Do you enjoy letting your fantasy run wild?
If so you might enjoy this, too.
I for one want to tell a story in the ORPG I'm currently working on. I know that the typical guy on bnet refuses to read whatsoever, but let's ignore that for a second.
Here is how it works: Let me outline the map, with its terrain, the important characters and the game mechanics. From that point it's up to you: Drama, tension, love whatever you think should be there.
Terrain
It's a war scenario. The area is mostly destroyed. Burning trees, dead bodies, wrecked, abandonned houses. In the East there's a zerg-infested canyon, to the west a human city. These two battle constantly. To the south there are some mystic ruins where protoss live. But nobody really knows why they are there. Maybe you do? In the middle of the map there's a small campsite, where the player arives.
Characters
Right now theres Karass, who welcomes the player. Pretty much all the other characters are rather generic and really replacable. If you want closer insight I will gladly show you ingame.
Game Mechanics
The most important thing here, really the most important thing overall, is to know that the game has a custom dialog system. You can always answer in a good, bad or neutral fashion. I'm not forcing anyone to do anything, but I strongly encourage to use this feature as much as possible! Ideally the story would have key points where the player has to side with one or another party. Also know that the player behaviour is recorded and saved. Players are currently separated into the good players and the bad players. These player groups are a key part of the map, because they can battle and compete against each other.
Also, the world is seperated in different levels, so I can easily add the terrain you need. Currently there's the following levels: Forest, Swamp, Miner's Camp, Ambushed Valley, Lost Forge.
Well, that became quite the wall of text. Kudos to you if you're still reading, you're certainly not bnet material! ;-)
To sum up
Would you like to design a story for this map? There's no actual triggering/scripting/programing involved.
I'd love to give you a hand...,
just pm me more of what you need... I'm sure you have more to say on it... your story so far, the type of levels (getting use to it, dwelling in it easy through hardcore etc), the type of choices you'd envisioned and how they'd affect the "quest" and so on...
If you want an example of the type of story I've developed for my own mod, just pm me and we'll swap...
kudos if you can implement all the features you described in the op.
yes i would. but as burne said if u add cinematics it will be more intresting. or add things that happen instead of just text (like wow did when cata hit)
I would love to add cinematics, I'm not sure whats the best way to do it, though.
An example: In your cinematic you just want to show how a small village is attacked by zerg. Sounds easy enough. But with 6 players on the map, who may very well trigger the cinematic at completely different times or, which is even worse, shortly after each other it becomes challenging. Do you create a seperate area where the units and doodads for the cinematic are created? Can you show units to one player only? That would actually solve a lot of issues.
I think the major problem is not the story...its how its told! If its just plain wall of text in a dialog box, then its SO SO SO boring.
If you add cinematics to the story, it might work and make it interesting.
You will probly have to make cinematics that way that they can display for all players at any time.
example: zerg attack village, make units gain more hp than they do damage and you can show it whenever you like. I would probly add trigger when they start attack and when they stop (and start again if nobody is watching)....meh I hate explaining this, but I hope you get the picture (the units shouldnt just stand there..and units shouldnt do anything if nobody is watching).
or you could spawn new unit when one dies...wotever...there is always a way :)
I think it might be interesting to use hi-def models and such to make quality cut-scenes. Then make a video of the scene on your computer and then simply playing the video in the map editor rather than requiring the user to have a high spec computer to see all the glory.
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Do you like to tell a good story?
Do you enjoy letting your fantasy run wild? If so you might enjoy this, too.
I for one want to tell a story in the ORPG I'm currently working on. I know that the typical guy on bnet refuses to read whatsoever, but let's ignore that for a second.
Here is how it works: Let me outline the map, with its terrain, the important characters and the game mechanics. From that point it's up to you: Drama, tension, love whatever you think should be there.
Terrain
It's a war scenario. The area is mostly destroyed. Burning trees, dead bodies, wrecked, abandonned houses. In the East there's a zerg-infested canyon, to the west a human city. These two battle constantly. To the south there are some mystic ruins where protoss live. But nobody really knows why they are there. Maybe you do? In the middle of the map there's a small campsite, where the player arives.
Characters
Right now theres Karass, who welcomes the player. Pretty much all the other characters are rather generic and really replacable. If you want closer insight I will gladly show you ingame.
Game Mechanics
The most important thing here, really the most important thing overall, is to know that the game has a custom dialog system. You can always answer in a good, bad or neutral fashion. I'm not forcing anyone to do anything, but I strongly encourage to use this feature as much as possible! Ideally the story would have key points where the player has to side with one or another party. Also know that the player behaviour is recorded and saved. Players are currently separated into the good players and the bad players. These player groups are a key part of the map, because they can battle and compete against each other.
Also, the world is seperated in different levels, so I can easily add the terrain you need. Currently there's the following levels: Forest, Swamp, Miner's Camp, Ambushed Valley, Lost Forge.
Well, that became quite the wall of text. Kudos to you if you're still reading, you're certainly not bnet material! ;-)
To sum up
Would you like to design a story for this map? There's no actual triggering/scripting/programing involved.
Greetings, Obatztrara
@Obatztrara: Go
I'd love to give you a hand..., just pm me more of what you need... I'm sure you have more to say on it... your story so far, the type of levels (getting use to it, dwelling in it easy through hardcore etc), the type of choices you'd envisioned and how they'd affect the "quest" and so on... If you want an example of the type of story I've developed for my own mod, just pm me and we'll swap... kudos if you can implement all the features you described in the op.
I think the major problem is not the story...its how its told! If its just plain wall of text in a dialog box, then its SO SO SO boring.
If you add cinematics to the story, it might work and make it interesting.
yes i would. but as burne said if u add cinematics it will be more intresting. or add things that happen instead of just text (like wow did when cata hit)
I would love to add cinematics, I'm not sure whats the best way to do it, though.
An example: In your cinematic you just want to show how a small village is attacked by zerg. Sounds easy enough. But with 6 players on the map, who may very well trigger the cinematic at completely different times or, which is even worse, shortly after each other it becomes challenging. Do you create a seperate area where the units and doodads for the cinematic are created? Can you show units to one player only? That would actually solve a lot of issues.
@houndofbasker: I'll get back to you! :-)
@Obatztrara: Go
You will probly have to make cinematics that way that they can display for all players at any time.
example: zerg attack village, make units gain more hp than they do damage and you can show it whenever you like. I would probly add trigger when they start attack and when they stop (and start again if nobody is watching)....meh I hate explaining this, but I hope you get the picture (the units shouldnt just stand there..and units shouldnt do anything if nobody is watching).
or you could spawn new unit when one dies...wotever...there is always a way :)
I think it might be interesting to use hi-def models and such to make quality cut-scenes. Then make a video of the scene on your computer and then simply playing the video in the map editor rather than requiring the user to have a high spec computer to see all the glory.