Frayed Knights: Top-Down Development
by Jay Barnson · 05/28/2007 (11:01 am) · 10 comments
Last month, I talked about how I would be publicly documenting my development on Frayed Knights. So far, it has been a successful experiment.
In particular, I ran into some troubles early on with my initial control scheme. I am trying to make Frayed Knights completely playable with the mouse - all keyboard controls are either shortcuts to mouse commands, or allow access to optional functionality (like walking sideways). My initial control scheme, based on vague recollections of classic games, turned out to be ... less than optimal. Like completely unusable.
While I've got a lot of ideas about how to resolve the situation, several community members have been extremely helpful in providing suggestions and alternatives. So something is working here.
Another thing I'm doing right now is "top-down" development. As a fan of the evolutionary prototype methodology, my initial efforts (after getting a design doc done - yes, I bothered to do an actual honest-to-goodness design doc for this game, as it's an RPG and I'm a little frightened by the complexity) have been focused on getting all of the game elements in place in at least a prototype state. The idea is that once I have a "complete" prototype in place, I can begin hammering on it in either one-month or two-week development cycles to refine the game, replace semi-functional code with more-functional code, polish, and so forth.
Unfortunately, trying to throw together the entire game at once in a prototype stage means less-than-beautiful results. But hey, it's fun to see menus put together, even if they are full of stand-in content.
This week, I'm working on the heart of any RPG (well, any RPG I've ever played, at least): COMBAT! Combat is turn-based in Frayed Knights, and let me tell you just HOW fun that will be working with things like spell durations when moving around in the game is in real-time. Ah, well. Combat is going to make heavy (or heavier) use of TGB's 2D capabilities, as I've mashed TGB into TGE to make Frayed Knights tick. There will be a lot of 2D particles and nifty animated 2D UI elements to make things more visually exciting.
In case you were interested in following how things have progressed, the updates from the last few weeks are available here:
Frayed Knights: Design Doc Fun
Frayed Knights: The Scoping Saw
Frayed Knights: Getting Around
Frayed Knights: Mocking (up) Conversations
Frayed Knights also has an official website where you can find all updates here:
FrayedKnights.com
Anyway - there's the scoop.
In other news, I got my LAST bit of 2D artwork for Apocalypse Cow, and some really awesome music for the game. Oh, and I've also enjoyed (well, "enjoyed" might be something of an overstatement) working on the Wii lately on the non-indie title "Space Station Tycoon." If you guys remember the indie PC game "Outpost Kaloki" (and the XBox 360 Live Arcade game "Outpost Kaloki X"), let me be the first to tell you... this ain't it! Yeah, it bears a family resemblance... in the way that Diablo resembled Rogue... but it's a pretty different game.
In particular, I ran into some troubles early on with my initial control scheme. I am trying to make Frayed Knights completely playable with the mouse - all keyboard controls are either shortcuts to mouse commands, or allow access to optional functionality (like walking sideways). My initial control scheme, based on vague recollections of classic games, turned out to be ... less than optimal. Like completely unusable.While I've got a lot of ideas about how to resolve the situation, several community members have been extremely helpful in providing suggestions and alternatives. So something is working here.
Another thing I'm doing right now is "top-down" development. As a fan of the evolutionary prototype methodology, my initial efforts (after getting a design doc done - yes, I bothered to do an actual honest-to-goodness design doc for this game, as it's an RPG and I'm a little frightened by the complexity) have been focused on getting all of the game elements in place in at least a prototype state. The idea is that once I have a "complete" prototype in place, I can begin hammering on it in either one-month or two-week development cycles to refine the game, replace semi-functional code with more-functional code, polish, and so forth.
Unfortunately, trying to throw together the entire game at once in a prototype stage means less-than-beautiful results. But hey, it's fun to see menus put together, even if they are full of stand-in content. This week, I'm working on the heart of any RPG (well, any RPG I've ever played, at least): COMBAT! Combat is turn-based in Frayed Knights, and let me tell you just HOW fun that will be working with things like spell durations when moving around in the game is in real-time. Ah, well. Combat is going to make heavy (or heavier) use of TGB's 2D capabilities, as I've mashed TGB into TGE to make Frayed Knights tick. There will be a lot of 2D particles and nifty animated 2D UI elements to make things more visually exciting.
In case you were interested in following how things have progressed, the updates from the last few weeks are available here:
Frayed Knights: Design Doc FunFrayed Knights: The Scoping Saw
Frayed Knights: Getting Around
Frayed Knights: Mocking (up) Conversations
Frayed Knights also has an official website where you can find all updates here:
FrayedKnights.com
Anyway - there's the scoop.
In other news, I got my LAST bit of 2D artwork for Apocalypse Cow, and some really awesome music for the game. Oh, and I've also enjoyed (well, "enjoyed" might be something of an overstatement) working on the Wii lately on the non-indie title "Space Station Tycoon." If you guys remember the indie PC game "Outpost Kaloki" (and the XBox 360 Live Arcade game "Outpost Kaloki X"), let me be the first to tell you... this ain't it! Yeah, it bears a family resemblance... in the way that Diablo resembled Rogue... but it's a pretty different game.
About the author
Jay has been a mainstream and indie game developer for a... uh, long time. His professional start came in 1994 developing titles for the then-unknown and upcoming Sony Playstation. He runs Rampant Games and blogs at Tales of the Rampant Coyote.
#2
05/28/2007 (2:37 pm)
If I do show it in July, it will only be an on-request kinda thing. I imagine it'll still be highly stand-in looking. 
#3
It`s really cool to see your thought process and all the little changes/iterations. Well, in kind of bulletin-form, but cool nevertheless :)
05/28/2007 (2:47 pm)
Pure goodness! :)It`s really cool to see your thought process and all the little changes/iterations. Well, in kind of bulletin-form, but cool nevertheless :)
#4
Can't wait to see this in action...
05/28/2007 (3:32 pm)
Can I officially request you show it, then? ;)Can't wait to see this in action...
#5
05/28/2007 (6:10 pm)
Nice write-up, interesting screenshots, keep up the good work! :0) 
#6
05/28/2007 (11:40 pm)
Nice work Jay, glad to see you working on an RPG, I check your blog daily, always an interesting read.
#7
Anyway, I'll bring it next indie night. Just don't blame me if you go blind looking at it. But I'll bring it! :)
If you guys have any suggestions, please post 'em! That's kind of the reason for doing this. I know there's not a whole lot to comment on yet, but feel free.
05/29/2007 (12:25 am)
Heh... "interesting screenshots" - the content isn't (yet) a whole lot more than stock Torque, I know... but oh well...Anyway, I'll bring it next indie night. Just don't blame me if you go blind looking at it. But I'll bring it! :)
If you guys have any suggestions, please post 'em! That's kind of the reason for doing this. I know there's not a whole lot to comment on yet, but feel free.
#8
05/29/2007 (4:37 am)
Oh, I wasn't intending to be sarcastic or rude regarding the screenshots (in case it read that way), I know some/most of it is stock, but I guess what I should of perhaps said was interesting interface (speech bubbles and so forth), anyhow I look forward to the successful progress of this project and the future write- ups :0) 
#9
05/29/2007 (6:28 am)
Very interesting idea- cartoony characters might be a strong point of your project. I'll surely keep an eye on it.
#10
One of the tricks with cartoony characters is that they have to - to some degree - match the surrounding environment. Since I *will* be working with a bit of stock content, that means modifying the 3D world to make them more cartoony, and modifying the characters to make them a little less so.
Hopefully I will get there.
I have the DrewFX skeleton pack for the games (sole) enemy monsters right now... I'll have to see what I can do about scrubbing the textures to make them a little less realistic. Which I hate to do, because they really do look pretty good as-is.
05/30/2007 (2:12 pm)
No worries, Leroy... I just know how far they are from anything reasonable yet. I *HOPE* they will be much better on release. One of the tricks with cartoony characters is that they have to - to some degree - match the surrounding environment. Since I *will* be working with a bit of stock content, that means modifying the 3D world to make them more cartoony, and modifying the characters to make them a little less so.
Hopefully I will get there.
I have the DrewFX skeleton pack for the games (sole) enemy monsters right now... I'll have to see what I can do about scrubbing the textures to make them a little less realistic. Which I hate to do, because they really do look pretty good as-is.
Torque 3D Owner Marcus Daw