Role playing games, the non table top kind.

I've been into gaming for a long time. I started writing up a brief history for my gaming but I'm thinking it'd be boring. So quick long short, started in shooters, got exposed to pokemon, played a lot of japanese role palying games, and don't grind in grinding games. That about sums it up.

Now onto something interesting. I have tried programing a few rpg like games over the years. A few ambitious goals considering I am not good at GUI work that I technically have enough framework to finish but never do. In the end I program things far faster and to completion more often for others than myself. I did get together a very badly clunky "fighter" rpg for giggles just to prove I could do it. "Fighter" being something a friend made in middle-high school with one of those programmable TI calculators. Hit things for exp, get spells, fighting his wacky idea of things with special abilities and all that. With X areas you could go go through. By areas I mean fight X enemies in a row and then the boss then you "beat" it meaning the next is unlocked and maybe something more in your home base. Simple design, enough that you can play with and test combat systems. Which brings me to my next thing.

I've had this one idea floating around for a semi roguelike. 2d "Odin sphere" maps as I don't want to deal with 2d maps and all those calculations. I actually have the system roughly built with some AI even. The problem was I had an ambitious  idea for an item format. You take some material and combine it with others to produce what is effectively your weapon parts. There is some rolling going on based on the parts used that give stat bonuses and even special abilities. It was when I wondered how good this was I realized I would rather test this in a less complex environment than my current game layout. That one failed, then I made my "fighter" just to say I could, then worked on a more complex version based on that ones workings and have just sorta stalled. It sits in a state of limbo due to how close it is to finishing with how I designed it, I have the parts to put them together but little reason to go through it as I'd have to get up to the next step of incorporating the item system in which could be quite frustrating.

This was a while ago. Recently I've been looking into the various combat systems in games. They are sort of disappointing. The basic mecanics beyond getting into magic spells which start to follow their own individual rules to a degree boil down to take a penalty to hit gain a minor effect. This is all well and good in pen and paper actually, the more complicated a mess you make it the more frustrating and long combat takes but for video games I want something more than that and the "know the elemental immunities" that pop up. I've heard of some complex RPGs in the videogame side but I can't remember them and missed out on them due to coming in late on the rpg craze with the 64 and no playstation till much later. So I think something for me to work on may be some "simple" ideas on enhancement to combat mechanics. While this sounds difficult from a programing standpoint it's just a few more functions to play around with in a combat loop. If I get it down to combat basics and a few enemies I'll call it a successful run.

So project "Combat tester" is go. Hopefully I'll have something by next week.