Ren'Py and storylines

4 stories based on character selection, each with 3 different starting scenarios depending on difficulty, and all with various possible endings and moral choices... yeah, that sounds nice.

Even if i have full confidence in my capabilities of writing an interesting story, i'm still not a writer so i guess i should be careful in how i construct the main storylines. Which is why i start by creating a box for it just like i've created a box for the game to happen inside of. This box will be the universe it happens inside of.

And today i managed to build that box, or roughly anyways. Not a lot of details but enough to go by for now.

Next i think i'll have to decide the differences between the various starting scenarios, and what the 4 main storylines will be about.

And so i took a shower to think on it, and here's what i thought.

The 3 different starting scenarios based on difficulty will be:
Easy: Start in a capital city with enough money to buy whatever starting gear you need.
Medium: Start in a village with enough money to buy a weapon.
Hard: Start in a dungeon with no money, but one item of choice (out of a list)

The 4 different storylines will be about:
Maton asking the player to help in his war against Xandis and her abominations.
Xandis asking player for help to defend against Maton.
Quiline asking player for help in causing chaos, griefing Maton, and teasing the other gods.
Zanth asking player for help in fixing the balance broken by the overpowered dragons.

I think that creates a nice variety...

Attack.
Protect.
Have a lot of fun.
Save the world.

I decided at this point since i have a rough idea of what i want the stories to be like, difficulty levels, etc that now would be an ideal time to start making the first prototype! Ren'Py! Prepare yourself!

There are also a few games i'll have to play before i reach alpha for ideas. Namely:

Fallout 2
Long Live The Queen
Record of Agarest War
Contrast (it seems to have some interesting things that might inspire me)
Chantelise (I already played Recettear, it inspired me to make a business system alongside with Kamidori)
Wizardry 8 (I need to replay it for some combat system, leveling system and magic system ideas among other things)
Hate Plus (I'm thinking i might get some story and character ideas)
Heileen series
Lands of Lore (If i get my hands on it)

And possibly some others. Luckily i have most of these games on steam. Some who are reading this might be thinking "what kind of a developer spends precious development time playing other games?" but trust me when i say, playing other games is a huge and important part of being a game designer, it's important to play other games and investigate their features and pick out the ones that are well done for ideas and inspirations. I wouldn't have started working on this game for example if it wasn't for Fenoxo's Corruption of Champions. Another inspiration for me to start working on this project by myself is Josh Parnell who is currently working on a much bigger project (Limit Theory) mostly by himself! i would never know what features i want to cram into this game if i didn't play other games for ideas. Just watch some Extra Credits, and you'll get what i mean.

But before playing any of these games i want to start at least working on the first prototype!

I started by cheating a little, and surfing renpy's cookbook forum for example codes so that i wouldn't have to start off empty handed while learning how to use this engine.

First i found a dungeon crawling frame and a dress-up game example (for character creation and possibly equipment system) and inventory system. First thing is first, i need to create a game that can combine these various scripts, or quite specifically, a game that will dump the player into a character creator upon pressing new game, which will then drop the player to a menu selection to pick out the other minigames (such as dungeon crawling or dress-up). This doesn't sound like it will be very complicated, but i guess that's just something i'll have to work on tomorrow since i'm out of brain juice :(

Note: I will not be relying on other peoples code in the alpha, but i will be relying heavily on it for the prototype(s). When i start working on the alpha i will use the prototype code for reference, but actually rewrite everything that i didn't make myself originally.

Since i am only just learning to use renpy, i might not write a post daily anymore, but everytime there is something to say i will say it! Judging by my experiences with programming so far though, i suspect that once i get into it there will be plenty to say though :)