Some questions on the character graphics, my apologies if these have been asked and answered already:

How many views (front, front 3/4, right, back, etc.) will be supported for each character animation?
Will there be support for changes in player graphics depending on items equipped/weapon held?
Can a character animation be set for any event (frowning during conversation) or just movement and fighting?

I'll hold other questions for now. Thanks!

myshkyn

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"I'll give the fans just what they want, and nothing else at all."

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Originally posted by myshkyn:
**Some questions on the character graphics, my apologies if these have been asked and answered already:

How many views (front, front 3/4, right, back, etc.) will be supported for each character animation?**

There are eight different directions as the Coldstone Engine uses Tiles to calculate player, NPC and terrain positions.

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Originally posted by myshkyn:
Will there be support for changes in player graphics depending on items equipped/weapon held?

Yes, when an item is equiped you could call an event that changes the players map graphic.

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Originally posted by myshkyn:
Can a character animation be set for any event (frowning during conversation) or just movement and fighting?

Hmm..this hasn't been asked before. It would be quite easy to activate animations through conversations, as after every string of text you can specify what events you want to call. One of these could be animating the player or the NPC. If you wanted to change what the player did as he moved about, you could specify an event for a certain tile that changes the player graphic. When fighting, you could probably change the player animation according to how healthy your player is, or what items he has equiped, most actions in the game allow you to call events...

/me prays this isn't giving away to much...(looks at andrew nervously)

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cool! I was wondering if you could do that. So you could effectively have the character convey all sorts of emotions after a conversation, like confusion (scratching the head), sadness (sobbing), anger (steam coming out of the ears) etc.?

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Okay, couple more questions. Stop me if I'm becoming a pest.

What's the angle of the viewpoint of the game? Approximately. Meaning, if I drew a couple sprites right now, where should I assume the camera is to make the characters fit with the perspective of the graphics that will come with Coldstone? You know what would be great is if we had a wireframe cube picture at the correct perspective to reference for this. Boy, I'm demanding.

Second, will the characters be able to fragment, with momentum, in various directions upon death? Like, say, when your dwarf in Myth blows a target into multiple bloody chunks?

Finally, can scenery be made destructible? Or will we need to cheat and create stationary monsters that look like chairs and tables to give them a "death" sequence?

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"I'll give the fans just what they want, and nothing else at all."

You can never ask too many questions.

About the perspective, I'm not sure of the exact angle, but if you look at the Pillars of Garundell or Coldstone screenshots, you may get an idea. To see all sides, check out the movies.

Death sequences are entirely up to you. Upon an enemy's HP reaching zero, you can an event which starts the animation of say, the character blowing up.

I'm not completely sure about this last one. If the physics engine can handle it, I'm sure you could call an event to change that tile or layer when a specific area is targeted and hit. If not, it wouldn't be too difficult to make "vegetable" monsters.

Saphfire

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About the perspective: there is no perspective. It's straight top down tiles. But you can render / draw the characters from whatever angle you want - so ff1-6 style graphics are definitely feasible, as are, say, chrono-trigger or PoG style graphics.

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(Insert Signature Here)

<shh> If you wanna get really fancy, you can even create a psuedo 3D look by offering say a side scroller view, simply by modifying the background, movement tiles, and character graphic to fit. </shh>

Saphfire

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Back off the beta testers you should. Trouble they can get into if answer the wrong questions they do. Wait until release of program you must

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Before criticize someone you, walk a mile in their shoes you should.
That way, criticize them when you, a mile way you are and have their shoes you do.

Grrr....this Yoda thing is getting very annoying fox, do it on my board again...and I may have to get my karma stick out.

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Ladies and Gentlemen, as you know we have something special for you at
Birdland this evening. A recording for Blue Note Records...
Let's take it back to the concrete streets, original beats and real live MC's...
"We find it hard to strike a good balance between reality and fun. The reason being? Reality is often not fun." - _pipeline

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Originally posted by Desert Fox:
**Back off the beta testers you should. Trouble they can get into if answer the wrong questions they do. Wait until release of program you must
**

::rubs his eyes, then stands alert::

S o we meet again F ox...

::falls back asleep,dissapates,dreaming of a 1.0 release::

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::materializes::
-4,-3,-2,-1
Almost a stand up citizen,
::Laughs himself to vapor, dissapates::

(This message has been edited by chill_rx (edited 04-26-2001).)

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Originally posted by Desert Fox:
**Back off the beta testers you should. Trouble they can get into if answer the wrong questions they do. Wait until release of program you must

**

Whoa, had to read that twice to understand it.

Anyway, I don't really see any top-secret ultra-confidential stuff in here. In fact, I don't even see much that hasn't been brought up before. But of course, I don't know who the beta-testers are (certainly not me), so I don't know who to be looking for.

Saphfire

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Hey everyone, i decided to 'step into the breach' too finally.
So what it seems like you're saying is that there's no really easy way to make the perspective of your game change from that straight aerial look.
Don't get me wrong, i love all those top view games, but i kinda wanted mine to look more like the Nintendo 64's Zelda, or Mario64.... You know, where you can switch the camera angle so that it's directly behind you. Is there any way to do that easily? My entire game idea sort of depends upon that fact.... I need the camera behind my characters.
(PS- Sorry, this question is pretty redundant, I know, but i'm not a beta tester so i've never seen this game's controls... so you'll have to put the answer in pretty small words for me. I don't have too many computer games either....)
Thanks for the time!

Sorry, Coldstone will not be 3d, so "switching the camera angle" would be very hard to do. However, you could possibly simulate a low viewing angle (i.e, not overhead) by creating a map with short, wide movement tiles shaped

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like so, and rendering your graphics appropriately.

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Hey there

just a quick question, anyoen remeber sercrets of mana?? well there is that jelly baddie, do u think it would be possible to script somthing liek that? starting as one, then breaks off into 3??

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Originally posted by Tank241:
**Hey there

just a quick question, anyoen remeber sercrets of mana?? well there is that jelly baddie, do u think it would be possible to script somthing liek that? starting as one, then breaks off into 3??**

That shouldn't be too difficult, simply setup a script that executes the following animation and enemy change whenever a certain action or assumptions are met, such as the enemy having an hp fallling below 200.

Saphfire

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Originally posted by the Necromicon:
**Grrr....this Yoda thing is getting very annoying fox, do it on my board again...and I may have to get my karma stick out.

**

takin it a bit far, are we?

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DeAdBoY-
(url="http://"http://www.grybs.com/harzius")Harzius Productions(/url)
(url="http://"http://www.IcedEarth.com")Iced Earth(/url)

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Originally posted by DeAdBoY:
**takin it a bit far, are we?

**

No, it just really, really, really pisses me off...

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Ladies and Gentlemen, as you know we have something special for you at
Birdland this evening. A recording for Blue Note Records...
Let's take it back to the concrete streets, original beats and real live MC's...
"We find it hard to strike a good balance between reality and fun. The reason being? Reality is often not fun." - _pipeline