Hybrid game (Link's Awakening + Lost Vikings 2)

[Diarandor]

Greetings! I'm working on a solarus game where you can control 3 heroes that have different abilities and weapons, and switch between them using the menu (or pressing space bar if they are in the same map). I have not worked much on the plot, but I will explain now a bit about the gameplay.

The main heroes will be:

-An archer, the only one who can jump over holes (and water and lava), and has a bow with wooden arrows, a crossbow with metal quarrels, a shovel (that can be used to obtain metal quarrels from the ground and the usual uses), a sickle that can be used to obtain wooden arrows from certain plants (which unlike the sword, cannot cut solid plants), running boots (that can be used with the ability of jumping), etc.
-A swordsman, the only one who can swim on water, and uses short range weapons like a sword, spear, shield, a magneto (that can be used to deflect the metal quarrels a certain angle, and other uses), etc.
-A mysterious wizard (with short range spells) who has lost his memory, that can throw fire (to burn plants, or to combine it with the arrows of the archer to produce fire arrows), throw electricity (which paralizes enemies, turns on machines, hurts water-type enemies, and also can be combined with metal quarrels to electrify them), swimming in lava, mind reading of npcs (and even the other heroes), teleporting all heroes to the entrance of the dungeon or certain place of the map, etc.

I have also finished the scripts to change control between heroes, but it remains to make the menu to change between them from different maps. In maps where one of the main heroes is left, the position and state of everything must be saved to avoid solid entities to reappear overlapping some hero (this is necessary, but easier than it seems).

Also, I made a script to carry custom entities (although I still have to solve some problems and improve it). These portable entities can be thrown from one hero to another (useful if there is a hole or thin wall between heroes, or if they are moving in platforms, etc). Keys will be custom entities that will be carried, which is something unusual, and will allow to make enemies that steal the key, or annoy in other different ways (like changing the color of the key, but I don't want to give more spoilers). A key will open only a door of its color. There could also be magnetic keys (to use the magneto with them), and other types. Some portable items can be used to push buttons, and they are always moved by platforms.

The symbol of the game will be a clover (instead of the triforce), there will be secret clovers in the island that can be collected for something good to happen (like the secret seashells in Link's awakening), and a dark/light magic clovers which will be part of the main plot.

There are huge possibilities for the puzzles in a game like this. But the hardest part will be to design the island (not the dungeons), since sometimes the heroes will need to take different paths to arrive to the same place, and other times you can cross some road if you take two or all the heroes at the same time in that way (cooperation between them is needed). There will be parts of the game when you don't have the three heroes (at the begining you only have one of them). Etc.

This are the main ideas for my game. This is maybe too ambitious, but it is possible, and the hardest part of the scripting is almost done, although it still remains to make most of the graphics and start making all the maps and dungeons. I would be grateful if someone wants to cooperate with this project or contribute with some more ideas.

[Zeror]

Make the change cost something that can run out. This way you can create puzzles with the change alone. That with the combination of puzzling with using the the right items can make really hard puzzles.

Sound like a cool idea.

[Diarandor]

If you mean that changing the hero should cost something that can run out, that would be a pain, and probably unnecesary...

Anyway, you have given me an idea about changing, not exactly the hero, but in chains of changing (trading) objects in the game (which is typical from Zelda games). I could make some areas accessible for some heroes so that it will make necessary to interchange objects from one hero to another (this will be done using the menu), since the hero that obtains the item in the trade cannot access the area for the new trade.

EDIT: I think I understand now what you meant. (Something like in Zelda Navis Quest with the tradings, I suppose.) But that is more an annoyance than a puzzle...

[Diarandor]

I made a very silly video to show the carrying system of custom entities that I have scripted and show a bit of what will be the game. (It's just a bunch of test maps, with no dungeon or puzzle.) I think this game will take me at least 5 years of work (I am replacing all the ALTTP resources by others made by me, and that is too much work for one person), so be patient.

You can watch it here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iY-yckilRrg

PS: sorry for my English if it is terrible and if the quality of the video is not too high.

[wizard_wizzle (aka ZeldaHistorian)]

This looks like a really cool idea! And it appears you've gotten a lot of the difficult custom scripting done, so great work! I look forward to trying this one out.

[YoshiMario2000]

I saw the video, Everything looks great, Other that the obvious bugs.
Also, I have a small problem with the clashing tilesets and characters.
But that's just personal preference.

I look forward to it's release!

[Diarandor]

I still have nothing playable, but the new things done are:

Customized half of the HUD: there appears a bag of money instead of the usual rupee, which appears when you pick some money and disappears in 2 seconds (I prefer to hide it since the money is not important information). Also I made custom hearts, which appear with a beat effect in the hud (which is cool). I also made pickables for the hearts, heart containers and money. The money are no longer rupees, but what I call ore drops (pieces of ore) of different colors similar to the rupees (the ore drop with value 1 is the malachite ore, which is green like the normal rupee, etc).

On the script part, I can now also switch hero from the menu. This works also if the new selected hero is in a different map (the action button switching only works for heroes in the same map). Also, some custom entities I made, which I call portable entities (they can be carried but not destroyed when thrown), can be carried by heroes to other maps, etc. Also, several types of entities, like independent entities (which can be left alone and reappear when coming back to the map), and companions that follow you between maps if some condition is satisfied (I made a silly one which works), etc. I also customized my dialog box, also allowing to show a sprite of the npc or hero who is talking.

I will be improving my code and solving bugs for some time. But now I will be mainly working on the graphics, making some tilesets and a small part of the world. I want to replace all Zelda sprites and tilesets for my own ones, but this will take many months of hard work.

[Diarandor]

New video showing more features and things.
This video contains spoilers!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFBOuENNbIY&feature=youtu.be

[MetalZelda]

That poor cat  ...

Though, I'm really impressed by the progress so far, hope to see more .

[Diarandor]

@MetalZelda: Thanks a lot! Although there are still too many things to do. The general idea of the game is to have 3 different short stories to choose at the begining, one with each hero. These stories could be played in any order, and even simultaneously. When you complete all the short begining stories, the three heroes will join for a common goal (maybe to save the world and that kind of things), then the switching heroes mechanics will be enabled (and then the most interesting part of the game will begin).

Since I am working alone, this project may take between 6 and 10 years of work, but I am doing this as a hobby so that does not matter, and I am very obstinate so I think I will finish this someday. I plan to make a 256 x 256 island (like in LA), and to use Chtulhu as the end boss, so there could be crazy things. I will try to release the first demo before the end of next summer, which will be a silly level where you get the first weapon (obviously the sword), and the most important thing: there will be some cats to rescue . Of course, there will be original puzzles and enemies that can be killed without the sword.

Next future work:

-Make the initial menu to choose savegame, and for each savegame choose a story between the three heroes.
-Create sprites, redraw the main heroes, and draw more and more sprites, including grounds and some enemies...
-Choose a title for the game (this is harder than it seems... )
-Write part of the plot with details, and program/draw the starting story of the swordsman hero. (Maybe I will skip this for now.)
-Re-program the menus: first menu for the inventory of weapons and some info (like the money you have), the second one for non-weapon items (the ones that can be interchanged between heroes) and other options like saving the game and switching between heroes, and the third menu for the maps.
-Make the first level and a small part of the island near the beach.

[MetalZelda]

This is ambitious, take your time, Rome was not built in a day 
I also do like all these little details that you put here and there (the raft)
Wish you good luck for your project 

[Christopho]

Very nice project
Where do the hero sprites come from? Did you make them yourself?

[Diarandor]

@Christopho: Yes, I drew them almost two years ago, when I was still learning how to draw sprites. I now have more experience, so I can improve them a bit and finish some remaining animations to do. All graphics of the video, except the weapon part of the hud (that will be made too), are original and made by me.

[Christopho]

Ok, very good work then!

Would you be okay to allow reuse of your hero sprite for the official sample quest of Solarus? With a creative commons license?
Because we are having huge difficulties to gather a coherent non-Zelda set of sprites for the hero and some NPCs, and your hero sprite with a sword is just what I am dreaming of!

[Diarandor]

@Christopho: Yes, you can use them . I will have to upload all my art and sprites to my repo (I will do it before summer, probably for the next month).

The art license I am using currently for the graphics, sounds and music is: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).

If someone else wants to use some of my art, it is necessary to keep the original license and give credit to me. I might change the license in the future for a commercial one (which would allow people to sell a game that uses my graphics), but not yet. If someone wants to use my graphics I recommend to ask to me first.