[Arena] Project: Grimoire Fantasy Zero Arena

[neku99]

Project: Grimoire Fantasy Arena(?)
by neku99

UPDATED: Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays! Trying to make the Map neater for now.

Done with some basic stuff as well! (Character Selection is one).

UPDATED: New Screenshots

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Grimoire Fantasy
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Is a world I created and conceptualized inspired by various games I've played. Not much will be revealed about the world yet except that it revolves around the use of Grimoire's or Tomes filled with mysterious power.

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Purpose
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The purpose of this map is to jump start a journey of creating a finished working game with core systems in place for a bigger project. Therefore it must be not be too big a game but must have simple objectives yet utilizing various custom systems that I will make for it.

As it isn't a big serious map (unlike some of the awesome ones I've dreamed of making) I won't be beating myself up too much about this.

Baby steps can go a long way.

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Custom Features
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GFA will implement a few custom things that will be far removed from how a warcraft 3 game traditionally works.

User Interface (UI) - A new more modern looking UI. My goal is to shift focus from UI (making it a bit more simple) to the actual game experience itself.

Controls - A redefined way of controlling characters inspired by console controls which tend to be very minimalist. My intention is to not bog down a player with too many abilities and to hopefully eliminate the need to click on the command card.

Combat - Combat will be redefined as well using a Lock-On Battle System much like the one I created long ago (based on the FFXII System) which I will rewrite to suit my needs. This will also be implemented on enemy AI so those are goals.

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Characters
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There are 4 characters I thought up to choose from with it's own unique play style and is based on familiar RPG roles. They are not as fleshed out for now.

UPDATED: New Character Descriptions and some shady lore.

Swordsman - Melee DPS

Lore: Formal swordsmanship training was only granted to soldiers and royalty until an incident in the kingdom saw the disbandment of the order of knights. Knights who sought work after the disbandment went to offer their services as mercenaries, body guards with some offering their skills for self-defense. This saw the spread of practical self-defense for common folk.

1. Horizon - A horizontal slash. Deal damage to targets in front of you.
2. Vertigo - A powerful vertical slash. Deal damage to the first target in front of you with a chance to knock-back.
3. Parry - A defensive technique. Block one instance of damage for a split second. You cannot move at this time.
4. Divide - A powerful slash. Rush forward a short distance. All units caught up in the path will be dealt massive damage and a powerful slow for 2 seconds.

Gunslinger - Ranged DPS

Lore: The pistol was an evolution from the canon of old and combined with steam tech it has steadily rising as the go to hunting weapon. People who favor the use of guns are called gunslingers.

1. Shoot - A gun shot at a direction. Deals damage towards a direction.
2. Steam Bomb - Throws a bomb that explodes in an area that produces a cloud of smoke and steam. Deals damage to nearby targets and blinds and slows targets in the area of effect.
3. Hit - Hits a target with your gun. Stuns target for a short amount of time.
4. Delete - Uses up all remaining ammunition to deal massive damage in a narrow line.

Guardians - Tank

Lore: After the disbandment of the order of knights, some of the knights decided to return after the previous king was assassinated. The order was re-established with some of the former members returning to duty. Since then the order of the guardians were trained not only in combat but in protection.

1. Lunge - A forward strike. Deal damage in a line in front.
2. Shield Slam - A forward shield strike. Deal damage in an area in front knocking back those who are hit.
3. Endurance - Condition the mind and body for pain. When active doubles your damage reduction for a short while, and prevents you from being stunned or knocked-backed. Targets who hit you in melee ranged will be stunned for a split second. You cannot move while active.
4. Shield Wall - Rush forward a short distance deflecting any incoming projectiles and dealing massive impact damage to targets who get caught on your path. Knocks them back a long distance.

Magician - Buff/Debuff

Lore: Traveling entertainers seeking fame and fortune, they have marveled audiences with their illusions and sleight of hand. And although mere entertainers in the eyes of common men, magicians are master craftsmen and thinkers whose tricks can turn the tide of battles.

1. Throw - Throws objects at a target. Type of thrown objects can be chosen.
2. Blast Mine - Sets up a mine on the ground. Targets who step on it will activate the mine.
3. Smoke Bomb - Creates a cloud of smoke on an area. Targets that get caught in the area will disappear from view but also become blind.
4. Dark Eye - A mysterious power said to be a form of Ancient Magic. Curses a target reducing their all their stats by half for a few seconds. After the effect ends you will yourself be weakened for a while. Effect ends when you get stunned or blinded.

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Goals and Wishlists
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These are the goals I currently have in terms of finishing the game as well as a wishlist (which is just a fancy way of saying I need help/advice in this area).

Goals

Finalize the Control Scheme and UI- Still jumbled up right now but isn't too hard to do.
Create Terrain Concept - Need to do it on paper first.
Concept Art - For characters first. Already have a pretty rough sketch for the arena itself.

Wishlist

Hide Mini Map - If anyone ever finds a way to remove/cover the minimap, that would be great.
Make UI Transparent - Wishing this would happen. I saw a map which did this exact thing.

UPDATED: Started working on this here again. Finalized the command card buttons to something that I liked. Working on some core systems

Control Scheme and UI - Already setup to something I think satisfies my vision for it.
Terrain Concept - Already created some sketches and started teraining a bit.
Concept Art - Already have a ton but I have to make a final design one of these days haha.
Inventory/Menu System - Inventory using units and their command cards. Something for the future but I really wanted to explore the idea a bit more.

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Thanks!
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Amazing! You got this far in the post!

If you have any questions about the map or any suggestions at the early stages, or want to help out in some way don't hesitate to post or pm me.

 

[neku99]

Reserved

 

[A]mun]

Hiding the minimap - maybe you can overlap the minimap area with a custom ui piece? You could also import a black/white minimap .tga and remove hero minimap icons in the object editor.
Transparent UI - that means the whole UI or just pieces? At any rate, please share that source.

Subbed.

 

[neku99]

Hiding the minimap - maybe you can overlap the minimap area with a custom ui piece? You could also import a black/white minimap .tga and remove hero minimap icons in the object editor.
Transparent UI - that means the whole UI or just pieces? At any rate, please share that source.

Subbed.

I already did the removing icons and other things but I can still see the the white rectangular thing on the mini-map it be awesome if I totally blocked the mini-map off.

As for the Transparent UI I managed to find it here. Pretty awesome map too.

And thanks for putting interest here really appreciate it.

 

[Elprede]

How To Remove Lines From Minimap - Last Post

 

[neku99]

How To Remove Lines From Minimap - Last Post

Awesome! Thanks for this!

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: Started working on this here again. Finalized the command card buttons to something that I liked. Working on some core systems

Control Scheme and UI - Already setup to something I think satisfies my vision for it.
Terrain Concept - Already created some sketches and started teraining a bit.
Concept Art - Already have a ton but I have to make a final design one of these days haha.
Inventory/Menu System - Inventory using units and their command cards. Something for the future but I really wanted to explore the idea a bit more.

 

[neku99]

UPDATE: Not much update since last year. School work and some other stuff are slowly creeping in. I did some experiments with scaling units and structures and adjusting the camera distance which will hopefully be a useful technique for really big worlds with lots of needed space. Screenshots will follow.

If anything else! Happy New Year! 20 Days in!

 

[tulee]

Keep up the good work Neku! Happy New Year.

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: I'm back! Started doing some terrain first. And rewriting some stuff about characters.

Right now my goal is to rethink about the character's abilities. Looking around for character models that could fit. Generally doing some concept + terrain here and there.

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays! I'm back with some time to map make!

So far the new stuff I've done pertain to making the map making process cleaner and more structured. (Like categorizing the triggers, items, etc.)

Character Selection - Done with a basic and modular character selection. I made it modular so I can quickly transfer it if I need to change maps.

Characters - The current roster will be: Swordsman, Marksman, Artifice, Herald. Will change with some info later in the main post.

Terrain - Redoing terrains. I got inspired by old school RPGs so I'm making a proof of concept.

Overview - I have this YouTube channel I always watch called "Extra Credits" where I encountered the concept of minimum viable product. It's basically the bear bones of a game so it can be playable. I'm using this lens as I go about the development.

If you want to check it out, this is the link:

Cheers!

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: Doing progress with the Lock-On Battle System

Action Ready - Action Ready is a code I wrote where in after activating the ability, there is a "ready" time before the ability effect triggers. Kinda like a cast time. The difference is that while it is charging you can walk around and it will only activate if you are in-range of the target.

I made it so it works along with the Lock-On Battle system code I wrote. It will pick whichever unit is considered as the "Target" or "Focus".

It's still pretty rough and I'll refine it later but a good proof of concept.

Cheers!

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: After a long hiatus I finally got back working on this map.

A pretty big change - There might be some major changes regarding the whole theme of the map but currently doing core mechanics on combat and other interactions (like buying/selling with shops etc.).

Mechanics - Currently refining some mechanics for the game such as hero selection, combat, player to player interaction, player to NPC interaction etc. My whole mindset is to create a working system first then work on aesthetics after (How shops, NPCs, and other things will look or exist in the world).

Cheers!

 

[neku99]

UPDATED: Thought I would post some stuff I've been working on.

Command Card - Trying to redo the command card and the actions that a character can do. This is inline with the Target System being (Partially) implemented and it seemed to me that I had to implement some things to make the combat easier. I also tried to keep some basic commands that are familiar to the Warcraft 3 experience. Those commands being attack tied to the "A" key and stop tied to the "S" key. I find it much nicer to keep those kinds of elements instead of totally rearranging them or removing them.

Cheers!