The Mad King's Tournament by ZaneDD
First post-LD Update is here, containing the much-asked for fullscreen mode and multiresolution support, and also fixing a bug with food spawning that should make it much easier to find food now!
Hear ye, hear ye!
The Illustrious King Cathusalah of Aristinia, Heir to the Throne of Illisneth, Ruler of the Western Peoples, Prince of the Parchirrans, Father of Many Nations, Sailor of the Great Oceans, Conqueror of the White Mountains, Devourer of the Legendary Lord Briscutt's Two Pound Steak Challenge, Rider of Fierce Stallions, Writer of Beautiful Poems, and Possessor of Amazing Hair, wishes to remindeth his subjects--meaning, needless to say, thee--that he is of very sound mind and not, as some whispereth, mad.
On an unrelated note, the King hath also declared a great tournament to be held in three weeks' time! 100 of the King's subjects shalt be ~~forced~~ ~~chosen~~ honored with the opportunity to participate in this tournament, with the prize being unimaginable wealth and power fit for a king! (A lesser king, of course; even the bravest man alive wouldst never dare insult The Illustrious King Cathusalah of Aristinia, Heir to the Throne of Illisneth, Ruler of the Western Peoples, Prince of the Parchirrans, Father of Many Nations, Sailor of the Great Oceans, Conqueror of the White Mountains, Devourer of the Legendary Lord Briscutt's Two Pound Steak Challenge, Rider of Fierce Stallions, Writer of Beautiful Poems, and Possessor of Amazing Hair by being wealthier than he!)
This tournament will be particularly special, as it will take the form of a combination of game genres once thought to be incompatible! Namely, a text-based adventure and a battle royale! For those ~~forced~~ ~~chosen~~ honored to participate, the following instructions are given:
To moveth around, thou shalt type "move ", followed by a cardinal direction. For example, "move north"
To findeth useful items and food, thou shalt exploreth the area by typing "explore". If one should findeth, say, a crossbow, one shalt pick it up by typing "take crossbow".
Thou shalt remembereth to equipeth any weapons thou find! However, thou shalt note that armor is equipped automatically upon picking up.
Thou art encouraged to attacketh thy fellow contestants in the King's Arena! To attacketh a Male Dwarf, for example, thou shalt type "attack male dwarf"
Thou shalt remember to eat and drink to prevent dying of starvation or thirst!
When typing commands that take a target, thou shalt always remember to typeth the target, as failing to do so might cause the instant destruction of the King's Arena, killing all inside. The King's Army of Royal Software Engineers promiseth to fixeth the issue by the next iteration of the tournament.
Thus sayeth The Illustrious King Cathusalah of Aristinia, Heir to the Throne of Illisneth, Ruler of the Western Peoples, Prince of the Parchirrans, Father of Many Nations, Sailor of the Great Oceans, Conqueror of the White Mountains, Devourer of the Legendary Lord Briscutt's Two Pound Steak Challenge, Rider of Fierce Stallions, Writer of Beautiful Poems, and Possessor of Amazing Hair.
Hello, everyone!
This is my submission for Ludum Dare 41: my first LD, but definitely not my last! The theme was "combine two unlikely genres", so I combined "text-based adventure" with "battle royale". It's not 100% complete, but it's very much playable if you forgive the incomplete AI and occasional bug. I'm very happy with how the project has turned out so far, so I plan to keep developing it to make it into a more finished game and give it a wider release. Please let me know what you think of it, good or bad! Please report bugs either by commenting or by emailing zaneddennis@gmail.com.
(When I say the AI is incomplete, I mean the NPCs can't pick up items or attack you back, so they're not much of a threat at the moment; more complete AI is the #1 thing on my priority list for continuing development)
If anyone has trouble reading my faux-Old English above, let me know and I'll water it down. I might've gone a bit overboard.
Itch.io link so you can download it: https://zanetrain.itch.io/mad-kings-tournament
A game by Zane Dennis.
Music by Spencer Sosnowski.
Ratings
| Given | 16🗳️ | 12🗨️ |
@August1413 I'll be crazy busy with schoolwork for the next few days, but I plan to make an updated version with some better AI, more fleshed-out combat, and general bugfixes next weekend! About to play and rate your game!
@Nyriswar That was not by design on my end, at least. To be honest, my buddy made all the audio and I rushed to throw as much of it as I could into the project with 20 minutes left, haha. I may have inadvertently changed some setting or something, or he could have done it that way. I have no idea. I don't see a game listed on your profile, but if you're part of a team or something, send me the link and I'll play yours!
@lost-dutchman-software I'd love to, but I don't know anything about implementing multiplayer or networking at the moment. I could do it eventually, but I have some other projects I'd like to work on instead. But I do plan to flesh out some mechanics (and the AI) before moving on from this one!
In any case, I had fun. Multiple times I failed to pick up something because the "You found a [blank]!" text tricked me into thinking I had picked up something.
It seems like there wasn't really enough food -- I only found one in both my playthroughs -- I died of hunger the first time and won the second time.
Something that would be really neat is autocomplete for the command window, especially because typing out things like "Male Orc" is kind of painful.
Unfortunately I could managed to arrange the window to see all the screen. Part of the left and upper side just goes out of the screen and could't find a way to center it or move it. Also in the main menu the "exit" option was hindered by the botom of the window.
If you add a fullscreen mode or some way to correct this please notice me.
* Finding items isn't supposed to pick them up (there's a "take" command for that). I definitely concede that I did not communicate it well, but this was an intentional design choice for two reasons: first, to force strategic risk/reward decisions of do I spend the time to pick up everything vs do I keep moving away from the fire, etc. Second, to keep exploring meaningful as a mechanic in the middle and late game, or else every item on the map would be taken within a few turns.
* The music loop stopping is a bug I just keep forgetting to fix. Thanks for the reminder! It should be simple, I'll have it done in the next update.
* Unreadable button(s), presumably at the bottom right of the screen, are (I think?) fixed in the latest update. If not, could you give some details as to what you see and what screen resolution you have?
* Eating is tested and working correctly as a mechanic, I'm just still getting the balancing right on food availability.