For rocks, trees, bushes, etc., it should be worth taking a look at some of (Mega)Glest's CC-By-SA terrain assets. I might have a go at importing some of them into Blender for rendering, but don't hold me to that. Their ground textures are somewhat lackluster though.
> For example, the hero of this story is not The Chosen One.
I think it could be interesting for the chosen one to exist somewhere in the world. Perhaps he's a complete chump following in your foot steps after you've cleared the way, while taking all the credit for your accomplishments. Maybe you're following after him, making sure he can get the job done (spoiler: he can't). Maybe you have to find him to light a fire under his ass, and then you learn that he's worthless/unwilling so you have to save the world yourself. Maybe it turns out that the chosen one you're looking for is actually the bad guy. Maybe the chosen one is the real deal, but he's more messiah than fighter so you have to clear the way for him.
Going back to my previous idea about the storyline: There is a villain trying to steal the power of the gods. He has each of the elemental gods shackled in secret places, and their power radiates out to shape the surrounding area. The wood god's power causes the area to be a forest full of crazed hero-murdering ent monsters, etc. Since the evil guardians gain strength from the trapped god over time, the ones in the later dungeons are stronger than the earlier ones. The gods normally hold dominion over the elements, so the natural order is gone when they are chained. Tornadoes, droughts, tidal waves, and earth quakes ravage the land, and the hero has to help set things right. As the hero liberates more of the gods, the villain becomes desperate and captures the sun god to take his place. In the final act, the hero must ascend the sky bridge to the local version of Mount Olympus to slay the villain and restore light to the world.
The above paragraph assumes that the hero is working to restore the world to order, but an alternative motivation for the hero is that he is a fallen angel, a casualty of the villain's ascension to the divine throne, who seeks to kill the villain to reclaim divinity and free the gods to whom he is still loyal (or he could turn rogue and try to take the power for himself). The hero is stripped completely of power when cast out of the heavens, not even able to wield a simple dagger at first, but able to quickly regain staggering levels of power as he advances. Also, he respawns when he dies because you can't kill a divine being for very long. :)
Potentially, the boss of each area would be an already-occurring denizen, warped by the power of the chained god. Thus, the obvious choice for wood would be some ent-like creature, but I'd also be tempted to make it a bear or sasquatch, perhaps with a plant-like nature due to the divine presence. For the metal boss, my instinct would be a minotaur chief, perhaps turned into some kind of half-metal monster armed with a spiked chain. For the earth caves, I'd say the ant lion queen would be an obvious choice. For water, a shark or squid could fit, or monstrous merman. For fire... well, not many things live in volcanoes AFAIK but a scorpion or snake would go along with the desert theme. For the final sun-defeating boss, I'm reminded of beliefs and superstitions that say that eclipses are the result of a dragon devouring the sun, and dragons have significance in Chinese myth, so the villain could easily be a dragon or somehow identify with dragons.
> Physical attacks get stronger if you chain them, building up momentum. Maybe this could be a power of certain weapon types, so broadswords have this but rapiers have a different power (but same base damage).
Combos would be awesome! Of course, that's more animation and rendering to do, but I think it could help break up the monotony of downward slash, downward slash, downward slash...
Regarding cross-class balance, the battle mage (mental and physical) build is currently pretty useless because he has to choose between having a wand and having a sword. Maybe the wand should be equippable in the left hand as well, for dual-wielding á la Gandalf.
There seem to be a lot of FOSS games out there that put all their work into the engine and just expect artists to show up and work for them, so they end up programmed fairly well but with crap art assets. So yeah, I say working on art is probably the way to go.
Concept art can take many different forms. I think a lot of it depends on whether the concept is by the same artist who is going to make the finished asset. For example, I generally just do a rough sketch of what I'm going to make because I mostly have the idea in my head, but I need to work out the proportions and get a general idea if the idea looks good on paper or not. Also, some concept art is more of a general idea of an event, scenario, setting, or even game mechanic, rather than a blueprint for a particular art asset.
Both of these are concept art by the same artist for the same game, but very different from each other in style and function.
> To avoid spamming of the same attack, allow a recharge on powers.
I definitely agree with that one. Due to stun-lock, no melee enemy can touch a 2nd-level ranger one-on-one, and no mass of melee enemies can even get a hit against a character with the earthquake power.
For rocks, trees, bushes, etc., it should be worth taking a look at some of (Mega)Glest's CC-By-SA terrain assets. I might have a go at importing some of them into Blender for rendering, but don't hold me to that. Their ground textures are somewhat lackluster though.
http://glest.org/en/gallery-screenshots.php
http://megaglest.org/screenshots.html
> For example, the hero of this story is not The Chosen One.
I think it could be interesting for the chosen one to exist somewhere in the world. Perhaps he's a complete chump following in your foot steps after you've cleared the way, while taking all the credit for your accomplishments. Maybe you're following after him, making sure he can get the job done (spoiler: he can't). Maybe you have to find him to light a fire under his ass, and then you learn that he's worthless/unwilling so you have to save the world yourself. Maybe it turns out that the chosen one you're looking for is actually the bad guy. Maybe the chosen one is the real deal, but he's more messiah than fighter so you have to clear the way for him.
Going back to my previous idea about the storyline: There is a villain trying to steal the power of the gods. He has each of the elemental gods shackled in secret places, and their power radiates out to shape the surrounding area. The wood god's power causes the area to be a forest full of crazed hero-murdering ent monsters, etc. Since the evil guardians gain strength from the trapped god over time, the ones in the later dungeons are stronger than the earlier ones. The gods normally hold dominion over the elements, so the natural order is gone when they are chained. Tornadoes, droughts, tidal waves, and earth quakes ravage the land, and the hero has to help set things right. As the hero liberates more of the gods, the villain becomes desperate and captures the sun god to take his place. In the final act, the hero must ascend the sky bridge to the local version of Mount Olympus to slay the villain and restore light to the world.
The above paragraph assumes that the hero is working to restore the world to order, but an alternative motivation for the hero is that he is a fallen angel, a casualty of the villain's ascension to the divine throne, who seeks to kill the villain to reclaim divinity and free the gods to whom he is still loyal (or he could turn rogue and try to take the power for himself). The hero is stripped completely of power when cast out of the heavens, not even able to wield a simple dagger at first, but able to quickly regain staggering levels of power as he advances. Also, he respawns when he dies because you can't kill a divine being for very long. :)
Potentially, the boss of each area would be an already-occurring denizen, warped by the power of the chained god. Thus, the obvious choice for wood would be some ent-like creature, but I'd also be tempted to make it a bear or sasquatch, perhaps with a plant-like nature due to the divine presence. For the metal boss, my instinct would be a minotaur chief, perhaps turned into some kind of half-metal monster armed with a spiked chain. For the earth caves, I'd say the ant lion queen would be an obvious choice. For water, a shark or squid could fit, or monstrous merman. For fire... well, not many things live in volcanoes AFAIK but a scorpion or snake would go along with the desert theme. For the final sun-defeating boss, I'm reminded of beliefs and superstitions that say that eclipses are the result of a dragon devouring the sun, and dragons have significance in Chinese myth, so the villain could easily be a dragon or somehow identify with dragons.
> Physical attacks get stronger if you chain them, building up momentum. Maybe this could be a power of certain weapon types, so broadswords have this but rapiers have a different power (but same base damage).
Combos would be awesome! Of course, that's more animation and rendering to do, but I think it could help break up the monotony of downward slash, downward slash, downward slash...
Regarding cross-class balance, the battle mage (mental and physical) build is currently pretty useless because he has to choose between having a wand and having a sword. Maybe the wand should be equippable in the left hand as well, for dual-wielding á la Gandalf.
Yes, an "I'm using this" button would be nice, as well as a more standardized way of defining attributions. Maybe something like...
People who use this work must:
[] Only provide credit
[X] Provide credit and link back to OGA
[] Provide credit and link to another site (fill in the blank ____)
There seem to be a lot of FOSS games out there that put all their work into the engine and just expect artists to show up and work for them, so they end up programmed fairly well but with crap art assets. So yeah, I say working on art is probably the way to go.
Concept art can take many different forms. I think a lot of it depends on whether the concept is by the same artist who is going to make the finished asset. For example, I generally just do a rough sketch of what I'm going to make because I mostly have the idea in my head, but I need to work out the proportions and get a general idea if the idea looks good on paper or not. Also, some concept art is more of a general idea of an event, scenario, setting, or even game mechanic, rather than a blueprint for a particular art asset.
Both of these are concept art by the same artist for the same game, but very different from each other in style and function.
http://blog.wolfire.com/2008/12/concept-art-to-finished-asset/
http://blog.wolfire.com/2009/09/overgrowth-concept-poster/
> To avoid spamming of the same attack, allow a recharge on powers.
I definitely agree with that one. Due to stun-lock, no melee enemy can touch a 2nd-level ranger one-on-one, and no mass of melee enemies can even get a hit against a character with the earthquake power.
A little something I've had sitting on my hard drive for who knows how long: http://opengameart.org/content/low-poly-tower-glest
Sure, but credit goes to Onision, not to me.
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