ID:153117
 Dec 29 2004, 11:53 pm
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A lot of people seemed to think that building and customizing burrows in HrH was one of the high points of the game. But, looking at it plainly, all you did was set walls, floors, doors and counters. Add in a few pieces of furniture and you've got a burrow. But it was oddly fun. I'm just curious what other people think about it, and what exactly made it fun, as simple as it was? And what influences from the rest of the game contributed to that?
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Dec 30 2004, 12:08 am
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Teh Governator
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I think it was more of a status thing than anything else. Mainly, the bigger/better your burrow was - the cooler you seemed to be. At the same time, you could also setup trading posts, shops, etc...AND even have "STAFF ONLY" doors with keys. =D
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Artekia wrote:
You people and all your HrH talk makes me wish I was around for it. (sounding like a radio announcer) "You too, can re-live it all through the thoughts, roughage, and commentary posted on the Hedgerow Hall archived forum at: http://alchemisten.serveftp.net/~jimm/digitalbyond/hrh/ portal.php" :) | |
Is there a place I can find screen shots of HrH?
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Well, in my case, I had lots of plans for the burrow, tied in to my character's biography. There was going to be a meeting-hall, catacombs, a secret treasure storehouse, etc.
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I and some friends are trying to recreate the Hedgerow hall experience in a game called Redwood Falls. So far it is going rather well, however we aren't duplicating it, rather, we are creating our own experience built around the lessons learned from hedgerow hall.
The burrow system was the first thing I put into the game. It was rather simple, but there were certain problems with my system versus Lexy's. For one thing, we've devided on basing the world map off of 100x100 maps rather than lexy's 50x50, therefore we have to stuff 4 burrows into one z-layer, rather than just one, making burrow recycling (after a player logs out and the burrow is unloaded) rather more complicated. For another, keeping a defined barrier between the two was something of an issue as well. The hardest part, however, was getting the saving system to be both fast and intelligent. In order to do this, I had to make it so that only the changes in the burrow since the last save were saved this time. Plus, I had to make it so that it did not save if someone was in it during the saving cycle. On top of all this, I had to make a shutdown cycle, which would kick all the players off the server and then save everything. Burrows were indeed simple, but actually making this system had it's own complexities. | |
Why doesn't Hedgemistress put the game up for download, or possibly find a decent host to host the game? I know a lot of people would love to play it again. It is one of the many games people talk about and it has not been seen in a year or so. It wouldn't hurt to try, would it?
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I guess it's the same concept as building a Lego house. It's entertaining to think of new things to put in, what you're going to do with each area, etc.
I had a lot of fun a few days ago while helping my Dad design a house he's building. Finding a new way to maximize the space in a room feels a lot like beating a level in a game. | |
I think the jist of it is that she doesn't have time to moderate it, and without heavy moderation it wont work. Also if I remember right the game isn't up to a standard she set for it.
Personally I'd like to see her get someone to build it based off her documents while she simply watches over development. | |
GokuDBZ3128 wrote:
Why doesn't Hedgemistress put the game up for download, or possibly find a decent host to host the game? she did have a decent host- me! :p and as to why it is not available for download, here is a quote from articles on the HrH website (linked above in a previous post): "I'd love to be comfortable enough turning over the HRH project or even the concept to somebody else to carry on, but at the end of the day, I'm too attached to my own ideas to give up control of them. As a writer I might still have a use for the idea of Hedgerow Hall... I might even, God willing, one day have the clout and reputation needed to get a professional team to make my vision reality. I'm going to respectfully ask that mouse does not host the old version... I do not want a crappy, half-finished version of my game to stand as a testament. Those of you enjoyed the genuine roleplaying experience... I would encourage you to emulate what I've tried to do here by creating your own unique roleplaying settings." ... "Because of repeated, repeated, repeated violations of even the simplest, most dumbed-down versions of the roleplaying rules I could think of by everybody and their brother.... I am permanently suspending all hosting of the old version of Hedgerow Hall. Those with access to the game's .dmb are asked to NOT host it. Why not let the old version be hosted while I work on the new one? Because there's no effective way to enforce the roleplaying guidelines and work on the new version, and I REFUSE to let the only version of Hedgerow Hall that's available represent the game as poorly as the server has so far. That's going to do nothing but attract the sorts of players I don't want and drive away the ones I do." One part was kids in-ability to actually role-play, the other was her preference to pursue (successfully I might add) a writing career. I know a lot of people would love to play it again. It is one of the many games people talk about and it has not been seen in a year or so. It wouldn't hurt to try, would it? well had you played often enough or been apart of the invitaion testing for version 2, it was played right up until the middle of August. :p i would suggest taking on her challenge and creating something that was along the lines of her concept. | |
Maybe it's time that someone made a decent non-icon-trading-or-stealing builder game. It might be popular, considering the terrible ones get a lot of players, and as long as it's done right, it shouldn't get too many idiots in the game. Although, it might not be a good idea for the building be the ONLY part of the game... It's got to be a game still :P Maybe take the tycoon approach, build stuff to try to get the most customers.
One of the things that made me estatic about the now-probably-canceled Dawn, is that it included to defend your town, you had to build everything to the last brick, but it still included basic designs you could work off of if you wanted to. | |
Kunark wrote:
Maybe take the tycoon approach, build stuff to try to get the most customers. I can discuss my old Department Tycoon game idea at length if people are interested. I never bothered to make it a reality or anything... just an open-source "Tycoon" project which I was planning on making in C++ if I ever got around to it and had enough time to work on it. One of the things that made me estatic about the now-probably-canceled Dawn, is that it included to defend your town, you had to build everything to the last brick, but it still included basic designs you could work off of if you wanted to. "Blueprints" are a very good feature to implement in a game. Instead of having to select a particular pattern and lay down a building plan from scratch, you can "build" a building on a blueprint, and then drag and drop that blueprint where you want the building to appear. (At least, that's how I've been intending to handle pre-fabs in Haven. It also makes "architect" as a viable occupation.) | |
Spuzzum wrote:
"Blueprints" are a very good feature to implement in a game. Instead of having to select a particular pattern and lay down a building plan from scratch, you can "build" a building on a blueprint, and then drag and drop that blueprint where you want the building to appear. (At least, that's how I've been intending to handle pre-fabs in Haven. It also makes "architect" as a viable occupation.) That sounds like a good idea. My current project is a faint concept of something that balances trade-for-profit and estate building (either for private residence or for public convenience). (Actually Kunark's post gave me the idea of trying to get people to your estate in order to make money off them...) Being able to build houses on blueprints (calculating the cost of the structure when the blueprint in completed) then place the results on the map would be a great way to simplify building. Coming up with a clever system for building blueprints would be the hard part though. Getting them to work well with BYOND's restrictions might be even harder. :P | |
I did alot of planning for my burrows as well. I had a really weak squirrel once, who also happened to be one of the better forest crafters and carpenters around at the time. Whenever a bandit threatened to beat me up, I babbled about my 'legendary blanket'... Then I'd take them into my maze of a burrow and being nimble I'd lose them in a secret passage, shut and lock a secret door and loop around and lock the door they had come through.
It actually worked once or twice! I had another character bent on building a real community of animals. It was all set up for the community's public use, with very few locked doors and whatnot. I tried it a few times, but it never really got off the ground. | |
Given that HrH has given up the proverbial ghost, I'll post an annotated version of Icarus' burrow. Who knows -- it might be useful for someone to get ideas on how to design areas for their games:
 Legend: White: open floor Brown: walls Violet: entry ladder Yellow: locked doors Blue: blankets/beds Light Green: stools Dark Green: tables Red-Orange: fireplaces Orange: arches and/or open doors Light Red: alcoves/shelves/chests Light Grey: counters Dark Grey: beds Purple: barrels | |