These are early project notes when the project was just a couple of ideas threwn around on the FreeGamesWiki? :) See News for some more recent stuff.
Project History
- First, I had a lot of notes I had taken on the train (you need something to do on a 36-hour train ride across China, I wouldn't be surprised if I spent a hundred hours on trains and buses during my last holidays) about a WikiGameworld?, about simple tile-based game design, etc.
- I decided I may as well try to implement it.
- I looked around for similar ideas, and didn't find anything close enough.
- I came over to this wiki and wrote a bit about a WikiGameworld? (there should be a place where wannabee-developers say "I want to do this" and people can answer "stop ! It already exists ! Go work with them !" - this wiki has the right spirit but low readership)
- I chose Python as a language, though it could probably be done in Java or Flash or maybe even Javascript.
- I went through a few PyGame? tutorials, and started coding, using some basic artwork from "Adventure of Einar", one of the pygame gamelets.
- I started wondering about where to find FreeTilesets?. I googled, searched through SourceForge?, Freshmeat, the local debian apt repository … then sorted out what I had downloaded according to the license (awful lot of it is "borrowed") and quality / useability of the artwork. The artwork by the DaimoninProject? seemed the best choice - 2D isometric, wide choice of tiles. However, I later discovered that their tiles aren't that reuseable, and had to do some more detective work.
- In the meantime, I continued coding, switching to an isometric tileset (requires better management of overlapping tiles than simple square tiles), and using TwistedMatrix? for networking instead of directly using sockets (thanks to some advice on irc :) )
- I started looking for places for ProjectHosting?. I chose gna.org, and it took a few days to go through formalities (the source files need headers mentioning the GPL, how to mention CreativeCommons? ?).
- In the meantime, I started drawing my own PixelArt?, so I could at least release a "test" version that was useable and didn't rely on images I wasn't sure I could use (not to mention that I didn't find the artwork for the player characters in Daimonin that great). PixelArt? is fun :)
- I put most of the data (room maps, which textures to use) under xml (instead of in text files or in the source code), which makes it much easier to change stuff.
- I made enough tiles to not rely on any exterior artwork, then added some more so as to have an interesting enough GamePlay.
- Gna.org finally opened my account. Unfortunately, I need SSH to upload stuff, and I can't do SSH out of China. Spent several frustrating hours trying to solve this and asking for help (OK, this situation probably only happens to me, it's not a typical barrier to making a game :) ).
- I discovered a lot of 32*32 tiles for a roguelike game, that can be freely reused. This may reorient the project towards square rather than isometric tiles (But at least for the first release, I decided to stick to what I had already done - it's no big deal if I have to "throw away" the tiles I drew in the Daimonin isometric format).
- I finished DreamStones 0.1, but have nowhere to put it :-P (release often and early !). In the meantime I come here to write a bit on this wiki, and look for another place to put it (tuxfamily ? I'll have a look)
- Registered to tuxfamily (it's a nightmare). Can't upload anything there yet - switched to alioth.debian.org, waiting for project to be approved.
- They're bloody slow ! Still no answer for three days now. They said they'd answer in three days. oh well. (I haven't programmed much since then, tweaked XML parsing a bit).
- Created a new wiki, here.
- Ah ! Finally got a bit of web space (alioth.debian.org refuses me, I'm not debian enough). Uploaded the 0.1.0 version :-P Now it's downloadable and playable !
- Still working on a more advanced version.
- made another release, 0.1.1 (server now allows for different game rules)
- Put up the home page, with a few basic links.
(Maybe this contains some not-that-interesting technical details (I mean, who cares about xml ?), I'll refactor it as I add stuff.)