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Stantzfield
07-30-2006, 12:25 AM
I'm nearly done with my Steve Irwin quest and have began jotting down ideas for my next quest. I've decided to make a sequal to my favorite detective game, DeJaVu. It was an old point and click rpg for the NES and old computers. So those who have played this game or Shadowgate or Uninvited will more easily understand what I want to do.

Multiple Warps

The basic idea of the game is search the screen for clues like the original game. However in Zquest you obviosly can't select an option labeled Exam and click on an object on screen.

So what I want to do, is have the player move Ace (the character) on warps that would be placed in front of objects and walls and have it act like someone would create a screen to make it seem like a character is talking. Instead, it'd be like if Ace is thinking to talking to himself describing what he's seeing. Some of these would be helpful and others would be pointless.

Having one per screen wouldn't fit the game. How would you go about having more than one of these "Observations" on a single screen. I also want it so that the player can only cause these to activate once during the game as well.


Cutscenes

Pretty much the game is going to have 3 different types of cutscenes depending on the type of information the player is being given, but all will be done the same. Unlike other quests with cutscenes where it'll use the basic Zelda sprites and have them act out a scene, I just want to have simple pictures displaying the action with the game text describing what's happening. I know this is possible and very basic, but how do you do cutscenes? I also once again have these occur only once when they get activated.


Instant Death

In the original game if the player either did something stupid or wrong, the player would either get killed or arrested. I want to have this happen too. There will be some screens where if entered, a cutscene would occur, however, it would describe an incident in which the player either died or got arrested and then I want the Game Over screen to appear (Continue, Save, Retry Screen) without having to be killed by a regular enemy in the game. Note: there will be clues in the game that warn the player prior coming to a screen that is an instant Game Over. It'd be up to the player to decifer what the cutscene was trying to say.


Random Interactive Cutscenes

In the game, every once in a while if the player entered a particular screen there was a chance that the player could run into someone. Likewise, I want to impliment this in my quest. Specific screens would have cutscenes that would happen randomly. They don't always occur, but sometimes they do.

During the cutscene, after the screen describes how and who Ace has ran into and what they want. the player will be given a choice of 4 possible things to do. 1. Talk to the Person, 2. Give the Person money(but must have money), 3. Punch the person, 4. Shoot the person(but must have the Gun). And then depending on what the player chose, the game would go to another cutscene describing the outcome of the choice. Sometimes the choice will be fine and the game would resume normal, but if the choice is wrong, the player could either get killed, mugged, or arrested!


Rewording Triforce

Instead of hunting down Triforce pieces, the player is hunting down major pieces of evidence hidden inside concealed envelopes. On the inventory screen, is there any way to change the word Triforce to something else like Evidence?


Multiple Endings

To get an ending, the player must enter the Police Station. Depending on how much evidence the player has would determine which ending he/she would get. For example, having no evidence would be equivilant to an Instant Arrest Game Over. While having all 8 pieces of evidence would net the true ending of the game.


Thanks for the help. And I'm hoping this is a good idea for a quest.

Pineconn
07-30-2006, 12:57 AM
Multiple Warps:

Not in 2.10. You can have 4 tile warps and 4 side warps in 2.11, though.

Cut scenes:

Check here (http://www.armageddongames.net/showthread.php?t=92335).

Instant death:

In 2.11 there are combos labeled as "Damage (32 hearts)". In 2.10, you could have a Death Knight's beam/sword hit Ace, which does 16 hearts with no ring. You could make everything black (on layer 6), and force the player to hit the beam/sword quickly. Additionally, in 2.10, the highest damage combo is 4 hearts.

Random Interactive Cutscenes:

Seems complicated, might not be possible... in 2.10. Perhaps an expert can help you.

Rewording Triforce:

There is no way to change "Triforce", I believe.

Multiple Endings:

You could use boss flags.... Boss flags, to me, are difficult to explain, so I'll leave an expert to that again. ;)

Hope that helps a little. :)

Stantzfield
07-30-2006, 09:39 AM
Where can I get version 2.11? It looks like I won't be able to make this game the way I invision it with 2.10.

erm2003
07-30-2006, 12:03 PM
Go here:
http://www.armageddongames.net/showthread.php?t=90670

Download the full version (first link) and then overwrite the exe file with the one you get from the second link which has a major bug fix. You will then have ZC 2.11 beta 10b. Just be sure to put this in a different folder! Keep both versions and COPY your quest into that folder so that if something goes wrong you have a backup.

Mega Link
07-30-2006, 12:45 PM
Random Interactive Cutscenes:

You'll have to use multi-warps using the random warp.

DeFray
08-02-2006, 09:37 PM
You could set up the multiple endings if you tried hard enough, using a trick I learned from Freedom a long time ago. It would indeed require the use of boss flags. Do you have the general idea of what boss flags do? My explanation assumes you already know how to use them...


Let's say that the screen for the entrance to your police station is a long, straight hallway from the bottom to the top of the screen. Make a bunch of copies of this screen.
Set a secret flag on the first combo above the entrance of this screen (a normal floor combo). Set it so that when secrets are triggered by the boss flag, this combo will turn into another that looks exactly the same, but is a Stairs combo. Set the tile warp for this screen to go to one of the copied screens that you made earlier. If you set it to Insta-Warp and both screens look exactly the same, the player won't know they warped at all.
Now, on this next screen, set the next combo up the hallway with a Secret flag. Just like last time, set this combo to change so that it looks exactly the same but becomes a Stair.
Continue this way, so that each step Link takes warps him to another identical screen. Set the bottom Side Warp for each of these screens to go back outside the police station.
Now, for each of these rooms. Room 1's secret will be triggered if you have Evidence piece 1; room 2's secret will be triggered if you have evidence piece 2; and so on. The more evidence pieces you have, the more the player will be warped as they walk up the hallway. Then just set it so that the top side-warp for Room 1 takes you to Ending 1, and the top side-warp for Room 2 takes you to Ending 2... Well, you get the idea. ;)

Make sense?