Dungeon TF Prototype (2023-02-23)

Hey folks!

Finally a new update and just by checking the last one, to see what changed, I realized that a lot did.

I guess first of all, the visual. If you remember, it was a one-screen game first. Like the old classics, Rogue, Nethack, etc.

That gave a lot of issues with the user interface/health display. SO I moved to a more flexible system, that uses several screens, with transitions.
This also allows for vastly bigger levels, if so desired! For now, it's 4 screens, for this level, because I just scaled the graphic zooming up by two and kept the level size.

The level looks a lot different too. Both in level design and also in the tile design. This is mostly just because I had to redo the level of course and secondly that I moved to a different way of coloring things.

If you remember, I included some concepts and that also lead to using different palettes. That then lead to some re-design of older tiles, which you see now.

Secondly, movement changed. I moved away from the key tapping and towards sticky keys.
Ultimately it will become a setting, you can change whenever you want. Right now it's changeable on SPACE

Also, mobs! And mob behavior. You have two types of mobs and two types of behavior right now. One being roaming kobolds. These fellas leave you alone and are extremely easy to defeat, but they will have more to them soon. The idea is, that if you attack one, they all come swarming towards you and chase you! But that isn't implemented yet. I need for time for different behavior. The second type of behavior, is to guard. In the image above, you see guarding kobolds. They will always be around a dragon or treasure, guarding that. They also swarm you, if you attack them or their dragon (or loot their treasure).

Again, their alerted states are a WIP and aren't in the prototype yet. I keep working on that, as well as player defeat/game over stuff in the coming weeks.

Enemies also show their health, once you've hit them. So you can estimate how many hits they have left. But without cluttering the screen too much.
Not sure if I want to add variety in mobs, because that could lead to confusion, but we;ll see.

Also, once you've seen a mob, but don't anymore, they will keep a shadow up. So you know you've seen someone and where they might be.
The shadow doesn't move though and disappears on two conditions:
a) you see the tile again. Then it disappears and if the mob is still there you see them. Otherwise the tile is just empty
b) you see the mob again. This is a bit of a player advantage, but otherwise things get pretty messy and well, you just know each individual mob. Good memory!

There are also a lot of bug fixes and visual glitch fixes. The reason this took so long, mostly, was a few reasons.

On the one hand, deciding what AI scheme I would want. As there are a few approaches to choose from, I had to try out a couple, until I found the one I really want. That took most of the time

Then I also had a few commissions left, I wanted to finish, so I can concentrate on my game here.

Lastly, I also didn't work on mob behavior and combat solely. As you can see and know from the concept, I've also been busy with zone design and am trying to add more mob types. Also adding game over scenes.
This will continue, as I try to make all the mobs, before I'm done with the base stuff. So I don't have the hardest part left alone!

Plans for the future?
Adding to the mob behavior set. So I can build all mob behavior I want.
Generally it will be rather simple (due to screen size and other limitations), but mobs will all be rather unique with abilities.

Having a win/lose state. So you have level progression and also see the game over stuff. For the next prototype, it will only be graphics, as other ideas would fit more to general NPC implementation.

More mob types. Currently there are 6 zones, where I want to have 2 "small" mobs and one "big" mob.
Small mobs would be easier to defeat enemies, that don't have special abilities, but are there more as annoyances and fillers.
Big mobs will have special abilities and often have very special game over scenes. The numbers are not fixed though and might vary.

So far I have some zones filled, others lacking one or two and others have no mobs so far. Some zones might also change completely, so I can fit mobs in there.

After those are done, for the next prototype, NPCs, items and level generation will be the big goals. After that (or in between) will be menu design, save games, a bestiarium and other features, I haven't fully decided on yet.

As a bit of a teaser, there might even be a small crafting system be implemented. But that mostly depends on how other things evolve and if it breaks the scope or not.