RPGLIKE Project Update (Patreon)

Well I was hoping to have the new game mode out for you all to check out by this weekend, but it turns out that was a bit overambitious of me since--who would've known*--it's the beginning of December and I had to do my annual review over on the blog.

(*the answer is: anyone who can look at a calendar xD)

Good to have that out of the way, in any case, and now I'm really putting the pedal to the medal to hit an approximate December 17th deadline to release this publicly. I only just started yesterday, but progress has been fairly quick so far.

It's changing a bit from the earlier plans, though, having gone through quite a few iterations in my mind and on paper as I see different barriers to feasibility, or just plain old fun. I still haven't nailed down some pieces of the picture, in favor of letting a lot of the newer concepts incubate as I implement the fundamental pieces that I know won't be changing, specifically the upgrading aspect and the new UI requirements that comes with.

Like Pay2Buy mode there's a little info bar in the bottom left corner with the relevant vital info, it glows when you raise a new level until you open the full window to at least check your remaining XP to distribute among the pool of available upgrades. You don't have to upgrade right ,away though, and can save up as much XP as you want for later if something is particularly expensive.

The upgrading aspect and relevant buttons and colors aren't functional just yet, but it's close. I've been working from this REXPaint mockup, which I did back during the planning phase:

You'll notice it bears a resemblance to the evolution menu, which you won't even be seeing in this mode because there is no normal evolution at all--even your slots are bought with XP! Same with other aspects that you normally improve naturally as you get closer to the surface, e.g. core integrity, and dissipation.

I originally said this mode was going to go as far as having parts immune to damage and a regenerating core, making it that much more like other traditional roguelikes, but although interesting I started seeing too many problems with that approach and am now backtracking a bit.

Instead I think it'll make more sense to just have the following general characteristics:

• Your core still absorbs a majority of incoming damage (and therefore has a higher-than-usual integrity), but parts can take a little bit of damage and theoretically still be destroyed, although part destruction won't be anywhere near as rampant as in normal Cogmind combat. De-emphasizing this aspect of the game will be pretty important because you'll possibly have fewer slots than usual.
• You'll also have zero base inventory capacity--you have to buy it with XP, and it won't be too cheap. Storage units won't exist in the game, either.
• You can repair your core with some sort of new item dropped by enemies (this is sorta like healing potions found in other roguelikes). The latest idea is it's some kind of "Protomatter," a different colored matter-type (%) item which degrades quickly if you don't use or carry it. If your core is full it repairs damaged parts instead.

The "RPG"-ish nature of this mode is, after all, mostly reflected in the permanent upgrade-based progression system; the rest of the design shouldn't add a ton of destabilizing influences in addition to that, and the whole environment and gameplay of Cogmind isn't really set up to facilitate the average roguelike's quick combat -> heal to full -> combat -> repeat cycle, at least not without a ton more work and testing. Who knows if it'd even be fun :P. Too risky for such a short-term project. So no core regen after all.

There are a huge number of variables to consider in this mode, one of the big batches being exactly what all these different leveling/XP upgrades are going to cost. For that I've set up a spreadsheet, and the current version is attached as an Excel doc, although note the values are mostly not yet what will actually be used. The balancing will come later once it's actually implemented, I just wanted to hook everything up and get it working, and spent a good couple hours looking at relative numbers to get an idea of what's possible. (The cells with colored backgrounds are where variables are set to calculate all the other data. In short: Upgrading something has a base cost the first time, and each time after that will cost progressively more XP, so specialization will come at a higher cost.)

There's definitely a basis to work from, considering we're very familiar with the relative value of these different capabilities, and a portion of them are even capabilities that you'd naturally gain as you progress through 0b10, so the idea is to base everything off of an ideal target.

Set an approximate path for XP progression, and compare that progression to the cost of what someone might normally expect to have at a given depth, and how much extra XP they can have, or might want to reallocate elsewhere at the cost of fewer slots/etc. There are a lot of possibilities, and of course it gets harder and harder to predict what will happen as you reach higher and higher levels, though as a special mode it doesn't have to be that balanced right away.

This mode in particular I will likely actually spend some more time balancing, and even release updates for it, expecting that some players might enjoy playing Cogmind as this sort of game rather than the "usual" game it is :P.

On that note I will also be opening up both special modes and challenge modes to all achievements, to both avoid confusion and enable players who'd like to mostly play some non-standard mode a way to earn their achievements as they please.

Anyway, lots more to do! There'll definitely be a test build out on Patreon before it's released, though I can't yet be any more specific than "some time next week."