Diadem of Maunstraut

[Holy_Diver]

In lieu of a "Diadem of Maunstraut" board, I'm making this thread for discussion...

Formalities aside, I'm thoroughly enjoying this game for the most part.

I could've waited to make this post, but I wanted to say one thing before I forgot about what seems to be a clipping bug (of which I'm sure there might be many, but nonetheless...)

This bug bit me particularly sorely because I ran into it after my first successful go thru the section of the earth realm which won me the earthen armor (exact name wanting) ...basically upon my exit I headed immediately for the save point just outside the cave, and in my eagerness I found myself fallen thru the hillside, and to make matters worse this soon resulted in my HP hitting 0 no less (apparently the default action once without solid fooding)

Normally this might not warrant fixing under such already buggy (and generally irreconcilable limitations) but being as it is right behind a save point, I suggest giving it a once over before your next release iteration (please)


I'm not sure I have any further technical complaints which do not seem indigenous to SoM itself. But I feel like for all the talk of great difficulty in the publishings surrounding DoM, though there is a fair dose of genuine challenge, much of it appears to be simply the product of giving great one-hit kill power to the monsters of DoM. It would be far more rewarding I think to somehow limit the ability of normal monsters to do so.

(In turn perhaps items could be made to delay the player before successive use inorder to return some damage potential to monsters)

In fact the later game is not so difficult at all due to the unlimited spawning of baddies and no exp leveling off. I realize it is probably difficult to balance the game, and SoM perhaps ties your hands in terms of growth formulae... but perhaps at least you could balance out the early stage of the game by doing something like letting the player start with a full set of knight armor. It is after all very heavy, and the astute player might decide to discard it for the leather armor for more freedom (at their own risk)

...

Furthermore it seems a bit paradoxical for a chosen champion of sword and magic on a quest for a king to begin completely naked without weapon or magic. Perhaps you should even begin with a holy endowed mace, and a significant attack spell (though the bullet would seem much)

To further balance that you could greatly increase the undead and bug population.

Another nice feature if possible might be to make the larger monsters more powerful. They do have a longer reach, but it would be nice if size always equaled a greater challenge. Also again the immediate respawning I think actually makes the game easier (not what you want if your goal is challenge)

edited: Also there are a number of errs and oversights in your online documentation (maps etcetera)

Just some thoughts, and probably not the last of them.

I realize SoM is probably a bit of a straight jacket (though I have a fairly thorough grasp of its capabilities -- ie. with little time in it's trenches) but it never hurts to share impressions. Plus btw, though I'd admit this is an unexpected place to say so, I think I'm in the impression to remake SoM according to open and state of the art standards, so come what may, someday you will probably have a chance to do virtually anything with DoM you could possibly imagine. So here's to the future~

PS: Great job! Can't wait to find out if I get to do battle with The Master Therion himself...

[Hguols]

Thanks for posting.  That's fine that you posted this here, I will not move it.  However, if someone else posts about DoM, it will more than likely get integrated into a single thread.  This thread will be their home...
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First off, thanks for the compliments on the game.  I expected heavy criticism, which I've gotten on many levels, and I attribute that to DoM being not only the first game I've ever made, but my first experience with any game-making editor.

...remaking the game, I would have done several things different, but that's just not looking possible at this time.  Who knows, a DoM 1.5 might surface one of these days....  to be honest, it was rushed in places, and overwhelming at times.  I blame my own ego for almost taking on an entire team's work....

I'm a musician first and foremost and this project was a bonus to the soundtrack, not to mention the ode' to King's Field and its fans.  ^_^

I apologize about the bug which plunges you to your death.  You're the first to tell me of it, but a fairly simple workaround would be to use the Fruit of the Healing Tree (or should you have it, the Staff to the Shadow's Abyss) upon starting to fall - to warp to safety.

If you've saved ala Ring of Salvation, join the growing group of people who had minimal hit points and saved mid monster's swing, or saved halfway down a pit....  ^_^

Granted you shouldn't have to work around bugs (mine and SoM's) and I hope you'll still be able to finish the game.  

As for the damage and difficulty, I've been told a rainbow of opinions on them.  A select few found the game too difficult to pass the first group of enemies.  Another group found it a pleasant experience at enemies making critical hits from the start.  More incentive not to get hit, right?  ...then of course, the hotshots that thought the game was too easy.

As for the story, that would probably be one of those "rushed" things.  Musician, game maker, story teller, potato juggler seems to be the hierarchy of best to worst in my recreational jack of trades abilities.
*_*

Thanks again for your input and I hope you stick around here.

[dmpdesign]

I realize SoM is probably a bit of a straight jacket (though I have a fairly thorough grasp of its capabilities -- ie. with little time in it's trenches) but it never hurts to share impressions. Plus btw, though I'd admit this is an unexpected place to say so, I think I'm in the impression to remake SoM according to open and state of the art standards, so come what may, someday you will probably have a chance to do virtually anything with DoM you could possibly imagine. So here's to the future~

PS: Great job! Can't wait to find out if I get to do battle with The Master Therion himself...

To remake SOM, @@.  Hehe, if you understand that thing on that kind of level, Im pretty certain I won't be of any use to you if you try to make some games with it.

All things aside though, I had my own opinions on DoM (as I am sure Tom recalls hehe) but I try to remember (now that I have tried making my own game more than ever!) that this was basically a one man operation, and that fact still floors me to this day.

All games made with this tool will have bugs, all the KF's themselves had some bugs ( I can show you if you like) but the game itself is very well made IMO.

As for the opinions, they are just that, and we all have em.  I am sure when I release DD, if anyone even bothers playing it hehe, that it will get criticized for TONS of bugs I already know exist and can't do anything about, that wont bother me, but as for the design of the game, its really up to the programmers opinions as to how it turns out.  

I didnt see eye to eye with Tom on some things on DoM, starting difficulty, low clip plane, but I figured what the hell, he made it as he saw fit, and its what he wanted..and I am lucky to get the chance to enjoy it :)  I feel that way about any game given the chance to nitpick, even the one I am making certainly doesnt satisfy me...but we all make sacrifices on some things to gain in other areas.

I guess what I am saying is, I hope no one dogs on my game too bad lol, and I will be very happy if its anywhere near as nice as DoM was.

[dmpdesign]

Tom, do you think there would be a good need of a DoM section on the forums?  With your walkthrough and maps I never really thought it would be worth having since anyone can get the info they need there, but I suppose there is always room for discussion.

[Hguols]

Nah.  I never intended DoM to have it's own forum.  I was hoping the maps and other stats on the site would answer a large amount of questions.

Any additional DoM posts, I'll just add them here.  This will be known as the Diadem of Maunstraut thread.  ^_^

[Holy_Diver]

I noticed yesterday playing DoM the draw distance appears to be obscured by drawing a successive number of black semi-transparent overlays to the screen. I could've sworn some of the Japanese SoM games I've played had hardware "fogging" happening, but it could've simply been an oversight on my part. I don't think hardware fogging would've been unheard of for DX for SoM at the time, but I could not say for certain.

I'm sorry to be so casual btw about remaking SoM (from scratch if I said so) ...it just happens I'm involved in developing some state of the art technologies and a SoM is actually a very simple demo of what exactly said tech is primarily designed to do. So it should be a happy marriage. I won't ever be making a SoM game with the original tool, but I will probably see that all of SoM's features are carried over... so unless I can farm off some very high level (ie. easy) programming work to someone else, I will probably become intimately familiar with SoM at that time. I have plodded thru just about every SoM screen however.... though I did have some display difficulties which John has been coaching me through. I'd hoped to be able to use Virtual PC (which I thought would also probably let me put SoM games in a window) but I found out late last night my Windows OS was not supported.

[dmpdesign]

SOM definitely has hardware fogging.  You choose the draw distance, and then a fraction of the draw distance to begin fog based on the color for the fog you choose.

[Holy_Diver]

Hmmm... there is no fogging in my DoM game. I don't know if the driver is using a fallback or what. Should DoM have hardware fog?

[dmpdesign]

Err, maybe I meant software fogging, but nonetheless it should have some fog I am pretty sure...though the game really just has a very low draw distance.

[Holy_Diver]

Fog is a very specific function pretty much always performed on hardware save for when everything is done in software. It's basically per pixel... so if you KF game is fogging the cutoff should appear very gradiated (per pixel) and round. The effect I'm seeing right now is straight (not round) and has only two or three gradiations.

I'm going to monkey with the system options some...