Hero of Allacrost -- FOSS 2D RPG

Roots · Post by **Roots** » September 2nd, 2006, 7:14 pm

Thanks for pointing out that link problem freim. We just luanched our new site recently so we're still working out all the bugs.

As far as the SVN check-out goes, no there are no media files in it currently. We're going to upload those soon, and then you should be able to try playing around with the game. ./configure && make should work (and they do on all Linux systems I've tested), but make install will not work because we haven't bothered with that step right now. You can only run allacrost from the directory where it is built in ($ ./allacrost).

Honestly though, there's not much you can do just yet. You can walk around on a map, talk to some NPCs, use a potion in the character management menu, fight some simple battles, and that's it. The majority of our development has been focused on the engine until recently, hence the reason why things are not more fully developed. There's also a lot of weird bugs in the video engine with mis-applying textures which results in some really messed up looking images sometimes, so we want to iron out major bugs like those before anyone plays the game. Its a quality assurance kind of thing

Post by **Jetrel** » September 2nd, 2006, 9:13 pm

For those who are wondering, the guy who's been making those wonderful bits of painted art is "Safir-Kreuz".

Another thing which is not immediately obvious from what's been posted here, is that the soundtrack for Allacrost is ... amazing. Honestly on the same level as Zelda, or the earlier Final Fantasy games. These songs have been made both by a fellow named "Loodwig," and primarily a fellow named "Rain".

Like Roots, I'm a bit mystified as to how they've managed to get those people when the actual game isn't publicly available yet, but; they have them, and they're working on a very professional level.

What Allacrost really needs are:
Ã¢â‚¬Â¢ tileset artists (plain, old-fashioned 32x32 tiles - just like RMXP)
Ã¢â‚¬Â¢ battle mode artists (visually like street fighter, although the gameplay is like Final Fantasy)
Ã¢â‚¬Â¢ programmers (for a few specific things they're having trouble with)

Post by **zookeeper** » September 2nd, 2006, 9:37 pm

I had a short chat about the sound effects with Roots on IRC, and I was actually a bit surprised to hear that they have several people working on the sounds. Since it seems to be rather rare to have a lot of dedicated sound effects people in an free game, I'll be very interested in hearing that stuff when they get the first release out (or when I can otherwise get my hands on the media files).

Post by **Dave** » September 2nd, 2006, 9:41 pm

Jetryl wrote: Like Roots, I'm a bit mystified as to how they've managed to get those people when the actual game isn't publicly available yet, but; they have them, and they're working on a very professional level.

Honestly, I'm a bit mystified by this too. I didn't think that the approach the Allacrost project has taken would work, to be honest, and while it's certainly a long way away from a 'complete, 1.0 release' yet, it's done much better than I thought it would.

But, this is a case where I'm very glad to be wrong. I hope there will be a playable demo soon. I really hope they make it easy for people to jump in and start creating content for the game, because I'm sure that if they do, they'll find themselves seeing a stream of quality user-made content.

David

Roots · Post by **Roots** » September 2nd, 2006, 10:52 pm

Since zookeeper is so interested, here is one custom sound effect that has been made for our game. This piece is played at the very beginning during the logo animation sequence. The timed combination of the logo animation and this sound is pretty bad ass I think.

http://www.allacrost.org/staff/build/mu ... Effect.ogg

Dave: I'm glad we failed to meet your expectations.

We are, in fact, already opening our project up more to allow more community participation (mostly in artwork, but also in other areas). We want to have a firm foundation and all of the major features of the game worked out before we take community participation to the next level, otherwise we suffer from having "too many cooks in the kitchen" so to speak.

Post by **Dave** » September 2nd, 2006, 11:01 pm

Roots wrote: Dave: I'm glad we failed to meet your expectations.

You didn't fail to meet my expectations. On the contrary, you have far exceeded my expectations.

I guess the big difference is that I am very very impatient, have a short attention span, and tend to give up on things easily. As such, any development model I use has to cater to this.

I could never use the development model Allacrost has used, simply because I wouldn't be able to develop a game for more than a year without seeing any releases. You are obviously far more persistent and patient than me, and so the development model you have chosen can apparently work for you.

I am very happy to acknowledge and respect developers who use a very different development model to mine, and achieve success with it. I do hope Allacrost continues to be successful. It could become the first FLOSS RPG that I would actually consider worth playing.

David

appleide · Post by **appleide** » September 10th, 2006, 7:20 am

look! a free game that has been completed, yet it isn't released yet!! looks very good too.

Ranger M · Post by **Ranger M** » September 10th, 2006, 7:37 am

appleide wrote:

look! a free game that has been completed, yet it isn't released yet!! looks very good too.

Well, almost. It's more of a free game which has an almost completed engine, but hasn't got a finished storyline yet (I believe that there are only two map areas available at the moment).

Roots · Post by **Roots** » September 10th, 2006, 6:38 pm

Ranger M wrote:
appleide wrote:

look! a free game that has been completed, yet it isn't released yet!! looks very good too.
Well, almost. It's more of a free game which has an almost completed engine, but hasn't got a finished storyline yet (I believe that there are only two map areas available at the moment).

You're both wrong! The fundamental parts of the engine I would consider complete, but the advanced features are forth-coming. The story-line is mostly an idea at this point; I haven't written past the first chapter yet. The game right now only has one map area (the cave) because we have had so much trouble finding artists. I would love to have a map for the desert town, but that still has a lot of work to go before its complete.

charlieg · Post by **charlieg** » September 11th, 2006, 1:52 pm

Release a tech demo. It may attract new artists.

Roots · Post by **Roots** » September 12th, 2006, 9:28 am

charlieg wrote:Release a tech demo. It may attract new artists.

That's what we're doing right now.

-> What i might be working on · Post by **Eleazar** » September 18th, 2006, 6:52 pm

Dave wrote:
Jetryl wrote: Like Roots, I'm a bit mystified as to how they've managed to get those people when the actual game isn't publicly available yet, but; they have them, and they're working on a very professional level.
Honestly, I'm a bit mystified by this too. I didn't think that the approach the Allacrost project has taken would work...

Eleazar = mystified, too.
In large part because their model wouldn't have worked for me. When i make a new graphics, i want to see it in-game ASAP, not only as a little reward, but to evaulate it. I wouldn't have joined Wesnoth, if i would have to wait for months or years to see them in-game. I wonder, did a significant part of the core Allacrost developers already know each other before starting the project? That might help explain how they pulled it off so far.

However they do it, more power to them.

Of course, once the tech demo comes out, the differences between our products will be lessened.

Post by **turin** » September 18th, 2006, 10:18 pm

Well, my understanding (someone correct me if I'm wrong) is that they make the SVN or CVS or whatever version of the game available to all developers, be it art, code, whatever; so, art contributors, as long as they make a commitment to the game, will get to see their stuff in-game before the public does.

Roots · Post by **Roots** » September 19th, 2006, 5:42 am

Eleazar wrote:I wonder, did a significant part of the core Allacrost developers already know each other before starting the project? That might help explain how they pulled it off so far.

Nope.

There is only one person on our team that I knew (in real life) before Allacrost got started.

turin wrote: Well, my understanding (someone correct me if I'm wrong) is that they make the SVN or CVS or whatever version of the game available to all developers, be it art, code, whatever; so, art contributors, as long as they make a commitment to the game, will get to see their stuff in-game before the public does.

In theory, yes any artist, composer, etc. on the team could see their stuff in-game before the public does. In practice, however, I have found that even when we build an internal version of the game and make it available to our artists, they don't seem effected by it (I don't even know if they play it to be honest). Sadly, our art team has been rather detached from the development team, despite my efforts to encourage them to participate in ways other than simply creating art. I'm still trying to figure out how to break down that communication barrier between developers and artists currently.

Even though we have very talented artists and many pieces of high-quality art, looking at things over the long run, the amount of artwork content created can be seen as dismal at best.

Hence why we are pushing this demo out early (despite missing a lot of artwork and features), as one of our primary motivations is to grab the interest of new potential artists to help out.

Post by **fmunoz** » September 20th, 2006, 2:44 pm

In Wesnoth artist can just slap a new set of unit images and test them in the test scenario.
New terrain images can be tested in the map editor after a minimal (usually) edit of the terrain files.
In the ancient itmes things were easier...as the units and terrain deciption files doenst really have any complex syntax.

OTOH I was unable to see the HoA engine running or get a good set of sample images to play with, so you only got marginal contributions from me.