niches placed in the game that contain nothing which are a bit of a red haring. I suppose a person could have a hot key that speaks something like, "niche above and to the right 3 meters." That might work from an accessibility standpoint, but if you have to tell someone where the niche in the wall is that is as good as giving away half the secret right there. About the only way I can see to kind of hide items is to use pictures or images in various rooms. That is have it mention there is a picture on the wall in each room. Some are nothing more than pictures, but if you press enter on the right one it will swing out revealing a hidden corridor or perhaps a niche in the wall where goodies are stached. This forces the player to try each and every picture in the game to find out if items are hidden behind it. Cheers! --- Gamers mailing list __ Gamers@audyssey.org If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to gamers-unsubscr...@audyssey.org. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://mail.audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/gamers@audyssey.org. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to gamers-ow...@audyssey.org.
