You can download the mp3 of the podcast, play it in the embedded player below, or you can follow us on iTunes.
Topics discussed in this episode include:
- The dangers of messing too deeply with procedural content and clever AI
- Making what's special about your game stand out more
- Using a single hit point model to keep your scope down and force some innovation out
- The pros and cons of scope
- Motivations for doing a 7DRL and what to expect to get out of it, and the sheer fun of the week
- Why everyone thinks their own roguelikes were so highly rated (in modest terms, of course)
- Having a good theme and name and not having them too generic or hard to search for
- How much time to spend planning and thinking, and retaining flexibility for changes to plans during the week
- Everyone's game plans for this year
- What we'd like to see come out of the challenge this year
- An encouragement to join in discussion on the #rgrd IRC channel
Join us next time for an episode on player challenges.
Thanks yet again! Hopefully I'm ready to make a 'good' 7DRL now :P
ReplyDeleteInteresting you mentioned searching for "X@COM" on Google, Eben. I wonder how long ago that was, perhaps back in the earlier days? You said it was "the other day" but I've been following the term on Google for a while now and in recent months growing popularity of the game has brought it to the fifth spot on the first page of results, and "X@COM roguelike" even comes up in the search suggestions while typing in Google. For the longest time it had no idea what the '@' symbol was for, but seems to have figured it out now. Blogspot shows people arriving at the site by searching for "X@COM", but many more come by way of "XCOMRL". Perhaps even better, X@COM now also appears on the first page of search results for "X-COM" :)
ReplyDeleteThat said, I'd certainly agree about the ease of searching for a name being important for a game (or anything online...). The X@COM name is temporary, in any case, and will change once the game is "ready to be popular" :) Sometime this year or the next...
On a side note, I remember being surprised that Rogue Basin allows an '@' symbol in page names.
Good luck to everyone doing a 7DRL this year! Unfortunately I don't have the time I did last year to burn myself out for an entire week, family obligations will do a fine job of that without any help ;p
It was about three weeks ago that I was searching for it, but it was on someone else's work computer.
DeleteSpecifically I was looking for a screenshot or somesuch to show him the gameplay and UI of it.
Probably a failure on my part not to include the word "roguelike" in the search :(
Ah, yes, precisely what you should be doing at work :)
DeleteI suppose not finding it isn't too surprising since Google does behave quite differently on different users' computers/locations, especially if logged in.
Note that if anyone is using Unity for their 7DRL I have several trial codes to offer out. E-mail me at darrenjohngrey at Hotmail.com if you want one!
ReplyDeleteDon't forget to check out the Retrospectives page at http://roguebasin.roguelikedevelopment.org/index.php?title=Retrospectives. Learn from those who have attempted the challenge before. And/or, share what you learned!
ReplyDelete