JS roguelike game: The Royal Wedding

http://ondras.zarovi.cz/games/trw/

by ondras • 13 years ago

283 73 13 years ago

ondras.zarovi.cz

biot• 13 years ago

Nice. I hope the next feature is to use localstorage to save your current state so that when you return it picks up where you left off.

lindsey-lohan• 13 years ago

Dungeon font at second screen appears too small.

Gotttzsche• 13 years ago

so i dropped my weapon to pick a flower and then i went into the dungeon unarmed... great

DannyPage• 13 years ago

There is a weapon in the dungeon! Just have to find it.

Posibyte• 13 years ago

There is sometimes another weapon in the dungeon. Hence, the rougelike nature.

dpcx• 13 years ago

Step back over the weapon to pick it up again.

kbenson3• 13 years ago

I just started playing Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup the other day for the first time (I've played Nethack and Angband for years though), so I'm in a Rogue sort of mood. Thanks! This is wonderful.

ricree2• 13 years ago

Tome 4 (http://te4.org )is a really polished, modern take on roguelikes. It's also based on a pretty modular, GPL3 licensed engine, in case you ever feel like making your own.

kbenson3• 13 years ago

Yeah, I played that quite a bit a few years back. Unfortunately at the time quite a bit of some of the runecaster class was broken, but it was still quite fun.

That was all before the current engine, which I have to say looks pretty awesome from videos and screenshots. I'll have to try playing it again.

JoshTriplett• 13 years ago

I found the dynamic lighting effects quite impressive, and I like the use of proportional text for the story rather than more monospace.

Habits from other roguelikes make me keep looking for an inventory and the ability to move diagonally, but neither one actually seems necessary, just unexpectedly missing for a roguelike.

Edit: "Achievements: 0 gold found 1 secret gold stashes found". So, I found one secret gold stash but it had no gold in it?

gmkoliver2• 13 years ago

Just checking now, vi keys work for diagonals.

ondras4• 13 years ago

Also the diagonal numpad keys.

emhart• 13 years ago

I believe you were mugged. By the mugger! He was wandering around outside the castle with the dog. I found 3 gold spots, but interacted with the mugger twice and finished with 1 gold, so I'm betting I got pick pocketed or something.

lucaspiller2• 13 years ago

It looks very nice, and I'm pretty impressed with the effects.

I do have to admit though that personally I just don't 'get' rougelikes, maybe I'm just too young, but they just don't really interest me.

gmkoliver2• 13 years ago

Just curious, is it the kinds of visuals, or...?

rsaarelm• 13 years ago

They are a bit tricky to get. And OP's game probably doesn't quite have the hook that will make you get them. As far as I can see, the draw is that the games are ruthless and kill you over and over again, but they are also ever so slightly different, and always hint at the chance to crack a bit more of the game on the next play, when you have both learned more about the game's tricks and get a new roll of the procedural generation dice. And, if they're done well, they don't waste your time. There should be something that even a veteran player won't just sleepwalk through right through the door.

AlexDanger4• 13 years ago

Normal game: You pick up an unknown potion. Do you drink it? You save the game and drink the potion. The potion kills you. You reload the game, dont drink the potion, and move on to the next level.

Roguelike: You pick up the potion. Do you drink it? Hmmm...too risky, it could kill you. You decide to visit a wizard who can identify it for you. Oh no! A monster. You fight! The monster is strong...You're down to 1 health..the potion is your last chance...AHHHHGH OMG IT WAS POISON. <or> OMG ITS A HEALTH POTION I LIVE TO FIGHT ANOTHER DAY!

People play roguelikes because the specter of permanent death (no save games* ) creates tension and suspense you rarely see in other games. This tension has a dramatic influence on gameplay choices and the emotional response elicited by those choices.

If, however, it's the oldskool text graphics and complex control schemes that you dont 'get', you'd be forgiven for thinking that 'ascii graphics = roguelike'. This is not the case, its just that the many famous roguelikes are dungeon crawlers with this graphical style. And yes, the controls are complex and the learning curves are steep. They are not for everybody. ADOM is my favourite roguelike dungeon crawler.

The best (IMHO) recent roguelike is FTL: Faster Than Light. Its a spaceship combat/strategy game designed to be played so a session lasts about 30-90 minutes. The graphics are nice and the gameplay is simple to understand but difficult to master. Its brilliant.

FTL: http://www.ftlgame.com/

ADOM: http://www.ancardia.com/download.html

*Generally you can have one save game. So you can save and quit but then have to resume that same game.

rcfox2• 13 years ago

Permadeath only really works for games that don't have an explicit narrative. It's no fun to die and then have to sit through the same conversations and plot twists all over again. Roguelikes tend to be complex and random enough to allow the player to experience something entirely new each time they play. There's still an overall story, but every telling of it is unique.

lucaspiller2• 13 years ago

I've thought about it some more, and I think the main issue is that most rougelikes I've seen are in the fantasy genre, but dungeons / castles / magic / etc don't really interest me at all. As such I've never really got into them to see what they can offer. I never knew that there was the randomness or permadeath - they are both pretty nice game mechanics.

I'm perfectly happy with the graphics, I've played Dwarf Fortress (in fortress mode - I think the city building overcomes my lack of desire for fantasy) and use Vim all day at work :)

Thanks for your explanation, and yeah I'll think I'll give FTL a go!

EastCoastLA• 13 years ago

What's next Dwarf Fortress?

Draiken• 13 years ago

That would be so awesome. :D

acomjean• 13 years ago

nice. as someone unfamiliar with rougelike games I liked the walk you through it on the side and map legend on the bottom. In javascript too. I like the reference to the toolkit on the homepage.

kbenson3• 13 years ago

> I like the reference to the toolkit on the homepage.

Oh. That's a problem. The only thing I can think of that might be more of a productivity drain than playing a roguelike is writing one. Goodbye sweet, sweet sunlight...

frsandstone• 13 years ago

Incredibly well done. I love it.

aroberge• 13 years ago

Brilliantly done! Nice lighting effect.

acheron• 13 years ago

Wow, very nice. I kept looking for an inventory too, but I like that it was kind of stripped to its essentials.

wazoox2• 13 years ago

Great game! Too bad it bugged on me at some point; after getting out of the dungeon I can't move anymore...

ondras4• 13 years ago

Sorry to hear that! Can you post the output of your browser's JS console?

wazoox2• 13 years ago

Oh, sorry, I reloaded the page and played the game again to the end this time :) Thank you for the fun!

tveita• 13 years ago

Mine froze when I entered the castle garden looking for the bride. :(

Using Opera 12.14, exception traceback: http://pastebin.com/DJXrkae5

enigmango• 13 years ago

Same thing happened to me, and I reloaded before I read this post...I'm starting over now and I'll post the output if it happens again. Loving it so far!

marxdeveloper• 13 years ago

same here, maybe this might help out debugging Uncaught TypeError: Cannot read property '36,20' of undefined on line 272 of level.js

antonios• 13 years ago

Given the selection of characters that represent walls, corpses etc. I'm guessing that this game is influenced by Adom. The narrative system is pretty well done, and the font is awesome by the way :-)

Edit: The author has built other games as well http://ondras.zarovi.cz/

mrcharles2• 13 years ago

The dynamic legend and narrative bar are really great additions to roguelikes. Did you have inspiration for these things? I don't know that I've seen either of them done before.

teod• 13 years ago

The dynamic legend I have not seen before, but this game must be based loosely off of nethack (which includes a narrative).

RobotCaleb2• 13 years ago

Brogue has a dynamic legend. I've not seen a narrative like that, though.

mrcharles2• 13 years ago

Ah, I don't remember it from Brogue but it has been a while since I played it.

ferongr• 13 years ago

Thank you for mentioning Brogue, from a couple of levels I went through I found it very approachable (both in UI and gameplay) yet not shallow.

robocaptain2• 13 years ago

Brogue has a dynamic legend for monsters and items. I've never seen one done so well for terrain. This game does a nice job of combining all useful information I need in one tiny spot. Well done!

Aaaand... idea stolen! ;)

SeppoErviala• 13 years ago

Certainly a bit easier than dungeon crawl or adom.

smickie• 13 years ago

They lighting effects make every move a visual treat.

I'm wondering how much of it was randomly generated? Does story ending have a random outcome?

3327• 13 years ago

Fantastic! Finally my 16 core Xeon dev laptop with 32 gb's of RAM is finally doing some useful computing.

jes5199• 13 years ago

Anyone who feels inspired by this should enter the Seven-Day Roguelike Challenge! It starts this weekend! http://7drl.org/

robocaptain2• 13 years ago

Seconded! The library used in this game (rot.js) is the perfect platform for a 7DRL game as well. I've been using it quite extensively (via coffeescript) and it handles a lot of the hard stuff (FOV, lighting) very well, which frees one up to work on more interesting things: setting, gameplay, etc.

sideproject• 13 years ago

You my friend, is crazy! :)

acoleman616• 13 years ago

That was fantastic! As others mentioned, really enjoyed the dynamic lighting and key. Great touches.

RobotCaleb2• 13 years ago

I've been playing a ton of Brogue lately. The dynamic lighting in this is similar to what Brogue has. Brogue is by far the prettiest ASCII game I've ever played.

p0nce• 13 years ago

Brogue's gameplay also is extremely well-rounded.

sirwitti2• 13 years ago

awesome game!

but is it just me, or is it impossible to defeat the murderer? played it 3 times and i get killed everytime by the murderer.

what did i miss?

killahpriest• 13 years ago

Pick up the plate armor, he'll barely score any damage on you. It looks like `[` and is in the dungeon somewhere (in addition to chain mail, which looks like `[` as well).

sirwitti2• 13 years ago

thanks! funnily had it both times and got killed with good health. anyway now it worked.

totally worth the time this game :)

esrauch• 13 years ago

I had the plate armor and I suspect there was a bug with the axe (or perhaps a feature where one of the weapons does nothing), he didn't do much damage to me but I just had 100% miss rate. Second playthrough used the sword and dispatched him easily.

simcop2387• 13 years ago

Use the sword. The axe seems to fail to hit a lot of times. The sword on the other hand seems to be far more imbalanced for gameplay.

zizee3• 13 years ago

Huh?

My game ended because the princess (or was it queen?) drowned herself. Does this game have multiple endings? Nice!

zizee3• 13 years ago

Great fun, a nice short diversion! Why did she do it! Such a senseless waste :-)

Achievements:

1 gold found 1 secret gold stashes found 4 precious gems found 27 enemies killed 2899 turns played

zizee3• 13 years ago

p.s. for anyone looking for a great Rogue like game for mobile checkout "Legends of Yore". I have wastedH^H^H^H^H^H whiled away a lot of time with this gem.

http://www.legendsofyore.com/

bajsejohannes• 13 years ago

That was great! I'm particularly impressed with the smooth learning curve, especially the dynamic legend.

I sometimes didn't notice when a new narrative appeared. I would just glance over once in a while to see if something new had happened. Maybe bring more attention to that, like having it blink once instead of fade in? Sure it doesn't look as nice, but you want the player to focus there.

ondras4• 13 years ago

I agree; the narrative should bring more attention to itself. Not sure about the proper UI/UX way to do that, though...

talmir• 13 years ago

Having the text in different colors would be enough. Maybe just a different "brightness" of that golden color

khromov• 13 years ago

Gardener killed me. :(

hakaaaaak• 13 years ago

Can't find the murderer. :(

klipt• 13 years ago

You have to go into the dungeon (> just below the chapel)

jasonshen• 13 years ago

Holy shit that was impressive. I clicked just for fun and got sucked in for a full 20 mins. Glad it ended where it did!

wink• 13 years ago

Excellent!

JS roguelike game: The Royal Wedding

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