Gladiator: Road to the Colosseum (Out Now!)

Well back in the day @Vendetta did this with a custom system, @Havenstone included a skip chapter feature for testing, but that code itself was extremely buggy took away character customization and caused a fair amount of headaches.
I think designing a custom save system would be the best bet. There is a save plugin on Dashingdon too, I believe but those are soft saves that still get wiped on browser/cookie resets.

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I know the Rebellion game which has been testing for the last year or so had options at the beginning to start at a certain chapter. So skipping ahead is definitely possible.

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@idonotlikeusernames @chrisbat
Well, skipping chapters is definitely possible using the *goto_scene function. The issue is really how to carry over the saves for each player. For now I only have a soft save that wipes when you close the tab. And also, it doesn’t carry over from game to game.

One way I can think of is to auto-generate a code at the end of the game for the player to copy and key in at the start of the next update. For example 13245 would mean option 1, option 3, option 2, option 3 and option 5 in that order. So yes it would be a really long number by the end of it, but this will be generated for the tester and can be copy/pasted.

The issue is, I don’t think ChoiceScript has a splice function (the opposite of concatenation) so I don’t know if it is possible.

The next alternative is to get the player to key in stats manually. But with the number of variables I’m looking at… I think it might be best not to. What are your thoughts? Do yall think it is important to skip right to the new content as the WIP progresses (perhaps playing as a random character). Or would you be willing to click through the portions that you have played before.

I know the demo for Community College hero 2 asks you a short series of questions to adjust your stats to decisions you made previously. That may be a possibility.

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I think this would be quite a good option. I’ll play around with it after I’m done with the chapter! Thanks @chrisbat :smile:

Also, shoutout to @RETowers for tagging this topic. Much thanks :smile:

As @idonotlikeusernames correctly recalls, it is possible to develop a beta testing system to achieve your aims. In our case it involved a separate website, a database, some clever code in a ‘proper’ programming language, and a not-inconsiderable amount of time & effort… Is it a practical (or even necessary) solution for most Choice Game authors? Probably not.

Most make do with either “soft saves”, which are of course only useful for a single session but can still be a great benefit to play-testers, or make use of the excellent smPlugin.js by @CJW, which is fully supported by dashingdon.com. This uses a browser’s LocalStorage so saves can persist between sessions, provided that no changes are made to game files up to the point of the latest save. If or when such a change is made, it will usually break all existing saves.

It would take a bit of doing, but it’s certainly an intriguing alternative. This topic might provide the functionality you’re looking for?

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One game I have beta tested uses this feature and it works ( almost every time ) and that was one of the coolest thing of that game

The second one uses something slightly different as that game saves the values of the variables ( obviously encrypted ) to give us a password which we can use anytime we play to get to some specific points in the game ( sort of checkpoint ) I have asked the author that how they do it and he told me how to but I wasn’t able to replicate the thing ( I think I should try it one more time )

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Will we be able to pick what weapons we can use in the ring.

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@Vendetta
Thank you for sharing. It seems to me like this is an ongoing issue and there’s no one easy fix for it. The smPlugin.js by @CJW has been really helpful and it is what I am using now but I find that most of the time, there will be changes to the game files up to the point of the save because things like typos and bugs might come up, or things might change to make the entire story more cogent.[quote=“Vendetta, post:195, topic:26462”]
It would take a bit of doing, but it’s certainly an intriguing alternative. This topic might provide the functionality you’re looking for?
[/quote]
This is extremely helpful. I will see if I could device something with it. Thank you so much!

@DUNGEON_MASTER
Wow that sounds like a really good system to emulate. Do you mind pointing me towards these games? Or perhaps share the code that goes into the save system?

@Arcane_warrior
It depends on the type of fight, as well as some political events. Over the course of the game, players will slowly get more proficient with certain weapons. But some fights would impose certain restrictions that cause the player not to be able to use his weapon of choice.

One big factor might also be the kind of backing you get. If you were a no-name fighter who was sent as fodder against a crowd favourite, you might be stripped of your weapons and armour (this would be the worst-cased, politically triggered event - perhaps you angered your owner or trainer) but if you win, it will be much more awesome and people would love you. On the flip side, if you were a popular and famous gladiator, you would get to bring in your favourite weapons and armour.

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One is the upcoming CoG game - Unmasked ( bookmark feature )
And the other one doesn’t have any name ( yet ) it’s by grapefruit - the author of magikiras ( password feature )

Bookmark feature provides more freedom to save because you can save at any given point in story

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One thing worth bearing in mind, when making minor changes to existing files, is that save systems tend to work on line number. If the changes you’re making don’t change the actual line number of the save / reload point (e.g. by removing an unnecessary blank line for each new line of code added) then the chances are it won’t break existing saves.

Not much use when making substantial changes, of course, but useful to remember for minor bug fixes and the like.

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@DUNGEON_MASTER
Thanks for the links! I really appreciate it :smile:

@Vendetta
Oh wow alright. That is definitely new information to me. Thank you so much for the pointer!

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No problem @nauhziy but they aren’t links they are ideas and features created by creative minds merely mentioned by me

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@DUNGEON_MASTER
Haha no worries. I’ll see if I can emulate what you have talked about :smile:

Now that sounds awesome

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@Arcane_warrior
Haha I hope the implementation is as good as it sounds!

Hi guys, I have uploaded the play-testing Player Code feature, which essentially allows you to carry your character across various play-throughs and updates! (Whuttttt) In terms of content, Chapter 3 is still very much in the works (boooo), (but you might be able to unlock it if you are persistent enough :wink: But… you have been warned.)

Anyway, if any of you are willing to be my guinea pigs, do try out the play-test Player Code feature. Essentially, it generates a code that you can copy at the end of each chapter. So copying that code and entering it at the start of the game allows you to skip the chapter and retain all your stats, traits and decisions! Pretty neat huh.

I would love for you guys to give it a try and let me know if it works/fails for you! That way, I can make sure that future play tests and demos won’t bore you guys with old content (as long as you save the code somewhere hahaha)

Check it out here:
https://dashingdon.com/go/1476

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I can’t play after the first auto save, there is an error that doesn’t allow me to continue.

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Apologies, in my excitement I forgot to initialize the plugin :frowning: Thanks for the heads up! Fixed :smile:

Hi. So I was somewhat bored and decided to fiddle with the player code. This was the result-


Basically you can change the code to get crazy stats. This is technically cheating of course, but people might try it. Maybe you could make the code more, uh, complex?

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