Happy December everyone. I’d like to official announce my next game I am working on is Daemonglass!
It has been over a century since a daemon roamed the streets of London. As one of the children from one of the few daemon-hunting bloodlines, your only dealings with the daemonic have been theoretical, and you can’t help but wonder why your parents trained you to fight an enemy that hadn’t appeared in more than twice your lifetime. Your childhood lost practising for a hypothetical event you believed would never occur. But then everything goes wrong, and during your final test, a Tier-Three Daemon escapes, taking four other daemons with it. With your parents incapacitated, it falls upon you to track them down and recapture the daemons. You can work alone, with your mentor, friend or rival. Rely on your knowledge of runes and daemonlore to assist you on your quest to seal the daemons away. You can hunt down the four lesser daemons in any order you choose, but you should be careful because the longer a daemon resides in our realm, the stronger it becomes. Then, once you have finally sealed all four, you may turn your attention to the Tier-Three Daemon that caused this mess.
I’ve finished Chapter One which is about 22,000 words which you can play through here
You might be familiar with this project if you’ve been on the forums for awhile as an older version of this game was my NaNoWriMo project for 2017 but the current version is revised and is better and benefits from the differences between Matthew2017 who originally started it and the older (maybe wiser?) Matthew2023.
Feedback I am after;
Feedback on the general concept.
Feedback on the story itself - the world, the NPCs and the daemons.
Spelling and Grammar mistakes (I’m writing this in my own British English but am using CSIDE that seems to be locked in US English so I’m expecting something to slip past my checks).
Pronoun issues - are you getting referred to by the wrong gender.
Suggestions for options that you wish you had.
I also want to expand on the gender choices so suggestions and feedback on what you would like to see would be most appreciated. I’d especially like suggestions on where best to put a choice that allows a player to get the option to switch genders mid-game (a genderfluid MC) I want it to fit naturally in the story and then I can code it so if you are happy with a single gender you only have that option once then it won’t reappear but if you want the choice then it will appear (I am currently leaning towards offering the choice every time the MC wakes up or at the start of each chapter maybe).
Enjoy and I’m looking forward to hearing from you. I hope you enjoy the revised world of Daemonglass…
Well, since you can do them in any order, you can’t really have a coherent character arcs for anyone involved without having to change what happens with other daemons almost entirely depending on the order you do them in (and while that would be cool, it would also be a massive undertaking).
And since you’re probably in an emergency situation until they are all caught, it probably won’t allow for much down time or smaller stuff to deal with while reader catch his breath from beating one daemon before going to another.
[quote=“Dragomer, post:5, topic:145639”]
Well, since you can do them in any order, you can’t really have a coherent character arcs for anyone involved without having to change what happens with other daemons almost entirely depending on the order you do them in (and while that would be cool, it would also be a massive undertaking).[/quote]
The Daemon encounters will change depending on when you are taking them on. Hosts can change, more people could get hurt or involved with the daemons etc.
It is an emergency situation but it does take time for someone to locate each Daemon. So when I wrote it originally back in 2017 it worked out to one Daemon each month which does allow for downtime and smaller stuff.
Not to mention that the main Daemon will pop up throughout the game up until you finally defeat them.
Thanks for clarifying and I hope I’ve answered clearly for you.
Just wrote 2200 words tonight just devoted to drawing a conditional attack rune sequence against a daemon.
Fun things to note:
You can decide what triggers the rune (or even to not trigger it).
It is up to you whether you are trying to kill the host or save them.
If the daemon escapes if your are with someone Haven or Emery will stop them for you (one fatally the other trying to save the host)
The shape of your anima affects how the attack rune works as will the moment you trigger it.
It’s been a productive evening and it was fun writing it. Will work on the defensive rune next which should be just as fun to write. I am really happy with adding a conditional rune because it allows the player to decide to trigger it
For example; does your barrier trigger as soon as the daemon throws a punch or do you wait to block a different attack or do you use it to stop the daemon from fleeing etc.
I am curious of how people read into how runes work in this. Anima and by extension the Luminal Essence is non-elemental and has no distinct shape. Which is why Weavers (the wip name to replace Enchanter) have to visualise it as an element to make it easier to weave.
This means that it a player chooses their LE to take on the shape of fire, it will look like and move like flames but it will not be actual fire.
I’m trying to make sure that is how it reads in-game but I’m not sure how well I am doing in that regard.
I didn’t feel mentally well this morning. A lack of sleep and lots of my mind racing through my thoughts was a bad combination but I still went to work as I didn’t want to be left at home to my thoughts. So overall not a great day.
However, one positive from today is I randomly solved the issue I was having with the current rune system. So I’ve been going over Chapter One and should be able to update the demo of chapter one over the weekend.
But the new system is Anima and Luminal Essence will remain as an unstable and formless non-elemental energy. To make it easier to control a weaver visualises the energy as either a solid energy, a fluid energy or a gaseous energy.
Which will show in the type of rune you use. For example using Haven as an example, your mentor visualises their Luminal Energy as a Solid form of energy.
Haven can use an attack rune which results in a thick line of energy (which could end sharp if they want a fatal attack or blunt for a non fatal attack.
They can use a defence rune which would result in a solid wall of energy,
An enhancement would take on a form of a hardened “armour” around Haven offering them protection (the MC can have a similar bulky armour or one that is more thinner offering agility or a middle-ground between them).
Your friend Emery however prefers to see their Luminal Essence as a fluid energy.
Their attack runes result in a stream/jet/wave of energy.
While their defence rune would result in pool of energy that could wash away an attacker,
And their enhancement rune results in them becoming more streamlined allowing them to be faster than usual.
I just need to refine how controlling the Luminal Essence as a gas would work, currently it will revolve around creating storm-like results
I’ve not really written much due to whats been going on with my health but I finally felt focused enough to do some writing over the weekend. Unfortunately I’ve hit a road block. I can cleary think of how a solid energy could be used for attacking, defending and enhancing the user. Same for a fluid energy but it is the gas energy which I am struggling with atm. I was leaning towards it basically being altering particles in the air causing storm like results. But its just not working right and feels like it doesn’t work like the other two do.
Has anyone got any suggestions for how it could work? I’m nearly leaning towards scrapping “gas” and coming up with something else (such as lightning/electricity) but I want to give Gas another chance.
For the record to help runes can be instantaneous, delayed or conditional and can be used to attack, defend of enhance the user. For example solid can create spears or fists of solid energy, it can create a solid wall of energy to defend or even create an armour to enhance the users defence.
I think I have some ideas(I just looked at the description and never played the game before)
Instead of just altering particles in the air, what about having it so you could solidify the gas temporarily, creating barriers or platforms for defense or strategic positioning.
Another idea is:
Using the gas to distort light and sound, creating realistic illusions to confuse or deceive opponents.
Instead of storms, try more precise manipulation of air currents.
eg. creating blasts of wind, forming air blades, or even using air pressure to push or crush opponents.
OR
Consider the manipulation of air pressure. Try compressing or expand air in specific areas, creating vacuum pockets for defense or high-pressure zones for attack.
Continuing with the ideas:
What about having the ability to compressed and then released explosively.
and well I don’t know about this one
what about enhancing the player’s physical abilities by pushing air through their body at hyper speeds, granting short bursts of super-human strength and speed.
These are some neat ideas. Actually the enhancement I was actually using arm was breathing the energy into your lungs to amplify your physical ability.
