Stu's Rusty Bucket

Two odd thoughts on Pool of Radiance

I was thinking about things to add to my CRPG (Not like it needs MORE stuff added), was two things that stood out for me in Pool of Radiance, the attract screen or demo, and the computer guided introduction for the player.

Now POR was not the first game to have the attract demo screen, the Ultima series had them since what? Number III I think, only it was more cut down, you did not see the real combat action.  Pool of Radiance cycled through lots of different screens and displayed a really great demo setup.

The second thing was when the player started a new game, you got that awesome guided tour that brought you into the game. I remember when you first walk in and see ivy on the wall, it was like, AWESOME in its pseudo 3D-ness.

I want this type of introduction in my game, but I’m not sure how to go about it. For the 3Dlik ness of POR it worked, everything is hidden that is not in the immediate view and reveals as you go through doorways and around corners, yet with my 2D tile approach you don’t get so much of the ‘reveal’ factor. Whats there is there, the LOS hiding does not have the same affect.

Right now I have a simple attract screen much like Ultima III with characters walking around the screen in random fashion (unlike Ultima III’s scripted sense). I would like to have an entire scripted display of some 2d tile action with a AI controlled combat (so it should be different each time).