KickStarter Monomyth - A first person action RPG/dungeon crawler - now in Open Backer Beta

[RatTower]

I'm surprised by the color of the lighting, isn't usually more blueish in other games?

Some of the spells are color coded to match their respective spell caste.
There are a few exceptions like fireball or poison.

A variety of weapons are very important for this kind of game

Currently Monomyth has about the same amount of weapon meshes as KF4. I'm not sure yet whether that will result in the same amount of weapons though.
The thing is: KF4 reuses almost every mesh at least once (MLGS and other traditional KF weapons like the triple fang are the exceptions I believe). Most of these reused weapons have a hue-shifted, alternative texture. So it's the same model but the color is a bit different. From Software pumped the weapon count beyond 50 with that - which is the most in the series - but it comes with a deeper issue: With the high equipment density I'd start skipping certain weapons that were just slightly stronger if equipping them meant that I'd have to adjust my playstyle. That might just be me though.

For Monomyth I could imagine throwing in an alternatively textured weapon here or there to bolster balancing/progression a bit. But at least on paper that wasn't necessary. I'll see about that in playtesting.
Either way, it shouldn't be a problem to get the "right" amount of weapons into the game.
All of them are modelled. Half of them are textured. The other half shouldn't take longer than a week.
Then it's about balancing.

Arx and Underworld were completely different in that regard. In those games - until late game - weapons were essentially throw-away items. At least in Underworld.
If I remember correctly, Arx would let you find some good stuff early on and you'd roll with it for a while - it still had lots of throw-away weapons in the early game.
In both games that was due to the weapon durability system, which Monomyth does not have. So naturally gear progression is more inspired by KF.

 

[Narushima]

[Weapons stuff]

Sounds good.
Personnaly I'd rather have a lower number of weapons, but each with very different handling than many variations of a few styles. Nioh did that quite well. Playing with a lance, kusarigama or tonfas felt satisfyingly varied.
It should also be possible to switch from one to the other on a whim without being limited by your stats.

 

[RoSoDude]

Why no weapon durability? I felt it was pretty well handled in Underworld and Arx. It added some depth to decision-making about what weapons to carry and when to use them on which enemies and limiting their use in cheesy endeavors like smashing down doors, while giving some additional utility to technical skills and NPC trading for repairs. Of course, there are drawbacks to consider, and weapon durability systems are not created equal. Just curious for your general thoughts on the matter.

 

[baud]

DS

Nice example. I never got really far in Dark Souls, so I had never seen that

I'm surprised by the color of the lighting, isn't usually more blueish in other games?

Some of the spells are color coded to match their respective spell caste.

good idea

 

[RatTower]

Why no weapon durability? I felt it was pretty well handled in Underworld and Arx. It added some depth to decision-making about what weapons to carry and when to use them on which enemies and limiting their use in cheesy endeavors like smashing down doors, while giving some additional utility to technical skills and NPC trading for repairs. Of course, there are drawbacks to consider, and weapon durability systems are not created equal. Just curious for your general thoughts on the matter.

You should find the discussion about weapon durability a few pages back in this thread.
Essentially I was lukewarm on it and people weren't too hot for it either so I decided to drop it for now.

I think its a good method to keep the player from breaking through all doors but it's really hard to get it right. Especially when you wanna have more of an impactful gear progression than Underworld.
In Underworld you had 15 (melee) weapons categorized in three weapon types. You could put skill points in each weapon type.

For the sake of simplicity lets say I only put skillpoints in swordfighting and I only use swords.
In the KF world of design I'd start out with the dagger, I'd progress to the short sword and I'd end up with the sword of justice (or the Moonlight Greatsword) at some point.
In the UU world of design I'd do the same, but I'd cycle back and forth between different "tiers" of weapons, because of their durability. Eventually I will burn through quite a few swords of the same type, cause once my weapon starts falling appart I either have a repair skill ready / run all the way back to a blacksmith or - what's more likely - I'll just grab something from the ground and hammer away with that. I may switch to "non-combat" weapons to smash in a door - which solves that problem - but that's as far as preserving my equipment goes. For the most part it is "first in, first out". Arx does the same, but tones it down noticeably. I have used the blacksmith's anvil exactly once during my last playthrough. By mid-game you normally find new weapons before you break your old ones. In early game you mostly burn through them like in UU.

All in all, UU's design adds a bit of durability management, which is cool - especially with regards to the survival aspect of the game - but it has three major consequences:
- Item progression gets watered down. This is a bit of a "touchy-feely" argument but it just feels less "impactful" to progress from one weapon to the next. Sure you'll try keeping that broad sword, but you know it will probably break at some point, so you don't really care that much.
- Item distribution is way different in UU's design. Now this is actually the big one and the thing I'm struggling with because it has to do with realism/believability (which I like). Due to the fact, that weapons keep breaking, you'll find dozens and dozens of the same sword type throughout the dungeon. That, on the one hand, is realistic, but on the other hand, it further devalues any sort of item progression. In KF2 you find the Katana/Wind Sword at the warriors grave on the other end of the island. How do I know that without looking it up? Cause there is exactly one of those.
- And both of the previous points have another consequence, which is messy inventory management. That's of course on the player, but you'll always have at least a bag full of junk weapons - which in UU then also plays into the weight system. That can get annoying depending on how well you do with inventory management. But there are lots of game series that eventually just drop that feature entirely. Demon's Souls still had the "Item Burden" mechanic which was removed in Dark Souls and I might be wrong but I believe Arx dropped the feature right away. It's also less of a problem in UU2 , but I don't remember whether that was because it was toned down or because you could easily drop stuff in the hub. Even tabletop RPGs tend to drop inventory weight rules from their core rule books (people tend to ignore those rules anyway).

So quite a few problems, some of which can create interesting (or annoying) situations.
In the KF design you don't have those problems at all. The downside however: It feels more linear and it's less "realistic".
In the end it comes down to opinion and where you wanna position yourself in terms of gear progression.

 

[V_K]

All in all, UU's design adds a bit of durability management, which is cool - especially with regards to the survival aspect of the game - but it has three major consequences:
- Item progression gets watered down. This is a bit of a "touchy-feely" argument but it just feels less "impactful" to progress from one weapon to the next. Sure you'll try keeping that broad sword, but you know it will probably break at some point.
- Item distribution is way different in UU's design. Now this is actually the big one and the thing I'm struggling with because it has to do with realism/believability (which I like). Due to the fact, that weapons keep breaking, you'll find dozens and dozens of the same sword type throughout the dungeon. That, on the one hand, is realistic, but on the other hand, it further devalues any sort of item progression. In KF2 you find the Katana/Wind Sword at the warriors grave on the other end of the island. How do I know that without looking it up? Cause there is exactly one of those.
- And both of the previous points have another consequence, which is messy inventory management. That's of course on the player, but you'll always have at least a bag full of junk weapons - which in UU then also plays into the weight system. That can get annoying depending on how well you do with inventory management. But there are lots of game series that eventually just drop that feature entirely. Demon's Souls still had the "Item Burden" mechanic which was removed in Dark Souls and I might be wrong but I believe Arx dropped the feature right away. It's also less of a problem in UU2 , but I don't remember whether that was because it was toned down or because you could easily drop stuff in the hub. Even tabletop RPGs tend to drop inventory weight rules from their core rule books (people tend to ignore those rules).

Frankly, I fail to see how any of this is a problem and not a feature.

 

[RatTower]

All in all, UU's design adds a bit of durability management, which is cool - especially with regards to the survival aspect of the game - but it has three major consequences:
- Item progression gets watered down. This is a bit of a "touchy-feely" argument but it just feels less "impactful" to progress from one weapon to the next. Sure you'll try keeping that broad sword, but you know it will probably break at some point.
- Item distribution is way different in UU's design. Now this is actually the big one and the thing I'm struggling with because it has to do with realism/believability (which I like). Due to the fact, that weapons keep breaking, you'll find dozens and dozens of the same sword type throughout the dungeon. That, on the one hand, is realistic, but on the other hand, it further devalues any sort of item progression. In KF2 you find the Katana/Wind Sword at the warriors grave on the other end of the island. How do I know that without looking it up? Cause there is exactly one of those.
- And both of the previous points have another consequence, which is messy inventory management. That's of course on the player, but you'll always have at least a bag full of junk weapons - which in UU then also plays into the weight system. That can get annoying depending on how well you do with inventory management. But there are lots of game series that eventually just drop that feature entirely. Demon's Souls still had the "Item Burden" mechanic which was removed in Dark Souls and I might be wrong but I believe Arx dropped the feature right away. It's also less of a problem in UU2 , but I don't remember whether that was because it was toned down or because you could easily drop stuff in the hub. Even tabletop RPGs tend to drop inventory weight rules from their core rule books (people tend to ignore those rules).

Frankly, I fail to see how any of this is a problem and not a feature.

That's the thing. It's more of a "philosophical" issue and it really comes down to opinion.
It's not really a "problem" if you don't care about gear progression for example.
But a well balanced gear progression also adds to exploration and it really cements certain pieces of equipment in your head.

To name another example:
I still remember World of Warcraft's whirlwind axe. And most vanilla warriors do. That was 15 years ago.
I haven't played that game since its first add on. But I still remember that questline and that weapon.

Now if you overdo it, gear progression can also spiral out of control. Especially with regards to min maxing.
That's the other side of it.

In short: It's tricky. Doing it like Arx may be an interesting approach (with durability becoming less of an issue later on).
You'd have to scale durability values right and probably still add some trash items. I'd still be lukewarm on potentially breaking my Moonlight Greatsword.

 

[V_K]

It's not really a "problem" if you don't care about gear progression for example.

It's not that I don't care, but I just prefer it to be flattened - with regular weapons being roughly equal and (rare) magical weapons adding something unique and exciting into the mix. I think it adds to resource management when you have this unique gamechanger weapon, but it can still break, so you have to consider whom to use it against.

 

[RatTower]

I'd probably not flatten it. When you go from zero to hero I still believe that at the end you might wanna have that trusty magic sword as your go to weapon rather than an exception.
Early and mid-game may be different, but doing that kind of durability scaling in late game feels like it would cause players to treat those weapons like special potions.
And then you got that typical player (and I have to force myself not to be that guy) that hoards potions, cause "now is maybe not the right time". And in the end a big portion of the gameplay is lost cause people never use their items.

What I could imagine is a fragility factor that determines how quickly durability decreases and then scale that factor according to early/mid/late game. Maybe not exponentially but certainly more than linearly. With the right scaling durability management decreases towards the late game, while retaining the survival aspect of the early game

I'd have to look into whether that could be realized with the current architecture.

 

[V_K]

I mean, I'm not saying you should necessarily include item durability - just sharing my opinion on it.
I'm also probably the minority here because I absolutely hate frequent equipment upgrades. In Div:OS it was a huge pain in the ass to have to stop every few steps to compare the stats of newly found items with currently equipped ones. I much prefer the Realms of Arkania way where you find maybe 10 magic items in the whole game, and the rest of the time fight with regular gear, which has to be occasionally replaced.

 

[Narushima]

What I could imagine is a fragility factor that determines how quickly durability decreases and then scale that factor according to early/mid/late game.

Not quite sure how that would be implemented, but it seems needlessly complicated and confusing for the players.

I much prefer the Realms of Arkania way where you find maybe 10 magic items in the whole game

I agree, scarcity of great (magical) gear makes it more exciting, especially if the gear in question has a unique name and is mentionned in-game before you acquire it.

 

[Ranarama]

Since all inventory management is annoying trash, you should do anything in your power to avoid the player needing to do it.

 

[Harthwain]

In short: It's tricky. Doing it like Arx may be an interesting approach (with durability becoming less of an issue later on).
You'd have to scale durability values right and probably still add some trash items. I'd still be lukewarm on potentially breaking my Moonlight Greatsword.

Suggestion: why instead of breaking a weapon not render it useless (deal no or almost no damage) when its durability gets down to 0? You could even limit this functionality to special weapons, making them more significant than regular weapons, in order to not discourage players from using them.

 

[RatTower]

Not quite sure how that would be implemented, but it seems needlessly complicated and confusing for the players.

The player wouldn't really get to see it.
An item's durability would decrease normally from 100 to 0%.
Lets say everytime I hit something the durability drops by a fixed value.
The fragility factor of a weapon is then multiplied with that value, which lowers (or increases) the total durability loss.

Early game weapons would have a regular fragility factor (1 or more), whereas in late game it'd decrease below 1 for most weapons.

To give an illustrative example: I hit a door. That causes, let's say, 5% of damage to a weapon. A rusty dagger has a fragility factor of 1.5. It's durability decreases from 100 to 92.5% (100-(5 x 1.5)). A regular broad sword has a fragility factor of 1. It's durability decreases from 100 to 95. A magic hammer of eternal head crushing has a fragility factor of 0.5. It's durability decreases to 97.5. And so on.

Meaning, in late game you'd automatically do less and less durability management because the weapons are more robust.

The player would only get to see a single line in the item description:
"This weapon is as good as new."
"This weapon looks worn."
etc

Some magic weapons could be indestructible (fragility factor of 0) whereas other magic weapons could be very strong but extremely fragile (crystal/glass swords with a fragility factor of 20).

One can of worms that comes with this whole system is the balance of item repairing. A couple issues you gotta take care of in that regard:
If you repair a weapon, should it be fully repaired or just partly?
Should you be able to repair stuff yourself or do you have to go to a blacksmith?
If you are able to do it yourself, do you need a skill like repair or arms lore?
What are other uses for that skill? (so a single mechanic doesn't clutter up your skill sheet)
etc

Suggestion: why instead of breaking a weapon not render it useless (deal no or almost no damage) when its durability gets down to 0? You could even limit this functionality to special weapons, making them more significant than regular weapons, in order to not discourage players from using them.

Yeah, I wouldn't go for full item destruction. That'd be too harsh. I'd take the item durability (0-100%) and multiply it in the damage calculation. Maybe clamp it between 10 and 100% so it doesn't fully nullify the damage.


All in all:
This whole thing would probably be possible from a technical perspective (I'd probably have to refactor a couple things in the inventory system). The only thing that's a bit tricky is rebalancing the weapon table.
I may also have to add a few weapon variations to bolster the curve for the fragility factor.
Ironically that leads to more weapons in the style of KF4.

 

[Narushima]

OK, I thought you'd use the fragility scale to make the more powerful weapons more fragile; that would have been frustrating.

Realistically, durability would never be a thing in video games. A steel sword/axe/whatever will only lose its edge with use, and that can easily be brought back with a whetstone. But I understand the need to implement that sort of thing for balance and added difficulty.

 

[V_K]

OK, I thought you'd use the fragility scale to make the more powerful weapons more fragile; that would have been frustrating.

Actually, I've played some games - e.g. The Summoning or Beyond Oasis - that essentially treat weapons as consumables. In Beyond Oasis, they even have a charge indicator that shows how many hits you can land before the weapon breaks. That actually makes for a pretty interesting take on fighting.

 

[RatTower]

Aiming a bow with a low archery skill will affect your mouse controls in a similar way (not as extreme though).
Other than that I'm still in the middle of fixing weapons/spells & doing some level design.

 

[Ysaye]

Aiming a bow with a low archery skill will affect your mouse controls in a similar way (not as extreme though).
Other than that I'm still in the middle of fixing weapons/spells & doing some level design.

I don't drink; can someone confirm that the Monomyth drunken experience is what it is like in real life?

 

[Technomancer]

experience is what it is like in real life?

Totally wrong, I don't hic nearly as much in my drunken ramblings. Srsly dev spice up your drunk-talk a little, I know it's a lot of work but "hic" every sentence will get old.

 

[V_K]

Would be cool to have a mechanic like in Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones, where if your char is low on sanity, regular dialog options would randomly transform into raving mad dialog options, like e.g. here:

So something like that, but for inebriation.

 

[garren]

Hopefully you sneak in some drunken exclusive dialogue in there

 

[baud]

Aiming a bow with a low archery skill will affect your mouse controls in a similar way (not as extreme though).
Other than that I'm still in the middle of fixing weapons/spells & doing some level design.

I don't drink; can someone confirm that the Monomyth drunken experience is what it is like in real life?

increase in reaction time, harder to stand straight, slurred speech. Though it happens more gradually after starting to drink and it'd have to be a very strong beer to get someone that drunk

 

[RatTower]

Lots of stuff going on.
Finally finished an enemy type I had lying around for a while:



Asset-wise I'm lacking in the character department so I'll probably spend some time on that in the coming weeks (focus on modularity).
Currently I'm mostly developing on the weekends, which will probably change throughout the next three months (as I mentioned, my work contract is ending in february).
Either way, I gotta step on the gas a little. Still sticking to my old plan of doing a small crowdfunding campaign and for that I want a proper demo ready.
Combat is getting better, but still needs some work.
Someone in the thread mentioned that torches should be an off hand item and I agree.
I'd love to have those torches, because that was a feature in a very old version of Monomyth (the unity/flat shaded one to be more precise).
I will look into it (since I need to fix some animation issues anyway), but for time reasons can't promise anything

 

[The Wall]

Kickstarter campaign when?!!
I can see this EXPLODING! on Kickstarter
Too many gamers want new Ultima Underworld/Arx Fatalis, too little such offerings on market. You have high value gem in making, muh dude

 

[The Wall]

Also: Chris Avellone is in hiding, disgraced, lonely, unemployed and bored. Maybe he could write your game's story under pseudonym. If you won't contact him, I'll stretch my flappy wings and try to be Cupidon who married your gameplay design and his writing. There, you already have first stretch goal for your Kickstarter :D BTW: I'm serious