The Tower of Ivem - Ideas

Mar 3, 2009 at 1:33 AM
Banned
"Bleep, Bloop, Bleep, Bloop"
Join Date: Mar 1, 2009
Location:
Posts: 1587
Age: 28
In Cave story, and really any mods I've seen, there isn't much point to ammo limiting on anything... It either comes back too fast (provided it does that), or half the enemies drop the ammo. Why can't there be a limit on everything?
 
Mar 3, 2009 at 3:15 AM
Administrator
Forum Administrator
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Jul 15, 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 6211
Age: 38
I would recommend original sprites, tiles, and music. Quality mapping would be good. Oh, and one last, but very important, thing. You need to have a good story.

Fire1052 said:
In Cave story, and really any mods I've seen, there isn't much point to ammo limiting on anything... It either comes back too fast (provided it does that), or half the enemies drop the ammo. Why can't there be a limit on everything?
Just set the max ammo counts for most weapons to anything above zero. Then almost everything will have an ammo limit.
 
Mar 3, 2009 at 11:28 AM
Justin-chan
"Heavy swords for sale. Suitable for most RPG Protagonists. Apply now!"
Join Date: Oct 15, 2007
Location: Nowhere
Posts: 1921
Age: 30
SeriousFace said:
Multiple endings? Is there a single mod with a single ending?

Yep.

When the modder stops working on it.
 
Mar 3, 2009 at 12:46 PM
Bonds that separate us
Forum Administrator
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Aug 20, 2006
Location:
Posts: 2846
Age: 33
It should be perfect in every way with no flaws and appeal to EVERYBODY. Piece of cake.

Seriously though, good ideas for level designs are the best place to start. It doesn't have to be anything complex, but it's always great to see something that hasn't been done before or is a new spin on an old tactic. Dumping a crapload of enemies into a level does not really make things harder due to invincibility, and try to avoid over-using enemies like the homing bugs. I can't even remember how many mods I've sped back through a homing bug level only to find 50 of them are following me. Also, echoing SeriousFace in regards to accurate scripting, although that is what player-testing is for :eek: Since you have assembly skillz, new bosses and/or enemies are always a plus, as are new weapons. Puzzles are tough to come up with, and tey often takes a LOT of scripting and flag-setting. Stealth levels get a thumbs-up from me too.

As for story... it doesn't have to be overly complex to be enjoyable, look at Magic~ for example. Story also comes second to gameplay IMO, at least in games like this where the majority of playtime is spent... well, playing. If you want some help though I am (not) always around to offer ideas/advice!
 
Mar 3, 2009 at 3:34 PM
Banned
"Bleep, Bloop, Bleep, Bloop"
Join Date: Mar 1, 2009
Location:
Posts: 1587
Age: 28
andwhyisit said:
Just set the max ammo counts for most weapons to anything above zero. Then almost everything will have an ammo limit.

No, I mean YOU should do that in THIS.
 
Mar 3, 2009 at 5:08 PM
graters gonna grate
"Heavy swords for sale. Suitable for most RPG Protagonists. Apply now!"
Join Date: Jul 2, 2008
Location: &
Posts: 1886
Age: 31
DoubleThink said:
I can't even remember how many mods I've sped back through a homing bug level only to find 50 of them are following me.

:eek:


DoubleThink said:
Puzzles are tough to come up with, and tey often takes a LOT of scripting and flag-setting.

Lol, it's a good thing I'm a good programmer, because otherwise I would have had to spend several hours copying/pasting/editing in order to make that arrange-the-stones puzzle in TWoR!
 
Mar 4, 2009 at 9:06 PM
Junior Member
"Fresh from the Bakery"
Join Date: Dec 4, 2008
Location:
Posts: 17
Age: 35
What would be nice to see in a mod is not hell like levels, but levels with actual puzzles. Even if it takes a while to come up with said puzzles, you WILL eventually come up with some if you think about it long enough.
 
Mar 9, 2009 at 10:09 PM
Senior Member
"Fly, Fly, Fly!"
Join Date: Dec 1, 2008
Location:
Posts: 128
That old mod where you start out on an airship and it gets attacked and you get a modified but ammo-limited nemesis and you can either fight the sisters (who are impossible) or jump off the ship and transfer control over to a young Momorin with the ammo-limited snake... that was you, right? Because what I'd really like to see is a continuation of that. You put so much work into reskinning everything and making everything look new, and really did have the beginning of a fun mod and a potentially interesting story. If you build off of that quality beginning rather than starting from scratch than in the time before you inevitably run out of free time or energy to work on it you'll be able to get either a lot more finished or do it with a lot higher quality, if not both.

Barring that, reskinning and all that is certainly necessary if you want it to stand out. However, it won't make things fun by itself. I agree that just throwing enemies and stuff out is not the way to go, and having too many bosses too close together is DEFINITELY a bad way to go (cough Revorshenskal cough). One boss per level, two if the plot gives you an excuse. I've always liked mods that used the booster 0.8 more than the 2.0, especially the few (actually, to this point, one that I've played) that make it have infinite fuel; yes, I know that's something that sort of takes over the rest of the game unless you take it away after a level or two, but there's nothing wrong with taking away items either, as long as you avoid making it so that there's areas/secrets/items which can only be reached during a brief period of the game before the necessary tool disappears (even if you get it back much later). In fact, giving and taking away items is a good way of varying the gameplay.

I wouldn't mind seeing a good unarmed portion or two; almost nobody does that. It has to be the right portion though; the egg corridor (both versions) and grasstown enemies would be fun to fight unarmed, while sand zone's enemies would be boring.

Please don't give the player the polar star, and then put some further effort into making sure the player cannot rely on a single weapon. Among experienced players, the weapons basically form a usefulness heirarchy: If you have the spur, knife or nemesis, always use that (knife and nemesis having some situational exceptions of course, more for the latter); otherwise if you have the machinegun or snake, always use that; otherwise, always use the polar star with the fireball for bosses and shooting around corners. And 95% of all mods default to either the polar star, because everybody knows you shouldn't give the player anything more powerful than that until very late in the game and most mods never REACH very late in the game. Yes, it's the most balanced weapon, but it's also the weapon we've already used against everything in the game umpteen times; one of my favorite things about Jenka's Nightmare and The Wrath of Revorshenskal was that they specifically did not give you any "best" weapon (not counting that hidden knife in the former) and especially not the polar star; the bubbler is a very fun weapon to be forced to use, and both had a heavy focus on it. Jenka gave you the fireball (which can't deal with many enemies) and the missiles (with strictly limited ammo) to coexist with the bubbler (useful against anything but slow damage output), while Revorshenskal also gave you the fireball and a buffed bubbler and then later a limited ammo snake and a very nerfed machinegun (and eventually the knife). Basically, the polar star's the baseline, but if you want a mod to be really memorable you don't want it to be the main weapon. I'd rather see a mod that gives you the machinegun but ends up a bit too easy than another polar star mod, because at least it's different and fun.

Otherwise, just surprise the player with things they weren't expecting to see--enemies that don't behave like they did in the original, bosses that weren't in the original, new or very altered weapons, etc. And dress up the stuff which is still the same with new sprites, new backgrounds and new music. As I said, assuming my memory's right and it belongs to someone else, you already had a great base to build off of.
 
Mar 9, 2009 at 10:31 PM
Cold Agony of Resolute Vacuum
"Heavy swords for sale. Suitable for most RPG Protagonists. Apply now!"
Join Date: Jan 1, 2008
Location: Elsewhere
Posts: 1973
Hmmm...
Methinks a merger may be in order...
Email me Lace, so that we may discuss things.
EDIT: Post 977
 
Mar 10, 2009 at 12:19 AM
Okay
"The Ultimate Sword of Extraordinary Magnitude"
Join Date: Oct 11, 2006
Location: Somewhere
Posts: 280
Brickman said:
That old mod where you start out on an airship and it gets attacked and you get a modified but ammo-limited nemesis and you can either fight the sisters (who are impossible) or jump off the ship and transfer control over to a young Momorin with the ammo-limited snake... that was you, right?...
That was Nator. Also fighting the sisters wasn't impossible it was just hard.
 
Mar 10, 2009 at 12:25 AM
Senior Member
"Fly, Fly, Fly!"
Join Date: Dec 1, 2008
Location:
Posts: 128
I seem to recall searching the thread and not finding a single person say they had succeeded, though.

Oh, and darn. Wrong person. Whatever. For some reason I thought I remembered Lace posting it... oh well. Ignroe that part of the post.

That is something I'd love to see finished though (/offtopic).
 
Mar 10, 2009 at 2:58 AM
Banned
"Bleep, Bloop, Bleep, Bloop"
Join Date: Mar 1, 2009
Location:
Posts: 1587
Age: 28
Everyone wants to see all of these mods finished. Most all of them (like this one) look really promising. If we had more people on the forum, we'd get things you'd never even imagine with a CS mod.
 
Mar 23, 2009 at 10:23 AM
Hax on....Hax off....
"Big Joe Tire and Battery Restaurant! Opening Soon! Eat at Big Joes!"
Join Date: Jan 5, 2009
Location: Easter Island
Posts: 476
Some things that I think went wrong with my mod that you should consider are:
I didn't know how to use flags at the time so you would never return to a certain place which I didn't really like.
My mod lacked puzzles i guess but before i decided that i would quit making it, I started making a stage where you had to get out of by doing little puzzles.
I can't quite say it was a great stage cause all i had done at that time was just a booster bit and a true or false quiz thing where if you get the answer wrong you fall to your death
My point is that puzzles are always great to add in, especially if they're quite original, for example the tetris stage in wtf story.
You seem to know quite a bit about assembly so I'm guessing with that you can make some pretty nice stuff. I respect anyone who can get their head around a bit of assembly.
Good luck with it anyway
 
Apr 12, 2009 at 4:18 PM
Been here way too long...
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Jan 4, 2008
Location: Lingerie, but also, like, fancy curtains
Posts: 3054
me?
I'm dead!

=P
So yes, I am working on it, but sloooooooooooowly.

cheers.
 
Jul 6, 2009 at 8:36 PM
Been here way too long...
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Jan 4, 2008
Location: Lingerie, but also, like, fancy curtains
Posts: 3054
really?
that's interesting.
or it would be if you hadn't freaking spammed in my thread.
ban him.
BAN HIM!!
 
Jul 6, 2009 at 8:46 PM
Senior Member
"I, Ikachan. The Life and Documentary of the OrigiNAL SQuiD."
Join Date: May 3, 2008
Location:
Posts: 188
Mar 24, 2010 at 11:09 PM
Been here way too long...
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Jan 4, 2008
Location: Lingerie, but also, like, fancy curtains
Posts: 3054
And why might this be, young one?
 
Mar 25, 2010 at 12:34 AM
Bonds that separate us
Forum Administrator
"Life begins and ends with Nu."
Join Date: Aug 20, 2006
Location:
Posts: 2846
Age: 33
Warning sent etc.

Oh that note a LaceMod would be very awesome D:
 
Top