Dev-Diary #1 - A single player action-RPG

So as I mentioned in some blog responses, I am working on new project. For the last month I have been working on designing an RPG. As the title says it is single player not an MMORPG! it is based on an 8-year old idea that a friend whom I haven't seen in many years originally created and passed to me where I took it to the Deus Ex engine. So it has layed dormant for a couple years and now a month ago I have completely redesigned the world, the title, which I won't say today as I will announce the project with screenshots and the sort of thing in the coming weeks, remains the same as it still is part of the world. In short, I can describe the world in terms of Frank Miller's Sin City, James O'barr's The Crow, and John Woo's Hard Boiled. Gameplay would be described as similar to System Shock 2 and Deus Ex, with more of a emphasis on character development and dialog thru branching dialog which depends on a characters Charisma and Persuasion abilities and skills.

So the core rules design document was done and this past week I have had off so coding went into full swing. I have found I have learned so much in the last year of using Torque. I guess having over ambitious projects and that giving you headaches helps you learn things via failing :) There are a ton of resources I have found that at least set you in a direction you want to go with things.

What is done ::
Character Generation - Attributes, Skills, Model Choice System
Character Sheet - In game character screen, used for viewing character stats and leveling.

In progress ::
Dialog - Branching
Persistence - Saving/Loading
Object Interaction

Not Done ::
Inventory
Mission portals
Journal/Quest Log
Unarmed, Melee, Firearm Combat - Based on attributes and skills
AI

I had contacted Nick Zafiris as I had seen his game Nuclear Nightmare and been following his dev diary since his projects original conception. He has helped answer questions and we will be sharing some of our skills for each others projects. I have also finished work on male and female base models and finally learned how to rig up a character and put it into the engine.