Chaosforge Forum
General => Discussion => Topic started by: DaEezT on March 24, 2007, 07:32
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Ok, this topic is about two things.
First: pre-generated maps where the entire game is generated during the character generation, similar to the way AliensRL does it. And since AliensRL already does it I'm mostly talking about DoomRL and if it would be possible and useful.
The idea is, that you select a pre-generate option in the main menu and after you created your character (difficulty, name, first trait) the game generates all the levels, creates a save and exits. You can resume that save like any other (meaning it's deleted upon loading).
Why would we want this?
Simple: Game of the Month(GotM)
I remembered this yesterday. Civilization Fanatics' Center (http://civfanatics.com/) has been doing Civ 2,3,4 GotM for quite a while now (total of 192 games so far, not counting special challenges).
The idea is simple: Every month, the guy who organizes these games creates a new game. He selects the civ, the world setting, difficulty, etc. The starting save is then posted on the forums and everyone who wants to can download the save and play the game. The players then discuss their strategies, how their games turned out, what victories they went for, etc.
It's always quite interesting to see how much the results can differ between players, even though everyone started out with the same game.
Something similar might be interesting for DoomRL (and other RLs). Right now, when we discuss strategies or talk about our games in the mortem board, it's always game specific. Since each level is generated randomly there is always luck involved.
With pre-generated games we could play the same game and then discuss the choices we made, the strategies we used, etc.
But it would require a new game mode for DoomRl, and the mortems should probably contain the selected game mode.
Anyway. Long story short: Would anyone else be interested in such a mode and/or GotM?
And I'm not limiting this to DoomRl. AliensRL is also an obvious candidate. I dunno about Berserk! tho.
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Interesting. The only problem that I can see is that people might be able to figure out the best strategy for the games very quickly, and so it may have to be GotW instead of GotM (Civilization is a very complex game, which is why it can easily take a month to work out how best to handle everything, whereas DoomRL is intended to be much simpler).
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I love it!!
This sounds like a great idea. Everybody would be able to find the same weapons and items in the same locations, and by reading the mortems and stories of better players, new players would be able to learn and utilize existing strategies, as well as create new ones by looking at what worked/didn't work for others.
The problem is that this would require a massive rewrite of the game code. Yes, Kornel could throw this in as a new mode. But DoomRl is cobbled together enough as it is. On the other hand, Kornel has been looking for an excuse to go through and rewrite the code anyway. This would give him that excuse.
Ooh. Another thought occurs to me. We hate save-scummers, right? Well, when you save the game, copy to another location, and load it up, everytime you load that file it will load a different map. This allows players to find "easy stairs" to quickly get lower. If the levels are pre-generated, however, players are stuck facing the same enemies and levels over and over.
What happens when you are forced to fight the same enemies over and over after dying time and time again? You get better. You change tactics. You learn what works and what doesn't. This would change save-scumming into a powerful learning tool. Advanced players could put working characters together and post them here for younger players to mess with and learn from.
I know that trying to include this in version .09 would be impossible. I know that trying to include this in version 1.0 would push it way back. But please do it anyway.
Anything that will help me not suck at Rougelikes is Aces to me. :)
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But DoomRl is cobbled together enough as it is.
I just want to make sure this doesn't get edited out or "lost" ;D
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But DoomRl is cobbled together enough as it is.
I just want to make sure this doesn't get edited out or "lost" ;D
*My doomguy avatar glares at you*
Okay, I don't have a direct quote where Kornel said that, but he has said similar things in the past, yes?
Uh....
Sorry, Kornel? :X
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I think this would be great fun!
The only possible downside I see as using it for a competition is that the people who play first will be at a disadvantage because later players will know what items to expect (an early doubleshotgun or advanced chaingun would affect which traits you pick for example). Even if we had mortem-scummers, though, I still think it would be worth doing.
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The starting save is then posted on the forums and everyone who wants to can download the save and play the game.
I think it's even simpler. Every game is generated from a sequence of pseudorandom numbers from the RNG, which (probably) only needs a single random seed. If DoomRL sets the random seed only once at game initialization, all you'd have to do is implement an option for the user to supply the random seed, and leave the rest up to the program. So players wouldn't even have to download a save file, they could just copy this week's magic number off the forum.
And yes, I'd be interested. :)
Edit:
The problem is that this would require a massive rewrite of the game code.
If what I just said is true, the massive rewrite would amount to some ten lines of code. ;)
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The starting save is then posted on the forums and everyone who wants to can download the save and play the game.
I think it's even simpler. Every game is generated from a sequence of pseudorandom numbers from the RNG, which (probably) only needs a single random seed. If DoomRL sets the random seed only once at game initialization, all you'd have to do is implement an option for the user to supply the random seed, and leave the rest up to the program.
(...)
If what I just said is true, the massive rewrite would amount to some ten lines of code. ;)
What you didn't take into account is the fact that contrary to AliensRL levels are generated when you enter them ;]. That means, that you'll get a different level depending on (for example) how many times you fired in the previous one :P.
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The starting save is then posted on the forums and everyone who wants to can download the save and play the game.
I think it's even simpler. Every game is generated from a sequence of pseudorandom numbers from the RNG, which (probably) only needs a single random seed. If DoomRL sets the random seed only once at game initialization, all you'd have to do is implement an option for the user to supply the random seed, and leave the rest up to the program.
(...)
If what I just said is true, the massive rewrite would amount to some ten lines of code. ;)
What you didn't take into account is the fact that contrary to AliensRL levels are generated when you enter them ;]. That means, that you'll get a different level depending on (for example) how many times you fired in the previous one :P.
Uhhh... okay. Then I guess my question is, "What the hell does the preloader do!?"
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Uhhh... okay. Then I guess my question is, "What the hell does the preloader do!?"
Errr, what preloader?
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When you start the game, it shows you a screen in which it names all of the towers, and # symbols slowly pop up next to the names, one after another. (7 for the first towers, 8 for the main tower.) We all assumed this was where the levels were generated. They get loaded into the game, before the game. Hence my calling it a pre-loader.
So, back to my question. If it's not generating the levels (since you just said they get generated when you go to that floor) what the hell is it doing?
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What you didn't take into account is the fact that contrary to AliensRL levels are generated when you enter them ;]. That means, that you'll get a different level depending on (for example) how many times you fired in the previous one :P.
Translation: In AliensRL, levels are loaded at the beginning of the game. In DoomRL, they are loaded when you enter the staircases.
Make sense?
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What you didn't take into account is the fact that contrary to AliensRL levels are generated when you enter them ;]. That means, that you'll get a different level depending on (for example) how many times you fired in the previous one :P.
Translation: In AliensRL, levels are loaded at the beginning of the game. In DoomRL, they are loaded when you enter the staircases.
Make sense?
DOH!
Me so stupid sometimes. Need to read more thoroughly.
:(
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What you didn't take into account is the fact that contrary to AliensRL levels are generated when you enter them ;]. That means, that you'll get a different level depending on (for example) how many times you fired in the previous one :P.
You're right, I didn't take that into account. :) In that case, you would need to predetermine each level at game start, but it can still be done using a single random seed for each level. And an array of 'level seeds' could be determined randomly, using a single random seed to identify the game as a whole. You couldn't do that in ten lines of code, but I don't think it would qualify as a major rewrite.
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Hehe Kornel, but you can make it so the RNG seed can be obtained and reused? thus the newly generated leves would be the same for everybody playing the same seed, no?
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A big Yay! from me! This would allow many different fun challenges, like completing the said game in as few turns as possible and would also spawn some great tactic discussion for different situations.
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Hey, I missed this one completely! This looks great! That's a 'Yay!' from me, too :)
Since a form of save-scumming'll be an integral part of the game, how about disabling the normal saves during this type of play? IMO it'll help balance out exploitability, making for higher believability once everybody starts comparing replays, which I'd love to see happen.
Other than that, I agree with BDR. Game of the Week makes more sense with such short games. Why wait an entire month for something that'll be rather thoroughly explored in a few days at most.
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Since a form of save-scumming'll be an integral part of the game [..]
Huh?
I think you missed the point a bit there. GotM's are supposed to be played just like a normal game.
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Although I don't mind that at all, I thought replaying it, at least to a certain degree, was part of the plan. And if it isn't part of the plan, I suspect it'll become the common mentality among at least part of the posting players, unlike with usual save scumming, considering you start by DLing it, and then apply it the same way you would have a scummed game. People might feel cheated once they go through the effort (be it a minor one) of DLing the GotW/M and lose fast due to usual misfortune, but unlike with normal games, the idea of reinserting the save's sitting there from the moment you do it to start the game in the first time. Disallowing saves code-wise and "accepting" retries'll help balance this out effectively, and make it a slightly different RL gaming experience, IMO.
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Although I don't mind that at all, I thought replaying it, at least to a certain degree, was part of the plan. And if it isn't part of the plan, I suspect it'll become the common mentality among at least part of the posting players, unlike with usual save scumming, considering you start by DLing it, and then apply it the same way you would have a scummed game. People might feel cheated once they go through the effort (be it a minor one) of DLing the GotW/M and lose fast due to usual misfortune, but unlike with normal games, the idea of reinserting the save's sitting there from the moment you do it to start the game in the first time. Disallowing saves code-wise and "accepting" retries'll help balance this out effectively, and make it a slightly different RL gaming experience, IMO.
Maybe GotMs aren't such a good idea after all.
And here I thought people play for fun, but all I see is scumming this, cheating that, bla bla bla.
Well, it was worth a try.
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Although I don't mind that at all [...]
Is my personal feeling on the original idea once you explained it, so I'm not sure why you took my post so badly. Besides, you haven't even tried yet, and all I said is that I "*suspect* it'll become the common mentality [etc.]" - you can't seriously be taking my suspicion as the final say here Oo
Other than that, it doesn't seem people here are quite threatening to cheat. Some people may have pointed out the downsides of a RL GotM, which is legitimate as it has many rather unique sides to it, but they also all agreed it's a great idea non the less.
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I agree that trying to make it a one-shot deal would not work very well, but allowing people to try it as many times as they like and see how well they can do would be a good idea. Making two categories (1st game and best game) would work well for this, and if we make it a once a week deal then letting people retry won't be that big of a problem.