STRAK'S PROFILE

Great questions! I'll try to answer them as best I can.

So for the first question, the game doesn't actually save any of the parallaxes. The game uses the BLT method to temporarily overwrite the parallax for that map ID by taking samples from each of the individual rooms, then splicing them onto the main parallax as a cached graphic. Nothing actually gets saved. This does mean that if you close and reload the game, the map will be blank, but since this game doesn't allow saving in dungeons, it works perfectly for this game. Usually if you save and load in a dungeon, you'll be warped back to the home base.

I'll get to the second question last, since it's a bit of a longer answer.

As for the entrance and boss rooms, or places such as the home base, yes those will be created individually. There isn't really much reason to have them be randomized. This system is just for the purpose of dungeon crawling.

Now, advantages and disadvantages. For advantages, this means that I have less than 1/6th the amount of work I had previously in order to release this game. It's very likely that I can have this finished in the next two years now. From a gameplay perspective, this also means that dungeons are much more random, with far less repetition as to where chests, exits, monsters, item bags, and player spawn points are placed. Before, you could pretty easily figure out where all the potential spawn points are for each map if you'd played them enough. As the main test player/developer, I can attest to this myself. With this system, even I will have no idea where anything is on any given dungeon floor, encouraging more detailed exploration and immersion. In addition, the potential dungeon layouts can get VERY interesting and winding, far more so than they were before.

However, there are disadvantages. Mainly, there is quite a bit more limitation in exactly how dungeon "rooms" can connect to each other. In order for a more seamless transition between sections of the map, the room borders do need to be a bit more generic and standard. This means no more diversity between what constitutes a "wall" in a dungeon. For example, in the mine, you used to have cave walls OR vast underground ponds that dictated the border of the room. With this system, I can still have tiny ponds within the rooms themselves, but the border of each room will be essentially the same.

Now, there are ways around this. I'm currently working on an "overlap" feature for map generation, which will allow me to create borders that blend together a bit more, making for a more natural layout. I should also be able to create a system where instead of generating the "room," I can instead generate the "walls," allowing for more control over the things I just mentioned. This system is still in development, so the potential is still untapped, but as it currently stands the main disadvantage is that maps will be SLIGHTLY less detailed and deliberate than the originals, but will ultimately be far less repetitive and far more random than before.

Thanks! I hope that the things you're devoting your time to are going well! This game will be here when you're ready for it. I'm glad you find it interesting.

Hey, good on you for making a return to the project! It's easy to give up on something when you start experiencing burnout, or if it isn't turning out how you want. It's much harder to come back to it and say "okay, what can I do better and what should I prioritize?" Looking forward to seeing where this goes!

I'm considering modifying the functionality of two of the action skills. Elemental Burst and Aura are both powerful and useful, but both Rage and Stalking are limited in their usefulness due to needing to spend a turn to activate them. I'll be working on attempting to modify them this weekend so they can be instantly applied on use without costing the turn, allowing for an extra action. This should balance them out quite a bit. Let me know your feedback on how the current action skills work, and any potential improvements you can think of! I'm always open to perspective.

EDIT: With version 0.2 uploaded, this update is now implemented.

EDIT EDIT: Version 0.2 has been rescinded and replaced with 0.1 again, as it turned out to be a huge buggy mess. Keep an eye out for v0.3 when it's released, I'm still working on a fix.

EDIT EDIT EDIT: Version 0.3 is now available.

I discovered a small bug in the monster log book. It's not game breaking or anything, but there's an additional status ailment listed for each enemy in their resistances under the gallery mode. It shouldn't be there, and it may lead to some readability issues for monsters that resist a lot of ailments, but otherwise doesn't affect gameplay. I'll release a patched version within the next 24 hours, but it'll still be listed as v5.9.8. Thanks for your patience.