16 player chars?? and help??

[Corey]

... ohh I really didn't know where to post this. I'm very sorry if this is the wrong place so please change if it isn't.


OK, Like some people on this forum my know, I'm a big fan of: "Stephen King's IT". Ever since I found out about AGS I wanted to make an 2d Adventure game about IT. But lately I was thinking: "Hey then I would need like 16 player chars+it will be an awfull lot of work...". So I was wondering:

- Is 16 player characters even possible or isn't there any limit??

- If I ever going to make this it will be one of the biggest AGS made adventures (atleast i think so). So will anyone help 
  me create it??

Hmmm that's about all I gues.

thnx in advance 

[voh]

16 player characters? That would just, imho, be annoying. Multiple characters is a fun feature - but with 16 characters you won't be able to get any character development/game time with any of the characters.

Especially since I doubt you'll be making a game with more than 5 hours of gameplay :p

[TheYak]

It seems more practical to either divide up the storyline into short games.  Granted, that would make for 16 games, but you'd be able to recycle backgrounds, learn & improve graphics & puzzles as you went.  Or, there's always the focus on one person, use cutscenes for the others.

[Corey]

Read or see IT and you'll understand both things aren't really possible, thought splitting the story up might be a solution but i would still need like 5 characters

thnx for the quick reply's anyway 

[voh]

With 16 characters, make 4 parts - one part has 4 characters.

If you play your cards well, you can play with suspense and climax a lot with these parts.

[Mugs]

I've never seen it, but, do you REALLY need to play all 16 characters. Is there that many main characters?

[MrColossal]

have you made an AGS game yet? If not, don't try to make the biggest ags game yet with 16 playable characters.

[Elliott Hird]

Just a note - I'm really good with scripting (imho), so if you need help, I'll be REALLY more than happy.
Thanks.

[esper]

I happen to like IT myself.. not because it's a scary movie (it's actually good for a chuckle about the level of crappiness nvolved) but because I enjoy the camraderie between Steven King's characters. SK, BTW, has never yet released a "scary" title.

i wonder, having read AND sen IT, exactly why you need 16 PC's. There are only... what, six main characters? And doesn't one of them die? What are you going to do, have it so you can play everybody

Playing as all the main characters wouldn't be too bad. It might actually be REALLY fun, in the case of an IT game where the characters are well-written and easy to identify with. However, like Mr. C. said, you will NEVER complete this if it is only your first game. And, you only need to do, like, 5 characters.

[Ashen]

Yeah, where do the 16 characters come from? Admittedly it's been a while since I read 'It' - longer since I saw the mini-series - but I can only remember 7 main characters (backed up by the IMDb entry). I guess you play them as kids, and as adults - but even so that'd be 14, and then only if you're being pedantic ...

Perhaps you could split them into groups, with only 1 or 2 playable characters, and the rest following as controlable NPCs. You'd maybe have to take a few liberties with the story - but you're going to have to do that anyway, to turn it into a playable adventure (rather than a 'click at the right time to watch the next scene' interactive book kind of thing).

(16 playable character wouldn't be a problem as far as AGS is concerned but,as has been said, it might get confusing for player & programmer.)

[PsychicHeart]

this could be a little bit of a pain in the ass, but if you do one game, then release a "patch" sort of thing at your own pace, each containing, say 2 or 3 chars. ?
I'm just thinking though, is that possible without having to download the WHOLE game every time you download the "patch"?
Cheers,
FB.

[vict0r]

(it's actually good for a chuckle about the level of crappiness nvolved)

Personally i dont see why anyone would make a game about "IT" but do as you like. And why would you need to play everyone? This would only confuse the player.

[InCreator]

That's like 16 walkcycles? times three = 48?
And 48 talking animations?

So if each walkcycle has 6 frames and talkcycle has 4 frames, it's 480 frames to draw. That's only walk and talk, this is too little of animation for a game, anyway.

I bet it becomes hard, pointless work instead of joy of creating at some point. So you get stressed, tired and drop the project.

And it'll be weird if there's less NPCs than players. And NPCs need animations too! So...

You're crazy.

[TheYak]

If you're bound and determined to do this on a first outing, have you considered first-person?  No characters to animate and might even engross a person in the storyline more.  A portrait change in the GUI and - voila!

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Not all the characters in IT 'need' to be playable for the game to succeed.  Even just one- William Denbrough- would be enough as long as the other main players react to what is happening around them like in the story.  The key here isn't so much about the player taking control of them to make them seem real as you as the creator having the characters do things.  Since Bill is definitely the focal character of the story it would make sense for the player to take control of him with the other characters reacting around him and the possibility that you can take control of them for special scenes.

[MillsJROSS]

To answer his questions. Yes it is possible to have 16 characters in AGS. While it would be an enormous task to undertake, making graphics as well as just the game itself. Like most people have suggested, it's generally a good idea to start out with a small game, and work from there.

And while I'm too busy to help, I'm sure you'll find the help you need.

Good luck!

-MillsJROSS

[Corey]

Well this was my idea actually:

In the beginning you start with Bill as a kid. Then you will have to let Georgie get killed by Pennywise. Then the Playerchar changes to Ben (the kid) and so on until you had all the kids. After that you PC will be Billy again and with the "lucky seven" you 'defeat' Pennywise.

Then my plan was to make it then same in the 2nd part but then with adults ( but i made a terrible mistake  then i'll need 14 characters and not 16) 


But you are all right i gues, I must be crazy making such massive game while I didn't any game before.

and hmmm 1st person?? well I dunno... It could be but I dunno if it would fit with style.

anway thnx for the comments and help!! 

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

It's a doable project, but you have to take a lot of things into consideration.

First of all, as has been said, you should divide it in smaller parts. You're lucky in that the book actually allows you to do this to some degree - although some things are more global, lots of it can be broken down into simple sequences, such as, "Ben leaving school going to the library, getting out and getting chased, and meeting Richie and Will".

You should also be very careful. As much as it seems like a book may instantly be a good game, it needs careful planning. A book is not interactive; a game is. Reak "Gabriel Knight - Sins of the Fathers" to see how the book can end up reading like a game walkthrough. "The Beast Within" book was a MUCH better adaptation game-to-book. Similarly, if you make a game out of a book, you severely risk having the equivalent of Captsone's "The Dark Half". Which is the worst game I've ever played, bar none. I reccommend "The Dark Eye" for a brilliant adaptation of books (Edgar Poe's stories), but you'll notice that it forsakes the sort of interactivity you'll find in, say, Gabriel Knight.

Lastly, if you can show me a document design that plans the WHOLE thing in detail, I'd be happy to offer my services as programmer and dialog writer (for which I have the advantage of being a veteran SK fan, having all of his books except Dark Tower VII and Faithful, which I don't plan on getting).