googa
Level: Moderator

Rank Points: 282
Registered: 09-20-2004
IP: Logged
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Re: Wonderquest Dreams Final Version is out! (+3)
Thanks.
A few interesting facts about WQ:
First of all, I didn't plan to release a finished game from the beginning. All I wanted, at first, was to have a basic platform through which I could test stepping game's elements.
I planned to have something like a "stepping game creator", that would allow the user to create his own monsters via a scripting language. All was just for fun...
Then I used this not yet fully implemented engine to create DROD's basic monsters as a test. (that's why WQ monsters, mimics, etc are similar).
If I knew the game was going to be released from the beginning, I would have made things differently.
After that, I came up with the idea of having different avatars available for playing. Only then, I took the idea of releasing a game more seriously.
After having several heroes implemented, I realised that this would over complicate the process of adding a new monster,
since every new baddie should now be able to interact with the ten new entities smoothly.
I could have added a few different monsters, but this would be a daunting task.
When you have ten different types of heroes, the monsters must remain very simple. This way they will tend to work with all the heroes.
You can create a very fun monster to fight exclusively with the boomerang, or the bow and arrow, but it might not work with the sword or the axe. (and vice-versa).
Another thing: The "out of this world" feeling of WQ is kind of real.
The game was coded back in a time when I had two or three free week days.
My routine on Tuesdays was to buy pizza and soda, pack my notebook, and travel to one of my family's farm.
In a period of one year and a half, I used these two weekdays to create the game.
The decision to make it free was taken due to the fact that I did not want to limit creativity.
I didn't want to worry about the number of players WQ would have. I even refused proposals from people who offered good money to reshape it, and make a commercial game.
Morning routine: Grab a piece of paper, and "brainstorm" the game.
This was made along a river, by the forest. Or sometimes in a waterfall.
Afternoon: Coding .
Night: Coding and Pizza.
I don't know exactly the feeling of the game, since I haven't played it from the user's point of view.
But coding it felt like being far from the city, in the middle of nowhere... Wonderquest was really born in the woods.
Good times back there.
[Last edited by googa at 11-08-2009 08:51 PM]
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