Zelda III Online

Hi all RPG fans!

I'm looking for people willing to make a Zelda-like MUD (online-
RPG). Like Graal if
anyone knows -.-" However, I'm planning for a Direct3D-based
engine so we can make effects like transparency, rotations and
such...

I'll need people that can do:

• Server Programming (game classes, accounts, DPlay,...)
• Client Programming (whole DirectX, gfx engine, GUI,...)
• Graphics (tiles, objects, characters)
• Music (background music)
• Sound effects (various kinds)
• Design (levels, enemies, GUI...)
• Story (background story, races, ecomony,...)

We can make the talking here or by mail. However, please do
not join if you won't have the time to work on it! I want it to be
done soon.

Fox

It will have a lots of Zelda???

No :eek: surely not ;)

Like in other online games people can chose their own clothes, buy them in-game respectively. The same for weapons, we'll have more than just a sword, a master sword, 2 kinds of bombs and a bow.. -.-"

You may ask: So why's it Zelda then? Well simple, because of the graphics style and the engine. It'll be Zelda-like, but not Zelda itselves.

(And btw: The guy's called Link, Zelda's the princess -.-+)

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(And btw: The guy's called Link, Zelda's the princess -.-+)

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I know that :D

well I do not have a lots of knowledge about DirectX but I have some with VB maybe I can help you for some code but I can not be an important develloper :\

Btw, I really like your idea, I like a lots Zelda games.

are you planning on having ppl pay like at that Graal site?

Yah if this one would take off you definatly need a good server.

I would like to help in anyway that i can, never done DX before though

I liked the old zelda games too ;)

Ill join...

I can work on the background information, and design levels..

And if worst came to worst, I could learn DX... :eek:

I also enjoyed the old zelda games... Infact, I still have the old nintendo
hooked up to my TV... lol

-Andrew

I would try to help in following:

• Client Programming (GUI)
• Graphics (tiles, objects, characters)
• Music (background music)
• Sound effects (various kinds)
• Design (levels, enemies, GUI...)
• Story (background story, races, ecomony,...)

:) :) :)

I can only help on everything who is not programming coding like winsock... and these code about health..weapons.. all "back" code that we need to run the game.

Are we gonna do this or not... I REALLY REALLY like the idea...

I think we should get started very soon...

Im not trying to be rude or anything, but if Fox doesnt come back,

then I think we should start with out... Of course we would still

give 'em credit...



-Andrew

P.S. We probably need more people, so MORE PEOPLE JOIN!!!!

I can't hang around here every day :)

Well first thanks for the feedback. I mentioned Zelda because it's a kinda simple RPG and so Graal is and ours will be. But: I wan't it to be flexible so we can later make it more complex.

Well any more people for the team out there?

How many ppl you figure we need?

Am I in or not ?

hi i want to help. i pritty much know most of the vb lang and some of c++, ive just applyed to uni to studie computer game development (advanced directx and c++). i know some directdraw but hardly any direct3d. hope i can be of some use

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How many ppl you figure we need?

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I'd say for each of the 7 areas I mentioned at least 1 person...

aliboss: You could make the client programming

DaoK: You could make the editors we'll need

Stickman: Which of these is your favourite? ;)

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Originally posted by Fox



Stickman: Which of these is your favourite? ;)

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any of them would be fine. Whatever we need done, not like we just have to have 1 person focus on 1 area, we can spread around to help each other ;)

i think we need about 2 people for each section, but everyone helps each other as well. im quite happy to be working on the client code fox but i cannot do anything more than display a triangle in direct3d (ATM). once i see the code to do stuff i can pick it up very easy so im hoping to help on the direct3d as well. what parts will you be doing fox?

What about me?

flame211: story + level design is O.K.

stickman: Nice, can you take the sound / music part then?

aliboss: It's not more you need ;) In fact it's still a 2D game, but instead of drawing rectangle bitmaps you'll draw 2 textured polygons that form a rect...

Thanks, Im glad too help :)


Anyways... I dont know if you said it but what language are we gonna program this in? I know HTML & VB

yeh im mainly a vb programmer, i can do quite abit of c++ as well. i think we should do it mainly in vb and add c++ dll's if we need to do anything in C++. but its up 2 fox

I think we can do it all in VB. Oh well, I forgot one important part:

• Website + Design

Anyone for this part?

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Another thing: We could use my Nocturne2D - tile/level/player/obeject-editors :) So we don't have to start from 0. Also -for the server part- we could use my independant script-class.

I think we should work more as a team.

I say once we get started more people will probably want to help once we have a little something started

We can pool our knowledge for now, not really have to be confined to the certain task.

That's just what i think ;)

BTW, do we have a name for the game? :p

Sure, as soon as they 'see' something they'll beg us to join ;)

Well erm, Zelda3 Online is a nice work title, we'll change that later.

cool, when do ya want to get started with this?

:) :cool: :D :)

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DaoK: You could make the editors we'll need

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I will need more information because I really do not have an idea of what is that lol

Well as common we need a level editor, object editor, account editor and such...

As for the rest: I think the coding part is the most important, and as soon as this works we can make the grapics, sounds, shortly said the game upon that.. and people will more likely want to join the group as soon as we can show results.

So let's concentrate to the server/client part for the moment. And to keep things compatible I'd say we talk about everything here in the forum! Let's make say 2 threads, Z3O server+client programming, and we'll post our ideas and later code there.

I want to start out soon so .. any better ideas?

Sorry I wasnt able to get on this weekend...

Anyways, I know how to program in VB, so if you
need help with programming I can do that too...

-Andrew

P.S. I also know how to make websites, but we should probably
work on that AFTER we have something...

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P.S. I also know how to make websites, but we should probably work on that AFTER we have something...

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Sure, but its nice if we can show what we have as soon as possible. However, I'd say we make a small and simple concept now and then start out with the basic things so we get on fast.

I repost who's in atm:

• Fox
• DaoK
• stickman373
• aliboss
• flame_211

Everyone ok with this?

Yes :):)

sounds good;)

Ok... I got 2 ideas, but they both go in opposite directions...

You guys can either not pay any attention to them (hich would be
fine with me) or listen to them (which again would be fine with me)

1. Maybe when you engage in battle between you and another person, it goes to a different scene, where you and that person go at it head to head, where there is no one else to distract you, just you and the other player fighting til one is dead( unless one chooses to chicken out and runs :p )

or...

2. Have a sort of base, you can either be by your self, or on a team(with a base) and you can defend your base the whole time, or go out on your own and fight for your team, or you and several of your team mates can go and attack other teams.
The team would decide on a captain, and the captain can control the other players (only when they are not logged on) and lead them in to battle, and the captain would choose people to be in a certain rank (this would determine who would take control of the guys who are offline)





If any of this makes sense to you let me know, OR if you want me to elaborate on an area of my explanation, let me know...


The reason they go in opposite directions is because the first idea would be if their were no teams(if their were teams the team would be able to take out one guy(obviously))

Again if I make no sense at all, let me know And I'll shut up :)

-Andrew

I think it would be neat to have community type villages, sort of like clans like you see for a lot of games.

I think the fighting idea is good too, not sure what would be the best way, but i think a large up close battle would be a nice :p

can't wait to get started!

:D

person fight each others or vs computer???

Im glad you like my ideas... I cant wait either...

DaoK:
I dont know if we should have computer players in the game...
I havent actually programmed AI, but I have heard it is REALLY REALLY hard, so I think it would be just Human vs. Human...

-Andrew

Since we're going to make a tile-based engine we're very flexible. Also we can add any properties to objects, tiles or characters at any time we want. Therefore it shouldn't be a problem to implement a Guild system or however you call it (I'm pointing to Ultima Online).

However, to your ideas: I think fights shouldn't be in extra screens (or levels how it's technically managed). I don't like this Final Fantasy -style at all.. so fights will be realtime and just on the same maps as everything.

Not to misunderstand the fight system, people just walk around in the world and can fight anyone they want. So there's no really PvP or PvComputer fights, it's just fights... As in UO, Anarchy, even Diablo2 or any of these.

So a player who play sinec 1 years can kill a newby player with 1 shoot because he will had a lots more strenght ?

Sounds very intersting but Id like to make some suggestions:

Have you considerd as far as graphics style using tile sets not in the SNES Zelda style? That would make it look too much like you are ripping off Graal. Perhaps use the SNES Final Fantasy style tile sets!

And PvP. PvP is so much ignored in games today it is rediculous. Inadiquate PvP protection for low level players is used and eventually an online game of this nature becomes nothing more than an blood bath run by high level player killers. Something has to be in place to prevent newbies from getting slaughtered becuase they wont come back and number will dwindle. Ive seen it happen all too often.

I am kind of interested in joining this. I dont really have any DX knowledge yet, but I can pick it up. I cant draw, but I can program. I am particularly experienced in client/server porgramming with winsock and can probably easily pick up Direct Play.

I agree with Cander about the NPC but you will need to explain me how battles will work. ?

LOL I accidently click Submit before I was Done... so Read the POST Down their


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I never really enjoyed FF at all lol...

My brother was playing it the otherday and I just thought..Wel I dont know what I was thinking (Usually dont)

Any ways I am glad you are ok with the Guild/Team/Village idea...


Cander- Im sure if you joined your skills would not be wasted...

-Andrew

P.S. I really think this thing has a shot at becoming REALLY Real...

I dont want this to go under like all the other Games/Programs Ive seen...

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Originally posted by flame_211

Cander- Im sure if you joined your skills would not be wasted...


P.S. I really think this thing has a shot at becoming REALLY Real...

I dont want this to go under like all the other Games/Programs Ive seen...

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Yes i'm sure we can use everyone who joins!

And me too, I think we can really get a good game finished together!

:D :) :D :)

I am glad you agree...


-Andrew

Allright, let's talk about how the game should be then.

• I think we should not make realtime fights, because this may be bad for people with slower connections. As in UO characters should automatically attack their target so the player just has to select who to attack.
  
• There will be different weapons that cause different amounts of damage.
  
• Also will should have a level of experience. From this value we can also calculate the hitpoints, strength and anything other... (Yes this is a simple system, but we can always extend it later)
  
• There will be items like healing potions, different armors you can wear, magical amuletts (ie. a fireball spell) and many others I can't list here ;)

(to be continued..)

You should allow players to script combat behavior. This way, if someone has a slow connection, the HP packet might not get through, and they wont be able to accuratly judge how badly they are doing. Instead, allow small uploads of a script that would make certain descisions server side, to run if HP is less then 30%, etc. These would be extremely limited scripts, but would level out the difference between high and low pings.

Z.

You mean you just select how your player reacts? Thats a bit too easy for everyone, isn't it? And if you allow them to write scripts it's like 'the better you code the better you fight' ...

However, I actually dont want to waste server memory with this .. so better make just one good player AI that you can setup to your needs.

I think we should have many world. Like for person < 500, between 500 and 1000 ... Like that person who have 35000 exp will not be able to kill a person with 100exp

I agree with you DaoK...

We should have different worlds, then maybe put
each on a seperate sever...

-Andrew

Thats not needed, we can do it just as in Anarchy.. people with too different levels can't fight.

humm ok but how the map will be divided ? I think we should lock some place that only Higher level will be able to access... like that we will be able to add some place all the time ( like upgrade ) and like that the game will never have an end.

Not the better you code. Make the scripts extremely simple:

Code:

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IfLifeIsLessThenPercent(30, "Run");
IfEnemyRangedAttack("MoveIn");

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Think Baldurs Gate. You would supply several generic scripts with the game, and allow users to select one if they want to.

Z.

might be good to implement them now, rather than later, seems like a good idea, will let the user customize a bit too.

when do we actually get started?:D

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Make the scripts extremely simple:

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Think about 80% of all players.. they'll not want to script coz 'its too hard' even if they didnt try ... And I really dont think players should be able to write anything by themselves.

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Worlds can simlpy be divided by script: (this is a working script from my current script system)

Code:

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OnEnter
{
  If( Bigger( Player.Level, 10 )
  {
      Teleport( Player, "map0102" );
  } else {
      Message( Player, "You cannot pass this point before reaching level 10!" );
  }
}

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Anyone know some good tutorials on using tile systems with DX? Id like to start researching how to do this.

I do not understand the thing about script?

It's a tile-script that is called as soon as a player walks on it. It's a teleporter that only teleports players with level > 10, others get the message.

Cander: Maybe you can find something here

Should we have a limit of game play each day ?

No.. maybe a limit of maximum users but no time limit to each

Maybe...

Maybe a limit of Max users per Server, and then have a few servers... But not at the early stages, we aint rich or anything... And Im sure after the game is developed
we could get enough money from advertising to pay for a couple of servers...

Just a thought,

-Andrew