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16

Game design / How do pros create a design document?

« on: November 21, 2007, 09:37:22 PM »

Hi,

ok, so I found a subject for my game, I know the graphics type (rendered 3d) and am starting to write the design document.
I have read the Leisure Suit Larry design documents (I didn't find more)

My problem is that I don't really know how to fit the story, the puzzles, the dialogues etc. into one working logical structure.
How do I prevent chaos? how do I add systems like when you enter a location several times and you have different behaviors each time?
How do you actually structure or organize this in your design document? I mean when I program I have UML, classes etc, a visual structure, but in an adventure game?

The method I am using now is to have a sort story synopsis as guidance and then simply start writing the adventure like a story or a walkthrough. Then I intend to give it more flesh and then finally adding the puzzles or minigames or dialogue choices. Of course, if I have a direct idea for a puzzle or minigame while I am typing the story I add a note.

I would be very glad if some of the pros here (or anybody who has actually finished a working design document successfully ) would post their hints&tips or share their knowledge.

BTW I actually use Treepad for my design document. I own the Busines version but there is also a nice free version here.

17

Technical forum / Re: exporting character files

« on: November 21, 2007, 11:43:22 AM »

don't know if it's any help, but I had to do some massive exporting a few months ago. From XSI to Blitz33 for an architectural walkthrough. The best solution I found was Ultimate Unwrap 3D. Sure it's not free, but it handle's so much formats, and you can really be sure, that the exported files work. Also you can do alot more with this tool. I used it to correct the lightmap for Blitz3d e.g. I wouldn't have managed to finish my work without it. There's a demo too, but it's save disabled.
If you want I can convert a file for you so you can see the result.

18

Software and games / Re: Link with nice pdf's about creating adventures and more...

« on: November 18, 2007, 10:54:13 PM »

A new Link about  the <e-Adventure> project website

The <e-Adventure> project proposes a new model for the development of educational games. With <e-Adventure>, any person can write an educational point & click adventure game with enhanced pedagogical features. The games are stored in a plain text format, and their structure makes them look more like a storyboard document than a piece of source code. This means that the maintenance cost is very low and that it is possible for teachers (or students!) to modify the games to suit specific needs.

The core of the <e-Adventure> project is the <e-Adventure> educational game engine, that runs games defined using the <e-Adventure> language. Developers can use the simplified graphical editor to create the games or directly access the human-readable source documents that describe the adventures using XML markup.

But just writing a game is not enough to exploit the pedagogical potential of educational games. In <e-Adventure>, the language and the engine include support for in-game adaptation and an assessment mechanism that monitors and reports the activity of the student within the game. Additionally, the games can be also integrated with a Learning Management System (LMS), connecting the adaptation and assessment mechanisms with the LMS data flow.In a nutshell, <e-Adventure> games can be written and delivered by instructors as adaptive learning content, they can be included in an online course, and they provide feedback can be used to evaluate and grade the students.

19

Software and games / Link with nice pdf's about creating adventures and more...

« on: November 18, 2007, 02:10:43 AM »

PDF's about adventure creation and more

This one I like very much...

A documental approach to adventure game development

or get it here A documental approach to adventure game development

Haven read it all, but I wanted to let you know before I go to bed

20

Technical forum / Re: Screen resolution

« on: November 15, 2007, 11:41:37 AM »

okay, you're right on that one, so it works for comic style. Of course one could create the artwork squashed a bit so that it's not too stretched on a 16:10

Lets do a small calc..

4/3    =1,3333..
16/10 = 1.6

(1.33333+1.6)/2 = 1.467

so we need 22/15 as ar

21

Feature requests, suggestions / Re: Resolution 16:10 and 4:3 handled automatically

« on: November 14, 2007, 10:41:14 PM »

yes Mnemonic, you can start now 

22

Technical forum / Re: Screen resolution

« on: November 14, 2007, 04:53:10 PM »

Yes, because I have searched the forum here and read many requests about it and I think that many (commercial) games would strongly benefit from it.
IMO it's a really important feature.

23

Feature requests, suggestions / Resolution 16:10 and 4:3 handled automatically

« on: November 14, 2007, 01:06:17 AM »

I don't know what the status is but I would like to 'remember' what synchron wrote and already is on the todo list but is still talked about alot here.

<sychron> i would add an option "isWidescreen".
<sychron> to the global properties
<sychron> if it's set to false, the game is handled as normal
<sychron> and the graphics driver will add the bars.
<sychron> you can autodetect widescreen games by looking at the game size
<sychron> and handle them ...
<sychron> 4:3 games on 4:3 screens --> no problem
<sychron> 16:9 games on 16:9 screens: no problem
<sychron> 16:9 games on 4:3 screens: options bars or zoom
<sychron> 4:3 games on 16:9 screens: options "no change" (let the driver do it) or "crop"
<sychron> and ... each scene get's a parameter "allowScrollingOnAspectDifference" or something like that

I would like to add the option to have it as simple fullscreen window, a black background window and the content (game) in the middle. The window could be with an option to display the window bar, etc.

24

Technical forum / Re: Screen resolution

« on: November 13, 2007, 11:20:58 PM »

hmm, I am not to convinced. I tried Schach-Welten and it DOES look distorted. Tft's are very bad in scaling, it looks smeared.  I did an application with GameMaker some time ago and what's nice is that I can switch between (scaled) full window without borders etc. and normal window. The full screen window thing keeps the correct aspect ratio so I have some black borders, but that's ok. Of course if you need hardware acceleration you would need the correct full-screen. Wouldn't it be possible to create a correct aspect ratio screen and then paste the content in the middle?

E.g the game is in 1280x1024, the tft uses 16:10 , so the smallest res is 1650x1080, so WME creates a full screen in 1650x1050 and pastes the game content in the middle., without scaling.

25

Bug reports / SceneEdit: loosing focus

« on: November 10, 2007, 02:33:57 PM »

Hi, I've been able to continue with the tutorial and I have a minor workflow issue.
When I am in the Scene Editor and add the areas, every time I Alt-Tab to the help file and Alt_Tab back the focus on the selected item/layer is lost. Funnily this only happens when I'm on the waypoints layer. In the main Layer this doesn't happen. When I Alt-Tab back from the waypoints layer the focus is on the Free Entities layer.

I have the newest version.

Thanks

26

Software and games / Re: free and very powerful vectorization tool: VectorMagic

« on: November 05, 2007, 10:27:31 PM »

Yeah, and sorry about the false Anime Studio information 

27

Software and games / free and very powerful vectorization tool: VectorMagic

« on: November 05, 2007, 07:54:46 PM »

Hi, there is a new and free but very powerful vectorization tool out there.
Check VectorMagic

28

Technical forum / Re: Screen resolution

« on: November 05, 2007, 07:43:44 PM »

A 1024x768 game on a 1680x1050 screen doesn't look very good imo. Scaling to the dimension is ugly on a tft.
A black background and the game in the middle would look best.

29

Technical forum / Re: Screen resolution

« on: November 05, 2007, 12:37:02 PM »

Isn't it possible to create a window - not a fullscreen - without any bars and window handles, make it as big as the screen, black and place the game in the middle of it with the games resolution?
Like a game window in a true window?

30

Technical forum / Re: Hi everybody and on I go with a few 'essential' questions :)

« on: November 05, 2007, 12:29:33 PM »

If you include the dcscomp.dll file with the game, the engine will be able to compile scripts on-the-fly

uh, this is great! Many fields for experimentation with this scripting language, wonderful.

I would like to thank you all for your help, hopefully I will manage to show something in not to far a time