So Bad It's Good 2020 Game Jam

In this devlog(series?), I'll be recording my thoughts and process as I try to create something for the 'So Bad It's Good' game jam of 2020. This is not my first janky rodeo. I participated, but didn't submit, in the 2018 jam, but then turned around and won the 2019 jam with 'Out Of Order'. Out Of Order was a crappy retro fps throwback to the likes of Duke Nukem, with all the stupid one-liners and machismo, but with some self-awareness. I think it was a good starting point for a game, but was rushed as hell. Before the 2019 SBIG jam, I had no idea how to code AI, I had a hacked together system for switching weapons, and I knew how to do some basic modelling, animation and texturing. All of this combined for a pretty hacked together but kinda enjoyable experience.

Yeah, look at that beautiful art

This year, I'm following in the steps of some of my favourite developers, Arkane Studios and Obsidion Entertainment, by making a game in someone else's series. A fellow jammer, who shall remain unnamed, has been teasing the rest of us on the SBIG jam discord for years now with a possible sequel to his 2017 game Ja Wíźàrdmäñ 4: Legacy of Riveiera. Since he appeared to be taking his time, I took initiative and decided to make my own sequel. With blackjack, and hookers!

I joked a bout initially making a soft reboot, in the vein of Thief 2014, Fallout 3,  and the first Witcher game (I know it's a stretch but Geralt wakes up with a lot of amnesia and stuff). This idea would work well for crafting my own plot and gameplay, I could just ignore the entirety of the original game.

I also kicked around the idea of a disappointing sequel, like Resident Evil 6, The Last Jedi, and the last 3 seasons of Game Of Thrones. This I think could be pretty funny, especially if that other guy ever tries to make a sequel. Not only would I ignore the original game, but I would take it and twist the events and characters into something that doesn't resemble itself and ends up being very disappointing.

The final idea I thought of was a fan-made mod, based off an entirely different game. This would give the game an interesting charm, I've always loved ambitious mods. I can't tell you how many hours I've pumped into various total conversions or overhauls for Mount & Blade, Total War and STALKER.

After having a couple weeks to think it over though, I think my game will be a weird mix of the three. I have ideas to expand on the lore of the first game and incorporate it's plot in some way, so I don't want to throw out all of it. I definitely want to change the gameplay though, which I'll talk about later. I still love elements of the fan-made mod idea, it's allows for more janky and crappy jokes which is never a bad thing. As for what the game will actually be, I will only truly find out once I figure out how much time I have to make it.

I think of myself as a "kitchen sink" developer, as described by the great Warren Spector, I develop games by taking a big slab of marble and cutting off the pieces that don't fit until I have something that resembles a finished game. So with that said, lets break out that slab of marble!

As it was with Out Of Order, I use game jams to force myself to improve my development skills and possibly make something coherent. It's a similar idea to the various "X Year" plans implemented in various Communist countries during the  20th century. Except with less starvation and systemic oppression.

This time, I have a few ideas of where I'd like to improve:

Melee Combat

I've tried melee combat a couple times before, the first was for a game I was working on for the Vampire: The Masquerade game jam held last year. It was basically Oblivion level combat where you can block, attack and strong attack. In Out Of Order I added a punch attack that did little to nothing in damage, so there was no point in using it.

Since then, I've played a lot of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, and once I got used to it, I loved the melee combat system. With all the combos and masterstrikes you can perform, by the late game you can wreck anyone in a duel. The one drawback of the system, is that if you fight more than two guys at a time you're in big trouble. while you're locked onto one guy, the other two run up in your face or behind you. Once they start smacking you they don't stop, they never fucking stop.

I like the ability to lock on though, it makes smaller fights feel like a cool duel. It also avoids the wild swinging around that seems to happen in my other major inspiration for my melee system: Mount & Blade: Warband.

This system is more disorienting, but in my experience has been better for fighting multiple enemies. This seems to be mostly due to the fact that weapons can swing wider. Well, there's also the fact that there's a third person mode, which most people play in. But I don't plan to use a third person mode in my game, I instead see a chance to get some good out of both systems.

KCD's combat relies more on waiting for your enemy to attack so you can block them with a masterstrike, whereas in M&B, you can eventually hack your way through an enemy by swinging enough. I prefer the more active style of M&B, but I like the smoothness of KCD. What if, I could replicate M&B's directional swinging and blocking, but add the ability to lock on to a target like in KCD? That could be cool, and would be MUCH easier than trying to replicate KCD's system.

In keeping with being a parody of The Witcher, a system of adding poison or oils onto the blade before battle could be added. And maybe the player will have to drink a bunch of potions before a fight so they can enhance their speed, strength or max health. Or maybe another chunk needs to be taken off that slab.

Dialogue

I've been working on various ideas for dialogue systems for the past two years, but they've never really seen the light of day. Since I am making a sequel/soft reboot/fanfic of an RPG, I figure there's no better time to implement it than now. My ideal dialogue system would be able to handle a wide variety of parameters and consider the players attributes and inventory. The best example is something like the dialogue system used in Fallout: New Vegas.

I seriously need to finish this game again

Skills can be used to unlock unique paths, loot and depending on the quest can provide completely different outcomes. It also checks your perks, faction reputation, and even if you've completed certain actions during the story, like killing Caesar. However, since our hero is a witcher hexer, perhaps he should have the ability to use his black magic on people during dialogue, like in another famous RPG.

Ok, I'm definitely letting my ideas get away from me, let's shave the marble slab down a bit. While perks, magic and unrelated story events would be too much work, item, quest and perhaps skill checks is within reason. Here's a sample of an XML dialogue file, with the structure that's currently being used:

The system I'm putting in place requires parsing an XML file for its various tags and assigned values. So for a check requiring 300 gold, I could add a tag in the dialogue option, something like: "<goldRequired>300</goldRequired>". I already got a similar idea  working for voice lines to play alongside NPC dialogue, so it can be done.

Another major part of working with the dialogue system is actually having a story. Out Of Order had no story really, you spawn with a gun and start shooting. And for as fun as making the cutscenes was, it was time consuming. So by writing out a few XML files, I could get 10x the story, with perhaps similar or slightly more effort.

The dialogue is also where the mod idea comes in, because something I loved about eurojank games like STALKER and EYE: Divine Cybermancy is the poor translation. It gave the games this hilarious absurdity that you don't get in a lot of western games. So I thought it would be interesting to replicate that by taking all the dialogue, google-translating it into Russian, and then back into English. I have tried it before and the results were usually pretty good.

Quests

I've never implemented an objectives or questing system before. The closest I've achieved to that is making the game end when you kill the final boss in Out Of Order. I want something more complicated than that though. This ties in with my desire for more a narrative this time around, but I want players to actually progress through the game, and perhaps in a non-linear fashion.

I've thought about the ways of doing this, and I thought perhaps we could tie it perfectly into multiple endings with fairly little effort. In adding onto the lore of the original Ja Wizardman, I thought of having two major warring factions. The "Loyalists" who are loyal to Emperor Emperor, the previous ruler of Targareya who was deposed in a coup. And the "Federal Legion", a group of evil looking people who are your stereotypical evil empire types, looking like evil roman legionaries. Oh, and they're led by Donald Trump who usurped power from Emperor Emperor, and the loyalists are basically a bunch of lefties, Democrats, and anarchists. Which will mean some interesting cameos, but of whom I wonder...