Pussycat669
Liturgist
After all those passionate discussions about the deep philosophical meaning of RPGs it might be time for something rather minor: The good ole backpack (for adventurers).
The following will be quiet specific, so feel free to simply skip it and post your conception of an 'ideal' inventory.
I'm currently working on a little project of mine (seems to become quiet popular around here these days, strangely) and suddenly had to realize that I've never given lot of thoughts on this topic and that's taking its toll now.
There are many ways to do it and thus a lot of possibilities to do it awfully wrong.
I was wondering which one of those approaches I'm going to list here sounds good or the right opposite.
For this it is assumed that the inventory is limited (unlike the Gothic games for example) with two possible limitations either weight or space. Since those are already well established standards in the genre I guess they don't require much explanation.
Weight limitations are probably the most 'realistic' attempt (in terms of accuracy) to simulate an inventory that is dependant on attributes (although it fails to explain exactly how he or she is able to store all the junk but this is also carried over to space limitations). Fallout is a popular candidate here.
Space, well, who doesn't like small boxes as in NWN 2 or Diablo? It is simple to use and good to organize (if you take your time) since you don't need to deal with numerical abstractions like you do with weight limitations although space always seems to run out quickly (and often ignores attributes altogether. An exception I can think of would be Baldurs Gate which also takes weight into consideration).
I ultimately decided for the later. To spice it up a little though (and, for the most part, to avoid technical limitations) I altered the concept a bit. Instead of having one 'common' grid where you store all your stuff I made the game more distinguish between different kinds of sizes. Small (ammunition, food, puzzle objects), middle size (for now only weapons like rifles, heavy tools etc.) and huge (seldom present or really useful under this category falls heavy machinery, tables, basically everything that is too bulky to be put in your backpack and must be held in both hands. Therefore those items must always be equipped while you are carrying them).
At the beginning, depending on the character you choose, you have up to 10 slots for small items, two for middle size and one for the big junk. So far so good. But then again I wrote for the beginning. Well, this is where it becomes completely specific.
The game relies heavily on attribute degeneration. Considering this I believe that it would be half-hearted to let the inventory to remain as it is. But how could you implement the decay reasonably?
First I thought about bring back weight anyhow to furthermore limit the player as the game progresses. But this seems artificially complicated to me although a buddy of mine claims that since I've taken the realistic approach so far (meaning that you can and probably will die...a lot) I should work with this. This would grant a little bit of freedom (either take two big guns but only a smaller amount of ammo or only one with more lead) but still it doesn't sound right to me (plus I would have to go through all pick able items to give them separate weights and I must confess I'm kind of a lazy person). I could give the weight categories a maximum to serve as an orientation but still it would probably become micromanagement no matter what.
What I favour right now would be that you lose slots as your strength and endurance decline. That is if a numerical number which is combined product of those two hit a certain value you'll first lose the huge slot (if present), one middle size slot and up to seven small slots. That is both good for me since I don't have to throw random numbers at objects and the player since there is a clear evidence what is possible at current.
Any thoughts?
The following will be quiet specific, so feel free to simply skip it and post your conception of an 'ideal' inventory.
I'm currently working on a little project of mine (seems to become quiet popular around here these days, strangely) and suddenly had to realize that I've never given lot of thoughts on this topic and that's taking its toll now.
There are many ways to do it and thus a lot of possibilities to do it awfully wrong.
I was wondering which one of those approaches I'm going to list here sounds good or the right opposite.
For this it is assumed that the inventory is limited (unlike the Gothic games for example) with two possible limitations either weight or space. Since those are already well established standards in the genre I guess they don't require much explanation.
Weight limitations are probably the most 'realistic' attempt (in terms of accuracy) to simulate an inventory that is dependant on attributes (although it fails to explain exactly how he or she is able to store all the junk but this is also carried over to space limitations). Fallout is a popular candidate here.
Space, well, who doesn't like small boxes as in NWN 2 or Diablo? It is simple to use and good to organize (if you take your time) since you don't need to deal with numerical abstractions like you do with weight limitations although space always seems to run out quickly (and often ignores attributes altogether. An exception I can think of would be Baldurs Gate which also takes weight into consideration).
I ultimately decided for the later. To spice it up a little though (and, for the most part, to avoid technical limitations) I altered the concept a bit. Instead of having one 'common' grid where you store all your stuff I made the game more distinguish between different kinds of sizes. Small (ammunition, food, puzzle objects), middle size (for now only weapons like rifles, heavy tools etc.) and huge (seldom present or really useful under this category falls heavy machinery, tables, basically everything that is too bulky to be put in your backpack and must be held in both hands. Therefore those items must always be equipped while you are carrying them).
At the beginning, depending on the character you choose, you have up to 10 slots for small items, two for middle size and one for the big junk. So far so good. But then again I wrote for the beginning. Well, this is where it becomes completely specific.
The game relies heavily on attribute degeneration. Considering this I believe that it would be half-hearted to let the inventory to remain as it is. But how could you implement the decay reasonably?
First I thought about bring back weight anyhow to furthermore limit the player as the game progresses. But this seems artificially complicated to me although a buddy of mine claims that since I've taken the realistic approach so far (meaning that you can and probably will die...a lot) I should work with this. This would grant a little bit of freedom (either take two big guns but only a smaller amount of ammo or only one with more lead) but still it doesn't sound right to me (plus I would have to go through all pick able items to give them separate weights and I must confess I'm kind of a lazy person). I could give the weight categories a maximum to serve as an orientation but still it would probably become micromanagement no matter what.
What I favour right now would be that you lose slots as your strength and endurance decline. That is if a numerical number which is combined product of those two hit a certain value you'll first lose the huge slot (if present), one middle size slot and up to seven small slots. That is both good for me since I don't have to throw random numbers at objects and the player since there is a clear evidence what is possible at current.
Any thoughts?