3D Nethack
by Jeff Tunnell · in Game Design and Creative Issues · 02/19/2001 (9:34 am) · 7 replies
From the old GarageGames original posted by Kavik Kang: I love this idea... Jeff
It would be cool to have a good thread going here where we all contribute ideas to a single game concept. I tried to start that with the castle game idea I posted a while back, but not enough people were interested in that idea. But lot's of people seemed interested in 3D NetHack...
We should all just start throwing around ideas for 3D NetHack, that would be fun. So far, in the previous thread in a different section, I think we had the following ideas for it...
1) It would be pretty much just like NetHack, but made with a 3D engine (not first person).
2) It could be "semi real-time" (like Baulder's Gate) because fully real-time would just be a Diablo clone.
3) It should retain the basics of NetHack, randomly generated levels, if you die the game is over, would only take 6-8 hours to complete but would actually take hundreds of hours of play tome to actually achieve victory.
4) I had added that I thought it would be really cool to make the character classes work like the original Wizardry, where you change class after reaching a certain level and retain the abilities of all past classes in the new class. A good "tree" could be made with, for example, pure warriors on the left, pure magicians on the right, archers up the middle, and lots of mixed ability classes in between.
There might have been more, but that's what I remember from that thread. Most of us seem to have played NetHack, it would be fun to take this idea farther in this thread. Maybe someone will make it, I'd sure love to play it.
It would be cool to have a good thread going here where we all contribute ideas to a single game concept. I tried to start that with the castle game idea I posted a while back, but not enough people were interested in that idea. But lot's of people seemed interested in 3D NetHack...
We should all just start throwing around ideas for 3D NetHack, that would be fun. So far, in the previous thread in a different section, I think we had the following ideas for it...
1) It would be pretty much just like NetHack, but made with a 3D engine (not first person).
2) It could be "semi real-time" (like Baulder's Gate) because fully real-time would just be a Diablo clone.
3) It should retain the basics of NetHack, randomly generated levels, if you die the game is over, would only take 6-8 hours to complete but would actually take hundreds of hours of play tome to actually achieve victory.
4) I had added that I thought it would be really cool to make the character classes work like the original Wizardry, where you change class after reaching a certain level and retain the abilities of all past classes in the new class. A good "tree" could be made with, for example, pure warriors on the left, pure magicians on the right, archers up the middle, and lots of mixed ability classes in between.
There might have been more, but that's what I remember from that thread. Most of us seem to have played NetHack, it would be fun to take this idea farther in this thread. Maybe someone will make it, I'd sure love to play it.
About the author
#2
It would be nice if in addition to stopping time, as in Baldur's Gate, you could also speed up time, like the running in Angband, and I presume NetHack.
Anything besides real-time means no competive play, and could hurt co-op as well. But since it benefits single-player, it seems more true to the original to have non-real-time.
Any sort of top-down view IMO implies that the action should take place in a dungeon-style atmosphere, where your in-game line-of-sight can mimic your realistic line-of-sight. In Diablo II it is ridiculous that you can't see an area you can run to in less than a second on an open plain.
A version of NetHack for PDAs would be nice too, and could be part of the same product assuming: a) It can fit on a small screen. If you went with a top-down view, and allow pausing, then you could use the same basic interface regardless of the size of the screen, though larger would make things easier, you could always pause and scroll around.
b) you don't need too many buttons of input. Though, again, as long as movement isn't time-critical you can simulate a lot of buttons with just a few, but that could be irritating.
Seems doable, though not necessarily desirable. What do other people think?
Personally, I'd like to have all resembalances to D&D ripped out and replaced with GURPS style stuff... i.e. armor reduces damage taken in addition to making you harder to hit, no classes at all, no levels... but I don't really expect other people to agree, so that may be a mod of this game if it gets made, or my own project someday
02/19/2001 (9:35 am)
From Ondo:It would be nice if in addition to stopping time, as in Baldur's Gate, you could also speed up time, like the running in Angband, and I presume NetHack.
Anything besides real-time means no competive play, and could hurt co-op as well. But since it benefits single-player, it seems more true to the original to have non-real-time.
Any sort of top-down view IMO implies that the action should take place in a dungeon-style atmosphere, where your in-game line-of-sight can mimic your realistic line-of-sight. In Diablo II it is ridiculous that you can't see an area you can run to in less than a second on an open plain.
A version of NetHack for PDAs would be nice too, and could be part of the same product assuming: a) It can fit on a small screen. If you went with a top-down view, and allow pausing, then you could use the same basic interface regardless of the size of the screen, though larger would make things easier, you could always pause and scroll around.
b) you don't need too many buttons of input. Though, again, as long as movement isn't time-critical you can simulate a lot of buttons with just a few, but that could be irritating.
Seems doable, though not necessarily desirable. What do other people think?
Personally, I'd like to have all resembalances to D&D ripped out and replaced with GURPS style stuff... i.e. armor reduces damage taken in addition to making you harder to hit, no classes at all, no levels... but I don't really expect other people to agree, so that may be a mod of this game if it gets made, or my own project someday
#3
I wonder how well a PDA would handle the 3d environment. If it could, that would be a neat idea. Much of the interface problems could be solved by having it mostly work via mouse clicks on the screen with hotkeys for people who prefer to work with thier keyboard. That way the interface remains universal to both platforms.
I think it's more in line with the NetHack ideal to keep the character class and level idea. I know the concept is outdated in this modern gaming world, and I would never use it in my own tabletop RPG, but it does lend to the visceral satisfaction of playing the game. A lot of the fun in a game like NetHack is gaining levels and getting new stuff. I'm sure this is why Blizzard maintained the idea in Diablo. There's no space for "character growth" in a dungeon hack 'n slash game, so you might as well make it as D&D-ish as possible.
-Roy
PS -- that last bit was not meant to be a disparagement of D&D. (well, not officially, at least...:)
02/19/2001 (9:35 am)
From Roy Huggins:I wonder how well a PDA would handle the 3d environment. If it could, that would be a neat idea. Much of the interface problems could be solved by having it mostly work via mouse clicks on the screen with hotkeys for people who prefer to work with thier keyboard. That way the interface remains universal to both platforms.
I think it's more in line with the NetHack ideal to keep the character class and level idea. I know the concept is outdated in this modern gaming world, and I would never use it in my own tabletop RPG, but it does lend to the visceral satisfaction of playing the game. A lot of the fun in a game like NetHack is gaining levels and getting new stuff. I'm sure this is why Blizzard maintained the idea in Diablo. There's no space for "character growth" in a dungeon hack 'n slash game, so you might as well make it as D&D-ish as possible.
-Roy
PS -- that last bit was not meant to be a disparagement of D&D. (well, not officially, at least...:)
#4
02/19/2001 (9:55 am)
Have you seen Egoboo (egoboo.sourceforge.net)? It has been compared to Nethack a number of times, it is Open Source, and I know that they are about to release an OpenGL port. 
#5
http://www.hut.fi/~jtpelto2/nethack.html
Akiva
03/20/2001 (4:52 am)
Check out Falcon's Eye, an isometric graphics interface to NetHack.http://www.hut.fi/~jtpelto2/nethack.html
Akiva
#6
http://egoboo.sourceforge.net/
04/14/2001 (5:20 pm)
Then there's allso Egoboo, not as much a 3D interface to Nethack but an attempt to recreate nethack like gameplay in real time, with a 3D world.... they have quite an interesting graphical style to boot, similar to old Final Fantasy titles, but in 3Dhttp://egoboo.sourceforge.net/
#7
Two things that I would focus on in a game like this in order to retain what appeals (at least, to me) to players of Nethack.
First, Nethack has a very rich set of interactions between a finite set of items. There is very little to compare to Diablo's item modifiers in Nethack, and that seems to work fine. Having a similar set of interactions seems an important part of the game.
Second, Nethack is a strategy game, and personally I think that making it a real-time game would be a mistake. You have an extensive inventory (unlike Diablo), where quickly selecting an item to help kill off the approaching critter is difficult. Especially in Nethack, where you frequently use combinations of items to do something. Someone mentioned allowing to speed up and slow down time, and possibly that could be an option. But personally, I like pure turn-based when it comes to strategy.
And stuff...
04/17/2001 (8:35 am)
Well, this is an old thread, but I just found it so I'm going to reply to it anyway. Take it.Two things that I would focus on in a game like this in order to retain what appeals (at least, to me) to players of Nethack.
First, Nethack has a very rich set of interactions between a finite set of items. There is very little to compare to Diablo's item modifiers in Nethack, and that seems to work fine. Having a similar set of interactions seems an important part of the game.
Second, Nethack is a strategy game, and personally I think that making it a real-time game would be a mistake. You have an extensive inventory (unlike Diablo), where quickly selecting an item to help kill off the approaching critter is difficult. Especially in Nethack, where you frequently use combinations of items to do something. Someone mentioned allowing to speed up and slow down time, and possibly that could be an option. But personally, I like pure turn-based when it comes to strategy.
And stuff...
Torque Owner Jeff Tunnell
We'd also want to create a simple system for creating new monsters, items, etc. One should be able to make new modules for these things that will automatically add themselves to the local NetHack install when executed.
Along those lines, it could be lots of fun to allow people to create custom "dungeons" and even populate them with traps, treasures and monsters. Wasn't Dungeon Keeper supposed to do this in its early stages? I understand that Neverwinter Nights will allow this, but I'm sure it will work a little differently.
Basically, it seems to me that if we make the content of the game easily extensible (which would be a good way to go on this project), it would be a relatively simple matter to basically create a "GM"ing version of the game.
I know I'd play it...:)
-Roy