Ves's guarantees suggestion topic

[vespuleth]

okay, i know that some of you liked the first one, some of you didnt. what i want to know is, what do you guys want suggestions on how to do?

Some of the ones im working on are:

Name that game - how to come up w/ a creative title
The Real World- how to immerse the player in a realistic environment
Captializing on Cliches - how to use cliches to your advantage
Building Relationships - how to build a hero the player can relate to
Setting the Mood - how to set the mood of your game
Realative Reality - making your game believable

some of these overlap, and thats why i havent put a new one up yet.

so, which of these topics would you like more information on?

if not one of these topics, what area of game design would you like to get some hints, tips and tricks on?

do you even want me to continue the guarantees articles, or do you think im off my rocker, and have no idea what im talking about (be honest, im hard to offend)?

cool. feedback is good.

remember, you can suggest any topic you want to hear my opinion on. i really want these topics geared toward what you guys are dealing w/, so they are actually helpful. so what do you want some help w/?

[Dungeon Warden]

Here is a link to hundreds of action story plot cliches: sff.net/paradise/plottricks.htm

I didn't read them all but I noticed a few weren't really cliches - at least not the way they were written - since you could tell the story they came from (if you read and watch a lot of action stories).

There are quite a few things here you might want to avoid in your plots - mainly dealing with heroes or villians acting like idiots. For example, why does the villian always give the hero the chance to escape unstead of just killing him. This is so cliche that making fun of this cliche is becoming cliche.

As far as what your next topic is about, maybe name that game, since several people have trouble coming up with interesting names for their games.

[Jugem]

I think I've got a good grasp on many of those issues, but it's always interesting to hear someone else's point of view. So even if you're off your rocker, I'm still interested in hearing your viewpoint on any or all of those.

[Draygone]

Tips on creating good maps.

Like in RPGM1, I always had trouble creating indoor areas. This was in part because there wasn't much you could put indoors. But my indoor areas usually looked the same. Maybe I made the shape a little different, but there was always the chairs (that were always facing the same direction, darn it), a table, a bed or two, as well as a dresser, plus maybe some flowers to give the room more color. Outdoor areas I just placed the buildings in mostly random places, having a path going to these places, with scenery such as flowers and trees randomly scattered about. Caves were walls with rocks in random spots. Forests were tree-walls with trees and bushes randomly placed.

RPGM2 has a lot more stuff to use, yet I'm still making relatively bland (and clone-like) places.

[NASH7777]

Name that game - something catchy, usually one familiar term with another that isn't helps to introduce a different kind of game
The Real World- Maps with lot's of textures and hilly areas add a better feel I think, also I put trees and stuff everywhere till I reach my 200 limit then Events can still back me up
Captializing on Cliches - well you do want to use to obvious of cliches but you can make it add to the story and don't forget to "foreshadow" events
Building Relationships - Make people like everyday ppl, those you can talk to etc... this will give a more realistic and homely feel
Setting the Mood - If your goin sick and scary set up a macabre feel like Edgar Poe
Realative Reality - if you have all these elements it should come together this way

[vespuleth]

neo, that didnt help at all. it just attempted to explain what you think should be covered. care to make a suggestion now?

[Doan the Nado]

I think the problem here is that people are assuming that you want their opinion on the areas that you are planning on discussing. It would be better if you guys withheld your opinion on those until he got to it with one of his "guarantees" posts. Right now he just wants opinions on what everyone would like to hear about most, then he'll give you his take on it. After that, you guys can feel free to add to or counter some of his ideas.

To Ves: it may be a better idea in the future to just keep it a surprise as to what topic you will cover next, as you did with the first one. Also, I think it would be good to start a new topic for each guarantee, and don't sticky them, but have one stickied, locked "Ves's Guarantees" topic that links to each individual guarantee, and possibly tells the next "coming soon" guarantee. That would be very useful from an archival standpoint so that your information can be quickly and easily accessed. A stickied topic like that could also be useful to link to other helpful topics by different Domain members, such as the different Helpful Posts of the Week.

Just a suggestion.

[vespuleth]

sounds like a plan. ill do it when i get the second article finished.

[Deleted]

And one of you should do that with the Helpful Posts of the Week too.

[Doan the Nado]

I would say "good idea", but I already said that:

A stickied topic like that could also be useful to link to other helpful topics by different Domain members, such as the different Helpful Posts of the Week.

Thanks for the suggestion, though.