jClassicRPG dev / discussion thread

hello, people!

This thread is intended for discussion about the opensource java classic rpg framework/game. The name may be tricky - it features a lot of classic traits yet it tries to be innovative in a few things. It's opengl 3D, written in Java (yes, it is ), features a parametered world and ecology generation, a dynamic population system and a lot of things that are yet not touched in the actual development - only in theory.






The project is fully opensource code + media. If interested to add some 3d content you're highly welcome - especially because the project is a gatherer as it is a framework not just a single game implementation. Play value is not much right now (although you can explore some climate belts and some caves ) but check http://jcrpg.blogspot.com/2007/09/what-is-jcrpg.html if you want to know where this is all heading.

If interested in taking a quick glance at how the pre-alpha game is progressing check the new video showing the state of the project of its source repository version (not the release): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHPCuACpje0

I've opened this thread as a newbie here but I was reading the forums twice or thrice (or even more ) so I know that it's worthy to start a discussion here (although the project has its own forum at forum.freegamedev.net, I'm aware of the high creativity quotient of this forum in terms of discussion).

cardtrick brought up that a better name would suite it better, so I've have to explain a bit (and go with head against the wall ). I think java classic rpg naming is good enough for a framework. The word classic may sound dull but it covers the intent to recreate "classic values" not just the classic style (it is planned to be a mixture of classic and neoclassic elements). And as a route to escape the reference game can have a better, more exciting title later yet.

And finally - sorry for my bad English.

cheers,
lead dev of jcrpg

---
Latest release: 'Almost Pristine' codename (May 25, 2010),
migrated to Ardor3D engine. DOWNLOAD: https://sourceforge.net/projects/javacr ... p/download
You need Java JRE 6 and hardware accelerated OpenGL to run the stuff.

 

I think it's a good idea to paste here some basic things about the fantasy setting of jcrpg in general to make it more familiar for discussion:


"
Combat, social, physical and magical skills are the channel which through all actors of the game represent themselves. Players and AI beings can have professions which boost some areas of skills when learning. Professions can have requirements like Gender, Race and Attributes.

Attributes:

Strength, Speed, Concentration, Constitution, Piety, Psyche, Charisma, Karma

Professions of the player:

Alchemist
Bard
Crusader - a fighter with celestial destiny
Demonist
Enlightened - a fighter using internal powers and meditation
Jester - a talkative chatty person who can deal with people with a few right words
Lobbist - the witty politician
Mage
Monk
Negotiator - the diplomatic trader of fates
Priest
Psionic - mentalist
Ranger - the great survivor of the wilderness
Shadow
Swindler - observe his hands and words well, he/she will cheat you!
Thief
Warrior
Wise - the hopefully enough reason and experience is behind him/her
Witch - female only
Witch Master - male only
"

http://docs.google.com/View?docid=dfqcf69m_1fhm6xbj9

 

This sounds pretty interesting. I'm going to keep an eye on this.

 

I like Java.

 

Another more interesting detail to share about the innovative goals is the addition of social skill based duels. This will add some sort of peaceful or let's say bloodlessly aggressive ways to negotiate around. This is not planned to be dialog based only but similar to spells you will have different "tricks" and "rhetorics" to throw at a situation, a group of beings. It's meant to be a source of fun and ease on the "combat-burdened" mind and spirit, hopefully it will turn out to be so. Actually the so called social professional character of the party are mainly focused on this. (Lobbist,Swindler,Wise,Negotiator and Jester)

 

Heh . . . timong/Paul posted on the JCRG blog, letting his readers know about the thread here. His description of the Codex:

Just for the sake of comparison, Jedi_Learner also recently posted about the Codex, over at the Iron Tower boards:

 

errr, mine sounds much duller than Jedi_Learner's version.

 

Jedi_Learner got banned because he behaved like an emo bitch and posted NSFW pics in some attack of mental insanity. It's only natural he doesn't want to go back to a place where everyone would mock him after his return.

 

The funny thing is, nobody has mocked me since my return. Nobody cares.

 

Depressing isn't it?

 

Recently a few conceptual things have been laid down along with some UI design. The encounter windows received early prototyped forms, also Inventory prototype is being born nowadays.

Some quotes of interest:

http://jcrpg.blogspot.com/2008/05/abstr ... bject.html
"Important thing is, that I've decided to leave out the "equipping round" for weapons. You don't have to equip weapons to your characters before using it in a round, you can use them anytime you want. (It's more convenient and less frustrating), yet don't forget your enemies neither have to make an equip round for changing weapon! The Wizardry series had this equip round which finally I've decided to leave out of jcrpg."


"Regarding the inventory I cast my vote for a preorganized (not player organized) categorized inventory. As you can see, I've already added categories and multiselect dropdown lists for items. You can multi select items and later the window will have options like move objects to another party member, drop selected items and such. I've also added small icons to the multiselect list representing the item. I bet it's classic yet easier to use because of the categories. Always sorted, always categorized but a classic look."


A link to understand what Entity Fragments are (Entity is a group of similar beings, e.g. HumanCommoners of a town district. Fragments are a simple part of them representing position of a subgroup of the parent group.)
http://jcrpg.blogspot.com/2008/05/entit ... aming.html

Economy Update Turn: http://jcrpg.blogspot.com/2008/05/new-t ... -turn.html

"Walking around and around the problem of economic updating after trying different approaches in theory the final method has been born. It's called Economic Update Turn. It happens every X turns (let's say it will be happening daily in a stable version), and if a given population zone's inhabitant number has changed so much (or such an update-triggering event occurres) it recalculates a whole population infrastructure regenerating the population's physical form."

 

Did you cut your penis with a rusty knife?

 

Or this scares you too much have you checked jcrpg?

 

good work!

something about plot structure ready?

is a minor glitch but...is planned an increase of the view distance?

 

plot structure is not yet touched just as dialog system neither. It varies too much on how the underlying dynamic process will work and how living things relate to each other. It is half way under planning and development. A bit it may resemble rogue like games at this first stage of development, but with a lot of difference surging from the complex way living entity dynamism will be handled/generated. Entities having goals, changing populations, changing economy - this can make a specific kind of language that can describe the different "goals" of entities that player can help to achieve.

Another way to say it that much plot things will be born out of the situations created by the changing entity relations... on the other hand a scripting shouldn't be dropped neither but this is planned in the second stage of development.

View distance is not too high I bet, but there's a far view mode for more powerful PCs, that may be more close to nowadays' standard view distances in 3D games. Where did you see image that gave you a feeling of low view distance? This image here with the bear is not showing the maximum view distance with usable FPS/performance. edit: also I consider it (although may fail at it) more interesting to create an intellectually higher view distance than graphically

Thanks for the question and feedback!

 

Probably this old video shows better the view distance with farview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mh8rp9moiWY .

And this older shot is with farview and detailed water shader enabled:

http://bp2.blogger.com/_f57_nB05Gno/R4kbNsm1uiI/AAAAAAAAAcw/xU7yX93mo8E/s1600-h/shad3.jpg
cheers!

 

Have you improved the poor fps and the popup?

 

FPS is better since that video, also it was recorded with Fraps which may mod the FPS a lot. Here is a recent better video http://www.vimeo.com/917243?pg=embed&sec=917243 . With far view popups of pooled 3d objects are more noticeable, which I think won't be improved too much in the short term. With far view disabled, the fog is hiding away the popups much better.

I think a good fps (especially with low details, I've got good FPS on older hardware like GF 6200Go) and a not totally perfect (or even middle way to there) graphics will do for a big while (its still prealpha), or even on mid term too. This whole aiming at brain's other parts than just aesthetics of the eye, so while I'm trying to help these things when possible with my knowledge, I still find it more important to improve the game logic than graphics (which is starting to be acceptable for a classic 3d tile based philosophy, I think).

 

Why does the video keep pausing? Even thought the frame rate count seems to be reasonable, it still feels like it's juddering a bit. Also the popup seems to be fairly horrific, but overall I actually quite like it.

Good work. I wish you the best of luck

 

Thanks!

video recording software sometimes makes it stuttering and also there are loading times when you have walked out of the loaded part of the geography, it shows a load icon in the top left corner. Also if you're walking there's a little pause every square (you are moving in a cubic space, like in old games (eob and such).) Well, and yes, you can even get some stutters for some other reason, but in general it's not sooo bad. i hope at least...

 

Can you stream the loads in the background? It's details like that that make games for me.

 

There was a try for that partly successful, but finally I've found it more secure and bugfree to use loading in foreground. Later, with more fixed things in the engine another try can be made if the loading will really go against playability (which is quite possible, but who knows, what people can accept for a game in exchange for other gameplay experiences.) Currently I'm rather anxious to concentrate on creating the dynamic world and its rules to support a good and surprising gameplay.

 

New 1st anniversary release is out!

http://jcrpg.blogspot.com/2008/05/anniv ... tacks.html - in this blogpost you can read my summary of the year too.

Highlights:
"New UI windows for Encounter Phase, Turn Act Phase, Character Sheet (F3 key) and Inventory (F4) were added. New Population generation algorithms (GrownInfrastructure, DefaultInfrastructure) were added along with new integration level of named Towns for friendly populations to unite in. Economy Update Turn implemented for growing or declining population changes. Basic level Entity relations and Entity states (level and points) and Entity fragments (roaming entity groups) were added. A few Objects for inventory were added. Skill system further implemented with object dependencies and Skill Act Forms (like some spells and some combat forms etc.). New animals heron and deer were added and wolf replaced (glestanimals of wciow at glest.org). Smaller bugfixes, optimizations (culling works again now correctly). This is the First Anniversary Release!"



Downloads:

https://sourceforge.net/project/showfil ... _id=197331

Project is in need of mythic monsters 3d models:

http://forum.freegamedev.net/index.php? ... 64&start=0

Hope to see you around!

 

I find Gamasutra can be quite good for little technical insights. They have an article on streaming content that you might find interesting. http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1 ... _games.php

Also, have you looked at AI pathing yet?

 

Thanks for pointing out the article. It's an interesting one. AI pathing is really a hard nut, and I've spent on it little time, because I think a simple A* will suffice in case of this game when we'll get there, mainly because jcrpg is rather unbound of the 3D manifestations of entities, it's "collision" detection is an abstract thing, I imagine it as a thing a bit like in Civilization - checking table squares. This is a bit like a board game, like old rpgs were back in the days.