Worlds of Darkness!

Game development for MBBS/WG
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Questman
Posts: 160
Joined: Fri Aug 07, 2020 2:12 pm
Location: Raleigh, NC
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Worlds of Darkness!

Post by Questman »

Worlds of Darkness! has never actually been released before. It was an ambitious project from Ralph & Jeff at Wizard Software & GraphicWares (GWW ISV code) and was about... 60%? (give or take) completed for the DOS BBSes before it was left unfinished at the end of the BBS era.

It's been ported up, some loose ends have been tied up, and the game plays. There are definitely things missing - monsters don't have any inventory, there's some unfinished feature sets. Ideally, I'd love feedback on what should be added. But it's oddly fun... a dungeon crawl like wolfenstein mixed with the pit.

It's on bbs.elwynor.com testing for stability.
Founder, The Major BBS Restoration Project
Owner, Elwynor Technologies ISV
Former Owner, Galacticomm IP (2005-2020)
Contributor, Galacticomm IP baseline

Kracken
Posts: 77
Joined: Sat Aug 08, 2020 1:12 pm

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by Kracken »

Some ideas:

- Story: You start and don't know what to do next. And as much as I could explore, I didn't found any quest, any hints. So I just move around
There are couple landmarks, but no clues as to what needs to be done to progress.

- Leveling is not working. I reached level 1 rather quickly, and then no longer progress.

- Most of the textures are plain white walls. So it feels like you start in a maze, even though you are apparently in a city (weapon shop nearby)
While white walls everywhere are fine in a maze, 99.9% of this game is like that. Navigating your way around gets old quickly.

IE: You see a door NE. you want to go there.. so you turn "right" (no longer see the door, facing white wall), then move forward.. then as you attempt to turn left to face door, a mob appears and you are in the "PIT" ascii view. When you come back, you have to remember to turn left as you were in the process of reaching the door.
You easily get distracted this way, and get lost pretty quick. If you missed and press right, you're completely disoriented.
I think the game puts too much such "mob encounters" but maybe with more visual cues this wouldn't be such a problem?

I suppose the original authors intended to add "town", "forest", "cave" themed textures to clearly delimit areas and make navigation more enjoyable.

- At level 2, you are invincible, without weapons (they aren't working anyway). In the "pit" view (combat), since you are constantly distracted from 3-D navigating,
you always rush to the exit or quickly kill the mob, whichever is fastest. Since mobs aren't challenging, these are "in the way" of your exploration.

So, the engine looks great, but I think what's missing is mostly on the content/data side.

Questman
Posts: 160
Joined: Fri Aug 07, 2020 2:12 pm
Location: Raleigh, NC
Contact:

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by Questman »

You're absolutely right. I think the game is maybe 60% there. I have a list somewhere from the original developers that was a worklist. I'll post it when I dig it up. They got super ambitious and that distracted from making a base game that's playable long term.

I'd love more collaboration to finish this off, though!
Founder, The Major BBS Restoration Project
Owner, Elwynor Technologies ISV
Former Owner, Galacticomm IP (2005-2020)
Contributor, Galacticomm IP baseline

daniel_spain
Posts: 395
Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2020 2:39 am

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by daniel_spain »

Questman wrote:
> You're absolutely right. I think the game is maybe 60% there. I have a
> list somewhere from the original developers that was a worklist. I'll post
> it when I dig it up. They got super ambitious and that distracted from
> making a base game that's playable long term.
>
> I'd love more collaboration to finish this off, though!

i am a former game designer from Origin (of EA games) i am sure we can come up with
some things and even an end-game to give the game replayability after getting the
final level.

daniel_spain
Posts: 395
Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2020 2:39 am

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by daniel_spain »

Kracken wrote:
> Some ideas:
>
> - Story: You start and don't know what to do next. And as much as I could
> explore, I didn't found any quest, any hints. So I just move around
> There are couple landmarks, but no clues as to what needs to be done to
> progress.
>
> - Leveling is not working. I reached level 1 rather quickly, and then no
> longer progress.
>
> - Most of the textures are plain white walls. So it feels like you start in
> a maze, even though you are apparently in a city (weapon shop nearby)
> While white walls everywhere are fine in a maze, 99.9% of this game is like
> that. Navigating your way around gets old quickly.
>
> IE: You see a door NE. you want to go there.. so you turn "right"
> (no longer see the door, facing white wall), then move forward.. then as
> you attempt to turn left to face door, a mob appears and you are in the
> "PIT" ascii view. When you come back, you have to remember to
> turn left as you were in the process of reaching the door.
> You easily get distracted this way, and get lost pretty quick. If you
> missed and press right, you're completely disoriented.
> I think the game puts too much such "mob encounters" but maybe
> with more visual cues this wouldn't be such a problem?
>
> I suppose the original authors intended to add "town",
> "forest", "cave" themed textures to clearly delimit
> areas and make navigation more enjoyable.
>
> - At level 2, you are invincible, without weapons (they aren't working
> anyway). In the "pit" view (combat), since you are constantly
> distracted from 3-D navigating,
> you always rush to the exit or quickly kill the mob, whichever is fastest.
> Since mobs aren't challenging, these are "in the way" of your
> exploration.
>
> So, the engine looks great, but I think what's missing is mostly on the
> content/data side.

so is it like swords and sorcery from logicom?

Kracken
Posts: 77
Joined: Sat Aug 08, 2020 1:12 pm

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by Kracken »

It's more like door "Mines of Gorr": http://soznet.net/ags/reviews/gorr.html

Or SSI games ie: https://classicreload.com/pool-of-radiance.html

daniel_spain
Posts: 395
Joined: Sun Aug 09, 2020 2:39 am

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by daniel_spain »

Kracken wrote:
> It's more like door "Mines of Gorr":
> http://soznet.net/ags/reviews/gorr.html
>
> Or SSI games ie: https://classicreload.com/pool-of-radiance.html

so 2d dungeon crawler?

Kracken
Posts: 77
Joined: Sat Aug 08, 2020 1:12 pm

Re: Worlds of Darkness!

Post by Kracken »

2d just for mob encounters.
You move around the map in 3d.

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