I've been working on a game for about two months now, a Final Fantasy game with a real-time tactics element. It's been crawling along at a snail's pace thanks to school and other things. I am somewhat of a perfectionist, and I haven't even started working on a number of things that many others consider vital to a game even in its very early stages. I think the battle system is one of the main things that will make my game unique at byond, and I don't plan to move on to anything else in my game until the battle system is entirely completed (which may be another two months).
In contrast, many of the games listed on games:live have a wide variety of features but little cohesion as a whole. I won't give any examples, but I'm sure that if you have visited enough games, you will know what I am talking about. I think many of the people behind these games started out with good intentions, but I also think something was lost along the way.
So, why am I writing this? I have to host my game periodically to test my battle system in cases where more than one person is logged in, and those who log in sometimes give me their suggestions. In general, they want immediate gratification. "Make me a GM." "Give me some weapons." "Add more icons." These features aren't hard to add, but they are distracting. For example, weapons will be very important in the game as a whole, but shouldn't I worry about the problems at hand before making new ones? I don't even have a GM code yet, although I am sure that one will be needed later to take care of trouble-makers. For the moment, a GM code would only serve to correct mistakes in-game that should be corrected in the code.
I just wanted to know what others think: whether the code should come before the game or whether the code should be very flexible and evolve with the game. There is no question that coding for the moment is much easier, but which has better results in the long run?
ID:154184
 Apr 20 2002, 6:44 pm
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go for the coding, people who want to be GM's normaly are just looking for power. In my games i dont have GM's, i have a few close freinds programed in so they have a few perks like boot and ban, plus while coding put in a code that will make it so that when the host logs in it gives him thinks like boot and ban, this will keep out trouble makers. But as for grafixs, dont worry about them untell the basic coding is done, although you might please a few people with a fansy coding, the REAL byonders that stick around will like your game for programming. Games take time, theres no doublt about it. Dont worry about what people with names like vegitaSSJ400 or Goku1234 have to say, look at what people like nadrew, lord JR, leftly or Silk wiz have to say(there are many others but i just showed a few i could think of).
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game b4 the code
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It's best to have the game mechanics planned out before you begin coding. As you write, you'll find that some things don't work as well as you'd planned and have to come up with new systems. It is important to stick to the primary goals of the game, even if you can't stick to the details.
As for people telling you to add more icons and basic fatures, don't worry about it. When you get the core engine running smoothly, you can easily wow them with the glitz. The people who whine about poor graphics usually don't give you the feedback you are looking for during alpha testing anyway. If they find a bug, they'll often keep it to themselves to exploit it. | |
Some people have nothing better to do than whine for "GM powers", no matter what game they're in. They'll come into an online chess game, or a game of Lexiconomy, and ask how they can become a GM. Other people will constantly suggest things that have nothing to do with your game. ("Woah! Online Shadowrun! Cool! You know what would be cooler? If this game had Goku and a few talking skateboards!") These kinds of people will never stop pestering you, so it's better not even to worry about pleasing them.
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("Woah! Online Shadowrun! Cool! You know what would be cooler? If this game had Goku and a few talking skateboards!") Is this a hint to some kind of top secret lexyproject? =) | |
The ideal scenario is that you build flexible code that can easily be modified if you decide you want something different later, and you design your code knowing as much as possible of what you're going to be adding in layer and predict how you're going to be implementing it, so you can design it with specific future additions in mind.
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I set up a number of datums that have all of the vars and special procs that I need, and save that in a number of 'Sytems' code files. I then build on those systems to actually add content to the game. So, with my method, you could say that the code comes before the game does. It might not please the masses, but it pleases me a good deal. Best of luck with your game!
-Lord of Water