Home is behind, the world ahead...

2 January 2007

Another year bites the dust! The typical reaction on a blog on such a special event, would be summarising the year past, and looking forward on the road ahead. I guess I shall adhere to this tradition…

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What can be said about the past year? It wasn’t too good, especialy in the beginning. I might even say it was a waste up to the end of summer. But luckily I managed to revive myself after summer vacations, and Chaosforge started moving again. DoomRL 0.9.8.5 has been released, the community has been ressurected with a power far greater than it ever had, and I started accepting donations — finally being able to believe in a life where I could earn money by making games.

I’d like to give a big thanks to the first Chaosforge donators – DaEezT, Styro, Rook and Aki – you guys made me believe in the future.

And what will the future bring? There are two major plans for the first half of the year. The situation may change, but as for now those are my priorities.

The first one is DoomRL 0.9.9/1.0.0 and hopefully the introduction of the tiled graphical version.

The second one is a completely new project, and my first try to leave the roguelike world. Codenamed “Stardreamer” it will be a space game in the spirit of Elite, but with a completely different interface (2D interplanetary travel, 3D tactical third-person-view combat).

Generaly I think it’s high time to leave the world of roguelikes. I’m taking with me all that’s good from this genre, tough. I have plenty ideas for games, and it’s realy hard to keep those ideas at bay.

Probably as time allows I will polish up my existing roguelikes, tough. But I surely will take part in the next 7DRL competition :).

Comments

Bfg9001 · 2 January 2007, 07:57 But before you leave the world of roguelikes, make sure you give us Genrogue!

Lol
TFoN · 2 January 2007, 19:01 And I strongly disagree with you, Margo :P
Rogulikes have been in development for the past 30 or so years and seem to have out-lived any other game in terms of continued interest and revitalisation, but still aren\'t being developed fast enough for anyone to realy see what more potential they hold.
I was and am hoping Kornel\'s one to untrap this potential - but if he and others won\'t, then I\'ll simply have even more of a reason to study programming beyod it\'s theory :)
Still, any way it goes, I hope Roguelikes will eventually be shown for what they are are - not \"lesser\" games but powerful engines of pure logic, not to mention imagination toys at their best and strong fighters for the open-source/freeware agenda.
Slashie · 2 January 2007, 21:09 Hey! it was a good year!

Stardreamer sounds nice, will it be Open Source? Freeware? Commercial? or Closed Source as usual ;)

Kornel knows roguelikes are more than a genre, I am sure he will take all that is good on them and apply it on future games. It can only be for good, and he has given enough to the roguelike community which is more alive than never now.
Adral · 2 January 2007, 22:58 --WARNING-- Sorry for the long post, I was just inspired :P --WARNING--

TFoN said:
******************
And I strongly disagree with you, Margo :P
Rogulikes have been in development for the past 30 or so years and seem to have out-lived any other game in terms of continued interest and revitalisation, but still aren’t being developed fast enough for anyone to realy see what more potential they hold.
I was and am hoping Kornel’s one to untrap this potential - but if he and others won’t, then I’ll simply have even more of a reason to study programming beyod it’s theory :)
Still, any way it goes, I hope Roguelikes will eventually be shown for what they are are - not “lesser” games but powerful engines of pure logic, not to mention imagination toys at their best and strong fighters for the open-source/freeware agenda.
******************

I SO agree with you here, TFoN. Most people see roguelikes as Margo sees them - as secondary, ugly, almost stupid games. Although I think the potential they still lock is just unimaginable. Just look at Dwarf Fortress and see what can become of a Roguelike: the deepest you can imagine, and almost realer than \"Real Life\":P. And it\'s only on beta stage!

I just love how roguelikes stimulate my imagination with the descriptions, randomized everything, and how they are exercises on the mind, not on the reflexes or \"graphic whoring\".

Lately, games are all graphics and no content, and roguelikes are the opposite end of the spectrum: all content and no graphics. Still, if a graphical roguelike would be made with high-resolution tiles (which, in my opinion, and unlike 3d models that get outdated, don\'t get old as they are a work of art too -see end of post), it could more or less get the best from all worlds.

And about \"mind\" content, it\'s just so plain obvious: in roguelikes you ACTUALLY have to think your way out of most problems, whereas in most games it\'s KILLKILLKILL->OMG SWITCH/NPC HUNT->KILLKILLKILL or just plain CLICKCLICKCLICK. And how they are presented, with just a little imagination, can bring you to a whole new world, just read the YASDs and YAVPs at rgrm, rgrn, rgra, and you can actually see how it\'s almost as if you lived the life of your character.

Also, the reason roguelikes still exist: replayability. No other game EVER has had the replayability of a good roguelike. You can play ADOM for ages and it still doesn\'t really get old, you can rediscover Nethack after years of not playing it and still enjoy it, you can play Crawl several times in a row amazing yourself every time with new situations...

In my opinion, roguelikes are not just plain code. They are ART.

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Well, if you actually have read this far, congratulations - You win. :P
Kornel Kisielewicz · 4 January 2007, 15:41 Adral, TFoN, do not worry -- the reason I wish to switch to other genres is that I have a zeal to bring them what is good in roguelikes! Mainly I\'m talking here about PermaFailure and Randomness, but also a lot other things I\'ve learned while doing Roguelikes. And thank you all for the kind words :)
Adral · 4 January 2007, 16:44 I haven\'t lost the faith in you Kornel - you are one hell of a brilliant designer. That\'s why I would love seeing you continue working on RLs, and that\'s why I\'d like that you\'d never forget them and still get involved with your RL games or new RL projects.

As for the new games, I\'m sure they will pretty much rock - my only concern is what I\'ve said above and on the forum - that you might forget about you other \"sons\". :)
Kornel Kisielewicz · 5 January 2007, 04:39 Don\'t worry about my \"sons\" -- DoomRL and Berserk! will be polished up to great 1.0.0 releases for sure :). And don\'t worry about \"leaving too soon\" -- the final feature list for DoomRL 1.0.0 is pretty big (and for my point of view \"complete\").

DiabloRL is still a problem for me -- the amount of work is too big, and the rewards too small (it is not much popular :( ).

As for further roguelike games... there\'s always 7DRL compos :P.