Design doc

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DestinedToDie
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Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

With the possible rejuvination of ES I thought I'd post my ideas.

Setting: Dark fantasy, comedic hero
Polycount: Around Morrowind level or lower


The story would be inspired by the movie Army of Darkness. We won't be copying it, but we will use certain tropes for our own narrative, which is in the spoilers.
Spoiler: Show
As to how we'll be implementing this, we shall start with making a rough prototype of the static castle scene in which the game takes place in. This will consist mostly of simple cubic shapes as well as any pre-existing assets we may have. Once the placeholders are set, we can move onward with making proper models to replace them.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

"I stand before you as an old wizard in the twilight of my life. But there was once a time when I was a young apprentice, serving the wizard who came before me. He and the master of the fort had gotten their positions through mutual cooperation and were working together on trying to achieve something.

I wasn't trusted in on what that was. Instead, they had me gathering herbs and mixing them together into salves. Perhaps my ignorance is why I was spared. One night the common folk outside the walls got up in arms, stormed the fort, captured them and burned them as occultists.

The churchmen destroyed all of their books and scrolls. All but one. For there was one book that would not be scathed by fire, cut by sword, nor ripped by hand. They called it the Necronomicon. In an attempt to keep it away from those who would misuse it, they sealed it with their holy scripts and locked it away in the deepest dungeon of this fort, where it has stayed imprisoned for a hundred years.

I never learned what the master and my former teacher were trying to achieve all those years ago. But now the lock is broken and the book is gone. With its disappearance have come abominable creatures that torment us at night and break the will of men. Thus I urge you - free us from this evil. Find the one who took the Necronomicon and bring it back to our safe keeping.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

First area name: Whitefort.

Generic placeholder layout: http://i.imgur.com/Blynpmv.jpg
testman
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Re: Design doc

Post by testman »

DestinedToDie wrote:Setting: Dark fantasy, comedic hero
Fuck yes, I always wanted to see Dink Smallwood come back to life in a better engine / type of game.

Wel, even if you are not aiming for something similar to DInk, I still fully support you and I will send few septims your way trough Patreon once I get my next salary.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

We're making Dink 2 boys (well, not really?). I understand it's not so simple that we can do a remake.

I have actually never heard of Dink before, but it looks really good for being a game from 1997. I might play it some time. It also seems to be freeware.

What I like is the level layout. It's really simple. Makes modeling it also easier, if every fir tree looks the same and a village only has 3 houses. I had a similar idea from Balrum, where a lot of assets get reused throughout the game map.
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raevol
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Re: Design doc

Post by raevol »

Aaah, Dink Smallwood. Didn't expect to sink hours and hours of my life into that game, but I did.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

I got to the dragons, but they keep killing me. I guess I should have invested into attack instead of magic, because fireballs seem to only do 1 damage against them.
Ferk
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Re: Design doc

Post by Ferk »

Dink is not just freeware, it's actually completely open source (even has an improved fork that is part of the GNU project: https://www.gnu.org/software/freedink/).
So if you wanted you could actually borrow any ideas, characters or concepts from it to use freely with no problems.

It has some funny dialogs and even if the gameplay is not that good, it makes you want to finish it just to see what happens next.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Design doc

Post by DestinedToDie »

I talked to some Dink people and they weren't so sure about it being legal to copy Dink 1:1. The project you linked is the modified engine, which indeed has GNU GPL license. But what about the IP itself? I looked around and found nothing. And "it's free" doesn't really mean anything when the author doesn't clarify what he means by that. Is it CC0? Maybe it's free in the sense that I can download and play it without paying, but I'll get a cease and desist letter if I try to make Dink 2 and sell it.

Edit: I think I found out just how free Dink is. http://www.rtsoft.com/forums/showthread ... ce-License



"*** PROTECTING THE DINK SMALLWOOD NAME AND MEDIA FROM BEING EXPLOITED ***

Do NOT use this source to release "Dink 2" or "SuperDink" or any kind of sequel to the original Dink
Smallwood. Releasing this source does not in any way release the rights to the Dink name or Dink media.
non-profit improvements to the Dink engine are ok, as listed above, otherwise, you need your own name,
story and artwork. (in which case you can charge for it and pretty much do what you want)"

So that's freeware for you. What I could do is play Dink and make something in the spirit of it. Of course, the story, the characters, the artwork has to be different from Dink.
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psi29a
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Re: Design doc

Post by psi29a »

Correction, freedink is not a fork but a engine re-implementation (like OpenMW). This way they can get around the odious original license.
� � � �Dink Smallwood is now freeware but RTsoft still owns Dink and
� � � �all materials within, including but not limited to Graphics,
� � � �Sounds and concepts. (you may NOT use any of dink's original
� � � �graphics and sounds in any project that you charge for without
� � � �prior permission from RTsoft Inc.. except for DMODs (Dink
� � � �Modules that require the Dink engine to run), in which case
� � � �you can charge what you wish. �)
If you look at this:
https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/freedink/dink_108_game_data.zip
^-- keep in mind that this is hosted on GNU's website
This is the Dink Smallwood game data. The following license cover
all files present in this archive.

Copyright (C) 1997, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2003 Seth A. Robinson

This software is provided 'as-is', without any express or implied
warranty. In no event will the authors be held liable for any damages
arising from the use of this software.

Permission is granted to anyone to use this software for any purpose,
including commercial applications, and to alter it and redistribute it
freely, subject to the following restrictions:

1. The origin of this software must not be misrepresented; you must not
claim that you wrote the original software. If you use this software
in a product, an acknowledgment in the product documentation would be
appreciated but is not required.
2. Altered source versions must be plainly marked as such, and must not be
misrepresented as being the original software.
3. This notice may not be removed or altered from any source distribution.
As you can see, this is the license being used by the archive provided by GNU. It has been like this since 2003. Since this is also included in Debian which has a very strict DFSG which includes being able to resell all packages included in the archive, I assume that they are safe to use.
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