Comments - thedarkgod

I feel like the improvements are a mixed bag
The starting dungeon walls look like they are made out of cement rather than stone, and look overall more bland and boring, rather than the higher contrast of the original.

Having having multiple specific lines such as “Greetings of the Divine King of the Snow!” may prove a bit of a hassle from a gameplay perspective.
I would propose that having being able to choose different behavioral characteristics in conversations may prove much more useful.
Perhaps there could be a bar to the side of a conversation where one could choose characteristics such as say "formal",or "religious", which would play into whatever role you are trying to assume.
The player would choose one, or multiple, characteristics, and then pick a dialogue option.

As far as I know this has never been done before in a game, but, if properly implemented, it could provide a lot more options for the player, as it does not require writing a whole lot of dialogue for all characteristics.

Are you going to implement conversations, or at least a system where the npc eats up turns to give the illusion of a conversation, between these npc types?
It would make a bit more sense if, with the example of the guards, the npcs would strike up a conversation before they switch each other out, as they in all likelihood would know each other, rather than just switching as they ignore each other.

Will you be keeping track of spawned npcs, and attempt give them some purpose to their actions?
I personally tend to find it fairly disappointing, as well as immersion-breaking, when the npcs spawned are nothing but setpieces.
It would bring so much more mystique to the game to be able to befriend an npc in the street or at a bar and have them invite you over for dinner, or to find out that they are part of a family with a connection to the crown, enabling you to get close to the royal family.

I am strongly opposed to the idea of separating important npcs from those encountered through the crowd mechanic. Even though I understand the decision from a technical standpoint it would be nice to see that tradition being broken, and if any game would be able to do so it would be a game such as this one, with a stronger focus on simulation.

Nice, I'm loving the look of those boots, and I look forward to seeing the crowd mechanics.
If you ever do feel like returning towards working on other types of footwear I would probably make and reserve simpler types of shoes for the lower classes, for those that can not afford the boots, taking inspiration from the leather slippers worn in the middle ages.
This would make for some variation and differentiation without having to create even fancier shoes for the upper classes.
I would also look at roman sandals as inspiration for warmer regions, there are a lot of interesting designs one can make with those.

It would be interesting to see the clothing being reliant on a chain of supply for materials, with lower standing social classes using more common materials for the civilization, and rather than randomly generating the preferred color of the clothing it could rely on the supply of the materials and herbs being used for dyeing. The reason that, for example, purple has been associated with the western royalty for long periods in the past was originally for the difficulty in producing the color.
A system based on the availability of resources would hopefully provide a more dynamic grouping of regions than only basing it on the culture of the area, although it would of course all depend on what sort of system you would use for civilization wide resource management and trade.

I'm really impressed, I wasn't prepared for you to tackle facial generation, and the result is really cool.
I have a minor complaint though, and that is with the female hair, as the retreating of the hairline on both sides of the front is a trait which is distinctively male, and whilst in the real world there may well be some women which show some retreating of the hairline, I would strongly advise against using it in the portraits when there are little other features to differentiate between the genders.

I don't like the idea of currency becoming too automated. There should be challenge involved in getting your way around a new city.
Rather than that I think it would be more interesting to handle currency like how they handled it in the olden days, with many currencies being based on rare metals with has innate value.
For these currencies they might have a lower rate of exchange, or perhaps the nation has banned currencies from nations they are unfriendly with, but in general these currencies should be widely accepted.
Then there could be another type of currency not based on rare metals, which besides being guaranteed by the state holds no value, meaning that these would not be accepted unless perhaps the nation in question has a trade agreement of some sort with wherever you try to get it through.
It would be a more accurate reflection of the time, and would provide some ease of transaction, whilst still keeping some challenge to managing your economy.

Hospitals being tied to the military does in a way make sense.

Speaking of hospitals how do you intend to handle hospitals and healing?
It would be a bit fun if the skill in healing varied from civilization to civilization, or even from town to town, some of them perhaps having dangerous trends such as bloodletting, making different injuries more risky to treat in some specific places. Although it would of course depend on how you intend to handle injuries in the first place.

Will there be any larger settlements with less closed of districts, forming more natural formations, with housings outside the city walls, or perhaps with districts spanning multiple squares, providing a less fortified look?

On a sidenote, this sort of fortified look reminds me of a documentary I saw of a nation which existed during the golden age of Rome and Egypt, that was confined within strong castle walls, and hard to reach. The nation emphasized brotherhood, with an interesting religious twist, which ultimately meant the end for the nation, as it fell victim to an internal conflict. I can't however for the life of me think of the name of that civilization. any history nut here who might be able to help me think of the name of it, or point me in the right direction?

It is a platformer/hacknslash though, the lighting is just there to set a mood, if it was darker it would have an impact on the gameplay.

It would be interesting seeing a state where religions are completely banned, like the old communist states, I would imagine them being a bit similar to states with Zealotry, in regards to how they treat other religions at least.
I could also imagine that it would be able to contribute to an interesting interaction with the cult system you are planing.
It seems like it could be a fun extreme on the other side of the spectrum, as sort of an extended cultism.

Well, yes, but at this stage it is little more than a concept, so try containing your excitement, as well as your money until they have a more finished product.
I have seen multiple ambitious products just die off, and although i too look forward seeing the product get finished, at this stage of development anything can happen.

Looks a bit too human in my opinion.

Does the religion of the civilization affect whether or not they bury their dead, or does the gravestones generate independently?

Lovely progress, the character model is really taking shape.
It might just be thanks to the perspective, but the characters legs look oddly short, according to the common 8-head model the legs should make up about half of the total length.

The characters anatomy seems a bit of, but it is a nice improvement.

Edit: put the comment on the front page instead.

Brilliant idea with the phone-towers.

Just be careful that the 200 assets limit doesn't become too limiting in the future.

I'm really looking forward to the implementation of AI.
One question: Will the buildings be dynamically formed in regards to natural resources such as water, and will the NPCs actions in a similar way be affected by supply and demand?

I love the new version, every previous issue i had is fixed, the gameplay feels more fluid, and the new more open stages allows for more movement.
The only minor issues i had was that, firstly the part to get to the hubworld feels a bit slow, and although i get that you were going for a puzzle feel i would have preferred if the boxes needed to blow up were reduced, and the slow motion being mapped to the same button as jump in sandbox felt odd, those are just minor complaints though.
All in all absolutely lovely.

The first part is fun, and i love the controls(not the buttons assigned to them though, the ability to remap buttons is kind of important in this day and age.) but the when the game becomes more closed of it slows down terribly, similar to the fights in mirrors edge.
Also the pellet collecting system is just annoying, especially since the bar doesn't recharge on the checkpoints, which is just stupid.

I'm going to be disappointed if the storyline does not contain a twist in which it is slowly revealed that the organization you work for might not be that clean themselves, as with the 1984 references and all.

Life is a party

damn

Is it just me or does the flowers look really odd?

I'm getting some strange red artifacts covering the text making the game unplayable, anyone knows how to fix it?

yay pinkie pie^^

This is a really usefull addition, I long for a feature of remaping some of these keys in a future options menu.

Also i would really like to request a feture, or more accurately give you a little tip:
Whem loading an area try loading the landscape of the area/areas next to current area beside it to, that would decrease loading and increase immersion, depending on the engine it should not require that much work, execep for a bit of coding to smoothen out the switch betwean skyscapes.

Also guest: the launcher is an exe, so yeah you are out of luck.