Murder Mansion

Yeah, preview post #2 was pretty boring. I hope that this one is a little more exciting!

If you haven't picked up the pattern yet, I'm sort of selecting the topics of these posts in the order of importance (based on my own opinion) of the various areas of improvement.

First (and what I judge to be least important) was the graphics overhaul. Then came some boring presentation-type stuff in post #2. Don't get me wrong, those things are all very important to the game, but there are more important improvements for me to talk about. :)

And with this post, we're getting to the good stuff!

Gameplay, Game Control, and Interface Improvements!

There's really been so many little tweaks to various aspects of the game, that I doubt I can even remember them all, so I'm going to run through a game session from start-up to the finish of a round, and try to describe as many of the changes that I can.

Start up

First thing you'll notice is that immediately after login, a dialog pops up to select your music (or "None"). (you'll also notice the new volume control HUD button, as discussed in the previous post).

Now, we'll take a look at the screen. The view is now 15x15! (previous versions of MM are 11x11)

Map selection/Joining

Same as always, clicking the button on the title screen brings up the map selection dialog (if there hasn't been a map selected yet), or drops you onto the start location of the current map (if a map has been selected, of course)

Nothing really new here, but you'll notice that the "curtains" screen fade is now timed much better (in addition to looking much nicer/actually like curtains, thanks to the graphics updates)

Round Start/Character Creation

As fans already know, at this point the player who selected the map can click the little key HUD button to start a round (perhaps after waiting a bit for other humans to join the map). That's not changed.

However, some things are a bit different once you click that button.

After selecting the mode for the round, the dialog comes up to add AI. Some of the modes require more players than others, so the game will automatically pad the AI count if you do not meet the minimum (previously, selecting too few bots would just immediately end the round, and dump everyone back to the title screen)

Then comes the mode options settings (if you're a BYOND member, and if this round has any options that can be set)

Some options that are available (depending on the mode):

1) There are the ones that were already there: setting to announce murders or not, setting how long clues take to fade away, mode variation settings like changing Deathmatch to a Timed round, or setting the number of points required for a win, etc.

2) But now, in addition to those: you can limit the quantity of items available from spawners. Either unlimited, as the normal setting, limited to a realistic qty (EX 5 knives in the knife block, one shovel on the rack, etc.), limited to 1 per (no matter the spawner), and 0 (no items can be picked up from spawners!)

3) You can adjust the level of blood splatters. Either none, normal level, double normal, or triple normal.

4) In modes that pick a murderer (Classic, and some surprises), there is now an option to set the weight of picking a human player over AI. You can leave it completely random (as it normally is), set it so humans have twice the chance of being picked, or set it to only select human players.

Next comes character creation. This follows the old system, but with the tweak that it shows you the random value that it's going to give you if you don't pick anything (for instance, it fills in the name it will assign to you unless you type one in yourself) Nothing big, just a little more convenient.

And that brings us to...

Gameplay/Control During a Round

Ahh. Here we go. Strap yourselves in. (I'm going to be discussing things based on the Classic mode, since it's the one that requires the use of most of the game functions, but I'll mention tweaks that are specific to others along the way)

1) WASD keys can now be used to control movement (I could have sworn that I had already done this, but I ran the public game recently, and found that they weren't active; well, now they are!)

2) Modes now have a "LifeSupport" flag. Any mode that doesn't require life support functions (eating, drinking, and bathroom use) does not make any changes to these stats. Modes that do require it now set your stats to a random level at round start (in addition to them increasing at an interval during the round, as usual). You might start out a round being very thirsty, for instance.

3) Players and all other click-able objects (clues, spawners, etc.) now have a larger target to hit for clicking. Players have been given a 32px circular shadow underlay, which now gives you that full area as a click target (instead of having to hit right in the pixels of their body), and objects (switches, spawners, etc.) have a very faint/transparent full-icon, or circular fill.

4) The camera movement has been made smoother. (I've discussed this elsewhere, and we'll see how the players receive the new movement; maybe it's still not enough, but I hope it'll make most people happy)

5) Stumbling has been toned WAY down. It still occurs, and it is still annoying, but you can now walk outside without stumbling at every step (unless you're on the roof)! lol One thing new to stumbling, though, is that if you're currently stumbling, your movements will be random; you won't take your next step(s) in the direction you have pressed.

6) Status effect handling is much better (functional!) now. Sleeping works, getting knocked unconscious works as I originally intended (the screen fadeout applies correctly and remains, for instance), getting blinded works, etc.

7) A purely visual effect, but there's now a brief black screen fade when using the stairs, just to mask the "jump" when you go to the next z-level.

8) Players now generate a "Projection" object to the map layer above them if they are in an area where players above them can see the lower level (IE looking down to the ground from the balcony/roof). You can interact with this object (a copy of the player's icon); you can Look at them via their projection, and if your weapon has the range, you can attack them. This is a first for MM. You couldn't see/interact with players below you, but now you can!

9) Liquid clues (blood and water) now act a little differently. Before, you would just drop a water drop or blood splatter (if you were bleeding from a previous attack) randomly per step (until you "ran out"). Now, the dropping of these clues is working on the timer, so if you stand still, they pool underneath you (every new drop makes the puddle grow larger)

10) Wounds descriptions are now a little different. Before, each weapon had a little wound description text that would be added to a list when you got attacked. Now, each weapon only has a descriptive word ("bruising", "slashing", "bone fracturing", etc.) that is based on the type of weapon, and the description of the wounds given are generated using the amount of damage done, and that wound type, plus a randomly picked body part. So, for example, an attack from a knife might add a wound of "Moderate slashing to the chest", or "Minimal slashing to the arms", etc.)

11) Mobs now have an HP variable. (Let me explain...lol) In previous versions of MM, there is no HP variable. A running total of damage is kept, and death is calculated based on a probability check based on the total damage. I've added the HP var so that I can now give mobs a max HP, and then calculate death prob based on the ratio of damage taken to original HP. There's really not much difference in terms of how this affects the players, but it gives me the opportunity to create mobs that have different endurances for damage. For instance, the zombies in Zombie Survival mode (which can be played as a BYOND-member set option on the Escape mode) can have a range of damage thresholds. Some zombies might go down in one weak hit, some might take much more. This opens the door for me to add some more "enemy" types of AI, but more on that in a later post!

12) Bed feet now act as hiding places! (in case you're unfamiliar, there are objects around the maps that you can click on to hide weapons under, or hide yourself under), now, bed feet have the same functionality. (the head of the bed still performs the same function of laying your character down on the bed, and letting you go to sleep)

13) Windows can be broken with a proper object (any heavy weapon), before stepping through. This will spare you the damage from crashing through them (but you still might get cut on the broken glass, so be careful! lol)

14) Some weapons are now concealable! Before, examining a person would tell you whatever they were carrying. Now, it only tells you what they are carrying if the item is not oncealable, or they have it set as their active object (so, a player might have a knife stashed in their pocket that you can't see; but if they're carrying a shovel, you'll see it no matter what)

15) Accusation control is a bit different. Previously, Classic mode would not let you make an accusation unless you had satisfied the very open requirement of "having seen some clues". But what I found is that simply going outside, and looking at the water drops you leave behind, or examining a spawner or whatever was enough to let you make an accusation. So now, there's a "CanAccuse" flag that must be triggered before you can make an accusation. This flag is only triggered by actual evidence of a crime. You need to either witness an attack (or be attacked) see a body, or see blood or a used weapon.

Round End

Nothing much going on here. I just fixed the timing problems with everything that happens at the end of a round. The text output was all mixed up (the game was announcing players dropping items after it had already displayed the round end text, etc.), AI was still doing stuff after round end, the curtains weren't "closing" at the right time, etc. So the flow of info at the end of a round is now in a proper order (and slowed down just a bit; sometimes round ends in previous versions just fly by before you know what's happening)

And I think that about covers it (so far as I can recall, and so far as I'm going to discuss in this post.

There's more coming. The really good stuff will be covered in the next few posts!