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No, I haven't had a tip off, I'm just bouncing ideas off you guys. Actually, there's no need for this even to be Morrowind, it might as well be a fresh IP. Still, Morrowind is what gave me the idea, as I was humbly slicing kiwis (incidentally, there is nothing like kiwi juice for letting you know how cut up your hands are), so I will continue to use Morrowind as the example. It seems to me, as I was thinking of a way to expand upon the ultimately-inevitably-dull point'n'click genre which the DS is clearly going to do so well on, that a game such as Morrowind, which shares many features with point'n'click games, is well suited to DS play, in all but only 2 areas that I can think of, and will address later. Firstly, the first person view is, we almost unanimously agree, well suited to mouse (and hence stylus) control. Morrowind requires you to click on rather a large number of things, and navigate a few menus, as would any self-respecting RPG. I figure 1 menu per screen, with a slightly more intricate menu-choosing system, and poking at your DS would in no time make inventory management and such like much less of a chore. Another area that a stylus could well enhance is the journal, allowing you to flick through pages like you would with a wet finger, and of course writing your own notes, something I found morrowind to be slightly bereft of. As for combat, sword strokes could be directed by slicing at the screen, or by poking for thrust attacks. Ranged weapons would be slightly trickier... assuming the orientation of the weapon on screen allowed, you could try a pull-back-and-release approach. Might make aiming difficult. R button for 'ready weapon'? Magic, I believe, is the area that can be most improved upon. Firstly, the DS eliminates the tedius need for a (usually massive) choose-your-spell menu, in several ways. Imagine employing Darwinia's method for unit creation as a means to cast your spells in Morrowind. Tapping L to ready magic, and your stylus becomes a cursor, which traces sparkler-like lines aorund the screen as your character waves arcane insignia with his/her hands. There are quite a few possibilities for combinations, methinks. Failing that, you could assign voice commands to spells. Who can resist the temptation of summoning fiery death unto a hapless bonewalker by shouting "JIHAD!" for, to those around you, apparently no reason? But of course, magic isn't simply casting spells. Alchemy also stands to gain a great deal from touch control, making it an absorbingly interactive process. The recent Harry Potter book gave me this idea, thanks to the HBP's Potions notes... add half a clockwise turn, add a pinch of Sload Soap, blow gently for a while and allow to cool... could be very interesting stuff. I'd imagine a similar idea could be employed for enchantments and spellmaking... some kind of minigame with sufficiently occult grounding. Of course, there is the problem of a right click, but this is easily resolved, as my father's palmtop showed me, by holding a stylus click for about 1s. Now, about the actual problems involved. They are slightly related. Firstly, anything the size of Morrowind would struggle, I think, to fit on one, or indeed twenty DS cards. Someone cleverer than I will have to sort this one out for me. Secondly, there is the problem of how heavily text-based Morrowind is. Another Code showed us how limited the DS would probably be at handling large reams of text. Even if you cut Morrowind's texts down into smaller-scren-sized portions, that's an awful lot of screens to skip if you don't want to read it, and an awful lot of poking 'next' if you do. This would be eased slightly by the second screen. Still, squinting at the roughly 2x3" screen is not going to do your eyes any good. I think this second problem is best resolved by, as I said, introducing a fresh IP, which simply isn't as heavily text-based. I'm sure I had more ideas for this game, but they've abandoned me at present. I task you with adding your criticism, witicisms, and, indeed... titicisms (je suis droll). I reckon you could all add at least one good idea to this, and several more problems that would arise. On your marks... |
Morrowind DS?
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ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years ago/over-enthusiasm off -
Dirtbox 92,596 posts
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MikeD 10,063 posts
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Registered 18 years agoI believe there was an elder scrolls game for mobile phones. So, it shouldd efinitely be possible for the DS. I wouldn't expect the graphics and largeness of morrowind, though. -
Marcus 1,646 posts
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Registered 19 years agoThere was definitely a version for the ngage - first person perspective too if I remember correctly... -
dadrester 2,560 posts
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Registered 18 years agonew ip... it can feel as big as morrowind if you have sections between the towns randomly generated or generated using a tile based level editor like dark cloud's dungeons.
obviously some multiplayer adventuring wouldn't go amiss either. -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoOh yeah, I forgot the wireless-ness.
Hmm... tricky. Well, Animal Crossing style letter-posting and home invasion, obviously. Can't think of anything constructive though without radically altering the gameplay... I suppose you could just do everything in groups, but it would be a bit wanton.
Perhaps a separate online component, then? -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoHyoushi wrote:
lol
Hah, Balmora, or Piza? -
Abscido 641 posts
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Registered 19 years agoHyoushi wrote:
lol
Outstanding
Was it done with an editor? I presume so.
Would make for good pillow talk.
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay! -
Tiger_Walts 16,674 posts
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Registered 19 years agoAye, I already want an Elder Scrolls title on the DS, I mean, even the NGage has an Elder Scrolls game!
ProfessorLesser wrote:
Have you been reading my 'Blade of Mazan' ported to DS ideas?
As for combat, sword strokes could be directed by slicing at the screen, or by poking for thrust attacks. Ranged weapons would be slightly trickier... assuming the orientation of the weapon on screen allowed, you could try a pull-back-and-release approach. Might make aiming difficult. R button for 'ready weapon'?Imagine employing Darwinia's method for unit creation as a means to cast your spells in Morrowind. Tapping L to ready magic, and your stylus becomes a cursor, which traces sparkler-like lines aorund the screen as your character waves arcane insignia with his/her hands. There are quite a few possibilities for combinations, methinks.
Similar to Arx FatalisFailing that, you could assign voice commands to spells. Who can resist the temptation of summoning fiery death unto a hapless bonewalker by shouting "JIHAD!" for, to those around you, apparently no reason?
Nice idea. -
dadrester 2,560 posts
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Registered 18 years agoAbscido wrote:
Hyoushi wrote:
lol
Outstanding
Was it done with an editor? I presume so.
Would make for good pillow talk.
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay!
thing is i have more time to get into rpg's on handhelds than at home so for me it'd be great. -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoAbscido wrote:
Hyoushi wrote:
lol
Outstanding
Was it done with an editor? I presume so.
Would make for good pillow talk.
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay!
Alright then, on Revolution, assuming a touch screen controller.gif)
It's really the stylus that interests me for the game, not having it portable.
EDIT: Blaze of Mazan? Wha?
Edited by ProfessorLesser at 18:53:24 24-07-2005 -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoHyoushi wrote:
ProfessorLesser wrote:
Deep Labyrinth, bitches
Abscido wrote:
Outstanding
Was it done with an editor? I presume so.
Would make for good pillow talk.
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay!
Alright then, on Revolution, assuming a touch screen controller
It's really the stylus that interests me for the game, not having it portable.
Not sure what some of those flow-diagrams are meant to be showing but hey, that looks good! -
Abscido 641 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 19 years agoProfessorLesser wrote:
Abscido wrote:
Hyoushi wrote:
lol
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay!
Alright then, on Revolution, assuming a touch screen controller
It's really the stylus that interests me for the game, not having it portable.
Now THAT I could go for! Then again, in that case it would probably be Oblivion, which is looking more combat intensive (well, more detailed combat at least) than Morrowind, which mightn't suit a touchscreen. -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoTrue... but I did say there was no real reason this had to be Elder Scrolls!
/hopes Oblivion will run on his rig -
Abscido 641 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 19 years agoHyoushi wrote:
As for the whole Morrowind DS idea - no way. I spent hundreds of hours playing the Xbox version, it's completely unsuited to portable gaming. The Elder Scrolls are the opposite of pick-up-and-play gameplay!
thing is i have more time to get into rpg's on handhelds than at home so for me it'd be great.
Yeah, but battery time would severely limit the Elder Scrolls experience, IMO. You need to sit down for hours at at a time with those games.
EDIT: True, ProfLesser. Something like the aforementioned Arx Fatalis would probably suit better. Less huge and open-ended.
Edited by Abscido at 19:01:07 24-07-2005 -
Abscido 641 posts
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ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoNever heard of any Arx Fatalis...
/googles
EDIT: Interesting. Might even try and find a copy...
Edited by ProfessorLesser at 19:04:55 24-07-2005 -
Tiger_Walts 16,674 posts
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Registered 19 years agoSorry, it was Mazan: Flash Of The Blade -
ProfessorLesser 19,693 posts
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Registered 17 years agoTiger_Walts wrote:
Sorry, it was Mazan: Flash Of The Blade
Gotta love Japanese arcade! ^_^ -
Abscido 641 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 19 years agoProfessorLesser wrote:
Never heard of any Arx Fatalis...
/googles
EDIT: Interesting. Might even try and find a copy...
Edited by ProfessorLesser at 19:04:55 24-07-2005
Check out my EG review!
Suffers from occasional slowdown on the Xbox, but a PC version would do nicely. The magic system Tiger_Walts mentioned is great. -
Clicky?
.gif)
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