Rapid Adventure Game Development (RAGD)

Gerard Whyte

What is an adventure game?

Current Offerings

AGAST, AGI, AGS, AM, Bermuda, InterAx, IndyJava, Lixoo, MAD, SCI Studio, SLUDGE, STACK, Visionaire, Wintermute....

Scripting Languages.

Unintuitive Development Tools.

InterAx

Wintermute

No Technical Expertise Needed

A scripting language leads to...

A steep learning curve.

Lots of copy and paste.

Time wasted.

Errors.

All of the above.

Think Of The User, Not The Computer.

Designing the game from the viewpoint of the player.

Not worrying about implementation peculiarities.

Thinking about the game, and nothing but the game.

Separating Design From Implementation

Describe the game using the IDE.

Creates an XML description.

Translated into a file an engine can use.

One Description, Multiple Possibilities

Everything but the description is expendable.

An engine updates, but the game doesn't change.

Better engine, no problem.

What's in a game?

Scenes

Characters

Walks, talks and can hold items.

Items

Can't walk, can't talk, but can be picked up.

Hot Areas

Only seen and interacted with.

Interaction and Reaction

Events

When stuff happens.

Actions

What happens.

Constraints

Whether it should happen.

Demonstration

Gerard Whyte

2004-03-29T08:25:42