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Monday Screenshot 4/13

Raptisoft
in Anything else!
image
In the new Solomon's Keep, I had to add a new feature: persistent corpses.  This is not for the purposes of "showing carnage," but, rather, serves game function.  I had to have persistent corpses because the necromancer class works with them.  I also find that persistent corpses in games are very helpful for keeping track of where you've been.

In this screenshot, the corpses are placeholder graphics-- making persistent corpses in a game is a surprisingly difficult task, because they pile up and become a permanent part of the drawing pipeline.  Games usually cope with this by making the corpses vanish after a time.  I am hoping not to do that!  Therefore, they have to be optimized above and beyond anything else you will see.  In Keep, the task is made even more difficult by uneven terrain, stairways, pits, etc, that force them to be more complex than they would need to be in a completely flat world.

Comments

  • windslayer
    How about instead of the whole corpse, only a part of the enemy remains? Like a skull, a bone, or a hand?
  • xglsuperbounce
    On the brightside, this isn't boneyard. Ha. 

    Perhaps condense them all into one image that you only draw a portion of that is within the viewport. Then keeping the rest of the data somewhere else and when you resurrect one it removes it from the picture (rather makes the picure over again from the resulting list of corpses.) I don't know if the stairs would effect it, though. :/ Just spitballing.

    I'm sure you'll figure something out.
  • tekduchesnetekduchesne
    Look pretty awesome! :)
  • Avantir_ChaosfireAvantir_Chaosfire
    I like the depressed walkway. And the fire lighting, oh yes.
  • Solrex
    What if after you leave the room the corpses rot beyond resummoning? Or a similar thing happens over time.

    Maybe instead of infinitely spewing laggy corpses into a room, some corpses get back up after a while and fight again? That way no infinite body lag.
  • Tears_Of_AsarielTears_Of_Asariel
    edited April 2015
    i personally like the idea of the corpses rotting beyond use, but make sure if you implement that that its a time delay, not a body count thing like a lot of other games.

    making it time based also makes it feel like more of a mechanic for a necromancer instead of a graphical limitation   (and depending on how long you have the corpses last, and your overall plans for the necromancer, you could turn that into a trainable skill, to preserve the bodies longer)

    as for the corpses being an aid to see where you have went, when the body decomposes too far and cant be summoned, it could turn to just a char mark or bone dust, as a 2d image to reduce lag but keep the marker, and necromancers would still have the full polygon body before it rots
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