The last few days, I’ve been experimenting a bit with art for a type of game I’ve been wanting to make for quite some time: a game in the style of good old Dungeon Master. Did you use to play it, or other similar games? If so, I’d like to hear about what sort of things you remember from it, what made it fun and what would make you want to play a new game in the same style
Anyway, here’s a few examples of what my game will look like:

I’ve put a video on youtube of the Jade Figurines game I made recently. The video doesn’t really do the game justice though (it’s much smoother than in the video), so you’re still better off downloading it.

If you have any thoughts, suggestions or ideas, I’d love to hear them.

Here’s a little preview of a game I’m working on, called "Thieves and Warriors". I’vementioned it before.

(all the screenshots can be clicked on for full size view)
The game is somewhat inspired by old RPG games like Phantasie 3 (oh, and Pirates! as well, obviously), but even more inspired by oldschool pen and paper RPG’s. Ther’ll be lots of stats and numbers, none of it hidden away. And not so much animations or effects – more static screens and menus.

You control a party of adventurers. I won’t have a limit on how many, but eventually it will become difficult for you to manage, I guess.

The game starts off in a town, and you will also be returning to the town after completing quests. When in the town, you’ll be able to visit the market or tavern.

The tavern is where you get your quests. The quests will be auto-generated, but quite simple to their nature.

To get where you’re going, there will be one or more days of journey, where you can be beset by foul weather, food shortage and more.

You can also be attacked, and I’m not quite done with how that will work yet – thinking of having it like a game board with abstract pieces.

When you reach your destination, which is inevitably some sort of dungeon (keeping it classic, remember), which I haven’t even started to visualize yet – it will be auto-generated, but apart from that I don’t know. I’m considering a "doodles on graph paper" kind of look, but need to experiment some more.
Making the background pictures have been quite a challenge for me – have never used Poser to this extent before, and I’m really quite happy with the result

So, over the weekend (from Friday to late Sunday), I made a small beginning of a game, as an entry to the RPGDX competition. Now, 48 hours is a very short time for this, so I didn’t manage to complete the whole thing, but I did manage a very good start. There’s one short level, and the beginnings of a second, but I will continue to work on this, and make it into a full game

If you want to try it you can download it here:

Download The Jade Figurines

Here’s some screenshots of the game, but they don’t really do it justice, so download it and give it a try instead

Title screen – having to work fast means you can’t really be to particular with how things look..

The game starts in quite a generic setting – a dark forest. The sword at the bottom shows the direction you should move.

Simple "cutscenes" are indicated by black bars top and bottom.

There’s fighting too – though I’d really like to improve on it, it’s currently a bit rough as a result of the tight time frame.

Fighting can be difficult, and you can easily be knocked down. I didn’t have time to add a health bar, so you can’t die.

Decided to use a combination of text boxes and speech balloons for a comic book feel.

A shot from the second level, which takes place in town. This is the big scene where you get you mission…

I’d appreciate any feedback on the game as it stands so far – there’s lots of things I’d like to improve, and I have a lot of ideas for things to add, but it’s always good to get input from other people at an early stage…

There’s also a video of the game available, and some pictures of more characters for the game.

RPGDX is having another one of their friendly mini-competitions, where you’re trying to make games (mostly RPGs) in a limited time period. The competitions are just for fun, and you don’t win anything besides the bragging rights… and the winner is voted by the participants.

This time, the theme of the competition is to make a sidescrolling RPG in 48 hours, and is set for August 15-16. Basicly, you start when you wake up on saturday morning, and try to finish something before going to bed at sunday night, and you do as much as you want to in between. You can use any engine, tool or language you like, and for any platform.

As 48 hours is a rather short time to make a game, it usually results in quite small games, and it is important to stay focused. It is a great learning experience: having to make quick decisions, stick to them and not be too particular with what you do – the important thing is to have something playable in the end.

More details about the competition can be found here:http://forums.rpgdx.net/viewtopic.php?t=2237