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"Miss" icon in an RPG

Chris Koźmik

Silver Lemur Games
Developer
Joined
Nov 26, 2012
Messages
414
I'm localizing Legends of Amberland and I have a problem with "Miss" icon. I need to show it using some sort of icon... Dunno how.

Those are the possible situations in combat:
- A) When you hit a monster you get a number showing the amount of damage dealt (like "84")
- B) When you hit a monster but monster's armor absorbed all damage it shows "0"
- C) When you miss a monster it shows "Missed" (which is too long in some languages and need to be represented some other way)

So, how do I represent C) using some icon? I was thinking of a shield icon (but that's confusing since Shields in the game provide armor points and have nothing to do with Evade chance) or two crossed swords, as in "parry" (but two crossed swords give an impression of an offensive action, not a failed hit)... Dunno...

Feel free to provide non orthodox solutions if there ois no other option (still, something sane and normal is preffered) :)
Feel free to provide examples (with screens when possible) how other games solved this.
 

Grauken

Gourd vibes only
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obviously as an icon, maybe a target with 2 or 3 arrows not hitting

missed-target-Jumbo2010-Adobe-650.jpg
 

Infinitron

I post news
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You could assume that MISS is a universally recognized word and keep it in English in all languages. Or not show anything at all. Most games supplement this with a "whoosh" sound effect so people would probably understand what happened.

Maybe an icon of a stick figure dodging a blow?
 

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
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You could assume that MISS is a universally recognized word and keep it in English in all languages.

7e7.jpg


People would complain :D

And rightly so.

When you miss a monster it shows "Missed" (which is too long in some languages and need to be represented some other way)

Sounds like INFERIOR TRANSLATORS to me.
 

vlzvl

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Aug 7, 2017
Messages
191
Location
Athens
How about moving the targeted character left or right some pixels in a simple animation, indicating some dodging movement from the character.
Perhaps a little harmful for eyes after a while, i might test it myself :)
 
Joined
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Codex Year of the Donut
TBH if you can read the language a game was originally made for you should play it in that. There's a good chance the translation team will end up butchering a lot of things especially idioms, jokes, etc., Not to mention the recent thing with translation teams taking it upon themselves to censor other people's works.
 

Bester

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Vatnik
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Something like this. Get an artist to draw you an icon, I can't draw.

fd70804bb3c7c25ab6d27dcb87a79fa8.png


(it's a sword swooshing and missing a guy)
 
Last edited:

DraQ

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Chrząszczyżewoszyce, powiat Łękołody
I'm localizing Legends of Amberland and I have a problem with "Miss" icon. I need to show it using some sort of icon...
You don't. In general icons nor numbers don't belong in the world view. They belong in the combat log if you have any.
Icons are permissible for status effects if there is no good way of showing the status in question, but miss is not a status.

You can depict miss/dodge, hit for no damage and damaging hit visually even with very primitive graphics.
  • Hit - blood splash effect (might have several ones for different enemy types, like skellies) scaling with damage dealt (Lands of Lore style).
  • Hit, no damage - sparks like effect. Might scale with damage absorbed.
  • Miss - have dodge anim, at its simplest it's moving the sprite out of the way and back.
Sounds can also help (fleshy/crunchy hit - damage, metallic hit - no damage, swish - miss).




Apart from that...

KO6YfEp.png

...you're welcome.
 

Norfleet

Moderator
Joined
Jun 3, 2005
Messages
12,250
The method I've used before doesn't need any icons, but simply displays a "-" for a miss, an "X" for an active block such as a parry or point defense, and "0" for failure to pen. That works in with your floaty number display and requires no icons.
 

Norfleet

Moderator
Joined
Jun 3, 2005
Messages
12,250
I liked having separate symbols for Miss vs. Blocked vs. Failure to Pen because it provided more information in a single symbol. Getting a "-" for a miss indicates your accuracy was bad, getting an "X" for a failure to hit because of active defenses tells you that you need to counter that, getting a "0" for hitting and yet doing no damage indicates you need to adjust your damage/penetration.
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
As DraQ said, why even have an icon?

A simple "swish" sound and the absence of a blood splatter on the enemy sprite should be enough.
 

J1M

Arcane
Joined
May 14, 2008
Messages
14,616
You shouldn't introduce an icon if no other combat rolls result in an icon.

From a game design perspective, I would say that missing is better represented by the opponent succeeding at something than the character failing. I would not design an RPG where a character could "miss" (although I guess I would entertain a "critical miss" rule). Instead, I would represent that as the opponent performing an "evade", "dodge", "parry", or "block".

In this case, since it sounds like you are just localizing an existing game I would echo the suggestion of using another character that means "nothing". No need to get more complicated than the use of "-", which was suggested above.
 

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