as part of the project, i'm developing a permissive licenced sprite pack for other folks to use in their own games. you can get it here! (new version inbound in the very near future!) lorenschmidt.itch.io/phosphor
as part of the project, i'm developing a permissive licenced sprite pack for other folks to use in their own games. you can get it here! (new version inbound in the very near future!) lorenschmidt.itch.io/phosphor
i have developed a number of new procedural generation techniques specifically for this game. i gave a talk on some of the techniques i'm using to generate landscapes at this year's roguelike celebration, which you can see here. i'll likely tidy up + open source this soon. youtu.be/FaLUhh_Vfmk?...
Great talk! Thanks for sharing your process. Always inspiring to see other folks map generation techniques. Will definitely be looking into CA approaches in the future!
thank you! i really love the nitty gritty procedural generation talks. i wish i'd had time to go into more details!
I would love to hear the deep dive version of that talk! Look forward to following your progress here on bluesky.
the current status of the project is that world generation is quite robust, and i am moving on to tying it into the generation of local features. i'm doing a first pass on towns and cities right now, and integrating the underground realms i've made will come next!
and i am planning to do a lot of experimental work in the near future, too- ways of integrating generated narrative glosses and techniques drawn from interactive fiction, modes of interaction, abilities, etc.
i'm really excited about doing 10,000 little weird pieces of procedural generation. houses. dialogue. horrible aristocrats. descriptions of clothing. i am going to get back to work, but i hope it's been clarifying!
please feel free to ask any questions you'd like about the project here, and i shall endeavor to answer them! please reply with your question, and specify if it's ok to add it to the main thread so others can see it more easily.
What language/languages are you writing this in?
javascript! it will run in a browser and i'm also going to do standalone builds with electron or similar.
Ah cool! I’ve only dabbled in it, but it seems pretty flexible
wow I had assumed this was in something much lower level (or quicker?) like a C++/C#/Rust. Do you use any of the big game engine frameworks?
my question is: I AM SO EXCITED
aww thank you <3
A challenge I frequently see with games that include procedural generation is the 10,000 bowls of oatmeal problem. I really enjoy procedural generation when it results in unpredictable and meaningful interactions and narrative (Dwarf Fortress, Noita),
but not so much when it creates something unique but not particularly significant (No Man's Sky, Minecraft). I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this, and to understand further what role procedural generation will have in your game.
the silly answer to this is that i feel the 10,000 bowls of oatmeal framing is unfair to oatmeal: oatmeal is really good.
but that actually gets at a more in-depth answer, which is that i think a reason generated output can feel meaningless is if it lacks meaning, an expressive reason to be. or it might indicate that the presentation isn't supporting it enough. it's really an art or design answer rather than technical.
i think it's a lot like the problem of drawing repeating patterns. yes, a lot of patterns can repeat. but can you make a repeating pattern which draws the attention to relevant details, which has sub-structures which are worthy of attention within each iteration, which is relating to repetition well
What is the influence of decolonial thought? (Go ahead)
a lot of it is in particulars. but broadly, there are a lot of ways the main line of western fantasy has internalized colonialist + eurocentric ideas. and i've internalized a lot of these ideas as well, but i'm trying to inform myself and rethink the foundations of things.
one concrete example is that the notion of technological progressivism tends to strongly inform western fantasy, and we tend to default to certain technological modes, specifically cold climate, urban modes with dedicated crop fields. but there are a lot of other modes, like arboriculture + nomadism
Since discovering it last year I've put like 300h into caves of qud, so please consider me for beta testing 🙏 All these ideas seem awesome, can't wait to see it progress
Will there be an Excalibur
there will be a lot of storied magical artifacts and places, but the game is not 1:1 drawing material from english language fantasy mainstays like Arthurian legend, Tolkien, etc.. there are some loose takes and reimaginings of mythology and folklore, though!
sounds epic and amazing—keep up the great work ✨
📌