Space Wreck - post-apocalyptic space RPG inspired by Fallout

[HoboForEternity]

Underrail and and the original copper dreams have a baby

 

[Kamaz]

There's a RPG mechanic I decided to introduce in the game - detect lie.

You can check every phrase a NPC says to you, not unlike in table-top role-playing games with human game master. That allows you to get additional context for conversation and the character.

Behind the scenes, there's dice rolling - you roll PERCEPTION against NPC's FOCUS. If you fail the skill check, you get "truth" reading no matter what.

Besides binary output of TRUTH/LIE in form of blinking lights, you also get description of how successful your roll was in range 1-5. Here are the lines:

1 - "You have absolutely no idea whether this is or is not %status%. 50/50"
2 - "You have no clue, but if you had to guess, you'd say that this is a %status%"
3 - "Probably this is %status%. At least you think so."
4 - "You are fairly confident that this is a %status%"
5 - "You are almost completely sure this is a %status%"
>5 - "No doubt that this is a %status%"

Together with personality read mentioned earlier, this makes PERCEPTION useful for diplomatic characters, so it's not just max out CHARM/speech.

 

[V_K]

This is a very cool mechanic, but how useful is it in the game exactly? Do NPCs lie a lot? What can you do when you detect that an NPC is lying to you?

 

[Kamaz]

This mechanic is non-essential. It's main purpose is to provide player with better context in certain situations.

I added it because I usually am somewhat frustrated when NPC gives me a quest but I am not sure if I should trust him/her. Or whether this is the only way to progress the plot or I should be genuinely wary and careful. Then, even worse, later turns out it was a setup and - surprise! - NPC had been lying to me all along! If you have this in-game tool, you can try to make an informed decision based on your character's stats: essentially role-playing.

And last, but not the least, sometimes there's an option to confront the NPC about the lie and that unlocks new dialogue branches and possible further development.

 

[AdolfSatan]

Just throwing an idea, but what if instead of having you click the button each time (which seems quite cumbersome), the roll were automatically made every time the conversations progresses and instead of having a text prompt providing the outcome, you got the reading by looking at the beeping frequency in the lie detector? Perhaps showing it with a ribbon or knob instead of lights for ease of reading.

Are the text choices selectable via keyboard?

 

[Kamaz]

Just throwing an idea, but what if instead of having you click the button each time (which seems quite cumbersome), the roll were automatically made every time the conversations progresses and instead of having a text prompt providing the outcome, you got the reading by looking at the beeping frequency in the lie detector? Perhaps showing it with a ribbon or knob instead of lights for ease of reading.

Valid point. The reason why I chose the manual trigger, is that it is more similar to how pen-and-paper RPGs do it; at least in my experience - you tell the game master that you want to detect lies and then you roll. It's a conscious act.

Someone pointed out another possible issue - there are players that have kind of OCD level of obsession and they would feel really uneasy unless checked every single line of dialogue. Automatic checking would be better in that case.

Will see how playtesting with real people goes, might change things.

Are the text choices selectable via keyboard?

No, but that's good idea, I probably should implement that.

 

[V_K]

Valid point. The reason why I chose the manual trigger, is that it is more similar to how pen-and-paper RPGs do it; at least in my experience - you tell the game master that you want to detect lies and then you roll. It's a conscious act.

Someone pointed out another possible issue - there are players that have kind of OCD level of obsession and they would feel really uneasy unless checked every single line of dialogue. Automatic checking would be better in that case.

Alternatively, you could make the check expend some sort of resource, like stamina or the detector's charge (or even a consumable item), so that choosing to detect lies would be less of a no-brainer.

 

[ItsChon]

This game looks amazing, I can't believe I haven't known about it until now. Excited to see where you go with it man, keep up the great work!

 

[Kamaz]

Some time ago I decided to rework quite drastically the existing RPG system (might I note, a bit similar as original Fallout switched from GURPS to SPECIAL late in dev cycle). I migrated from quite weird and esoteric system (your skills are represented with custom dice that has as many points on the sides, as high is your skill level, max 25) to more classic 4 d3 (either +1/-1/0 on sides) dice system with all attributes 1-5. While the old system was ...interesting; new one is just better statistically - there's nice bell curve distribution which comes in handy for e.g. ranged hit chance, visibility, lock-picking rolls etc. Other reason for switch - 1-25 turned out to be too numerically wide of a gap, I mean, it was hard to grade th difficulty on scale of 1-25. Siwtching to 1-5 seems more organic and easier to understand - 3 is 'learned', 2 - 'amateur', 1 - 'noob' while 4 and 5 correspond to 'pro' and 'expert' respectively.

Main theme of this system is minimalism - IMO you don't need many attributes and stats and skills to have for good role-playing options. Sometimes it even gets in the way - see dump stats and throwaway skills (e.g. gambling/outdoorsman vs small guns/lockpick in Fallout).

That is why we intentionally went for as small number of stats as possible. Ideally, they all should be equally represented in the gameplay and every single one - useful for something

Attributes

Those are fundamental character parameters - rest of the numbers are mostly derived from these base concepts, so they define your character.

PHYSICAL

Physical strength and agility, flexibility and speed; full control over one's physical potential. This attribute combines strength, endurance and dexterity - usually separate attributes in many RPG systems. Physical kind of is something the jocks, the athletes would possess in your typical U.S. high school movie.

Affects: HP, AP, carry weight, base DMG, melee

Note: physical is only way to raise HP. You don't get any other maxHP upgrades, even on levelups.

FOCUS

Your mental strength, discipline; ability to concentrate all the resources to the task at hand.

Affects: AP, evasion, sneak and scitec (science & technology).

PERCEPTION

Eyesight, hearing, attention, all the senses, intuition as well as general awareness and ability to quickly assess situation. Good perception allows you to read people and even detect lies.

Affects: evasion, ranged (weapons), lock-picking, dialog, fog of war

CHARM

Likeness of one's persona. High charm make people other people more forthcoming to you; ready to listen and even accept your ideas. Essential if you are looking for diplomacy or seeking favors.

Affects: speech, sneak (yes, really)

Note: usually dump stat, I am trying to make it more prominent. First thing - there's difference between charm and speech; even though charm is directly dependent on charm, the base attribute has its own uses. One of the more controversial ones - the sneak. In this case, high charm means you are very confident and your walk, your stature raises no suspicion. You kind of blend in, hide in plain sight. I expect more functionality tied to this attribute in future.

WORK

This is a bit odd one. There's saying - genius is 1% talent and 99% hard work - you sacrifice attributes and early stats to get advantage at getting higher skills later in game. Don't rely on attributes you are born with, invest work to improve your skills.

Affects: rate of which you gain XP and thus improve your skills (from 80% at 1, to 200% XP at 5).

Note: considering that you mostly gain XP from quests (and not from kills!), you will not get as much skill points as the one that has maxed out the WORK. However, must remember that skills are not everything - many stats (like HP, lie detection, range etc.) of the character are dependent only on basic attributes and maxed out skill wont help there.

 

[Kamaz]

Last week I continued work on new game area, the rock ship "Kurbads". Here's an early visual concept of the wreck:

And there's a short clip of player traversing actual game map (work in progress):

These type of ships - called rockships - were primary means how ore, mined on asteroids, was delivered to the Earth. Usually asteroids with very high ore concentration (e.g. iron, Fe) are chosen for mining. Crews of miners with manual tools as well as huge rock mining machines dig material out and then it gets to the mobile refinery (though, must point out, iron is very pure on asteroids on account of there not being no oxygen) and then, in form of pure pellets, it is ready to be transported. That's when the rockship comes in - pellets are moved to the ship where they are frozen in place with a bit f water. So the pellets turn into a solid chunk of material that is fixed to the rockship. It then transports the "micro asteroid" to the orbit of Earth where it then thaws the contact surface and releases the ...errr... "turd". With precise manipulations and following very specific calculations the chunk of material is propelled into downwards orbit that eventually brings the lump of material down to Earth, to the specified area - desert, usually - where it crashes just like an meteorite. And then it is extracted with conventional mining methods.

This specific ship - "Kurbads" - has suffered catastrophic damage while maintaining overall structure. The causes of this damage is yet to be uncovered but player can explore the damaged below-decks and learn more.

 

[Kamaz]

One of the character paths you can take in Space Wreck is a "techie" (essentially a nerd). Based on a SCITEC skill, it enables you to hack computers and learn both interesting (e.g. lore) and valuable (useful for quests) information. Or just [un]lock/control/fix/trigger things on the shipnet (inter ship network).

In the game, accessing computer also gives you basic crafting options - as in, with right tutorials (on the shipnet) you can do anything. That all probably makes this skill extremely powerful but remember - there are only six skills and it has to stand its own against traditionally useful combat skills, SPEECH and LOCKPICK.

 

[Kamaz]

Excellent suggestion, ItsChon!

 

[frajaq]

im liking what I see

 

[680x0]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq0D8U5fHbk

I'll take 6 copies plz

 

[Kamaz]

Dialogues now show requirement tags for skill checks without exact number but ▲/▼ icon instead to indicate the difficulty. And there's also post-check animation to indicate that roll happened under the hood.

And, yes, previously almost all of the dialogues were skill gated (think New Vegas) but now I'm adding/changing to rolls in some places.

Oh, and I am aware that there is great shizm between players that want to see mechanics (skill check rolls) and those who want more of an immersion. So, you can turn this all off and looks like this:

Of course, it would be better not to show them to don't break the immersion however many players might just miss the idea that speech/skill affects your dialogue. Like, I loved Fallout 1 but I learned that it had speech checks only some time after I completed it first. New Vegas was great in this - it shows that there are tons of options to approach the quest. But it does make it all mechanical and metagamey in a while. But umm, thing is, I kind of like both approaches and some days prefer one over other, other days - vice versa.

Just curiouos - what's your take on this whole metagaming aspect, e.g. skill check indicators in dialogues?

 

[ItsChon]

Excellent suggestion, ItsChon!

My bad, I didn't even realize I'd rated it negatively. Misclicked and all that.

Just curiouos - what's your take on this whole metagaming aspect, e.g. skill check indicators in dialogues?

I think it's better when games have a little indicator for each option for the reasons you listed, as I believe the pros of seeing your skills and actions impact the dialogue far outweigh the cons. If possible, it'd be really cool to have certain dialogue options based on things you've seen/side quests you've done/items you have, which can be labeled accordingly as well. Stuff like that seems very small but is a big step towards making a game feel way more reactive. A player has one or two of those happen to him, and his perception of the game will shift greatly in terms of reactivity.

Oh, and I think the little arrow to indicate difficulty is kind of unnecessary and would prefer for there to be no real indicator, as players will naturally guess the difficulty of the skill check depending on the stakes at hand, how far they are in the game, their own skill, etc, and I think this just raises the highs and lows of passing/failing a skill check, which is definitely a good thing for a game. Just my two cents, since I owed you a little suggestion after my previous misclick.

 

[AdolfSatan]

I'm on the opposite side, as I consider one of the great strengths cRPGs have against PnP is that you ain't getting those "gimme a roll for dex" requests, they happen under the hood. IRL having all eyes 'round the table fixed on a pair rolling dice that might decide the fate of the party is a much valuable part of the experience, but on a screen it just seems tasteless.

So, kudos for having it as an option.

How's the size of the game compared to that demo from a couple of years ago?

 

[Kamaz]

Ha! Two posts and two different preferences already - obvious that the toggle is needed.

How's the size of the game compared to that demo from a couple of years ago?

It's hard to quantify that because I've both added and removed things, as my primary goal is not to expand but to refine.

However, there are now

• 16 maps, compared to 6 of the old version
• 45000 words in dialogues file, compared to 33000 at launch
• 70 conversation targets (NPCs+some interactions) versus 50 at launch
  

And I've also added many new solutions to existing quests and changed the flow, even the plot in places that may increase playing time.

 

[Kamaz]

This is a concept for screen what you get when travelling between various wrecks.

Oh, and btw, how many obscure games related references can you find in this GIF?

 

[toro]

This is a concept for screen what you get when travelling between various wrecks.

Oh, and btw, how many obscure games related references can you find in this GIF?

I only see Avellone.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

Is that legionnaire a Nethergate reference?

 

[JarlFrank]

Is that legionnaire a Nethergate reference?

I'd have guessed it as a reference to the recent indie RPG Legionary's Life.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

you're both wrong, it's clearly a reference to new vegas

 

[Butter]

It looks like it's from AoD (the shield in particular).

 

[toro]

Brahmin, AoD and Avellone