Dinofarm Games

Submitting to Apple Today!

2010-04-29T10:30:00.000-07:00

We're finally submitting 100 Rogues to Apple today, and oh man! What a crazy journey it has been. I remember in December of 2008 coming up with the very first concept art for 100 Rogues. I drew this picture during a cartooning class that I used to teach.

(Sorry about the quality)

Anyway, you can see the Crusader used to have a spherical helmet, something I really liked at first, but in the end it didn't have enough personality. This picture shows a little bit how far the game has come in the last 18 months. Much like playing a roguelike, developing 100 Rogues had many a windfall and pitfall.

The journey isn't really over; we still have lots of bugs to fix, features to add, and community requests to respond to. This might be a good time to outline some of our potential plans for post-release additions to 100 Rogues.

At least two new classes - the Dinoman Bruiser and the Skellyman Scoundrel
Two new worlds - "Hell" and "High Seas", as well as an endless "Moon" world
Quabbus' Item Shop
Many more monsters, such as Minotaurs, Pliosaurs, and Slimes
Many new items, such as charged Staves, Polearms, Claws, and uniques
Traps
Item Identification / Cursed Items
Item Locker - allows you to store several items for the next game
NPCs / Quests - Little dudes who walk around, and you can talk to them and sometimes get quests from them, such as the Homeless Blacksmith, who will improve your weapon for some food (he'll even take Rotten Food, the sucker!)

If you have some other ideas for 100 Rogues features, any questions, or comments, please direct them to the official 100 Rogues Forums.

Also, check out our 100 Rogues REMIX CONTEST here!

Otherwise, wish us luck, and tell your friends about 100 Rogues!

Getting ready to release!

2010-03-24T18:22:00.001-07:00

So, we're currently looking at an early/mid April release date. I'll be switching over to the www.100rogues.com site for most of our latest news. Also, as usual, stay tuned to our Twitter and Facebook feeds! See you soon!

Beta Starts Wednesday, Sign Up NOW!

2010-02-07T08:00:00.000-08:00

The official 100 Rogues Beta starts on Wednesday. We found that we'll only be able to allow about 50 of you in, so what we need everyone to do is to go sign up and provide their UDIDs and email addresses HERE:

http://dinofarm.forumbuild.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=284

Note that even those of you who have signed up before will need to sign up again here.

It's first-come, first serve, so get on those boards now!

Promo Art!

2010-02-01T13:48:00.001-08:00

More to come soon! Enjoy!

General News & Thoughts

2010-01-08T00:27:00.000-08:00

The game sure has come a long way in the last few weeks! Items are very exciting and add a ton to the game. Wes, our lead programmer, is really on fire, bouncing back and forth between implementation and bug/crash fixes. Our small community of closed-beta testers are super helpful, giving us great ideas, detailed bug descriptions, and even coming up with great ways to help us market the game!

So, onto the challenges. This being my first commercial game as designer, with a much grander scope than I'm used to and other people that I'm working with, the biggest lesson I've learned has been, "try to get things right the first time". It's a bit like how Pixar can't animate and render sequences they're going to end up editing out anyway - they have to get it all right before they even start. I'd say that's actually a lot easier to do with a linear medium like film than it is with games though, due to the non-linear and emergent quality of gameplay. So, while it has been a major lesson, at the same time, I don't think that any designer gets it right the first time. This might be one reason why smaller, nimbler studios tend to put out better games than huge studios - a lot of big studios aren't willing to "go back to the drawing board" if something just isn't working. Throughout our now full-year of development time, there have been many things that we had to go back to the drawing board on, to various extents. Maybe the biggest example of this was the skills system, which originally had eight skills, four of which also had a "super" counterpart, totaling 12 skills. Well, there were several problems with this, and we basically have treated almost every skill to at least a partial redesign since then.

So, after going back to something and doing it over again, is it better the second time? Absolutely. But it costs time and money, and we can't really afford to take much longer with the game. We've got to get it out. So the big challenge, the big struggle is deciding, what has to be in on initial release, and what can wait until post-release? As it is, we're a no-name game, and so we really need to blow people's pants off and get good word-of-mouth going. I think that we have a good chance of this. But there's a magic spot right between "how much time we can afford to spend" and "how little the game can be great with", and our challenge is trying to find that spot.

Seen here: items - in chests.

So for now, we've got almost all the items implemented - we still need consumables, which will again add a ton to the game. After that, we need a phase of crash / bug fixing, and then I think we can start the open beta! During this time, we'll also get some previews going with some media outlets. Really looking forward to the open beta, and hopefully by the end of February, getting this thing released!

Throwing (and Aptitudes?)

2009-12-20T08:29:00.000-08:00

We're on an extremely tight schedule. At the time of this writing, we've got forty-six bugs to deal with that are supposed to be mostly taken care of in - we hope - less than a month - and that's in combination with implementation of the items system and the day to day improvements that inevitably take place. The number of bugs also rises a little bit each day, with new bugs being reported and submitted. Therefore, we must be extremely careful about coming up with new ideas and additions to the game at this point. Essentially, we must add what the game literally needs, and no more.

I say that 100 Rogues needs the ability to throw items. The reason for this is that when you are out of mana, you have literally no strategic options available except run away, and fight. This may be acceptable on the very first level, but by the time you're halfway through the game, you should have accrued not just "better armor" and "better weapons", but also more strategic options via items. The ability to throw items - any item - means that there's always something you could do.

The relatively recent Roguelike "POWDER" has a cool system where potions can be thrown at opponents to cause whatever effects the potion has. This is in contrast to a game like Dungeon Crawl, where you need a specific spell, "evaporate", to use a potion offensively. We'd like to have exploding and poison potions be one-shot weapons that you can throw at an enemy.

In order to accommodate this throwing ability, we'll likely go for a "quiver" slot, in which you can put any item, even silly objects such as armors and helmets. We'll give different items different properties for being thrown, making it basically useless to throw armor or arrows, but decent to throw stones and much better to throw javelins (assuming we have javelins!). In addition to this, a "Fire" button will be added above the character radial, allowing the character to launch whatever item is quivered. If no item is quivered and the player presses Fire, it brings up the inventory panel, asking what object to fire.

While on the subject, an idea I'd like to eventually implement is aptitudes. What if any class can get better at throwing, from doing it a lot? Maybe the Skellyman and Dinoman can start out better at throwing than the Human or the Fairy. And if we have one such racial aptitude, which can grow over time, why not have a few more (it would be a bit strange to just have one, after all)? I've thought for awhile about removing the Crusader's Weapon Focus (replacing it with another ability) and giving all of the classes the ability to learn to get good with weapons. Here's an example of what starting aptitudes could look like (aptitudes would go from 0-100, higher being better):

So a really nice advantage of this is that we can really bring out the class traits a lot more. Currently, there isn't much of a way to really make the Dinoman any less good at avoiding attacks than the Skellyman, for example. Or to make the Wizard much worse at swordplay early on than the Crusader. With this data, the Crusader is now very clearly well-rounded, the Wizard is crappy with most stuff except wands (having to rely on her Skills), the Skellyman's great with daggers, bows, and dodging, and the Dinoman is great at combat overall, but not as good with little daggers, and can't dodge to save his life.

This is a system I'm excited about implementing, but one that may have to wait. We'll see how development goes. For now, we'll definitely be including throwing and ammunition.

P.S. Just a general update, the Closed Beta is going super-well! Everyone has been very active and supportive, and progress has been soaring! Thanks everyone!

Closed Beta Disclaimer!

2009-12-14T13:07:00.000-08:00

Thanks everyone who's participating in the Closed Beta. Those of you who weren't selected, don't worry, you'll almost definitely get into the Open Beta which should start in a couple of weeks.

We need to make a few things clear about this Closed Beta before you begin. It's early. There are bugs, performance issues, and missing features aplenty. Please understand, going into this, the following:

Items aren't yet implemented. This is a huge hit to the game's fun power, as well as the "windfall" effect which is so important to Roguelikes.
Minimap isn't yet implemented. At least not really. This will allow the player to easily see where he has been and where he hasn't, increasing the fun of exploration dramatically.
Monster AI isn't yet implemented. Ranged users should run from you, bandits should try to backstab you, and many more behavioral details will cause monsters to be a lot more interesting to fight.
Food system isn't yet implemented. This will have a huge effect on the overall tension of the game.
Performance Issues, Crashes, Bugs! This goes without saying in most betas, but it's still worth mentioning.
Fairy Wizard is way out of balance. We're focusing on balancing the game around the Crusader. This isn't a sexist thing, it's just that the Crusader is the "all around" class. Once he is balanced against the dungeon, then we will move on to the Wizard.
Lack of Polish. This also goes without saying for a beta - but we still need to do font selecting, probably will get a new logo, most of the cutscenes aren't fully implemented, many of the UI features are half implemented, etc.

So this is what you must understand before delving into our beta. Anyway, with that said, the game IS playable, and if you don't crash, you COULD potentially even get all the way to Satan and beat the game. That is, if it weren't for the massive imbalances you're sure to encounter once you reach the dreaded Dungeon.

Now, head to the forums!

New GUI Design

2009-12-10T21:42:00.000-08:00

Designing a game for the iPhone is a lot different than designing one for the computer. Or for the XBox. Or for any console that anyone has ever played a game on. No other console has had the unique problem of your giant, fat, sausage-like man-finger obscuring the screen simply by interacting. With the iPhone, you cannot interact without obscuring at least part of the screen. So here's our latest attempt at damage control:

(Note that this screenshot is still unfinished, with lots of debugging stuff all over the place. The top right corner will have a square minimap, which can be toggled to the icon that you see there.)

Here are the main lessons I learned from the almost full year we've been developing this game.

1. Down with Buttons. I don't mean that I don't like buttons - they're good, I just mean, put them towards the bottom of the screen. Since your finger generally comes from the bottom as you hold the device, this will mean the smallest percentage of the screen will be covered upon pressing. Also, it's more comfortable as you have to expel slightly less energy.

2. Important Data on Top. Some games, like StarCraft and Diablo for instance, put their HUDs on the bottom of the screen. We tried this, and the problem was, you could almost never see it. Since 90% of gameplay involves clicking around somewhere in the middle of the screen, your disgusting hotdog-hands are almost always covering up crucial data, like the health points bar. Keeping it on top ensures that it's always visible.

3. Keep the areas directly up, down, left and right of the player clear. We had the hud directly top center for awhile, or directly bottom center, and this is not optimal. Since the game is a quad-directional one, threats tend to come from directly up, down, left, or right of the player. Not to mention bosses, which are generally at the top center of the screen.

4. The "pass turn" button should be nice and big. This button does get used a lot, so it should be easy to push. We also figured it could be used for the "WAIT" signal when it isn't your turn, helping players to know when and when not to spam the poor Crusader with commands.

So that's our new GUI, for now. Until next time!

What Is 100 Rogues?

2009-12-10T20:11:00.000-08:00

100 Rogues is a turn-based RPG with randomly generated content and permanent death. Based on a relatively obscure thirty-year old genre known as "Roguelikes", 100 Rogues attempts to bring it into the mainstream with fluid 2D animations, clear and simple gameplay mechanics, and an intuitive easy to use GUI.

To learn more about 100 Rogues, read my interview on Gamasutra here.

Introduction to the 100 Rogues Beta

2009-12-10T19:36:00.000-08:00

There's a few things you should know about the 100 Rogues Beta which is to start sometime in the next week or so.

Even though development of 100 Rogues began formally in January of this year, there have been many severe roadblocks along the way that have halted development for months at a time. Everything is going smoothly now, but in releasing the beta next week, we are in fact releasing an early beta. It's not like the StarCraft 2 beta, which is feature-complete and polished and could pass for software that's ready to go on the shelf. It's a bit more like Stardock's new game Elemental, which went into a super early beta one full year before release. We don't expect 100 Rogues beta to go nearly that long, probably more on the order of 2-3 months at the most, but regardless, it has a way to go.

Firstly, don't expect it to be a ton of fun. It's missing some key features - most notably items management, which are essential to the core experience. There are bugs, slowdown, GUI issues and more. Also, the game isn't quite balanced. The game is missing equipment and items such as potions which will help the player a lot, and so for now the game is essentially just nerfed numbers-wise a bit so that you can actually play.

To be a good beta tester, you must play the game a lot, and discuss it a lot on the forums. Remember that you'll be helping us, the developers, make the game better by providing your experience, specific issues, and ideas. Beta testing can be fun, but it is also definitely work.

Tips:

Be as specific as possible when describing an experience you had. What dungeon level were you on? What class? What character level?
If it's a bug, please provide steps on how to reproduce it. If you cannot reproduce it but are sure it occured, submit it anyway and it will become an UNCONFIRMED BUG.
If it's a idea or suggestion, keep in mind that we have limited time and resources. Ideas like "have twice as many levels" or other large-scale suggestions won't be very useful or helpful. Remember that sometimes, less is more, which is something we have to embrace for practical reasons. Can you think of something that would improve the game while *reducing* content?
Play like a tester. Try to break the game. Try out edge-cases like confusing a monster who's already confused.
Be diligent. Again, the game isn't a ton of fun right now, but we really do need you to keep at it and be as active on the forums as you can.

Thanks a lot everyone, we really do appreciate it and we can't make a great game without your help, and may God have mercy on your SOUL!

And by the way, make sure, if you haven't already, to provide UUIDS on your forum beta applications. Instructions for how to find out your UUID are here:
http://www.ispeeddial.com/how-to-find-your-iphone-uuid/