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LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
LockeZ
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CloseHow many of you know what a randomizer mod is? It's a version of a video game - usually a mod or a romhack of an older game - where a bunch of the content is shuffled at random. For example, the Final Fantasy 1 Randomizer shuffles the contents of all the game's treasure chests, the spells that are available at each spell level, the inventory of every shop in the game, and the status effects used by enemies. The Legend of Zelda Randomizer creates random new dungeon layouts with random rooms and random enemies, shuffles item locations, and also shuffles the locations of dungeon entrances with shops, old men, and other random caves.
Different games choose different things to randomize, but the basic idea is the same - create replay value by creating a different experience every time, and create a fresh experience by making sure the player doesn't quite know what to do despite their familiarity with the game. In many cases this will get people who enjoyed the game to play it one or two more times, because it'll feel like playing the game for the first time again. In a few cases this can get certain types of players to play the game over and over.
There's usually a pretty low focus on being a "good" game every time. For example a lot of the time in the Legend of Zelda Randomizer you can find the Triforce piece in the first room of a dungeon, and the boss will only drop the compass, which does nothing but tell you the boss location. Players seem pretty forgiving of this sort of thing since they realize it's not how the game was meant to be played. So it's much less effort than making, say, a roguelike.
About three months ago I made a randomizer for one of my own games, the Unofficial Squaresoft MUD. I'm wondering how many other people have made, or considered making, randomizers for their own games. Why or why not? Is this something that indie games should try to do more? Is it something you'd be interested in as a player?
Also, from a technical standpoint, I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with doing this in RPG Maker, or any clever ideas of how to go about doing so.
Different games choose different things to randomize, but the basic idea is the same - create replay value by creating a different experience every time, and create a fresh experience by making sure the player doesn't quite know what to do despite their familiarity with the game. In many cases this will get people who enjoyed the game to play it one or two more times, because it'll feel like playing the game for the first time again. In a few cases this can get certain types of players to play the game over and over.
There's usually a pretty low focus on being a "good" game every time. For example a lot of the time in the Legend of Zelda Randomizer you can find the Triforce piece in the first room of a dungeon, and the boss will only drop the compass, which does nothing but tell you the boss location. Players seem pretty forgiving of this sort of thing since they realize it's not how the game was meant to be played. So it's much less effort than making, say, a roguelike.
About three months ago I made a randomizer for one of my own games, the Unofficial Squaresoft MUD. I'm wondering how many other people have made, or considered making, randomizers for their own games. Why or why not? Is this something that indie games should try to do more? Is it something you'd be interested in as a player?
Also, from a technical standpoint, I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with doing this in RPG Maker, or any clever ideas of how to go about doing so.
I've seen a handful of RPG Maker Fes games which do what you describe. The dungeon layout is fixed—it has to be—but the chests had different ranks of treasure inside. I think the floor exits were also randomized. It reminded me of Romancing SaGa, the way your spoils and enemies were confined to your current rank, but were randomized inside that rank.
Champs of the Bocca, maybe? The dungeon layout was grid-based, and each "cell" of the grid was randomized from 1 out of 5 possible room-structures, or so. I don't think we got as far as having skills/abilities, or stuff players can find, though.
*Edit: Well, I think we had functional Bombs, but, nothing to use them on. I think I remember a comment on the game (a review?) where somebody could switch characters, or quaff a healing potion in the middle of a combat sequence, when combat was supposed to put those functions (and movement in general) on hold.
*Edit: Well, I think we had functional Bombs, but, nothing to use them on. I think I remember a comment on the game (a review?) where somebody could switch characters, or quaff a healing potion in the middle of a combat sequence, when combat was supposed to put those functions (and movement in general) on hold.
bicfarmer
3601
I played pokemon randomizer. Gary recked me with a celebi in the elite 4.
When you randomize you must take into account how the plot is affected. Like in pokemon randomizer, I got fresh water off an item ball on the ground in viridian forest, allowing me to go to saffron city directly after cerulean city.
Since rpg games tend to have low replay value, a typical rpgmaker game probably wont have randomizing like that. Though there are a few 'roguelike' rpg maker games I've come across here on RMN, what would happen is that if you don't get the items you need early game, you can get screwed extremely quickly, making or breaking the game right in the beginning.
When you randomize you must take into account how the plot is affected. Like in pokemon randomizer, I got fresh water off an item ball on the ground in viridian forest, allowing me to go to saffron city directly after cerulean city.
Since rpg games tend to have low replay value, a typical rpgmaker game probably wont have randomizing like that. Though there are a few 'roguelike' rpg maker games I've come across here on RMN, what would happen is that if you don't get the items you need early game, you can get screwed extremely quickly, making or breaking the game right in the beginning.
Kaempfer
1932
It'd be interesting to see a big-time RPG include a randomized mode as a New Game+. Like, an official mode where great care is given to which things can be randomized to maximize replayability without it getting too janky.
I think a fully randomized mode is neat, even though I kind of hate randomized loot in chests if it's not game-wide. Like, FFXII has a few chests that contain random loot, and the table (the list of stuff you can get) is huge and ridiculous and broken.
So: if some things are random, I think that is bad. If everything is batshit crazy, then that's the fun!
I think a fully randomized mode is neat, even though I kind of hate randomized loot in chests if it's not game-wide. Like, FFXII has a few chests that contain random loot, and the table (the list of stuff you can get) is huge and ridiculous and broken.
So: if some things are random, I think that is bad. If everything is batshit crazy, then that's the fun!
Some of my favorite and most comprehensive randomizers are the Dragon Warrior 1-4 Randomizers; 1 and 2 are so comprehensive that they can generate random world maps, as well.
I guess my enjoyment of randomizers in genera really depends on how a given game is coded and just how much can be randomized. A super-linear game may not be as flexible as a more open one.
I guess my enjoyment of randomizers in genera really depends on how a given game is coded and just how much can be randomized. A super-linear game may not be as flexible as a more open one.
turkeyDawg
195
Well, Pokemon Uranium, which is an RMXP game, introduced a randomizer mde for their anniversary update. Not sure if they talked about how they did it anywhere, though.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Was it any good? What randomized aspects did you think worked and what didn't, and what did you wish they'd done?
I haven't played many randomizers, an FF6 one, Link to the Past, and if you count it the FF5 4 Job Fiesta.
4JF is simple: Nothing in the game actually changes, it's just a self-imposed challenge. You get 4 jobs, one from each crystal (or some other rules to shake it up) and you have to beat the game while each character is one of the four jobs you have. It does bring out how many options there are for various classes to deal with obstacles in the game beyond the obvious curbstomping options. It also points out how obnoxious it is to use some classes like the Beast Master or Blue Mage if you don't know where to get their spells. Or if you get White Mages for Garula and have nothing besidescheating with a Freelancer cracking a rod grinding. It can still be a lot of fun dealing with the varied challenges of the game and using knowledge of old runs or other runners to improve your next go-through.
The FF6 randomizer was... neat in a novelty sense but it never lasted. Your characters were random including their actions. There were new grabbag abilities that would pull from a predefined list, or it would just straight up be one ability/spell, and having the magic command wasn't guaranteed. That said... it just ended up a mess. There were some kinda memorable parts, like the South Figaro basement random encounter table was just Doom Train over and over again, and Celes could just spam Quasar but it still just became boring. Partly because that's FF6, but everything became just using the character who got the good ability, or the grabbag ability and hoping for Meteor and not Merton.
Gear was a mess. Stores might've sold things nobody could use and the FF6 UI doesn't make it clear at a glance what it does, not that it helps due to characters not being able to equip shit. Espers were random too but it doesn't really mean much when only one character has a magic command. I think I quit right after Zozo, and that was the farthest one I did.
The LttP randomziers I ran were the item shuffle with progression. The base game was the same but the content of every chest or reward was changed. There were rules: Since it's Zelda and items open up parts of the map they had to be set up in an order that you can beat the game in without glitches. Pendents and Crystals got shuffled around too but only between each other. Eastern Palace could now have a crystal while Palace of Darkness was the Pendent of Courage or so. It didn't have the Zelda Randomizer issue LockeZ mentioned... exactly. Boss rewards were part of the "everything gets changed" pool so you might get key items from killing a boss... or you got the dungeon map. Progression items made it so you couldn't just find the Butter Knife in a chest, you'd find the lv2 Sword, then the lv3 Sword, then finally the Butter Knife. Older versions had it so you could just find the lv3 Sword in a chest and if you later found the lv2 Sword it had no effect.
Ultimately you'd have to get items to access the dungeons with the seven crystals, clear Ganon's Tower, get the key items to beat Ganon (Lv2 Sword, Lv3 or Silver Arrows?, light source), and finally kill the giant evil pigman.
So far my preference with randomizers is something that builds on the existing game instead of trying to make a new, random game built on the core of an existing one. Put all that useless info in my head togood better use. It clearly isn't good for a first run of the game though, at least not with FF5 and Link to the Past. Hell, my first couple LttP runs was finding what chest I missed that had an essential item in it and that can really drag down an otherwise fun run (I missed a chest in East Death Mountain, I forgot the cave in Dark Graveyard, and Mimic Cave. Fuck Mimic Cave!). At least with LttP each run isn't long compared to a full RPG and there's little fastforwarding through cutscenes. Being short helps with the randomizer I think because at least bad seeds can be finished quickly and you get to interesting bits quickly.
I think a more random game can work, but FF6 isn't the game to do it in. A clear UI is essential so you know what shit does would help, and a shorter game too.
I'll try to post "how I would do it" later because it's late and my posting ability goes from worst to worster later in the night.
4JF is simple: Nothing in the game actually changes, it's just a self-imposed challenge. You get 4 jobs, one from each crystal (or some other rules to shake it up) and you have to beat the game while each character is one of the four jobs you have. It does bring out how many options there are for various classes to deal with obstacles in the game beyond the obvious curbstomping options. It also points out how obnoxious it is to use some classes like the Beast Master or Blue Mage if you don't know where to get their spells. Or if you get White Mages for Garula and have nothing besides
The FF6 randomizer was... neat in a novelty sense but it never lasted. Your characters were random including their actions. There were new grabbag abilities that would pull from a predefined list, or it would just straight up be one ability/spell, and having the magic command wasn't guaranteed. That said... it just ended up a mess. There were some kinda memorable parts, like the South Figaro basement random encounter table was just Doom Train over and over again, and Celes could just spam Quasar but it still just became boring. Partly because that's FF6, but everything became just using the character who got the good ability, or the grabbag ability and hoping for Meteor and not Merton.
Gear was a mess. Stores might've sold things nobody could use and the FF6 UI doesn't make it clear at a glance what it does, not that it helps due to characters not being able to equip shit. Espers were random too but it doesn't really mean much when only one character has a magic command. I think I quit right after Zozo, and that was the farthest one I did.
The LttP randomziers I ran were the item shuffle with progression. The base game was the same but the content of every chest or reward was changed. There were rules: Since it's Zelda and items open up parts of the map they had to be set up in an order that you can beat the game in without glitches. Pendents and Crystals got shuffled around too but only between each other. Eastern Palace could now have a crystal while Palace of Darkness was the Pendent of Courage or so. It didn't have the Zelda Randomizer issue LockeZ mentioned... exactly. Boss rewards were part of the "everything gets changed" pool so you might get key items from killing a boss... or you got the dungeon map. Progression items made it so you couldn't just find the Butter Knife in a chest, you'd find the lv2 Sword, then the lv3 Sword, then finally the Butter Knife. Older versions had it so you could just find the lv3 Sword in a chest and if you later found the lv2 Sword it had no effect.
Ultimately you'd have to get items to access the dungeons with the seven crystals, clear Ganon's Tower, get the key items to beat Ganon (Lv2 Sword, Lv3 or Silver Arrows?, light source), and finally kill the giant evil pigman.
So far my preference with randomizers is something that builds on the existing game instead of trying to make a new, random game built on the core of an existing one. Put all that useless info in my head to
I think a more random game can work, but FF6 isn't the game to do it in. A clear UI is essential so you know what shit does would help, and a shorter game too.
I'll try to post "how I would do it" later because it's late and my posting ability goes from worst to worster later in the night.
I've never made one but I've done personal challenges that involved randomly selecting things from The Hat or similar.
Hero & Daughter was likely the first RM game I've seen with random stuff. Random loot, random mobs and random dungeons, although obviously selected from lists of possibilities. I don't trust RM to make a random dungeon that is actually beatable.
Hero & Daughter was likely the first RM game I've seen with random stuff. Random loot, random mobs and random dungeons, although obviously selected from lists of possibilities. I don't trust RM to make a random dungeon that is actually beatable.
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