I made a PC game inspired by GW2 with Unity (on itch.io)

[Urud.4925]

Heya,

so after making a pen & paper tabletop game last year, I decided to start studying how to make games in Unity and now, after 6 months, you can play the PC version, if you want (it can also be played on the browser).

This one is for a single player and a bit different, but I used the same skills and values of the previous one, since it seemed decently balanced (if you are curious about the math, you can read the last page of the old pdf with the rules).

Anyway, the game is on itch.io, and since it uses ArenaNet's assets (images and music) is obviously free (I don't even accept donations, in case there is some crazy folk willing to donate). I actually hope that the game is not so bad that ArenaNet will ask me to remove it from itch.io...

I got a bit bored towards the end, as the project dragged for longer than expected, so something could have been done better: I could have spent more time on the particle effects, but I was more interested in learning how to write scripts, and making good animations is just a matter of spending a lot of time. I recorded the audio for all the skills, but unfortunately my Char and Asura always talked during the animations, so there is some overlap (disabling the player voice seems to disable also the sound effect). Also, while I was able to record some Sabetha's line, I wasn't able to destroy the 4 chains in solo before Saul died, so I had to extract the audio from some YouTube video (I tried to ask in chat and in my guild if someone could help me to summon Deimos, but I found no one).

If you have suggestions or want to leave some feedback to help me improving my beginner skills, feel free to do so here, on itch.io or with a private message. But be kind! (or at least not too rough)

Cheers!

Edited August 3 by Urud.4925

[Noidea Incognito.9607]

@Urud.4925

I tried it and its pretty interesting with the dice system. It has potential.  Already various components are woven into a functional prototype; so you are definitely on the right track.

This is like a Boss rush game i recon, but i could totally see it as an in game component of a much larger game.  Something like an Openworld Dungeon crawler(based on GW2) that gets build up in RNG fashion as a  series of connected rooms/encounters. What you encounter is hidden until the band of heroes enters these rooms. Finding the Key to open the Boss door etc.  Bonus objectives, Health shrines A lot would be possible. You could even make it even more amazing if you used the entire Tyria map as a foundation for going on various Dungeon crawler adventures.

Example would be something like this: Main World map(divided into various Zone Hub (with increasing difficulty) -----> pick the Kryta Zone Hub(Each Hub has their own "dungeons/routes" which are initially locked, by clearing one you unlock the next.) -----> pick an unlocked route (which is pretty much like connected rooms  with encounters but should see it as "exploring a local map in the actual gw2 game" -----> continue to clear all dungeons/routes in that specific Zone Hub untill you unlock the final Dungeon/route which will lead to the final big boss of that Hub(can be a world boss or something else) ---->clearing the final boss unlocks the next Zone Hub in the World map.

How this would work visually; you could use an images of the local zone maps as "the playing board", place the connected room visuals atop and have an icon representing the band of heroes move from one room to another, when an battle encounter happens it switches to the already created (battle component). At the end of regular routes the final enemy could be something like a champion/veteran. So effectively the heroes would encounter all sorts of enemies, from grunt skritt to risen depending on the Hub zone they are currently in.

Bonus Objectives, Health shrines could be something like a special criteria of Battle encounter and the reward is for instance a temp buff for entire party that remains active for the next X encounters.  When i say special criteria it could be something  like: A Health Shrine is under attack by an veteran Ogre; defeat it within 20 turns before it is destroyed. ----> you succeeded to prevent the shrine's destruction: The party receives a Health regen buff for the next 2 encounters. or ---> you failed to prevent the shrine's destruction: The Shrine is forever lost.

Again it would be all 2D image assets as 3D would be taking it a step too far.  Coding a game is one thing. making the visual assets is another. If you ever decide to make good gw2 inspired game but personal flair consider finding out if you have a knack for making own art. If not find a good artist which could create sprites/assets for you.

Something that might be interesting to look into much later is making the "party members" more recognizable/cooler; replacing the base class icons with famous gw2 characters like Rhytlock, Logan, Teyo, Blish, Taimi...  I can imagen it would be interesting/hilarious if they started throwing VA one-lines/banther after getting hit or never getting hit or going down.

The idea of your number of Heroes representing your "lifes" in an encounter would be a nice idea too. If one hero goes down you still have the remain heroes to backup.

 

You have a lot of options beside this creation really. I could give you some more idea's:

A 2D race game with rollerbeetle mounts (old retro style racer like F-zero)

A 2D side scroller shootem up of a lone Silverwaste Charr Airship(upgradeable weapon system) fighting the minions of the Elder dragons.

A party based 2D final fantasy-like rpg based upon the GW2 Novel Edge of Destiny.

A 2D "Simon Says" game but instead of colors its a choir of Quaggan with different sound pitches.

A 2D tower defence game but you are Evon Gnashblade trying to protect your stash of shinies from a raving army of Skritt.

 

Anyway, keep up the good work o7

Edited August 7 by Noidea Incognito.9607

[Urud.4925]

Thanks a lot for playing the game and for your feedback, @Noidea Incognito.9607!

The idea to use it for a dungeon crawler or a kind of map/rooms to explore (like "worlds" in a Mario game) is interesting and would definitely make the game more replayable. Adding more bosses wouldn't be that difficult now, code-wise. Adding some enhancements/loot (or something like the Elite skill stolen from the boss, like in GW1), so you can decide which room/boss tackle first would be also interesting (I'll never add Skritts as enemies though!). Timed challenges are also a good idea, to add some variety.

However, I already underestimated the work involved with this game, as I ended up writing 5472 lines of code (a joke for a seasoned programmer, but definitely more than I expected as beginner at my first game).

The problem is also that using GW2 as theme, makes it less appealing to other people, and I can't even dream about asking 2€ on itch.io (if I decided to invest more time on it), since I use copyrighted material. My initial plan was to add 3D models for the characters for example, so they could fight each other on the battlefield, using better animations, instead of throwing particle effects at each other. Using 3D assets it's not a problem: code-wise there's basically no difference. The problem is that while I could use a generic 3D guy for the player, I cannot use a generic 3D character for Sabetha or Deimos: they are too specific bosses. And I don't want to learn how to create 3D models in Blender, it would be too time consuming.

For now it has been an useful project to learn a lot (watching tutorial videos on YouTube is definitely not the same as bashing your head trying to understand where you did wrong). To make it a much bigger game I would need some help from people willing to work for free, as I do. I will probably do minor changes, content-wise, bug fixes and move on on something else. Replacing the standard player with a selectable character like Taimi, Rytlock or Caithe is not a bad idea either, but it would completely change the idea of playing with different skillbars, as these characters have specific skills/profession. I thought about changing the sprite to reflect a better gear for example, as you progress, but I don't know if it 'd work with a specific GW2 character. I think the idea of a basic map to explore, like you said at the beginning, if I decided to add more bosses, should be doable.

Anyway, few minutes ago I uploaded a new version with some changes to make the game easier to understand (a dear friend of mine that never played GW2 gave me some useful and detailed feedback :D).

Thank you again for playing the game and for sharing some thought. In the end, I'm realising that making a game is not only a matter of coding, but also design choices (that I definitely lack).

[Noidea Incognito.9607]

@Urud.4925Yeah, coding/programming is a form of mathematical Art. Tutorials will only get you so far... actually experiencing it first-hand, combining all that knowledge into something functional and finding out if it "clicks" is something else.

There are a lot of example of solo-devs that managed to create their own IP games; some took it a few years... others 15 years(KEIZO Astralibra... dedication that paid off bigtime)

Its true that creating games using existing assets from your favorite IP falls in the realm of "fan-made passion projects" But for learning purposes this game has succeeded 100%

There are a lot of examples of 2D games that still achieved a degree of 3D( you can create depth with clever intricate Parallax and even 2D sprites can be made to look like they are 3D/2.5D). But pretty gfx aren't everything... if you take a game like one finger death punch; gfx wise it looks rather crappy, but the game loop is easy digestible yet satisfying.

Again; you have a lot of genre's that work well with 2D gfx. think metroidvania's, top down twin-stick shooters, side-scroller games. You have so much options at your disposal.

About the select-able character thing; I didn't mean it like that. Right now; every turn you switch from class to class, but if you think about it; it could very well seen as 1 single character in your party taking its turn. Depending on how you go about It; you can create the Illusion you are in a party of adventurers that are taking turns to attack the boss. So rhytlock would be tied to the Revenant skill set, countess anise to the mesmer skill set, Taimi the engineer skill set, etc etc.

Now the only complexity with this lies in the fact that each skill bar is also that party member's HP bar. This revolves around the idea that if the boss manages to KO a hero(skill bar A); you can no longer use that hero(skill bar A) for the duration of the fight, but you still have the other Heroes left(Skill bar B to F) to hopefully finish off the boss. Its either that or all "heroes" share that 1 HP bar(that's currently implemented already)

To make it more feasible / believable that you are in a party; you could change the "current character image" to depict all party members instead: standing idle, facing the direction of said boss image as a static image, or an animated gif that gets swapped out depending who's turn it is.

A method for animation would be to record the idle animations of GW2 miniatures in preview mode(background is calm without distractions) of all characters you want to have as heroes, crop to proper size, composite the footage together if needed, then turning them into a sequence of loose images or some other format the game code can understand to loop these images at 24 frames or something).

This would be easiest solution i recon as you are swapping a visual for another visual in the same "assigned frame". There is plenty of static artwork of various Gw2 npc if the animation thing is a bit too much. like https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Rytlock_Brimstone#/media/File:Rytlock_02_concept_art.jpg 

Another idea could be a grid where the character image would be; which has 8 squares placeholders representing the party.(they are visual icons like a portrait or a miniature version of the party member; the Miniature method above would work well for this as you could record them, crop a bit till you have a square shape matching the ones for the grid.) A lit up(pulsing outline?) square means that's the active turn hero, A Grey-out(red colored) square means that hero is KO-ed for the current battle. subtle but fast wiggling animation of a square means they are either attacking the Boss, or getting hit by it.

I will try the new version o7

 

Edited August 8 by Noidea Incognito.9607

[Urud.4925]

3 hours ago, Noidea Incognito.9607 said:

About the select-able character thing; I didn't mean it like that. Right now; every turn you switch from class to class, but if you think about it; it could very well seen as 1 single character in your party taking its turn. Depending on how you go about It; you can create the Illusion you are in a party of adventurers that are taking turns to attack the boss. So rhytlock would be tied to the Revenant skill set, countess anise to the mesmer skill set, Taimi the engineer skill set, etc etc.

Now the only complexity with this lies in the fact that each skill bar is also that party member's HP bar. This revolves around the idea that if the boss manages to KO a hero(skill bar A); you can no longer use that hero(skill bar A) for the duration of the fight, but you still have the other Heroes left(Skill bar B to F) to hopefully finish off the boss. Its either that or all "heroes" share that 1 HP bar(that's currently implemented already)

To make it more feasible / believable that you are in a party; you could change the "current character image" to depict all party members instead: standing idle, facing the direction of said boss image as a static image, or an animated gif that gets swapped out depending who's turn it is.

A method for animation would be to record the idle animations of GW2 miniatures in preview mode(background is calm without distractions) of all characters you want to have as heroes, crop to proper size, composite the footage together if needed, then turning them into a sequence of loose images or some other format the game code can understand to loop these images at 24 frames or something).

Ooh, that's more interesting, yes. I guess each skillbar/hero should have its own HP then, a kind of Pokémon game basically, but with a fixed character per turn. Sharing the same HP bar would be easier but weird, as the heroes would basically die when they run out of moves. It's not difficult to do (although in order to fit 9 characters in idle in the current sprite used for the player, they would be barely visible :D).

I wish Unity supported GIFs, it would make animations so much easier 😕 (I think I saw some paid asset that allows that). Extracting every single image from a video (or one every x frames), then cropping them and use the magic wand to remove the background and have an alpha channel will be a huge work. Doable, and probably interesting to see if it works, but this is one of the examples of spending a lot of time for something that it's only a matter of patience, so I would avoid it.

I will probably try to fix the current bugs/balancing issues before thinking about a new design/gameplay (I still like your idea of an explorable map of Tyria, and changing the playable character from 1 to a party wouldn't be a major change, so there's time for that).It's nice how different people focus on different things, so I receive feedback both on the UI (a friend complained because the tutorial shouldn't go ahead automatically but with a mouse ckick and because the moves have no names - I will change that), another one because the bosses have unfair attacks (Deimos' Mind Crush can happen 3-4 times in a row and Sabetha's Firestorm is just pure luck - I will "nerf" them :D). Anf you gave me long-term ideas, to make this small game more interesting, so thanks again!

[Noidea Incognito.9607]

@Urud.4925 

Thats quite alright. It never ceases to amaze me how a bunch of code becomes the foundation for awesome stuff.

But yes i looked mostly at it from a possibilities perspective rather then a technical one. o7

That being said; this Ash legion Operative will extend his Claw a little further to provide some more idea's. (would have done sooner, but somehow i didn't see the august post)

You got the code thing down but it left you drained and perhaps even gave a bit of a headache right?.. and then there's the design point that might even give more headaches.

You did say you felt lacking in that area.

On that part i might have a solution to help yield great results while preserving efficient usage of time when refining the visual style of the prototype/game.

Take a look at this Proof of concept visual https://imgur.com/a/osFzWyr  (what is shown in it is also the to clarify the misunderstanding about the 9 characters as one image. You are right; stacking 9 sprites in such a small space is looney.  The proper idea in this case would be: A single Hero is shown when its their turn)

The icons used are concept art portraits from the various in game miniatures; pretty much like the Skill icons they have the same consistent/uniform art style(even if you resize them pretty big the quality isn't too shabby either) , which also makes them perfect to act as "the Heroes" and "Enemies" of the game...  When you mentioned Pokemon, the thing that came to mind was playing cards. So what if the enemies,npcs, heroes are presented as playing cards? It would mean the style/feel remains the same across the entire board but it would be extremely easy to fabricate new "enemy cards" for instance.  In the proof of concept you sort see the jest of it. Simple playing cards; but they have enough "personality" to convey what they represent. In the example i looked up some generic medieval/fantasy card deck designs, combined with the concept icon concept art, etc etc.. 

Photoshop seems to be your forte as well; so this should be a walk in the part for you.. probably. o7

Now perhaps your wondering about the deal with those Scales. You should probably ignore that idea all together; cause its a crazy idea from the mind  of a crazy Charr that has Noidea.

But to humor you; for this Prototype it seems like an interest idea to have a "battle arena" with a twist. The Scales ARE the battle arena you see.

Perhaps an interesting coding challenge as well... or a huge pain in the *** , who shall say XD.

The Scales are an Dynamic element which tilts to one side or the other depending which side has more hp. The blue and Red flame are a particle effect. The blue flame represents the total HP of all heroes combined. The Red flame represents the Enemy's total HP.  The "Playing cards" attack each other flames directly(shown visually) and the scales tilt accordingly in real time. To make even a little more crazy; the size of a flame is based on how much HP is left. 

Additionally the type of font could be tweaked a little to give that GW2/medieval feel. There is also an added pulsing glow effect around either the Hero card or enemy Card to determine which side's turn it is.

I could come up with more crazy stuff.... but i think this will suffice for now.  Goodluck! o7

 

 

Edited August 8 by Noidea Incognito.9607

[Urud.4925]

I didn't forget about my dear Ash legion Operative @Noidea Incognito.9607!

You should change name, because the ideas you wrote were so many that I didn't know what to do anymore with this project (I launched Unity's editor, and then I closed it again after 15 seconds because I realized that I didn't know what to change). The scale has been turned down after 15 minutes, both because of the challenge in making it work, and because it didn't really add any mechanic. As far as I understood it was only a visual effect to replace the current particle effects (giving some sort of buff to the side with more HP would have pushed the player into a more defensive gameplay).

However your concept art cough me off balance, so I had to ask advice to two friends of mine, showing them your image. Both of them told me that they found more epic to have 1 single character fighting a boss, rather than a party, although they both play Dark Souls and never played GW2, so they may be biased... In the end I discarded the idea for a more technical reason: right now the balance is not too bad, while putting 1 healt bar to each character/skill bar would have changed the gameplay quite a lot. The player would have played the first 9 turns (probably even 18) without ever using a heal, and then after 3 turns almost always heals. It might have been like playing the first 3 turns 9 time in a row, while in the current way it should be more flexible, depending on how it goes the fight after the first turns.

BUT, the nice art style gave me another idea: I put 1 different image for each skill bar (same character but with a different weapon), and allowed the player to replace them with their own custom images, so if you want, you can make your own 9 cards with the miniatures and use them instead of the new default character. Hope it's a good compromise 🙂

For a full list of changes, if anyone is interested, have a look here!

o/

Edited August 16 by Urud.4925

[Noidea Incognito.9607]

Quote

You should change name, because the ideas you wrote were so many that I didn't know what to do anymore with this project (I launched Unity's editor, and then I closed it again after 15 seconds because I realized that I didn't know what to change). The scale has been turned down after 15 minutes, both because of the challenge in making it work, and because it didn't really add any mechanic. As far as I understood it was only a visual effect to replace the current particle effects (giving some sort of buff to the side with more HP would have pushed the player into a more defensive gameplay).

Lord @Urud.4925  o/

All though you decided to go along with some of this Ash Legion's silly idea's of your own volition; i still need to apologize.

It was not my intend to obscure the original vision of this Prototype. I tested it the 1st time and thought to myself: this has potential, let me try again. Then i tested it a 2nd time and i could see the potential to "visually weaponize" this prototype. Thus idea's for visual possibilities started to pour into my mind; Alas, i could not foresee whether these idea's would expand beyond  the scope, or remain within the boundaries of the Original Prototype's Blueprint.

The scale idea was to serve as a more visual interactive element to show the progress of the Battle. The Original Particle system would still be in place but instead of attacking the "player" it would be attacking the "Flame" on the said scale instead.  The size of the Flame(HP) + How much the Scale would have tilted either left of right would either mean: the Hero was winning or the Opponent was winning.  In the Revised idea of this; on the bottom under the scale would be a layer Green flames (which symbolized  Grenth's flames of Purgatory) So the side that tilts more towards  the bottom would also be closer to meeting a literal Demise. (The scale should seen as 2 fighters in a battle Figurative speaking)

But yes... this was not meant as a mechanic; but more like to create a visual battle spectacle within the constrains of that square.

Quote

However your concept art cough me off balance, so I had to ask advice to two friends of mine, showing them your image. Both of them told me that they found more epic to have 1 single character fighting a boss, rather than a party, although they both play Dark Souls and never played GW2, so they may be biased... In the end I discarded the idea for a more technical reason: right now the balance is not too bad, while putting 1 healt bar to each character/skill bar would have changed the gameplay quite a lot. The player would have played the first 9 turns (probably even 18) without ever using a heal, and then after 3 turns almost always heals. It might have been like playing the first 3 turns 9 time in a row, while in the current way it should be more flexible, depending on how it goes the fight after the first turns.

I can totally understand what they are thinking. (Noidea also played/finished all fromsoft soul games ). besides; the original vision for this prototype is named I AM META. (not WE)

But i am starting to see new possibilities as i type.... Uhmm, best not ..... *Noidea takes notes, puts those in a sealed container, drops that in icy Frostgorge lake* 

The Noidea formula i came up with to "balance it out":  BOSS HP divided among X number of Hero HP  =  X number of Hero HP united into BOSS HP + a little extra.  XD

Also for fairness the TURN pattern would have been this:  Hero1 ---> Boss ----> Hero 2 ----> Boss ----> Hero 3 -----> Boss ----> Hero 4 ----> Boss ---->Hero 5.... etc etc.

(pretty much the same like Original prototype)

I already took into account that much more HP bars would complicate things; so the alternative idea of Skillbars would be only VISUALLY representing the Heroes. (in the Concept art it was still the original 1 HP bar vs 1 HP bar; the only difference was adding the swapping of the Hero/Image(Which you DID implement; well met sir! well met!) The other visual element would have been to add an extra placeholder icon in front of the various skillbars to make it seem more believable  that those are the skills of the said Hero(icon). (Also shown in the Concept art) These placeholder icons could also be showing the Standard Class icons like the warrior/ guardian.  But again; that's going beyond the scope of this Prototype's purpose.

 

One thing perhaps to look into is streamlining the "TURNS"? (you have to click 2 times each turn atm; 1 for confirmation the Enemy needs to make a ROLL then you need to click  2nd time for your own action)

I most TURN BASED games such as chess/checkers/memory/simon says; its usually a direct Action / Reaction thing.

So you might get away with something like this:

HERO THINKING/ACTION(press key)-----> BOSS IS "THINKING"/rolls dice----> BOSS PREFORMS ACTION----->HERO THINKING/ACTION(press key)----->BOSS IS "THINKING"/rolls dice ----> BOSS PREFORMS ACTION-----etc etc    That's 1 click per turn. ...unless i am overseeing something vital o7

 

One more other thing that might be interesting to look into:

On the Boss selection screen we see a list of all Combat Classes. It will depict the ORDER OF PLAY TURN represented as a small digit. 

But the static element (names of the Classes) combined with the Dynamic element(position of Turn based on RNG) make it seem a little janky?

What would you think of the following idea:

Make that spot an empty container/placeholder so when you select a Boss;  the Placeholder dynamically fills up/loads the Skillbars in correct order of Turn (Add something in front of them like "1ST TURN, 2ND TURN  or 1, 2, 3, 4

 

Oh my.... again i am yet rambling  like a madman... It must be all that confiscated illegal OozeBooze variant..... tha-THAT I ABSOLUTELY DESTROYED! of course it did!

Again my sincere apologies... i was about to turn this Pristine Nightmare into a Hellish Unicorn again....

Edited August 19 by Noidea Incognito.9607