My Game in a Year Entry, Aeges Road

A Little About the Game

With a very busy schedule, there is little hope that this will be done in a year, but a little hope out ways no hope by refusing to try. Personally, I have found that deadlines imposed upon me, motivate me. My first imposed project was a small desktop application contract. It took a while, but persistence brought it to completion, and taught me a lot along the way. I was also able to finish two small games in a months time for the 2007 4k Java competition at http://www.javaunlimited.net.

With my newly imposed deadline Aeges Road, a turn based rpg, is the intended outcome. Aeges Road is going to feature a hybrid approach to the turn based battle system. None of it looks truly revolutionary, but rather a new spin on many theories surrounding turn based rpg combat. My goal is not to be revolutionary, but rather to bring forward a game that is both fun and intriguing. Too simple a combat and stats system will bore a veteran RPG player while making it too difficult will scare away the new comers. It is important that I find that fine line between a fun game, and a game you can't wait to play again.

I have purchased Torque Game Builder for the game, and am currently working on it in linux since I already have compilers set up. I have been a Java programmer for the last 2 or 3 years, so I am very rusty on C/C++. In fact, the name Code Ugly was inspired by my attempts to brush up on C/C++. Good thing too, my previous web hosting service quite literally, and quite legally stole my old domain which I had owned for a total of 3 years and built a small business on, so watch out for leased domain names when you sign on with a web host.

A Little History

Ever since I was a kid, I have dreamed of making video games. I was mesmerized by my first gaming console, the Atari 2600. I started out with three games, Jungle Hunt, Donkey Kong Jr, and Joust. Soon after getting my feet wet with the Atari, I had a chance to watch a friend of mine play The Legend of Zelda on his Nintendo (he had the robot too). That game sparked an interest in me, and in the fourth grade I began designing game levels on wide ruled with a No. 2 graphite when I was supposed to be doing my homework. Not much has changed. :-)

When I turned 15, I was finally introduced to the game that would change my view of video gaming forever, Final Fantasy 3. I had never played an RPG before, I had seen them and they looked boring. No dancing mushrooms to jump on, no aliens to shoot, nothing. Well, as the story began to develop the hook sank deeper. The game play may not have been reflexive, but it was addictive, and the level growth added to the excitement. We played the game into the late hours of the next afternoon, could not go to sleep, and still today, an RPG will turn my wallet inside out faster than any other genre.

As we played more games, we got the urge to try and develop a game. We had some success, but we all got bored, and none of us were great artists, least of all me. Two of us could code C++, but not to the extreme of designing and bringing together an entire graphics and gaming environment. We eventually adjusted to mostly talking about making a game with little progress toward a final project (yes, I am very guilty). School caught up with us, and we eventually parted ways on the game design frontier.