Openly Licensed to Game

Posted: 2012-09-27 | Author: | Filed under: BattleScape, General, Guildsmanship | Tags: | Leave a comment

Finally decided that rather than skirting the issue, the final published Guildsmanship: Battle-Scapes will be under the OGL. What this means for me is to make sure all the Open Game Content (from the SRD) is visibly cited and identified. Putting such a framework inside an existing system is something I excel at (especially since the original system is one of my own design).

There will be (probably) two distinct ways to see the Open Game Content, one will be in context: in which information flowing through the workshop or to the client will be able have citations. The second will be to have an OGL explorer which will catalog list all the OGL information within the loaded assemblies.

The best part will be that I can finally mention the fidelity of the Ikosa Framework in implementing the OGL SRD, without having to cryptically mention “Classic Pen-and-Paper” mechanics.

To be fair, I have slightly tweaked (or enhanced) some terminology and mechanics, mostly for clarity and implementation consistency. I’ll probably describe (as Open Content), some of the specific implementation details for lighting, room topology, package serialization, and perhaps the WSDL (since it’s pretty much out there anyway).

I don’t have an OGL statement visible anywhere yet, but I am not actually “published” yet, either.

Video Killed the Programming Star

Posted: 2012-09-04 | Author: | Filed under: BattleScape, General | Leave a comment

Besides preparing for my looming black-belt test later this month, I’ve been cobbling together a video for Kickstarter. It seems my wife was right when she predicted I’d get this off the ground after my black-belt test, mainly due to time constraints (the time constraints of having a full time job book-ended by train rides are what I am trying to overcome by going FT on Guildsmanship). Since I’ve been working on the script, taping, gathering additional overlay video and editing it down (in Adobe Premiere Elements 8), I haven’t had much time to program.

During the one time I fired up the test host and client for capturing head-to-head activity for the video, my son and I had some classic moments.

First, I had a dwarf and a human in an enclosed area. We started taking turns moving, and got to the point where I should have provoked and opportunistic attack. None was triggered. I realized the characters hadn’t been equipped (nor had any class levels added). Doh!

Second, starting again with weapons, armor and a level of fighter each. My son maneuvers into position (he’s got darkvision so can move at full speed through the areas poorly lit to my character’s human eyes), he asks “how do I charge?” Not implemented yet 😦 But nice that he immediately saw what the game should be able to do and grasped just how much like miniature combat I was going for.

Third, I edge past him while he’s wielding a great sword, provoking an attack of opportunity. He hits, I take damage. I try to turn and attack, the F9 attack key is not responding?!? Apparently he hit me hard enough to put me in negative health points. Hence why I need to complete the gamification of the system and provide that kind of subtle “you are dead!” feedback to the user.