On the other hand, I got to talk with Fester Pot, creator of the Almraiven module. If you haven't played this module, I highly recommend it. It's a city adventure that's heavy on the role-play. The most amazing thing about it is the incredibly believeable city. FP makes Almraiven come alive with excellent use of sound, placeables, and tight streets. This module has become my favorite and a great inspiration. Of course, you have to make some changes to form it into a PW, and building something this intricate is much more time consuming than designing a bunch of sparsely populated areas, which is what I've seen on many PWs. The payoff, I think, will be worth it.
There's three key components FP mentioned that I'm trying to keep in mind: small areas with lots of alleys and tight construction, liberal use of placeables to give that lived-in feel, and heavy use of placed sound. Here's a couple of screenshots of the first area I've designed using FP's advice. As you can see, I'm only just starting, and there's lots of odd, empty spaces, even in this 5x5 area. Getting a variety of placeables that still seem to flow together is difficult, and I've never been much good with building anyway. Still, it's a start.
Morgan, one of the first NPCs players will meet.
Manheim Court, with two shops so far...
My favorite screenshot. Heiden, inventor-turned-junk-seller.
Cheers!
2 comments:
Ha! Finally some screenshots and you already make some stuff better that I! See? I knew that! :D
FP's advice is a good one, although I don't follow it always. I like making large areas in some cases, and I honestly don't go with the "rule" that long ways to walk are something evil. For me it adds to the immersion. It just shouldn't be plain boring.
However, I noticed that you can do a lot in a 4x4 area with some creativity, those small, cramped areas can turn into real gems. I'll use that kind of building in my southern city, and I'm really looking forward to it :)
Of course I'm already getting jealous when I look at the dialogue. Sheez, I need some dialogue writers.
Sorry to hear about your computer problems... um... get a Mac. Haha... no, really.... I had that too, but the keyword is Authorized Service Partners... took just 3 days and I got my lappy back.
Anyway, do go on, no reason to get frustrated.
Speaking of dialog, I just realized there's a spelling mistake in my first screenshot. Oops! :P
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