Chaosforge Forum

DoomRL => Requests For Features => Topic started by: Dervish on April 09, 2006, 03:19

Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Dervish on April 09, 2006, 03:19: One of the scenes i remember best from playing Doom:
Late night, still discovering episode 2, i enter a pitch black room with my shottie in hand, the door closes behind me, and the next thing i know the light flashes just enough for me to see a demon biting my head off and i almost jump out of my chair ^^.

Anyway, this brings me to my suggestion:

- Variable lighting per map area (monsters/items in dark areas would not be visible unless you were real close or with a light amp). This would include totally dark areas and blinking areas, like 20+ turns dark followed by ten turns light).

- Light amplifying goggles: x turns being able to see in dark areas.

I know this would involve changing the way sight is currently managed, and adding to hit penalty over distance for game balance issues but for me the game is all about what maybe hiding out there...

Other suggestions on the subject:

- new special level: lvl 5-8 "The Halls of the Blind":
severely decreased sight (about 2/3 squares distance), demons/lost souls, an autoloading double shotgun as reward and maybe a surprise (hopefully nasty^^)

- new monster: spectre:
same as a demon except you can only see them when they get real close to you (about 2/3 squares).
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: JimmyJ on April 10, 2006, 04:24: Well, ive never heard an idea for lighting in DoomRL, so you'd have to ask kornel, as for the spectre, 2/3 squares seems a little bit close..
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Anticheese on April 10, 2006, 04:27: When you consider it, You only get to see about 6 squares into the distance anyway.

I like the concept but I dont see how it can work in a Roguelike at the moment.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Dervish on April 11, 2006, 03:22: Maybe i didn't express correctly what i meant.
In most roguelikes the character has a small field of vision (equivalent to the torch, lantern, whatever) but if the room has some light of it's own you can see all the lit area. I don't like the current sight system, sure it's simple, but limiting sight by range alone doesn't feel natural to me.
It's much more logic that you see everything in an open lit area and that dark room/area is unknown to you.

The great advantage of using light/dark is that you get both the safety feeling of being able to see everything before it's dangerous on wide lit areas, and the stress of having to get close to that unknown area without knowing what is in there. You'll have to improvise more often -> you'll have more fun.

The blinking/strobing effects are just something to think about later if the game gets this system in the first place.

I know that setting this up will require a lot of tweaking on other stuff including monster AI, but if it works for other roguelikes, why not for this one.

About the spectre, any old-time doom player will remember the invisible demon which always manages to get close to you at the worst of times... and i think it will feel right at home in doomrl.
3 squares distance to spot it feels perfect to me... far enough to swap to your favourite shotgun/plasma rifle and waste it away; and near enough to be a threat if you got to deal with other monsters 1st.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: JimmyJ on April 11, 2006, 07:21: well, when i thought of making the spectre, i always considered making it a SLIGHTLY discolored normal gray dot ie: . (but slightly different colored from normal dots)
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Anticheese on April 11, 2006, 09:29: Come on.

Have you any idea how confusing it would be to be under attack and have the suspect to be a dot a slightly darker shade of gray?

I like the other option better.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Derek on April 11, 2006, 12:19: I think this is actually a pretty cool idea! As long as it's not overused. To have a few turns of light followed by a few turns of dark would be pretty intense.

Regarding the spectre, perhaps it could be handled similarly. The monster could appear for a few steps, and then disappear for a few steps...
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: JimmyJ on April 12, 2006, 02:31: Quoting: Derek
Regarding the spectre, perhaps it could be handled similarly. The monster could appear for a few steps, and then disappear for a few steps...

Come on.

Have you any idea how confusing it would be to be under attach and have the suspect to be a empty space?

It seems pretty hard to implement the spectre right now......
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Kornel Kisielewicz on April 12, 2006, 02:51: It would be possible with graphics. But it might be painfull with ASCII :-/. If I only had another (or even better TWO) shade of gray :-/
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Santiago Zapata on April 12, 2006, 03:26: An option would be to remap one the colors you dont use, (like lime green, pale blue, etc), on a windows shortcut so that it looks like another shade of gray; however that wouldn't work in full screen mode...
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: JimmyJ on April 12, 2006, 05:17: Yes it does, there is a color setting for windowed AND fullscreen ^_^
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Anticheese on April 12, 2006, 10:39: All the same, It is a pain in the ass to spot a moving patch of gray on a Roguelike.

Perhaps have it as a "d" that changes colour according to what tile it is on

I.E on water it would be blue, On floor it would be gray, Etc, Etc.

Sounds good?
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Derek on April 12, 2006, 17:18: Quoting: jimmyj
Come on.

Have you any idea how confusing it would be to be under attach and have the suspect to be a empty space?

Ha ha... hey, just expressing my (possibly very wrong) opinion. ;)

Well, in the original game, it's pretty obvious once the spectre's on your ass - you could make him always visible when he's adjacent to you and flicker otherwise.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Malek Deneith on April 13, 2006, 08:36: Quoting: Anticheese
All the same, It is a pain in the ass to spot a moving patch of gray on a Roguelike.

Perhaps have it as a "d" that changes colour according to what tile it is on

Beeing "ass to spot" is the whole idea ... once you know something is there ("Ow! That hurt... FTW?"), you can find it instantly using games auto-targeting feature... color chacnging "d" just wouldn't be enough.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Anticheese on April 13, 2006, 08:57: Yeah I know that, But what if new players did not know about the Specters? I would imagine it to be a major turn-off for those who dont know.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: JimmyJ on April 14, 2006, 00:43: Hmm, well, when you start up DoomRL it says some of what is new in the version, maybe next it can tell you of spectres?
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Kornel Kisielewicz on April 15, 2006, 19:24: Specteres would be evil anyway, and be a endless source of YASDs. Even a simple representation, that they have the color of the floorwould be a great pain in the ass.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Obscillesk on April 16, 2006, 10:32: Pain in the ass yeah, but a very nice addition. 'Sides, the spectres weren't meant to be friendly guys originally, they'd be something to keep people on their toes at least. Perhaps make it a challenge mode or a thing you can turn on/off in the config file (default as off)
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Kornel Kisielewicz on April 16, 2006, 10:49: Quoting: Obscillesk
Perhaps make it a challenge mode or a thing you can turn on/off in the config file (default as off)

Hmm, not such a bd idea. Or make them only appear on "Hurt me plenty" difficulty and above.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Obscillesk on April 18, 2006, 00:39: Actually, higher difficulty sounds prime, I like that.

Perhaps on the lighting effects, have it shorten your sight range a certain number of spaces. Have it act as a new type of liquid in the way it lies on the level, or somesuch. Attach a random number to the amount of shortening it causes to sight and you've got variable lights.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Kornel Kisielewicz on April 20, 2006, 15:27: Lightning and LOS/FOV needs to be reworked anyway -- I hope to include many additional possibilities to that.
Title: lighting and sight
Post by: Obscillesk on April 22, 2006, 12:52: Heheheh lightning... "Random chance you will be struck dead by JC's evil red lightning bullshit (Diablo 2 style)" Now theres a challenge mode, see how far you get before you just up and die to a whim :P