What Do You Look for in an ABS?

[Ace of Spades]

well if its possible make that the weapons icons are used so we dont have to create a charset for every single weapon and shield etc.

You mean using icons to fuse to character sets to automatically create animations?  While in theory that sounds like a great idea, I imagine it'd come out looking pretty bad and unpolished, plus it'd be quite difficult for me to accomplish something like that.

 

[sixtyandaquarter]

The only way you could do that is if you went very old school Zelda like, where the sword was just there.  No real animation it just appeared.  You'd show the icon tagged to the weapon, and use some sort of flip or rotate based on character direction - so if all icons faced upwards, facing down would flip it horizontally.  Right would rotate it 90 degrees clockwise, facing left rotate it counter clockwise 90 degrees.  When facing up no rotation or flip.  Then you'd show the icon, and hide it away again.

Unless you set the icon to swivel or move in a pattern in the script, you'll have no animation.
No Sword.
Sword.
No Sword.
-as opposed to a fluent animation showing the sword fly out towards enemy and arch away... but what about different weapons, will they all follow the same set?  A bow an arrow - you won't swing the bow like a sword.  A whip or a rifle.  Now your having to do more work involved with the script when you put it in your game, then with the graphics.  To set the path of motion.

I know there would be other ways to do it, but just pointing out a major limitation with this one method.

This really screws up if you need a weapon that's longer or wider than the 32x32 icons, as well.  Not everyone will use this for RTP sized characters, if someone was using half kaizers or some other taller size, the icon is going to look funky.
Naturally if you don't mean "icon" but rather more like a picture -as in the show picture command, only scripted- then this last limitation is nulled.  The first one stays.

I actually like character sets.
I can have my giant herculean brute hold a big sword in one hand and swing it like a club.  Equipped to another character, weaker but still apt in power, hold it with two.  A weaker character almost looks like they're swinging at the knees, not being able to lift it up greatly, dragging it on the floor and sending little dust pellets off when they swing.  Etc.

 

[Ellie]

I toyed around with icons before - you could create a sort of... very basic animation using them, but it would only work for side view frames, like so:

(Crappy animation beware)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v108/ ... word-1.gif[/img]

I never got around to scripting it though.

All that is, is alternating side view walking sprites with the icon placed behind the player.

 

[Link in Pink]

Actually I prefer my abs to not show damage.
Call it old school but I liked going "okay that guy takes 3 hits, this one takes 2... and I can take 8".  Zelda set.  I have my hearts/hp/health bar - whatever you'd call it, and the enemies have their crap hidden.  I don't see that I caused "108" points of damage.  I don't see that I was hit for "402" points of damage.  I see that my health just dropped, I see that they blinked red, and thus I damaged them.

A sound effect for me getting hit.
A sound effect for them getting hit.
A sound effect for them getting hit but dealing no damage - you remember in old ABS games when you'd hit a shield or try to hurt something with the wrong weapon, there was a "ding" like you hit your sword to stone?  That was awesome.

It's old school but I really liked it.  And since your asking what "you", as in "I" look in an ABS I'm tossing it out there.  Most people hate that though - the pansies >

Well that saved me some typing.

I'm old school too, anything like a Zelda system would be great. Pixelmovement, 1 primary weapon, a secondary weapon from the menu, and the classic hearts health system.

 

[Ace of Spades]

Yeah, so icon animations are definitely out.  I'll probably eventually need the help of a spriter to work on some animations, but I'll start recruiting for that once I have a little more done.  I realize no one's going to want to make a bunch of animated sprites if they think they're going to waste, so I guess we'll see.

So I got the general consensus that everyone wants something simple, along the lines of zelda, and something easy to work with.  Does anyone else have any kind of input?  Anything else you guys might be looking for?

 

[Zekallinos]

If you can get a few ideas it would be always refreshing...not absolutely a whole new system, that's too risky, more like small stuff like some new kind of skills (that have a weird attack path, slow enemies (turtles?) that teleport you in front of them, I dunno...). Of course, that's only natural, but a good aspect to work in.

 

[Diaforetikos]

Hes an idea, more of a challenge really. Have a abs where you can use the arrow keys plus one of your attack buttons to do different moves. Kinda like a fighting game, but less combinations. [->] + [whatever key the attack button is] = different move. Idk, something along those lines. If your feeling ambitious, try adding those to magic attacks or something. Like I said, its more of a challenge.

Another idea would be to make a combo system. You have a simple set of moves and you and your allies can combine attacks to do combos. If your character is by itself, it could string its own moves together. This one is a toughy too, but it would be nice to see.

I just hate any battle system where I watch my gameplay instead of actually doing it. Thats why I loved Tales of Symphonia so much. The storyline sucked but very addictive gameplay.