Follow-up Comment #1, task #3541 (project wormux):
I asked if the README was not enough:
> On 11/22/06, Eddy Petrișor wrote:
>
>> Isn't the information in /usr/share/doc/README to get you started?
>
>
> hello eddy,
>
> /usr/share/doc/wormux/README does indeed have information about keys
> to use, but i'm thinking about the newbies who have no idea where a
> readme would be and how to get started with a game like this. even
> the readme doesn't describe the objective of the game. i am
> wishlisting a first brief map that will start of by saying press this
> key, aim with this, shoot with this, select weapons with this, your
> goal is to wipe out all the other chars, etc.
>
> thanks for your consideration.
Also, I have proposed 3 alternative ways to solve this in a message to the
-dev list (message <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, sorry, the web archive
doesn't seem to be updated, so I can't provide a link, so I'll duplicate the
text here).
------------------------------
Proposals for the fix:
1) Interactive tutorial
Details: fully interactive tutorial
+ nicest
+ verbose
+ cool
- many special things to do (teams don't take turns, special initial
conditions for rounds, go to next tutorial[1], etc)
2) semi-interactive tutorial (maybe precording?)
Details: menu entry which leads to a series of images/videos+explanations
about the weapons, changing characters, etc
+ easier to implement
+ would not need major changes in the game and to modify the existent code to
do special stuff
- if videos are used, dependency on a video player is needed (we could use
subsequent images which are changed
cyclically[2])
- users will learn slower than with the interactive method, but that would be
good enough
- later changes in the game might make the prerecodings/images to become
obsolete
3) make a web page with the explanations, images and add a menu entry that
would just inform the user to open the file
with the browser in the place where it was installed (that path could be
defined in a string that would be set during
./configure, so is always correct)
+ really easy to do
+ could add a tutorial on wormux.org, too
- not interactive
- needs the user to start the browser (altough I have seen games opening
homepages of the project in a browser, I am not
sure if that is portable)
- the user might give up to use the tutorial due to the extra effort
(remember, he just wants to play ;-) )
Explanations:
A menu entry "Start tutorial" would go to the tutorial menu, whatever we
might decide to implment it like.
1) Interactive tutorial:
The menu would be:
- a list of "shooting lessons" and/or
- an "uneven game" where only the user can fire until a target it hit (and
allow the user to cancel/end that).
How I see those to act is:
* choose a "shooting lesson" or "uneven game"
* play an audio with instruction (catch, needs localization :-) - this
could be fun ) or with text on the screen like is
used for the messages in the game, but with a bigger font.
* in the audio/text instructions tell the user about the meaning of the
different bars indicators and area; tell about
how to select a weapon; tell how to circle beween players at the beginig of
the round.
* acompany the things above with nice arrows or something similar (the arrow
used to indicate the current user might be
useful) where necessary
* let the user try the things showed (if is the case - for things like select
weapons it could be, but not for wind
change, unless the user is given a jetpack and asked to go up twice in a row,
one with wind and one without)
* let the user have always a button "I am done with this lesson" that would
allow him to quit at any given time
Probably it would be rather complex with not so much return value (except for
the publicity points) to actually have an
interactive tutorial like "play an instruction, let user comply, next step,
next instruction, let user comply", unless
there is an easy way to make a modification to allow a game to have shots
only for one team, without switching it. Extra
features like replay instructions would be also nice, but I am not sure ...
2) semi-interactive tutorial (maybe precordings?)
I think this could be a good compromise between difficulty of implementing
the interactive tutorial in the game and
having something nice withing the game.
Probably it would be best to use cycling images that are shown in sequence
(img n+1 replaces img n in the same area of
the screen, so it looks like an animation. An alternative would be to use
some mpegs (with or without sound? [3]), but
that would blow up the size of the source
3) is simple enough not to need supplemental info
Whatever approach might be used these are my lesson proposals:
- pick a weapon
- bazooka target shooting - show witch is that
- grenade - wind influences (or not?) the direction, collisions with objects,
suicide :-D
- baseball bat
- air strike
- supertux
- gifts
- switching characters at the beginning of the round
- mine/dinamite weapon + scenario mines
- drowning, suicide by leaving the map/drowning, + kamikaze
What do you say?
[1] could be avoided if the user it told to exit when done and choose himself
the next tutorial
[2] maybe 5 to 10 images per explanation would be enough - resolution of
images would be small since it could cut the
intersting area only in order not use the whole screen and to prevent a huge
increase in the -data part of the game
[3] sound would need to be localized, so you need video separated from audio
track and you might also need to sync them,
fun fun fun :-D
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