Legendary Tales - Refresh

[Grimston]

Re posting this here, to keep things tidy.

I have been working on updating Legendary Tales, to be more user friendly and improve its abilities.

http://npipes.net/img/LT/LTR01.jpg
http://npipes.net/img/LT/LTR02.jpg
http://npipes.net/img/LT/LTR03.jpg
http://npipes.net/img/LT/LTR04.jpg

And a little update on the progress, this is LT-R running on... Ubuntu 12.04 64Bit  :)

http://npipes.net/img/LT/LTR01_Linux.jpg

Only issue I have had with getting it to run on Mono is the Split Container, is not finished in Mono, This has been fixed, with a custom control, which now supports collapsing, to give you more room to edit properties, and scripts.

Next stage is the script editor, which will have syntax highlighting, and auto-suggestions. I will give the highlighter support for Python, JavaScript, XML (Manual edit of the project file if needed). Python will still be the preferred scripting language for the editor.

Suggestions are welcome for this project.

[Hasabushi]

Python is a perfect choice, since it is a syntax stickler. I think this is a great move and could actually make LT a viable solution for gaming again :D. On our new site I'll set you up a blog where you can update your changes and the like. Again welcome to the forums :D

[Grimston]

Thanks :)

I'm glad someone else agrees with me about Python.

Hows the new site coming along? If you need some help let me know :)

Edit:
I'm using my site to record changes as create them, it can be viewed here: http://npipes.net/
I Will also post here as well.

[Hasabushi]

I'm glad someone else agrees with me about Python.
I program in the Unity3D engine so, I'm quite methodical when it comes to code lol. That was one of the main issues with LT was that the on the fly compiler was a poor way to go.

Hows the new site coming along? If you need some help let me know :)
Not at present but in the near future who knows, but thanks for the offer ;D

[Throndir]

Really interested in this project, and I hope this is the thing that will give the dying (or already dead?) LT community some life again!

It would at least boot up the LT projects I had going.

[Grimston]

Mmm interesting point there, I'll see if I can get a converter going to import old projects into it.

I will probably have to support JavaScript then, or find a way to convert all JavaScript to Python.

[Throndir]

Focus on the features first before importing. After running into stability problems with original LT crashing and leaving my project corrupted, I've learned to develop on it by having a ton of text files, so it won't be too hard for me to port it myself eventually.

[Grimston]

Yeah,  getting the program usable is top priority,  importing old projects, can be a update to it.

edit:
I plan to release the editor once the basics are working, it will also have a auto update function.

Basic features

• General Properties Editor
• Location Editor
• Item Editor
• Script Editor
• NPC editor

[Hasabushi]

I always thought the Location Editor should have been more of a graphic layout rather than the standard format it's in now. I mean a little drag and drop never hurt anyone :D

[Grimston]

I thought the same at one stage, I'll see what I can come up with, will probably be able to create a mini map from it as well, and just connect node to node.

I want to try to make it as easy as possible, one idea I had was to have a simple editor for skills, drag and drop of certain functions like, if statements, damage, kill, recover and so on.

I want to also create a easy to use chat editor.

Update:
The Project file now uses named links to different files instead of being one giant project file.
This allows for much faster loading time, I should have made it that way from the start, but only realised the issue when my test project got to 1000+ lines  ;)

So far only races have been changed to use the separate files. You can also order the races, by dragging and dropping them in the list.

[Throndir]

What are your plans for this by the way? Just a project on your spare time? Any grandiose plans for it? Will it be open source? Closed and commercial?

[Grimston]

I plan to spend as much time as required to finish the project, I can release the source code, if there is a interest in it. I have no problem with that.

There will be no charge for the program either, same as Legendary Tales.

[Throndir]

In my opinion, releasing the source code is always a good way to prolong the lifespan of the project when you decide to slow down on development.

Anyways this is a project I'm keenly looking forward to. Legendarytales was probably what started me off as a Computer Science major. So if there's anything I can do to help out or support let me know! Looking forward to it, and looking forward to boot up my old projects as well once this has lifted off the ground.

It's probably beyond the scope of what you were thinking. But I'll suggest it anyways since it was a feature that sparked a lot of interest back in the original LT (but which never really had any fruition). Once, Humangus had planned for a V2 of Legendarytales, which would have had multiplayer support. It turned out to be a webapp, but multiplayer wasn't very cemented in place. After he moved on to Gemstone Dragon, development on LT v2 was halted, and I believe he took down the multiplayer webapp shortly after as well.

Something to consider when you're developing your version of LT, is to consider multiplayer support. At least in how you architecture your programming so it wouldn't take as many code rewrites to change it from single-player to multiplayer. (Perfectly fine having a single-player version going before thinking of a multiplayer version). There are already a few single-player text-based game makers out there. But a multiplayer text-based game engine is harder to find. There are text-based MUDs out there that are still active, but those don't allow you to make your own world +quests +NPCs and play it with others. I think having this feature alone would differentiate the project from the other text-based game engines out there.

Making a text-based game to enjoy with 1-5 friends sounds like fun! :)

Since it's still early in development, I think it might be feasible to start thinking of heading into that direction, and I'd be willing to put some time in developing something like this myself.

[Grimston]

Multiplayer would be a great feature, it's also something I have thought about.

Nothing much the editor will need for it, maybe a checkbox to allow it.

The client I will probably base around networking, the idea is to on the local machine loopback and use the messages to start events and then handle it from there and send a message back to update info on the screen.

I will use the lidgren library for networking as it supports everything I will need.

Another idea is I could provide a master server, that games can register to, and players can select a game server, download any client side files needed(images,sounds, music) and then play from the servers. Granted I'm probably jumping the gun a little bit, but it's good to have a direction to aim for.

I hope everything above makes sense, using my phone at the moment and it's refusing to scroll up.

[Throndir]

I think the idea of a master server is great. Would bring anyone who uses it together in one place. It would be horrible if something bad ever happens to an official master server, and no one else is around to fix it up anymore or host it though. As long as its configurable to point to any master server, and letting anyone create one, I think that will help its longetivity.

Really looking forward for the first release! Going to start porting over all my projects once I have the means to do so. Good excuse to touch up on Python again.