Julian, please write an update it's been about 4 months and I am so hyped for this. If you need help programming I would be happy to offer my services for free.
Hey Benjamin! I'm planning to write an update soon. Life is really difficult for me right now, and I got a job so I can't work as much on Mystiqa as I'd like at the moment. I hope this gets better soon, but yea!
Thanks for the programming offer, but I think I am good!
I'm sorry for the inconvenience. The demo was up a few weeks ago, but had to be removed for maintenance reasons. It will go live with the Steam Next Fest June 13th.
Been following this project for a long time now and I just played the demo. Here are my immediate thoughts.
Some issues I have so far with the gameplay itself is the spawning system for enemies, they can spawn very close to the room's entrance so when you walk in you are instantly in danger, placing enemies further into the rooms would give you more time to react and would be a welcome change.
You also get no I-frames when entering a room which would be no issue if enemies didn't wait by the entrance after you leave the room. I would highly recommend rather than enemies dying and being deleted from the world you look at the legend of zelda series and instead set them to be invisible, inactive, and back to their starting position and upon reentering a room they are set back to visible and are reactivated. If you want the rooms to be random you could take the isaac approach and handmake many rooms with predetermined enemy and trap locations which can be placed in the world at random.
Slime knockback is also incredibly high and can send you out of the room which is a major annoyance. Slime should also indicate where they wish to jump more clearly and should have a sort of wind up animation. When they split they can also land directly on you and you take unavoidable damage.
Crabs tend to kill themselves with the water which is odd.
When you die you respawn at your current position which lacks any sort of punishment for mistakes, I would recommend going back to the world spawn or having spawnpoints spawn through the world.
Chests should be visible before defeating the enemies to incentivize them to stay and fight rather than to go to the next room.
As for bugs I have experienced a few, one major bug is the shell bug, if you pick up a shell and walk to another room it will float way ahead of you. There seems to be Z-layer issues with enemies in grass or that may be intentional?
I have seen numerous tileset bugs in the forest area in particular
What I liked, the UI is charming, the graphics are enjoyable. The concept is very interesting and multiplayer would be especially fun.
These criticisms are to improve the game, I want to see this game succeed it just needs work at the moment.
Thanks so much for the feedback! I fully agree on all these points.
I've been working non-stop the past few days to get the demo out in time for Steam's "Going Rogue" fest, but I've not been satisfied fully. All the points bring up are already on my list, and I will get to them in the next couple of days. I thought it would be best to release the demo in its current state still, in a "better than nothing" mentality.
You haven't seemed to talk about the dungeon of the demo. Have you not found it?
Edit: Looking back, I should have polished up the demo instead of rushing to release it on time for the steam fest. I've taken it down now to do exactly that.
I'll admit haven't yet made it to the dungeon because the bugs discouraged me from moving forward, but I am very happy to see these concerns are known and acknowledged. Looking forward to the great game I know this is gonna be, best of luck.
Thanks a lot! Progress is going very well. I'll be posting a new Kickstarter update at the end of the month, and a new demo will release next month as part of the Steam Next Fest. Stay tuned!
Oooooooh thanks for the heads up! Glad to see your kickstarter succeeded! I definitely would have backed it had I seen it earlier :-D Ill be keeping an eye on this and wishlisting on steam as well. Cheers!
Sorry if you've answered this somewhere else, but is there a estimated release window? I'm super excited for this game, I feel it'll scratch that itch I have for a randomly generated Zelda-like game, as well as the modding aspect being really exciting to think about if it's still a thing. Keep up the great work my man :)
The fact that you're not super constraining yourself is good to hear, and it just means that we'll likely have an even better time with the final product. Take all the time you need, especially since from what I've seen you're developing this almost entirely alone, lol.
Concerning the orb of ascension, that's not yet decided! I'll still have to find a way to end the game, and maybe it'll be the orb of ascension :)
But after you beat the game, you can explore basically infinite new islands within the same universe, so the orb of ascension is not neeeded to continue playing.
Nope. You start with the raft, which is unable to explore far because of deep water and rocks. There are multiple vehicle upgrades with let you explore farther.
The island grid is 5x5 biomes, so there is a lot to explore.
Hello Juice! This project has me extremely interested, i am developing an almost identical type of game to what you have here with a small team, maybe we can talk about this a bit more, do you have any contact i can use?
Well, for one, the game is in developent and there will a new demo very soon.
Second, I didn't email Peter Milko. He just posted a comment. I didn't interact with him afterwards. I don't use any of his work and don't work with him.
Oh bro, I thought you did cause you said "Need a pixel artist" and he said "Ok email me" Dx my bad man, take your time chief. Sorry about that. And yes I do know it is in development, I cant wait for X time for Demo. EDIT: Correcting myself, I misread who texted @Peter Milko forgive me.
I’ve encoutered two problems in the game that made it somewhat uplayable to me
After pressing enter in the title screen the top of the screen flickeres black it’s so annoying
F for enter, and enter for exit. Why? Just Why??every single PC game on the globe uses the enter button for selecting and accepting chocies except for this one, it’s so frustrating to the point where using menus is a real challenge
BTW I am using the windows version if that can help you find the cause of the first issue
I am looking for the fix of those two problems so I can play this promising game
That graphics card is indeed very old. If I'm not mistaken, MonoGame (the framework I'm using) needs OpenGL 3.0 drivers. So you can try updating your Nvidia drivers and see if that resolves the issue.
Can the game be played on a 32bit computer? (I'm using windows (x86), tried opening the game and got an error, saying that I need 64bit :/
Here's the error: [The version of this file is not compatible with the windows version you are executing, check the system information of the device to see if you need a x86 version or x64 of the program and then get in contact with the supplier]
Hello ! Actually playing your game, and it's a great game, even though it's a demo. Really looking forward for the full game, great job.
I have a question, will the full game have online multiplayer to play with your friends ? I know Steam has the Remote Play Together feature, but it doesn't work well because of my internet connection...
I have not yet decided. Implementing online multiplayer is really complicated, especially when you start it late in the development. Steam Remote Play Together is a viable option. I think they even claim that it's better than online multiplayer don't they? I suggest just trying it out when it's on Steam :)
Is there some kind of bugtracker somewhere? I tried to start the 0.8-linux demo and I was able to see a loading screen but after that it crashed to desktop with the following error:
Unhandled Exception: System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object at Mystiqa.MapState.Render () [0x0071e] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Mystiqa.Master.Draw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x00000] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.DoDraw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x0001c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Tick () [0x00239] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.SdlGamePlatform.RunLoop () [0x00021] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameRunBehavior runBehavior) [0x00082] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run () [0x0000c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Mystiqa.Program.Main () [0x0000c] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 [ERROR] FATAL UNHANDLED EXCEPTION: System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object at Mystiqa.MapState.Render () [0x0071e] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Mystiqa.Master.Draw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x00000] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.DoDraw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x0001c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Tick () [0x00239] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.SdlGamePlatform.RunLoop () [0x00021] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameRunBehavior runBehavior) [0x00082] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run () [0x0000c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Mystiqa.Program.Main () [0x0000c] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0
I am running on a Manjaro Linux with the 5.6.2-1 kernel and the open source amdgpu driver.
Hey! Sorry to hear that. I'm no linux dev and have very little knowledge. That being said, it's questionable whether I can fix the bug. I rely on the MonoKickstart made by other people and of course the framework MonoGame itself.
Have you tried installing the Mono framework (mono-runtime, mono-complete) and run it manually without using the "Kick" file?
Sadly the error doesn't tell me that much, there are a lot of instances in the render function :/
Hi, installing the "mono" package on my system helped to start the game (even with the Kick file). But unfortunately it's still not really running.
I can create a character now but when I start the game I only get a black screen. Also when changing anything in the configuration leads to a black screen even before the character generation/selection.
I tried some different start options (different LD_PRELOAD paths, start Kick, start Mystica.bin.x86, ...x86_64, Mystica.exe with or without mono) but nothing helped (but I was able to always reach the menu and get into the "black" game - sounds and music were fine and I was hearing sword sounds and so on).
So installing mono definitely helped, but not enough. ;-) Maybe you have another idea? Which mono version are you using? I have mono 6.4.0 on my system.
I tried the windows version with and without wine and I have the same error like in the linux version (so only a black screen in the game). Maybe it really is an issue with the mono version that I use. On which system did you successfully test the linux version?
Been following on reddit and twitter, finally got to play on mac.
Some notes: The fact that the town was a sub area inside of the forrest made me really confused for a while. If you didn't realize that it sort of breaks your understanding of the space.
Game crashed when I tried to forge something the first time. Now it doesn't crash but it only shows items that I already have in my inventory, and crafting them doesn't actually make it (but still costs gold and ore)
Im assuming the demo is only limitted to the starting area since I can't actually move to another area (invis walls) but was not able to find confirmation of this on this page or anywhere, might just be blind.
I'll investigate the forging bug. It always worked for me, so maybe it's something to be with you playing on Mac? Anyway, hopefully I'm gonna figure it out.
Yes, the demo is limited to the starting area. But there are 3 playable races! So there are 3 full biomes to explore! :)
Ok So I finished what I think is an entire run and here are the things I noticed/suggestions:
-teleport portals sometime appear over spike traps...not sure if this is purposeful but its a bit annoying. They are still sort of usable but not with losing 50% health.
-Spike traps should probably be more randomized as the levels increase. Different timing or just being always on.
-Fire breathing statues in the dungeons or arrow traps would be a fun addition to the dungeons.
-some torches are not lightable because they are in from of pits or other things. I suggest either fixing this or purhaps allowing fire magic or fire swords to light them from a distance
-Forests still need more distinguishing features that help players tell if they are different and more dangerous if there are going to be more than one per world (which there should be in my opinion especially if the infinite mode is eventually made). I suggest different color/shades of the trees bushes, forest traps (venus fly traps for example?) or road blocks (vines or magic vines for example) that require certain items, and progressively harder enemies (not just harder slimes or mushrooms and they should if they are, they should probably be a noticably different shades or colors). Some notification of the level of forest would be helpful too but as we talked about before, its not necessary if done right.
-the bosses still seem to have the same attack patterns at any level. In the games current from, they should probably add attacks based on level rather than just have them all on the first level and also perhaps have different colors or shades based on level. For example, Liches probably shouldn't get the big fireball attack at level one or be able to spawn any enemies and then get faster and spawn more enemies at higher levels. You could also do a zelda 1 thing and have weaker versions of big bosses as mini bosses to get keys or items.
-More doors and keys in the dungeons would be nice. Different color schemes in different dungeons of the same type would be nice too.
-sometimes if you are killed while lit on fire, you will still be lit on fire when you respawn
-I still miss the big world map option and sailing but I've already talked about this on twitter. I'm hoping it can be used as a quick travel or something at some point to make the world seem alot bigger than it is. It could work by just showing the islands or contentants and the various climate types on each one. When they walk to that climate area, the player could even potentially start at the same place on the climates overworld map kind of like they do currently with villages...even if that is a bit weird but its not a big deal.
-if there is a way to burn bushes/trees to reveal a secret, I still haven't figured out what it is besides just burning the normal grass to reveal a chest sometimes. I've used fire swords and spells to burn the bushes and trees to no avail.
-after I finished everything on all the maps, there was no notification of anything else to do so I went back to the title screen and started a new map...and while my Screen name was still there, all my earned items are now gone?!...is that intentional? I suppose it makes sense from a Zelda 1 second quest standpoint but I thought the point of saving a character was to not lose hard earned/made items.
-the spells are pretty cool so far. Looking forward to the implementation of other element spells
-...I still hold out hope that you can someday implement that Mutt Boss idea from one of my previous posts here :D Its like the ultimate in boss randmonization!...anyways.
That's probably enough for now. I already feel like I"m forgetting something but I'll post again if I remember. Overall it was a fun experience but it will definitely be held back by no saving feature since few people have time to do an entire run through without stopping or leaving it open on their computer.
First off, the saving feature should work fine. How did you close the game? The whole character is saved. Take a look at the "Saves" folder and see if there is a file in there.
Yup, the teleporters don't spawn on spikes anymore.
Yup, I've already thought about other trap types, especially fire traps :)
Torches will be fixed!
Yup, as I've said there isn't much going on with the difficulty variation in the current demo
Doors and Keys sounds good, maybe only for certain dungeon types like Ruins or Pyramids?
I've recently replaced the random overworld chest with actual secrets! So you have to burn bushes, bomb a wall, push away a block, the other ones I won't reveal :)
Yup, the game is not "completable" yet. The "Amulet of Yendor" is still missing. But congrats on beating all dungeons man!
As I've said, your items and equipment are saved. You should not lose it :/ something probably went wrong. If you close the game or exit in the "Settings" Menu, everything is saved for sure
And there's also progression items now! Currently, there are Flippers for the Forest and Climbing Gear for the Mountains :)
I'll check the save folder when I get home but yeah I left the game using the setting menu and then started a new one with the listed character file.
The dungeons should probably have the most doors in the tower and pyraminds then get less in the ruins (since they're ruined [rimshot] :p ) and none or moving cave boulder by a lever in caves. You might also consider castle dungeons and Mansion dungeons and you could also have haunted or living (orc or knight) versions of any of these dungeons with their own aspects.
Question, are you planning making the trees burnable to reveal secreta as well or just brush/grass that can be slashed anyways?
Fyi, I checked the Save folder and there is a file in there. I tried starting a new game again and I chose my character profile but it still has none of my previously earned items. I'll try experimenting with it more later to see if there is any situation it does save when I have time
ok so I just tested it again by just buying a torch and using first the Exit to title screen option and starting over with my Character file. When I got back in the game, he didn't have that torch I just bought and still had the 30 coins I had just spent.
So then I decided to buy a spear and use the Exit to Desktop option. When I started again, I still have the spear and no coins! At this point, I decided to "exit to title screen" again and load up my character again and I still have the spear and no coins! So apparently the "Exit to desktop" saves the character initially but the "Exit to Title screen" does not. Hows that for bug hunting?! :D ...I only wish I still had my old items but oh well ;p
Note: I started playing with my character and found a tower level where I entered the first stairwell and then the game crashed. Loaded up my character and I still have my spear but none of my recently earned items...so apparently the items to not survive a crash. I recommend creating an extra "save" and/or "auto save" option to fix this for now. I tried playing again for a bit and went to another tower and ANOTHER stairwell crashed me so there appears to be an issue with the tower stairwells on occasion
Did you have a companion with you when you entered the staircase? I found a bug yesterday that the game crashes when you have a companion and enter a staircase. I fixed it of course!
EDIT: Ok, just fixed the saving bug. Man, what a dumb mistake haha!
Ok I Played it for a few hours and here are my initial questions and observations and suggestions so far:
-The new features and minor classes are great from what I can tell.
-level 1 grave dungeons & Lich are WAY TO HARD! He 1 hit killed me with level 2 and 3 gear with that one attack! Needs more difficulty scaling unless I just chose hard one but it was way too close to the starting village. Ghosts should be 1 or 2 hit kill at first. Grave yard dungeons are also a bit too common so far.
-could use more smaller secrets. So far every secret Ive found is a full dungeon of some sort. Could use stuff like secret shops, camps, or kooky old men who give advice, or want to trade items, give quests, or just say "get out!" Lol
-the gray mountain/cave rocks should be much more common and perhaps make up larger sections of the forests. It will make bombing to find a cave a bit more difficult (less obvious), offer more visual variety and you can even make bombable rocks that block paths.
-Different forests could use slightly different color schemes like shades of green or other fall or dead colors.
-Yay Zelda 1 overworld! Glad you went this direction!...but is the world map gone? Haven't run into it or found the option for it yet. -mushroom enemy jumps too far for level 1 area in my opinion -spike traps kill followers too easily...timing issue mainly. It would be nice if they were a bit smarter about that.
-have you implemented burning bushes yet? If so, how do you burn them? Sorry I haven't played around with this much yet and haven't read the changelog if there is one
Are you sure it was the level 1 tomb dungeon? There's no clear indication right now. I never found them too hard, but maybe I have to tweak them.
The graveyards have the same probability as all the other dungeons, so maybe you got "unlucky" :)
Yup, secrets are still missing! In every place you find a treasure chest on the overworld, there should be a secret! Burning bushes, bombing walls, killing some enemies to reveal a hidden chest you name it.
The world map is accessible just like the dungeon map. Although I'm gonna redo the whole map menu. It has way too little detail.
Yeah, followers are pretty dumb. They just blindly follow you haha.
I've started work on the desert biome, new forest types are definitely coming man!
Yeah the Lich attack is tough man. The great fire ball he throws can't be blocked, so you have to avoid it by walking away. It's pretty easy once you get the hang of it.
As promised, in regards to your thoughts about an end boss here’s some ideas/possibilities to consider:
-When you beat the end boss, he says something like “you think you’ve won, but I’ll be back stronger” or maybe something less cliché but something to let the players know they can keep playing for a second quest. There could a 3 months later message following it saying the boss has come back and perhaps did something different like steal a bunch of princesses, friends, important items, or biome specific items or whatever to make it a bit different than however the main quest will turn out. You also just make it so the end boss flees to another far off land without having to do another main quest.
-You could simply make the end boss harder with health each time the player plays through the game or after each series of collecting something or rescuing someone. This might be a tad boring after a while but players might still play through a few times
-You could add more enemies to fight each time you fight the end boss as well including other boss characters.
-You could make a variety of end boss attack possibilities and choose a different combination each playthrough or just borrow from other bosses. The combinations should probably become more complex each time
-Similar to the last one, Each biome could have its own major boss with its own biome based attacks and the end boss could choose a combo of those on top of its own major attacks. Each playthrough the end boss gets one or two more attack possibilities based on these.
-You could make several combinations of boss parts (arms, legs, robes, head, attacks, etc.) and make a randomly generated “Mutt” main boss based on these parts for each main quest…heck you could potentially do this for more bosses if the code/engine will allow it…might be a lot of work but it would be pretty cool and in the spirit of a random generation game.
-You could make it so the end boss and perhaps other bosses in the 2nd+ quests change main attack if it senses you have been not taking much damage on whatever its current attack is.
-One plot line idea that might be simple to implement but emotionally effective in driving the player to complete the quest or 2nd+ quests would involve finding characters (or even princesses) to help you fight in your quest on occasion and then be captured or even killed by a boss or end boss and make the quest about saving that person or revenge or even resurrecting that person.
- One final note is you might also want to make updates to this game friendly to players that already have saved games once saved games is implemented so the players can save their items.
Well, theres some stuff to give you some ideas and the decisions are yours to make 😊 Hope this helps
I really, really like all of your boss ideas. I really do!
And in regards to people helping you: my plan since the beginning in 2017 has actually been to have NPCs in villages you can hire for a dungeon or two with gold coins :) So that will probably happen :D
Thanks. Its nice to be able to put forth useful game ideas again :)
Yeah, I like that idea about developing a favorite NPC helper (maybe just default it to whoever the player uses the most) and then having them captured or killed. When I play Skyrim and my long time helper Lydia gets killed I get pissed even though I can just resurrect her with a saved game so I figure a long time helper getting captured or killed might be a decent motivation to play and save them or get revenge ;) Just an idea through. The plotline can take many forms especially with an infinite game.
-My game crashed again just as I was about to picking up a few items out of a chest (including a really nice high level spear :'( ). I might have pressed F too many times but it crashed the game and once again I lost everything. Really look forward to the monogame save function! ;p
-In a cave secret room I just bombed that had the locked chest in it, I got blocked by a rock and a pit so I couldn't even get to activate the teleporter (see screenshot)
-There appears to be a bug associated with room borders where enemies and especially bosses can get stuck if they go too far off the screen. They appear to get stuck in an inbetween screens state where I ccan sometimes hit them through the side of the screen or trick them into jumping back on the screen but other times I can't and I have to abandon the area (see screenshots)
The above screenshots where taken just as the screen was shifting to the next screen.
Regarding the first bug: yeah, I'm really sorry for that. I hope the MonoGame version will fix a lot of stuff.
Second bug: Have you tried bombing the complete wall? It is not possible for a room to be created and not be fully traversable. It always is. You must have missed a spot. It looks like there might have been a way left of the hole :)
Third bug: Yeah, I also noticed that when playtesting. I didn't figure out how to fix it, but maybe I will now with MonoGame :)
Ok so I've played for several hours now and its a great game so far but I have a list here of issues/suggestions as I promised on Twitter:
-torches required in every dungeon is not very beginner friendly and a bit frustrating for even zelda vets. I suggest making oil torches on walls of rooms that dont go out once lit. In early dungeons and many later dungeons they should already be lit. But they start being not lit or not present in later dungeons rooms.
-going to stair well restores life without seemingly changing damaged health of enemies. Makes end bosses alot easier which is ok if its intentional but there should probably be a penalty of some kind like partially or fully restored health of the room enemies.
-I thought I remember a bow and arrow in the game before but haven't seen it so far. Would be very helpful against fire breathing bats/little dragons when they go over pits.
-more or some item drops from enemies or at least some reason to kill non-boss enemies. Since the orb of ascension is the way to level up and no experience points appear to be in the game, non-boss enemies seem best avoided besides annoyance factor.
-it would be nice to be able to visit every map land section to look for secrets (hidden caves reveled by bombs, chests under bushes, etc) and use the overworld as more of a quick travel. Over the water might be an exception unless you want to make a fishing or octopus fight options from the ship.
-what is the point of the clearings? I have visited many of them and it just one map square with no enemies or secrets that I can find.
-Villagers so far only say "nice to meet you". They should probably have a more diverse vocabulary for immersion purposes even if their village quests haven't been implemented.
-give certain enemies or items and item switching abilities/different attack types at higher levels.
-could use more environment, building, enemy, and boss diversity but I know that will come in time so I'm not really worried about that ;)
Thats all I can think of at the moment. So far its alot of fun and the dungeons are pretty decent as far as secrets and progression even if they are somewhat linear at first. Great effort and keep it up! :D
Nice! Thanks for the thorough feedback man I really appreciate it!
The torch idea is good, I will probably improve that.
Yeah, my plan was that you should not regenerate life when going up/down the stairs. It's still in the game, haven't fixed that ;)
Have you used a spear against the little dragons? Also works well. But yeah, the bow will come!
Yup, I plan on adding monster drops for upgrading and crafting special items.
I'll try how having more overworld maps feels like, but that's actually a really good idea!
Have you found a note in a dungeon as a reward? It points to a "Clearing" in the current biome. In each clearing there is a stone "chest" in which there is the actual reward. It's sort of like a treasure map you find in a dungeon, get it?
Ok I understand the clearings now. I did find one of those maps earlier in a dungeon and just went back and found the treasure since my computer is still running witht the game open 😂 Got another ascension orb 😁 Cool feature!
Regarding the dragons, you might want to consider more progression from the early levels just because even the first one I ran into was pretty hard. 3 heads with a steady fire stream and him physically chasing me around the room if enough to make non lesser experienced Zelda 1 players rage quit...luckily I was good enough to beat the second quest back in the 80s so not me! 😁
...but anyways, since you probably don't have a ton of bosses finished I would start with one head, slow movement speed, alternate attack (exploding fireball or maybe a scroll like power) and maybe short fire bursts and then increase one of these attributes per dungeon level. So by the level 30 or 40, the dragon would fast with alot of abilities and 10 heads!(which is probably enough heads and upgrades). You could also add different elemental dragons to vary the progression even more.
Lastly. I was just reading my last post and realized I had a huge typo and wasnt very clear...I meant to say:
-give certain BOSS enemies (like orc bosses) MORE items and item switching abilities/different attack types at progressivily higher levels. Imagine a level 40 Orc boss switching weapons, setting bombs, and using scrolls 😁. The higher the level, the more options, health, and switching rate they have.
Come to think of it, Wizard bosses could probably be implemented in a similar where they primarily use one scroll like power with no other weapons in the beginning and gradually get stronger and more varied....wizard camps or outposts might be fun too.
Nice! Yeah I like the dragon stuff. I've already thought about stuff like that but haven't implemented it yet :) Will definitely come tho!
Yeah the humanoid bosses will be more intelligent and use more items the higher level they are! They actually already use health potions, have you noticed that?
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ExceptionInInitializerError
at org.lwjgl.glfw.GLFW.glfwCreateWindow(GLFW.java:1384)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.createGlfwWindow(Lwjgl3Application.java:425)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.createWindow(Lwjgl3Application.java:372)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:107)
at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: GLFW windows may only be created on the main thread and that thread must be the first thread in the process. Please run the JVM with -XstartOnFirstThread. For offscreen rendering, make sure another window toolkit (e.g. AWT or JavaFX) is initialized before GLFW.
at org.lwjgl.glfw.EventLoop$OffScreen.<clinit>(EventLoop.java:38)
... 5 more
AL lib: (EE) alc_cleanup: 1 device not closed
I was able to run it myself with -XstartOnFirstThread, but it only black screens :(
Shit. LibGDX really does not run well on Mac and Linux. It's really shit. Do yo by chance have a windows machine? It seems that's the only reasonable option :(
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException
at mystiqa.game.state.GameState.update(GameState.java:85) at mystiqa.game.state.world.WorldState.update(WorldState.java:98) at mystiqa.game.Game.render(Game.java:74) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Window.update(Lwjgl3Window.java:386) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.loop(Lwjgl3Application.java:136) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:110) at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
As I've said, that's the exact I should have fixed. Have you redownloaded 0.2?
If yes, honestly I'm out haha. Please just wait for the new version 0.2.1, I'm switching to a new framework (MonoGame) which will definitely work on Windows, Mac and Linux :)
Running on Windows 10 with java version "1.8.0_221" I get a crash a moment after a black screen appears:
```
Controllers: added manager for application, 1 managers active Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException at mystiqa.game.state.GameState.update(GameState.java:85) at mystiqa.game.state.world.WorldState.update(WorldState.java:98) at mystiqa.game.Game.render(Game.java:74) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Window.update(Lwjgl3Window.java:386) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.loop(Lwjgl3Application.java:136) at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:110) at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
OpenGL version string: 2.1 Mesa 19.0.8 OpenGL shading language version string: 1.20 OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 2.0 Mesa 19.0.8 OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 1.0.16
2015 miniPC: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Graphics & Display
OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 18.3.6 OpenGL shading language version string: 1.30 OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 3.0 Mesa 18.3.6 OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 3.00
Yup, that indicates to me that the shaders aren't initialized properly. I fixed the problem earlier today, so in the next update you should be able to fully play the game albeit without shaders, sorry :| I'm not a huge OpenGL expert, but I hope at least playing the game is fine for you!
Is there the possibility that you could test it with windows? Because I don't think it's Linux. My guess it's the intel integrated graphics
Its really good, i think there is lots of potential in it but i think some tweaks here and there could improve it a lot
-increase font height by one pixel (most minor detail not really necesary but i really don't see it breaking anything there is plenty of space left on the screen)
-increase overworld move speed (i dunno if it is that slow due to generation times if it isn't i think the character moving faster would make traveling more pleasant)
-add some way for the player to be able to tell which room borders lead to another room, while on a cave i was constantly getting to borders and they would lead nowhere which was kinda frustrating since the character moves quite slow
One problem with increasing the font height is because it's grid based that the bottom row would collide with the top pixels of the next line :/
The overworld speed is indeed slow, I will increase it!
Yup, the room border thing haha. I don't have any idea how to do it tho, because visual indicators would seem unnatural. Any ideas?
When did the game crash exactly? After you hit a monster or what?
EDIT: I just fixed the movement speed on the world map. 2x was too fast, so now it's about 1.5x. Seems better to me. I also fixed the room tile borders not aligning. Now you can always tell! :) It will all be in the next update on Saturday probably
Looking cool! I like how the graphics are made, the animations fit well in the resolution. The enemies are something hard to defeat but it's interesting to apply some of technique to defeat enemies instead of recklessly trying to hit them, I like that.
← Return to game
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Mystiqa :'(
Julian, please write an update it's been about 4 months and I am so hyped for this.
If you need help programming I would be happy to offer my services for free.
Hey Benjamin! I'm planning to write an update soon. Life is really difficult for me right now, and I got a job so I can't work as much on Mystiqa as I'd like at the moment. I hope this gets better soon, but yea!
Thanks for the programming offer, but I think I am good!
Id love to talk more about this and help you out on anything I can, please add me on discord!
BenMulchi#7183
I got a lot of interesting things to talk about Julian.
Hey I'm confused on how to download this, there doesn't seem to be a file I can download...can you help me?
I'm sorry for the inconvenience. The demo was up a few weeks ago, but had to be removed for maintenance reasons. It will go live with the Steam Next Fest June 13th.
Still dont see any demo :-/
Been following this project for a long time now and I just played the demo. Here are my immediate thoughts.
Some issues I have so far with the gameplay itself is the spawning system for enemies, they can spawn very close to the room's entrance so when you walk in you are instantly in danger, placing enemies further into the rooms would give you more time to react and would be a welcome change.
You also get no I-frames when entering a room which would be no issue if enemies didn't wait by the entrance after you leave the room. I would highly recommend rather than enemies dying and being deleted from the world you look at the legend of zelda series and instead set them to be invisible, inactive, and back to their starting position and upon reentering a room they are set back to visible and are reactivated. If you want the rooms to be random you could take the isaac approach and handmake many rooms with predetermined enemy and trap locations which can be placed in the world at random.
Slime knockback is also incredibly high and can send you out of the room which is a major annoyance. Slime should also indicate where they wish to jump more clearly and should have a sort of wind up animation. When they split they can also land directly on you and you take unavoidable damage.
Crabs tend to kill themselves with the water which is odd.
When you die you respawn at your current position which lacks any sort of punishment for mistakes, I would recommend going back to the world spawn or having spawnpoints spawn through the world.
Chests should be visible before defeating the enemies to incentivize them to stay and fight rather than to go to the next room.
As for bugs I have experienced a few, one major bug is the shell bug, if you pick up a shell and walk to another room it will float way ahead of you. There seems to be Z-layer issues with enemies in grass or that may be intentional?
I have seen numerous tileset bugs in the forest area in particular
What I liked, the UI is charming, the graphics are enjoyable. The concept is very interesting and multiplayer would be especially fun.
These criticisms are to improve the game, I want to see this game succeed it just needs work at the moment.
Thanks so much for the feedback!
I fully agree on all these points.
I've been working non-stop the past few days to get the demo out in time for Steam's "Going Rogue" fest, but I've not been satisfied fully. All the points bring up are already on my list, and I will get to them in the next couple of days. I thought it would be best to release the demo in its current state still, in a "better than nothing" mentality.
You haven't seemed to talk about the dungeon of the demo. Have you not found it?
Edit: Looking back, I should have polished up the demo instead of rushing to release it on time for the steam fest. I've taken it down now to do exactly that.
I'll admit haven't yet made it to the dungeon because the bugs discouraged me from moving forward, but I am very happy to see these concerns are known and acknowledged. Looking forward to the great game I know this is gonna be, best of luck.
Ah, I figured. I admit it was also not clearly laid out what you can actually do in the demo.
how’s the progress coming? This looks super neat and promising!
Thanks a lot! Progress is going very well. I'll be posting a new Kickstarter update at the end of the month, and a new demo will release next month as part of the Steam Next Fest. Stay tuned!
Oooooooh thanks for the heads up! Glad to see your kickstarter succeeded! I definitely would have backed it had I seen it earlier :-D Ill be keeping an eye on this and wishlisting on steam as well. Cheers!
Thanks! Yeah, it's been a while haha
I wanted to try the demo.
will this be moddable?
The game is fully moddable.
Sorry if you've answered this somewhere else, but is there a estimated release window?
I'm super excited for this game, I feel it'll scratch that itch I have for a randomly generated Zelda-like game, as well as the modding aspect being really exciting to think about if it's still a thing.
Keep up the great work my man :)
Can't wait for the demo in October!
Thanks a lot man! I'd love to give you one, but the release windows I've given in the past were always off, so I try to not give one haha!
The fact that you're not super constraining yourself is good to hear, and it just means that we'll likely have an even better time with the final product.
Take all the time you need, especially since from what I've seen you're developing this almost entirely alone, lol.
Thanks man. That's exactly it. I don't feel comfortable releasing a product that I'm not happy with it. Cheers!
Hi, i just checked everything you have posted this past couple of month since my last comment and im still realy hype by the game.
I just wanted to know when the demo will be out?
Hi! October 1st.
Hi!
Just checked your development update of september, i rly like the ost and the new logo!
You didn' t talked about the demo, how is it?
Thanks a lot! Due to personal reasons, it had to be delayed until the next Steam Fest. Sorry for that one!
Is there no more demo?
Still checking on the project from time to time.
Awesome! If you wanna get up to speed, check out this recent Kickstarter post about the game: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/julcreutz/mystiqa-procedural-zelda-like-action-rpg/posts/2908493
Thanks!
Cant instal game :( sad
That's because the download link has been taken down by me.
oh. Did you cancelled project?
No, the demo is just way to old. There will be a new demo.
nice to hear that! I’ll be waiting for it
When the demo will be out?
In June!
new trailer is sick! now that we can travel by boat does that mean we wont have the map reset gem thing?
Thanks!
Concerning the orb of ascension, that's not yet decided! I'll still have to find a way to end the game, and maybe it'll be the orb of ascension :)
But after you beat the game, you can explore basically infinite new islands within the same universe, so the orb of ascension is not neeeded to continue playing.
so you have the main 3 biomes (or more) biomes to beat, than we get the boat ?
Nope. You start with the raft, which is unable to explore far because of deep water and rocks. There are multiple vehicle upgrades with let you explore farther.
The island grid is 5x5 biomes, so there is a lot to explore.
oh so its completelly dif from the demo
Yes. *Very* different.
Waiting for the next demo!
Thanks! I'm doing my best :)
The wait is making me go CRAZY!!! Please release the game ASAP!!!
I'm sorry, I'm doing my best!
Hello Juice! This project has me extremely interested, i am developing an almost identical type of game to what you have here with a small team, maybe we can talk about this a bit more, do you have any contact i can use?
Hit me an email to julcreutz@web.de
I do see you emailed @Peter Milko though so I hope you guys are doing good so far and I hope for your success.
Huh?
Well, for one, the game is in developent and there will a new demo very soon.
Second, I didn't email Peter Milko. He just posted a comment. I didn't interact with him afterwards. I don't use any of his work and don't work with him.
Oh bro, I thought you did cause you said "Need a pixel artist" and he said "Ok email me" Dx my bad man, take your time chief. Sorry about that. And yes I do know it is in development, I cant wait for X time for Demo. EDIT: Correcting myself, I misread who texted @Peter Milko forgive me.
No worries. :)
Right so I have a question why is it that I can't download the game like the download link doesn't show up
I've taken the game down intentionally for now. I won't spoil more :) the wait is over soon.
Oh alright thanks.
Do you know when the game is going to go back up. Or just soon
I won't say more than "soon" :)
2 YEARS LATER. lol
Sorry for the wait.
<3
I’ve encoutered two problems in the game that made it somewhat uplayable to me
After pressing enter in the title screen the top of the screen flickeres black it’s so annoying
F for enter, and enter for exit. Why? Just Why??every single PC game on the globe uses the enter button for selecting and accepting chocies except for this one, it’s so frustrating to the point where using menus is a real challenge
BTW I am using the windows version if that can help you find the cause of the first issue
I am looking for the fix of those two problems so I can play this promising game
Hey.
The first problem is likely a problem with your graphics cards.
Just play with a controller if you don't like the keyboard bindings.
Yeah thinking about it I am using a very old graphics card (Geforce GT 610), isn’t there any chance to fix it?
I’ll try it with a controller
Thanks for the reply
That graphics card is indeed very old. If I'm not mistaken, MonoGame (the framework I'm using) needs OpenGL 3.0 drivers. So you can try updating your Nvidia drivers and see if that resolves the issue.
Can the game be played on a 32bit computer? (I'm using windows (x86), tried opening the game and got an error, saying that I need 64bit :/
Here's the error:
[The version of this file is not compatible with the windows version you are executing, check the system information of the device to see if you need a x86 version or x64 of the program and then get in contact with the supplier]
Yes, you need a 64-bit system for it. For the next demo, I'll compile a 32-bit version.
This has a lot of potential! Im a pixel artist. Feel free to use my free assets and let me know if you need help with any sprites. :)
hello, I am looking for an artist for my video game. I was wondering if you could help me
Yes, email me
Hello ! Actually playing your game, and it's a great game, even though it's a demo. Really looking forward for the full game, great job.
I have a question, will the full game have online multiplayer to play with your friends ? I know Steam has the Remote Play Together feature, but it doesn't work well because of my internet connection...
Thanks !
Thanks!
I have not yet decided. Implementing online multiplayer is really complicated, especially when you start it late in the development. Steam Remote Play Together is a viable option. I think they even claim that it's better than online multiplayer don't they? I suggest just trying it out when it's on Steam :)
Axesome work, really good, i have finish the game (and try the ng+), really like it, keep the good job
Rating : 5 / 5
Thanks so much man! Glad you enjoyed it!
Is there some kind of bugtracker somewhere? I tried to start the 0.8-linux demo and I was able to see a loading screen but after that it crashed to desktop with the following error:
Unhandled Exception:
I am running on a Manjaro Linux with the 5.6.2-1 kernel and the open source amdgpu driver.System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
at Mystiqa.MapState.Render () [0x0071e] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Mystiqa.Master.Draw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x00000] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.DoDraw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x0001c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Tick () [0x00239] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.SdlGamePlatform.RunLoop () [0x00021] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameRunBehavior runBehavior) [0x00082] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run () [0x0000c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Mystiqa.Program.Main () [0x0000c] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 [ERROR] FATAL UNHANDLED EXCEPTION: System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object
at Mystiqa.MapState.Render () [0x0071e] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Mystiqa.Master.Draw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x00000] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.DoDraw (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameTime gameTime) [0x0001c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Tick () [0x00239] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.SdlGamePlatform.RunLoop () [0x00021] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run (Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GameRunBehavior runBehavior) [0x00082] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game.Run () [0x0000c] in <7df0491f78b541c48c6807e478b54930>:0 at Mystiqa.Program.Main () [0x0000c] in <cc43de19fd054eae806186ce72cd45e6>:0
Hey! Sorry to hear that. I'm no linux dev and have very little knowledge. That being said, it's questionable whether I can fix the bug. I rely on the MonoKickstart made by other people and of course the framework MonoGame itself.
Have you tried installing the Mono framework (mono-runtime, mono-complete) and run it manually without using the "Kick" file?
Sadly the error doesn't tell me that much, there are a lot of instances in the render function :/
Hi, installing the "mono" package on my system helped to start the game (even with the Kick file). But unfortunately it's still not really running.
I can create a character now but when I start the game I only get a black screen. Also when changing anything in the configuration leads to a black screen even before the character generation/selection.
I tried some different start options (different LD_PRELOAD paths, start Kick, start Mystica.bin.x86, ...x86_64, Mystica.exe with or without mono) but nothing helped (but I was able to always reach the menu and get into the "black" game - sounds and music were fine and I was hearing sword sounds and so on).
So installing mono definitely helped, but not enough. ;-) Maybe you have another idea? Which mono version are you using? I have mono 6.4.0 on my system.
Thanks anyway for your quick answer!
Sure! For me using the Kick on Linux works fine. I have no idea man...
Have you tried running it via Wine?
The linux version doesn't run within wine.
I tried the windows version with and without wine and I have the same error like in the linux version (so only a black screen in the game). Maybe it really is an issue with the mono version that I use. On which system did you successfully test the linux version?
The latest version of Ubuntu always works for me!
Absolutely loving this game so far :)
Been following on reddit and twitter, finally got to play on mac.
Some notes: The fact that the town was a sub area inside of the forrest made me really confused for a while. If you didn't realize that it sort of breaks your understanding of the space.
Game crashed when I tried to forge something the first time. Now it doesn't crash but it only shows items that I already have in my inventory, and crafting them doesn't actually make it (but still costs gold and ore)
Im assuming the demo is only limitted to the starting area since I can't actually move to another area (invis walls) but was not able to find confirmation of this on this page or anywhere, might just be blind.
Keep it up!
Thanks a lot!
I'll investigate the forging bug. It always worked for me, so maybe it's something to be with you playing on Mac? Anyway, hopefully I'm gonna figure it out.
Yes, the demo is limited to the starting area. But there are 3 playable races! So there are 3 full biomes to explore! :)
Sometimes when i go upstairs in a dungeons the game crashes anyway to fix that?
Hey man! Yeah sorry, that's a bug that was in the demo haha. I believe the bug only occurs when you have a follower, so make sure you travel alone!
Thanks for playing!
Ok So I finished what I think is an entire run and here are the things I noticed/suggestions:
-teleport portals sometime appear over spike traps...not sure if this is purposeful but its a bit annoying. They are still sort of usable but not with losing 50% health.
-Spike traps should probably be more randomized as the levels increase. Different timing or just being always on.
-Fire breathing statues in the dungeons or arrow traps would be a fun addition to the dungeons.
-some torches are not lightable because they are in from of pits or other things. I suggest either fixing this or purhaps allowing fire magic or fire swords to light them from a distance
-Forests still need more distinguishing features that help players tell if they are different and more dangerous if there are going to be more than one per world (which there should be in my opinion especially if the infinite mode is eventually made). I suggest different color/shades of the trees bushes, forest traps (venus fly traps for example?) or road blocks (vines or magic vines for example) that require certain items, and progressively harder enemies (not just harder slimes or mushrooms and they should if they are, they should probably be a noticably different shades or colors). Some notification of the level of forest would be helpful too but as we talked about before, its not necessary if done right.
-the bosses still seem to have the same attack patterns at any level. In the games current from, they should probably add attacks based on level rather than just have them all on the first level and also perhaps have different colors or shades based on level. For example, Liches probably shouldn't get the big fireball attack at level one or be able to spawn any enemies and then get faster and spawn more enemies at higher levels. You could also do a zelda 1 thing and have weaker versions of big bosses as mini bosses to get keys or items.
-More doors and keys in the dungeons would be nice. Different color schemes in different dungeons of the same type would be nice too.
-sometimes if you are killed while lit on fire, you will still be lit on fire when you respawn
-I still miss the big world map option and sailing but I've already talked about this on twitter. I'm hoping it can be used as a quick travel or something at some point to make the world seem alot bigger than it is. It could work by just showing the islands or contentants and the various climate types on each one. When they walk to that climate area, the player could even potentially start at the same place on the climates overworld map kind of like they do currently with villages...even if that is a bit weird but its not a big deal.
-if there is a way to burn bushes/trees to reveal a secret, I still haven't figured out what it is besides just burning the normal grass to reveal a chest sometimes. I've used fire swords and spells to burn the bushes and trees to no avail.
-after I finished everything on all the maps, there was no notification of anything else to do so I went back to the title screen and started a new map...and while my Screen name was still there, all my earned items are now gone?!...is that intentional? I suppose it makes sense from a Zelda 1 second quest standpoint but I thought the point of saving a character was to not lose hard earned/made items.
-the spells are pretty cool so far. Looking forward to the implementation of other element spells
-...I still hold out hope that you can someday implement that Mutt Boss idea from one of my previous posts here :D Its like the ultimate in boss randmonization!...anyways.
That's probably enough for now. I already feel like I"m forgetting something but I'll post again if I remember. Overall it was a fun experience but it will definitely be held back by no saving feature since few people have time to do an entire run through without stopping or leaving it open on their computer.
Thanks so much man!
First off, the saving feature should work fine. How did you close the game? The whole character is saved. Take a look at the "Saves" folder and see if there is a file in there.
Yup, the teleporters don't spawn on spikes anymore.
Yup, I've already thought about other trap types, especially fire traps :)
Torches will be fixed!
Yup, as I've said there isn't much going on with the difficulty variation in the current demo
Doors and Keys sounds good, maybe only for certain dungeon types like Ruins or Pyramids?
I've recently replaced the random overworld chest with actual secrets! So you have to burn bushes, bomb a wall, push away a block, the other ones I won't reveal :)
Yup, the game is not "completable" yet. The "Amulet of Yendor" is still missing. But congrats on beating all dungeons man!
As I've said, your items and equipment are saved. You should not lose it :/ something probably went wrong. If you close the game or exit in the "Settings" Menu, everything is saved for sure
And there's also progression items now! Currently, there are Flippers for the Forest and Climbing Gear for the Mountains :)
Thanks so much for the in-depth feedback!
A new demo will come really soon :)
I'll check the save folder when I get home but yeah I left the game using the setting menu and then started a new one with the listed character file.
The dungeons should probably have the most doors in the tower and pyraminds then get less in the ruins (since they're ruined [rimshot] :p ) and none or moving cave boulder by a lever in caves. You might also consider castle dungeons and Mansion dungeons and you could also have haunted or living (orc or knight) versions of any of these dungeons with their own aspects.
Question, are you planning making the trees burnable to reveal secreta as well or just brush/grass that can be slashed anyways?
Only the tree that hides the secret can be burnt. The other one's cant. All tall grass can be burned tho :)
Ah ok just like Zelda 1 :) can any fire item burn it and are there burnable trees in the demo?
Yup, any fire entity. So fire swords, fire spells... even you when you're burning :D
No, not in the current demo! In the next
Fyi, I checked the Save folder and there is a file in there. I tried starting a new game again and I chose my character profile but it still has none of my previously earned items. I'll try experimenting with it more later to see if there is any situation it does save when I have time
Hmm, interesting. It always worked on the machines I tested. Definitely let me know if you find anything!
ok so I just tested it again by just buying a torch and using first the Exit to title screen option and starting over with my Character file. When I got back in the game, he didn't have that torch I just bought and still had the 30 coins I had just spent.
So then I decided to buy a spear and use the Exit to Desktop option. When I started again, I still have the spear and no coins! At this point, I decided to "exit to title screen" again and load up my character again and I still have the spear and no coins! So apparently the "Exit to desktop" saves the character initially but the "Exit to Title screen" does not. Hows that for bug hunting?! :D ...I only wish I still had my old items but oh well ;p
Note: I started playing with my character and found a tower level where I entered the first stairwell and then the game crashed. Loaded up my character and I still have my spear but none of my recently earned items...so apparently the items to not survive a crash. I recommend creating an extra "save" and/or "auto save" option to fix this for now. I tried playing again for a bit and went to another tower and ANOTHER stairwell crashed me so there appears to be an issue with the tower stairwells on occasion
Thanks for the bug investigation!
Did you have a companion with you when you entered the staircase? I found a bug yesterday that the game crashes when you have a companion and enter a staircase. I fixed it of course!
EDIT: Ok, just fixed the saving bug. Man, what a dumb mistake haha!
Ok I Played it for a few hours and here are my initial questions and observations and suggestions so far:
-The new features and minor classes are great from what I can tell.
-level 1 grave dungeons & Lich are WAY TO HARD! He 1 hit killed me with level 2 and 3 gear with that one attack! Needs more difficulty scaling unless I just chose hard one but it was way too close to the starting village. Ghosts should be 1 or 2 hit kill at first. Grave yard dungeons are also a bit too common so far.
-could use more smaller secrets. So far every secret Ive found is a full dungeon of some sort. Could use stuff like secret shops, camps, or kooky old men who give advice, or want to trade items, give quests, or just say "get out!" Lol
-the gray mountain/cave rocks should be much more common and perhaps make up larger sections of the forests. It will make bombing to find a cave a bit more difficult (less obvious), offer more visual variety and you can even make bombable rocks that block paths.
-Different forests could use slightly different color schemes like shades of green or other fall or dead colors.
-Yay Zelda 1 overworld! Glad you went this direction!...but is the world map gone? Haven't run into it or found the option for it yet.
-mushroom enemy jumps too far for level 1 area in my opinion
-spike traps kill followers too easily...timing issue mainly. It would be nice if they were a bit smarter about that.
-have you implemented burning bushes yet? If so, how do you burn them? Sorry I haven't played around with this much yet and haven't read the changelog if there is one
More to come once I play it more
Thanks a lot!
Are you sure it was the level 1 tomb dungeon? There's no clear indication right now. I never found them too hard, but maybe I have to tweak them.
The graveyards have the same probability as all the other dungeons, so maybe you got "unlucky" :)
Yup, secrets are still missing! In every place you find a treasure chest on the overworld, there should be a secret! Burning bushes, bombing walls, killing some enemies to reveal a hidden chest you name it.
The world map is accessible just like the dungeon map. Although I'm gonna redo the whole map menu. It has way too little detail.
Yeah, followers are pretty dumb. They just blindly follow you haha.
I've started work on the desert biome, new forest types are definitely coming man!
Yeah the Lich attack is tough man. The great fire ball he throws can't be blocked, so you have to avoid it by walking away. It's pretty easy once you get the hang of it.
I'm excited for more feedback! :)
I would like to see the source code. I also use LibGDX and im curious about how the game is made.
Sorry, it's not open-source :) but if you have any questions, feel free to ask!
As promised, in regards to your thoughts about an end boss here’s some ideas/possibilities to consider:
-When you beat the end boss, he says something like “you think you’ve won, but I’ll be back stronger” or maybe something less cliché but something to let the players know they can keep playing for a second quest. There could a 3 months later message following it saying the boss has come back and perhaps did something different like steal a bunch of princesses, friends, important items, or biome specific items or whatever to make it a bit different than however the main quest will turn out. You also just make it so the end boss flees to another far off land without having to do another main quest.
-You could simply make the end boss harder with health each time the player plays through the game or after each series of collecting something or rescuing someone. This might be a tad boring after a while but players might still play through a few times
-You could add more enemies to fight each time you fight the end boss as well including other boss characters.
-You could make a variety of end boss attack possibilities and choose a different combination each playthrough or just borrow from other bosses. The combinations should probably become more complex each time
-Similar to the last one, Each biome could have its own major boss with its own biome based attacks and the end boss could choose a combo of those on top of its own major attacks. Each playthrough the end boss gets one or two more attack possibilities based on these.
-You could make several combinations of boss parts (arms, legs, robes, head, attacks, etc.) and make a randomly generated “Mutt” main boss based on these parts for each main quest…heck you could potentially do this for more bosses if the code/engine will allow it…might be a lot of work but it would be pretty cool and in the spirit of a random generation game.
-You could make it so the end boss and perhaps other bosses in the 2nd+ quests change main attack if it senses you have been not taking much damage on whatever its current attack is.
-One plot line idea that might be simple to implement but emotionally effective in driving the player to complete the quest or 2nd+ quests would involve finding characters (or even princesses) to help you fight in your quest on occasion and then be captured or even killed by a boss or end boss and make the quest about saving that person or revenge or even resurrecting that person.
- One final note is you might also want to make updates to this game friendly to players that already have saved games once saved games is implemented so the players can save their items.
Well, theres some stuff to give you some ideas and the decisions are yours to make 😊 Hope this helps
Wow man, amazing ideas again!
I really, really like all of your boss ideas. I really do!
And in regards to people helping you: my plan since the beginning in 2017 has actually been to have NPCs in villages you can hire for a dungeon or two with gold coins :) So that will probably happen :D
Thanks. Its nice to be able to put forth useful game ideas again :)
Yeah, I like that idea about developing a favorite NPC helper (maybe just default it to whoever the player uses the most) and then having them captured or killed. When I play Skyrim and my long time helper Lydia gets killed I get pissed even though I can just resurrect her with a saved game so I figure a long time helper getting captured or killed might be a decent motivation to play and save them or get revenge ;) Just an idea through. The plotline can take many forms especially with an infinite game.
I have a couple of bugs to report:
-My game crashed again just as I was about to picking up a few items out of a chest (including a really nice high level spear :'( ). I might have pressed F too many times but it crashed the game and once again I lost everything. Really look forward to the monogame save function! ;p
-In a cave secret room I just bombed that had the locked chest in it, I got blocked by a rock and a pit so I couldn't even get to activate the teleporter (see screenshot)
-There appears to be a bug associated with room borders where enemies and especially bosses can get stuck if they go too far off the screen. They appear to get stuck in an inbetween screens state where I ccan sometimes hit them through the side of the screen or trick them into jumping back on the screen but other times I can't and I have to abandon the area (see screenshots)
The above screenshots where taken just as the screen was shifting to the next screen.
Anyways, Hope that helps
Wow, thanks a lot man!
Regarding the first bug: yeah, I'm really sorry for that. I hope the MonoGame version will fix a lot of stuff.
Second bug: Have you tried bombing the complete wall? It is not possible for a room to be created and not be fully traversable. It always is. You must have missed a spot. It looks like there might have been a way left of the hole :)
Third bug: Yeah, I also noticed that when playtesting. I didn't figure out how to fix it, but maybe I will now with MonoGame :)
How to run the game?
Do you have Java installed? If yes, just double click the .jar file. If not, install java jdk and run the game then :)
Ok so I've played for several hours now and its a great game so far but I have a list here of issues/suggestions as I promised on Twitter:
-torches required in every dungeon is not very beginner friendly and a bit frustrating for even zelda vets. I suggest making oil torches on walls of rooms that dont go out once lit. In early dungeons and many later dungeons they should already be lit. But they start being not lit or not present in later dungeons rooms.
-going to stair well restores life without seemingly changing damaged health of enemies. Makes end bosses alot easier which is ok if its intentional but there should probably be a penalty of some kind like partially or fully restored health of the room enemies.
-I thought I remember a bow and arrow in the game before but haven't seen it so far. Would be very helpful against fire breathing bats/little dragons when they go over pits.
-more or some item drops from enemies or at least some reason to kill non-boss enemies. Since the orb of ascension is the way to level up and no experience points appear to be in the game, non-boss enemies seem best avoided besides annoyance factor.
-it would be nice to be able to visit every map land section to look for secrets (hidden caves reveled by bombs, chests under bushes, etc) and use the overworld as more of a quick travel. Over the water might be an exception unless you want to make a fishing or octopus fight options from the ship.
-what is the point of the clearings? I have visited many of them and it just one map square with no enemies or secrets that I can find.
-Villagers so far only say "nice to meet you". They should probably have a more diverse vocabulary for immersion purposes even if their village quests haven't been implemented.
-give certain enemies or items and item switching abilities/different attack types at higher levels.
-could use more environment, building, enemy, and boss diversity but I know that will come in time so I'm not really worried about that ;)
Thats all I can think of at the moment. So far its alot of fun and the dungeons are pretty decent as far as secrets and progression even if they are somewhat linear at first. Great effort and keep it up! :D
Nice! Thanks for the thorough feedback man I really appreciate it!
The torch idea is good, I will probably improve that.
Yeah, my plan was that you should not regenerate life when going up/down the stairs. It's still in the game, haven't fixed that ;)
Have you used a spear against the little dragons? Also works well. But yeah, the bow will come!
Yup, I plan on adding monster drops for upgrading and crafting special items.
I'll try how having more overworld maps feels like, but that's actually a really good idea!
Have you found a note in a dungeon as a reward? It points to a "Clearing" in the current biome. In each clearing there is a stone "chest" in which there is the actual reward. It's sort of like a treasure map you find in a dungeon, get it?
Yup, villagers will say a lot more in the future!
Thanks again for the feedback! :)
Ok I understand the clearings now. I did find one of those maps earlier in a dungeon and just went back and found the treasure since my computer is still running witht the game open 😂 Got another ascension orb 😁 Cool feature!
Regarding the dragons, you might want to consider more progression from the early levels just because even the first one I ran into was pretty hard. 3 heads with a steady fire stream and him physically chasing me around the room if enough to make non lesser experienced Zelda 1 players rage quit...luckily I was good enough to beat the second quest back in the 80s so not me! 😁
...but anyways, since you probably don't have a ton of bosses finished I would start with one head, slow movement speed, alternate attack (exploding fireball or maybe a scroll like power) and maybe short fire bursts and then increase one of these attributes per dungeon level. So by the level 30 or 40, the dragon would fast with alot of abilities and 10 heads!(which is probably enough heads and upgrades). You could also add different elemental dragons to vary the progression even more.
Lastly. I was just reading my last post and realized I had a huge typo and wasnt very clear...I meant to say:
-give certain BOSS enemies (like orc bosses) MORE items and item switching abilities/different attack types at progressivily higher levels. Imagine a level 40 Orc boss switching weapons, setting bombs, and using scrolls 😁. The higher the level, the more options, health, and switching rate they have.
Come to think of it, Wizard bosses could probably be implemented in a similar where they primarily use one scroll like power with no other weapons in the beginning and gradually get stronger and more varied....wizard camps or outposts might be fun too.
Just some ideas for your brainstorming
Nice! Yeah I like the dragon stuff. I've already thought about stuff like that but haven't implemented it yet :) Will definitely come tho!
Yeah the humanoid bosses will be more intelligent and use more items the higher level they are! They actually already use health potions, have you noticed that?
I'm not sure if Ive seen it yet. Does the loading bar appear over their head when they use the potion?
No it doesn't. But they have the same drinking animation as the player and of course you can interrupt them ;)
Been following on Twitter, love the update vids!
When trying to run on mac I get:
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ExceptionInInitializerError
at org.lwjgl.glfw.GLFW.glfwCreateWindow(GLFW.java:1384)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.createGlfwWindow(Lwjgl3Application.java:425)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.createWindow(Lwjgl3Application.java:372)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:107)
at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
Caused by: java.lang.IllegalStateException: GLFW windows may only be created on the main thread and that thread must be the first thread in the process. Please run the JVM with -XstartOnFirstThread. For offscreen rendering, make sure another window toolkit (e.g. AWT or JavaFX) is initialized before GLFW.
at org.lwjgl.glfw.EventLoop$OffScreen.<clinit>(EventLoop.java:38)
... 5 more
AL lib: (EE) alc_cleanup: 1 device not closed
I was able to run it myself with -XstartOnFirstThread, but it only black screens :(
Thanks man!
Shit. LibGDX really does not run well on Mac and Linux. It's really shit. Do yo by chance have a windows machine? It seems that's the only reasonable option :(
v0.2 crashes on windows. Switching to monogame?
It shouldn't crash anymore. I updated the 0.2 version :) Try to redownload it.
But yeah, I'm switchting to MonoGame :)
0.1.1 works but 0.2 crashes.
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException
at mystiqa.game.state.GameState.update(GameState.java:85)
at mystiqa.game.state.world.WorldState.update(WorldState.java:98)
at mystiqa.game.Game.render(Game.java:74)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Window.update(Lwjgl3Window.java:386)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.loop(Lwjgl3Application.java:136)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:110)
at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
As I've said, that's the exact I should have fixed. Have you redownloaded 0.2?
If yes, honestly I'm out haha. Please just wait for the new version 0.2.1, I'm switching to a new framework (MonoGame) which will definitely work on Windows, Mac and Linux :)
Running on Windows 10 with java version "1.8.0_221" I get a crash a moment after a black screen appears:
```
Controllers: added manager for application, 1 managers active
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException
at mystiqa.game.state.GameState.update(GameState.java:85)
at mystiqa.game.state.world.WorldState.update(WorldState.java:98)
at mystiqa.game.Game.render(Game.java:74)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Window.update(Lwjgl3Window.java:386)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.loop(Lwjgl3Application.java:136)
at com.badlogic.gdx.backends.lwjgl3.Lwjgl3Application.<init>(Lwjgl3Application.java:110)
at mystiqa.game.desktop.DesktopLauncher.main(DesktopLauncher.java:16)
```
Yup, I just noticed it. I'm so sorry. I was really stressed to push out the update yesterday so I didn't even test if it runs.
I just fixed the bug! Have fun playing the game :)
It crashes immediately. I tried v.0.1 and v.0.1.1 on two linux machines, Intel gfx, openjdk-8 and openjdk-11
`Exception in thread "LWJGL Application"
java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: no uniform with name 'cx' in shader`
Thanks for the bug report! Indeed, I've personally only tested on windows sadly. I'm sorry you can't play.
It sounds like the shaders are not intitialized correctly/at all. I've just built in a quick-fix for the incorrect shader loading.
Have you tried version 0.0.1? What version of OpenGL are you using?
0.0.1 works on both machines (but crashes when I get attacked).
2010 laptop: Intel Corporation Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller
OpenGL version string: 2.1 Mesa 19.0.8
OpenGL shading language version string: 1.20
OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 2.0 Mesa 19.0.8
OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 1.0.16
2015 miniPC: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Graphics & Display
OpenGL version string: 3.0 Mesa 18.3.6
OpenGL shading language version string: 1.30
OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 3.0 Mesa 18.3.6
OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 3.00
Yup, that indicates to me that the shaders aren't initialized properly. I fixed the problem earlier today, so in the next update you should be able to fully play the game albeit without shaders, sorry :| I'm not a huge OpenGL expert, but I hope at least playing the game is fine for you!
Is there the possibility that you could test it with windows? Because I don't think it's Linux. My guess it's the intel integrated graphics
I'm planning to install Win7 on miniPC, probably this weekend
Ok, great. Hopefully it works! Cheers man
Its really good, i think there is lots of potential in it but i think some tweaks here and there could improve it a lot
-increase font height by one pixel (most minor detail not really necesary but i really don't see it breaking anything there is plenty of space left on the screen)
-increase overworld move speed (i dunno if it is that slow due to generation times if it isn't i think the character moving faster would make traveling more pleasant)
-add some way for the player to be able to tell which room borders lead to another room, while on a cave i was constantly getting to borders and they would lead nowhere which was kinda frustrating since the character moves quite slow
-the game crashed while i was raiding a orc camp
Thanks a lot for the thorough critique!
One problem with increasing the font height is because it's grid based that the bottom row would collide with the top pixels of the next line :/
The overworld speed is indeed slow, I will increase it!
Yup, the room border thing haha. I don't have any idea how to do it tho, because visual indicators would seem unnatural. Any ideas?
When did the game crash exactly? After you hit a monster or what?
EDIT: I just fixed the movement speed on the world map. 2x was too fast, so now it's about 1.5x. Seems better to me. I also fixed the room tile borders not aligning. Now you can always tell! :) It will all be in the next update on Saturday probably
Very interesting project! Very similar to my favorite old games!
Thanks!
Another demo, yay!
Looking cool! I like how the graphics are made, the animations fit well in the resolution. The enemies are something hard to defeat but it's interesting to apply some of technique to defeat enemies instead of recklessly trying to hit them, I like that.
Looking for more progress here :)
Amazing! Glad you enjoyed it. A new demo will follow in a few weeks hopefully :)
Cant wait for the full version of this game, it looks great!!
Thanks, I'm glad you like it! :D
Will post a new version with the dungeons soon :)