Therium-2 - ModDB open!

[Constance]

This is no longer being updated.

Go check out the ModDB page!

[+] Outdated

Keep in mind that everything you are seeing is almost certainly going to change over time. This ain't the final stuff you're seeing here.

Current Therium-2 statistics:

• - 774 MB on Github
  - You know what, I should just stop counting how many dialogue files there are...
  - 6 new types of enemies
  - 7 Non-Playable characters with full personalities and backstories
  - 15 playable levels so far
  - 6 (or 8?) endings planned
  - 1 new terrain heightmap and texture
  - 1 new Skybox
  - 8 new hotspots specifically for Therium-2
  - 53 new prefabs of buildings and etc. to use in both development and making custom maps

[+] Plan for Development

Here's my plan for development:

• Alpha Stage

This is the time when I'll be making new levels, implementing new features, new textures, skyboxes, characters, paths and enemies. I'm basically making the whole game here. When I'm done, I'll have a mostly unpolished campaign with some bugs, plot holes and/or f****g stupid game or story design.
The Alpha stage will be done when every single level and path is finished and running mostly properly.

• Beta Stage

Once I'm done with Alpha, I'll be polishing the entire campaign. It'll look better, run better, have less stupid game design or plot holes (if any, hopefully) and probably so much dialogue I won't be able to count. The Beta Stage is over once me and any bug testers have found all the bugs present in Therium-2's gameplay and mechanics and the game is at a presentable state of quality or performance (AKA won't run horribly or look horrible).

• Review Stage

Once I'm done with both Alpha and Beta, I'll be doing a review stage. Here, I'll get some gameplay testers to go through each level and play the campaign before it's released, and give me (or us if I somehow happen to have a team or something) feedback for how each level feels in gameplay (whether it gives them a certain vibe through asthetics or gameplay, how difficult it is, etc). Then, based on this feedback, I'll work the levels through again and try to beta test it again if necessary.

• TEDIOUS Stage

This will be the absolute least fun part of everything ever. In this stage, I'll try to optimize downloading Therium-2 as much as possible, meaning less dependancies, less of a pain to install in any way, more accessible, etc. I'll do this both before and after I release the campaign, meaning I'll optimize the installation process and dependancies, and afterwards, you guys just give me bug reports depending on what status you were in and such. I'll fix anything that I can that comes my way.

• Release Stage

This won't be the final stage. In fact, this stage will be as infinite as whatever I feel like it being. From this stage on, the campaign is completely public and free for anyone to download. Every single level and aspect of the campaign will be accessible to people. What people will NOT do, but I can't stop them from doing, is loading a level they should already be loading. AKA: Skipping levels and cheating. You better not do this you guys, you can really spoil some stuff.

[+] Original Post

I'll occasionally post some peeks of what I'm making in this thread.

My project is named Therium-2 and I'm planning for about 30 playable levels in its campaign, including secrets and multiple endings.

[Surak]

That sounds ambitious I like the first video, a lot of little details. And I think it is a good choice to show some progress from to time. Releasing too much stuff at the same time is not very effective if you also want to reach the people.

[Constance]

At the time of writing, my level campaign has about 42 files of dialogue that are loaded onto levels. Currently about 6 levels are finished and are in a playable state, while one level (the one I'm working on right now) is getting polished and finished.

[MetalMilitia623]

Seems like one heck of a project man. Best of luck to you and it looks like it'll be quite fun when finished.

[halzoid]

just watched the video, holy f*** that looks like its going to be a good campaign. one thing though, I noticed that you wrote "please load pt.2.xml", isn't there already a load level trigger, you could have the ai walk into it during the last screen of dialogue, which I understand may be a bit tedious, but it would help the flow of the levels and would keep the player involved.
anyway, good luck with the campaign!

[Constance]

Yeah I'd love to do a load level trigger, but last I heard that hotspot was broken.
It's also somewhat intentional, because this way you can remember the .xml and write it down, like one of those games that use a password system.
That and I want to give the player a chance to open up the editor and see how the level was made. I'm totally fine and accepting with people doing stuff like that, as LONG AS THEY'RE NOT GOING INTO LEVELS THAT THEY HAVEN'T FOUND YET.
Seriously, it can give some big spoilers if you load one of the endings without any context.

[Autious]

Timbles, you mentioned in another thread that you don't have backups.

I'd suggest you start using GitHub and Git to keep track on your stuff, it's free.

It will give you two points of safety.

1. You'll have redudancy (meaning a backup offsite) so if your house burns down you're likely to retrieve your data.
2. You'll have history, meaning that if a file becomes corrupt you can go back to a previous version and continue from there, meaning less re-working.

Git is common for programming and the workflow is usually like this:

1. Create something
2. "Commit" what you have changed, giving your change a short description (a sentence)
3. Push to github

The iterations for programming are rather small like you've created a new small feature that works on its own.

Mapping it to mapping, it might be comparable to something like having spent 1 hour building a village, or a set of dialogue for a scene.

Each time you commit, you'll know that you have a "Snapshot" of the current state that you can always reproduce in the future. It might make you feel more relaxed in trying crazy things that would usually result in everything becoming corrupt.

[Constance]

Alright, thanks, I'll consider it (it's a good idea).
I'll definitely keep it in mind.

[Constance]

With help from Thomason, I got together a working prerequisite kind of thing.
Basically, if you can't tell from the video, walking on the red block triggers the NPC in the cage to fall into a hotspot that kills him. Once he's dead, his corpse drops into a special kind of dialogue hotspot. This dialogue hotspot only triggers when there's both one alive character and one dead character in it at the same time, so that dead NPC from the red block's dialogue fills one part of the requirements. Then you can walk into the hotspot and fill the other end of the hotspot's requirements, therefore triggering dialogue.

This hotspot is useful for more then just keys: if I decided that the dialogue at the end of a level is different if you triggered some dialogue beforehand, then this hotspot would actually help do that. I have a LOT more freedom in what I can do from hotspots like this.
Serious credit to Thomason for making hotspots like these for my project, it really helps me out.

[RagdollZombie]

Very cool! How did you get them to actually walk during a dialogue scene?

[Constance]

On the final dialogue scene, I had one guy off-scene who was set to be followed by a copy of those three characters (hooded guy, commander and guard). The guy that was followed as moved by a change in dialogue, so the three copies started walking towards the new position of the guy.

[underthedeep]

Really cool stuff, Timbles! As you said, I hope others see this project and feel inspired to make campaigns to this scale as well.

[Constance]

Also, my campaign will kinda be open world.




In layman's terms, imagine it like a choose your own adventure book without the bullshit deaths. You can choose each path you take and each path will be different in level layouts, storyline and (most importantly) endings.

The A path is more violent, linear, and results in more enemies wielding weapons. The visual style will look like the Lugaru Challenge maps.

[+] Screenshot

S1-A1

The B path is less violent, more open, and results in more stealth and hand-to-hand combat. This'll be way more open, more grassy fields, trees, etc.

[+] Screenshot

S1-B1

The C path takes place completely indoors and plays like Doom, but still keeping Overgrowth combat and style (explore indoors hallways, etc.) The visual style almost makes it look like it came straight out of a Thief game.
I edited out the terrain on indoors maps, so it'll load way easier.

[+] Screenshot

There are also two more paths, but you have to find them for yourself (D path and F path).


Every path leads to a different ending, and all of them are entirely unique. Some have a boss battle, some just end in a whole lot of dialogue, some are both. Every path has a distinct feel and gameplay style to it, and some paths tell more about the backstory and lore of Therium-2 then others.
Also there's backstory and lore. More on that later.

[Constance]

[+] Screenshot

Interiors in Overgrowth don't usually look this good...

[Constance]

Throughout the campaign, you can find notes scattered around the levels. Usually they're pretty easy to find, but it still requires a bit of searching on the player's part.
Every note brings a bit of backstory and lore to the game, and slowly, you'll be able to piece it together bit by bit.