A Walk in the Dark A look in to the mind of an RPG designer

      

2Apr/13Off

The Day After

Happy Post-April Fools Day everyone!

Time for an explanation... On April 1st 2001, while I was actively developing The Opera, a total conversion for Half-Life, I launched an "Opera Pre-Alpha", which is actually still visible and downloadable HERE through the Internet Archive (amazing... the ZIP file is still there to download!). You can read the entire background there.

No images are visible in the archive, but here it is for those of you unable to run that version:

Zork_Opera

Six months ago, amidst the news of "D&D Next", I made the choice to do it again and create another language interpreter using Dungeons and Dragons content. To be honest I had three choices of games I wanted to emulate: Zork, Wizardry (Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord) or Ultima (III: Exodus or IV: Quest of the Avatar). All things considered, Zork was the easiest to do.

I did not have the benefit of having the source code to the original one I created 12 years ago (in C++, if you're wondering), so I set out to re-create the entire natural language interpreter in C#.Net. Yes, you read that correctly... I didn't use an existing interpreter like Z or Muddle; I created my own interpreter from scratch.

The result was The Caverns of Mayhem: A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure!

Zork_DnD

This was actually somewhat of a challenge to do. Not so much the language interpreter - I've done that at least three times before, each time in a different programming language - but how exactly to translate the D&D game mechanic to an interactive text adventure. I did the best I could, but there are certain things that are noticeably absent; for example, I didn't implement skills because I didn't quite know how. And the cleric's Channel Divinity powers were for the most part omitted because most of them were reactions which just wouldn't work.

To "win" you have to battle your way to the treasure room, take the treasure and return to the tavern with it. There are goblins and a medusa in your way; everything else is just filler. As was the case with the first one I did in 2001 (read the write up linked above), there was a lot more that I was thinking about but just didn't have time to do. For example, I had much more interaction planned with the tavern staff, the orc and the gazebo.

Now, in case you haven't tried some of these, here are some things you can try and some Easter eggs:

  • There are numerous responses taken verbatim from Zork, such as responses to suicide, jumping, yelling or typing "xyzzy" (or any other magic word from Sorcerer, Enchanter, Spellbreaker or Wishbringer for that matter).
  • Use any one of George Carlin's seven dirty words.
  • Use a Doom cheat code like "idkfa" or "iddqd". The response mimics what the game Hexen does if you try to enter a non-Hexen cheat code in to it.
  • As a wizard, "cast magic missile" while in darkness.
  • "Cast burning hands" (as a wizard) or "cast flames of the phoenix" (as a monk) in the presence of the gazebo.
  • Sell the orc's pie in the tavern.
  • Count the leaves. This is an inside joke in several Infocom titles. The number also has special mathematical significance: 69 in hexadecimal is 105 in decimal, and 69 in decimal is 105 in octal. I had other plans for the leaves, but just never got around to them.
  • Search the refuse in the Refuse Room. Yes, I implemented dire rats that most people will never see.
  • As a barbarian, you can "rage" or "flip out".
  • Roll the dice and either get snake eyes (curse) or box cars (boon).
  • Try to cast a spell while in the tavern.
  • Besides myself, all the other names in the README are characters from films directed by Stanley Kubrick.
  • Other things I don't remember.

I worked on and off on it for the past two months, and it was kinda fun to do and I'm actually really proud of it. I wish I could do more, but there simply wasn't enough time. And it wasn't perfect; there was actually a crashing bug if you tried to eat the leaves (among other commands). I have since fixed that and uploaded the new version.

If you are curious, below is a link to where you can download the complete source code in C#.Net to The Caverns of Mayhem: A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure! The project is compatible with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 and only requires the Microsoft .NET Framework v2.0 to run.

I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed creating it. Maybe next year I'll have a Wizardry emulator...

Download complete The Caverns of Mayhem:
A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure
source code
(C#, Microsoft Visual Studio 2010)

Filed under: 5E, DnD, Programming, RPG No Comments
1Apr/13Off

DLI Acquires DnD Next Video Game License

DLIName_60

"Omne ignotum pro magnifico"

If you've been following this blog, you know that we have had our fair share of communication with the legal department over at Wizards of the Coast, and as a result we have not only learned a great deal of what we can and cannot do as far as licensing but we have been able to figure out exactly who the right person to talk to is in order to get the necessary licensing agreements in place

Several months ago, after a great deal of negotiations (most talks of which started with the words "now please don't sue us, but...") we have managed to talk to the right people and sign the proper agreements to do what we thought was impossible: secure a provisional license to use the Dungeons and Dragons brand name to create the next state of the art video game based on the "DnD Next" rule set. The official press release can be read below:

Official Press Release by Darklight Interactive (PDF)

Since we are not authorized to be direct competitors to the upcoming MMORPG Neverwinter by Cryptic Studios, our product is a single player campaign that will be a traditional delve through a dungeon. While we have had a group of professional, well known writers working on the story - most of which you are familiar with, but we are not allowed to disclose names yet due to Non-Disclosure Agreements - I and a group of experienced software developers have been working on the engine.

Since we do not want to take funding away from Wizards of the Coast and would rather they spend the resources they have to get "DnD Next" developed and released, in a few weeks we intend to launch a Kickstarter project to fund the development of the final product. We did not want to launch a Kickstarter before we had a "proof of concept", and unlike some other companies we do not want to launch a Kickstarter to fund said "proof of concept". So we have been developing the engine on our own, on our personal time and at our personal expense, in the hopes that it can show the world what we're capable of and more easily reach our goals once the Kickstarter launches.

After further negotiations, and painstaking work over the past few months to get it in running condition, I have been authorized to release our first "proof of concept" (which we refer to internally as an "alpha" build) for The Caverns of Mayhem: A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure (tentative title... we'll let the writers come up with something better) that you can download below!!!

Download The Caverns of Mayhem: A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure (ZIP)

The game engine is not exactly a direct port of the "DnD Next" ruleset simply because, as is the case in Neverwinter, a lot of the rules don't exactly port flawlessly from the tabletop to a video game. But it has everything you've come to love about D&D: it's got dungeons, it's got monsters, it's got treasure... and, heck, it's even got a dragon!

The "proof of concept" which you can download below has been developed for Microsoft Windows (we're investigating a Mac port, but none of us actually own a Mac so we'll probably have to wait for funding on that) and requires nothing more than the .NET Framework 2.0. It is not graphics intensive so it should run on pretty much any machine; in fact, for those of you with inferior machines our game will probably run significantly better than Neverwinter because the hardware requirements are much lower. And, thanks to proprietary compression technology, it uses a lot less drive space!

As we mention above, it is a very early "alpha" build and has some known issues. And, since it's an "alpha", I ask that you do not start reporting bugs in it; we pretty much know what most of them, and have tried to document them in the "readme" file included with the distribution. Please read that file prior to launching the game so you understand what to expect and are aware of the aspects of the game that have yet to be completed.

We here at Darklight Interactive are entering an interesting time, and we would like to thank everyone at Wizards of the Coast for giving us the opportunity to use your license. We hope that, after looking at our proof of concept below, you support us and await our upcoming Kickstarter launch.

Thank you all for your support.

Download The Caverns of Mayhem: A Dungeons and Dragons Adventure (ZIP)

Requires Microsoft Windows operating system and the Microsoft .NET Framework v2.0
(c) 2013, Darklight Interactive - All Rights Reserved
Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Neverwinter, Wizards of the Coast, and their respective logos are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries, and are used with permission. Hasbro and its logo are trademarks of HASBRO, Inc.
Please don't sue us.