This week I'm trying some new stuff on cutscenes and their artstyle, talk about the AI and some game design aspects and update on horse combat. Ever wanted to know what Monty Python has to do with game design? Well stop by and see!

Posted by BiggerBoss on Aug 28th, 2014

I'm giving it extra work on the AI that's why it takes so god damn long, what I'm going for as a game mechanic is that the player won't have a way to show him the level of the enemies, so he would have to figure it out by observing their AI if he doesn't he would be too outmatched in a fight. For every enemy there is a rank and a bravery level, if an enemy bosses other enemies around, he is of higher level, low rank enemies kneel to high ranking enemies, better clothing, the presence of armor, what kind of weapon does he hold, how many swords does he carry etc. But high rank doesn't always mean bravery, so the player would have to watch for signs to also figure out the level of bravery, while high levels of bravery fight harder and won't give up easily, the player should watch for the cowards also, because nothings cuts short a sword fight more than a concealed firearm! This is were the bird's eye view comes to play (among other things). I believe that in stealth games observation is the key mechanic, in contrast to games like AC where every enemy is just an enemy and you know that if he sees you, he would just attack you, here enemies might retreat and call for backup, they might surrender and when you come close attack, they might challenge you without calling for backup and lot's of other stuff. If somebody approached the game without taking the time to observe it, it would seem to him that everything is random but that's not the case, for every enemy there would always be clues for them, you can even make your character give you feedback on them, but every character has a different personality so you would have to know them pretty well, an arrogant character might feel that is superior from another enemy and that could lead to problems.

That's only for combat, for normal behaviours is another big talk :P . I have most of this things working but they need a lot of polish at the moment, on my next dev vlog I would explained all of this in even more detail or at least the parts that I have polished enough till then.

Basically the main idea for it was taken from Monty Pythons quest for the holy grail. When King Arthur passed two villagers and one says to another "He looks like a King" the other one asks why so he replies "Well he doesn't have feces all over him" :P . In every modern game now there's just too much information on the screen, they don't let the player explore the world around him, I remember memorising the map of GTA 3 and Mafia and I always knew exactly where to turn and where to go, just because there was no way of guiding you, now with all that GPS added into them that's a feature missing, it might be more easier now to find your way around but I believe that makes the game more remote from the player and doesn't let him invest so much as they used to.

With the addition of a campaign map in the game where the player would have to face "searching parties" I want him to be at the position where he would say "You know I should retreat to that level because if I'm attacked here the plain terrain won't give me much choices to hide if I can't beat them" kinda like the total war series but without the random levels, so memorising almost everything would be crucial.

I'm also expirimenting more with the cutscenes and their art style so here is a quick scene I've made, tell me what you think!

Some horseback melee AI that is looking pretty good

And test for the ranged aspect of the horseback AI

and in case you missed it last week, here is the "Next Gen Feature" of the game :P