2011/05/04

May 4, 2011

No Rest for the Wicked

v0.14 is ambitious. Let's take a look.

Title Menu

The first attempt at a title menu will be completely simple.

• New class MenuTitle, child of GameSwitcher
• Centered image/logo on black background
• Bottom-center: buttons for Play, Options, Exit
• Other buttons can be added later
• Button clicks change GameSwitcher state
  • Play goes to the Load Game screen
  • Options will be disabled for now
  • Exit quits the game without prompt

Load Game

This screen should display a list of the current save games. It should read each save file to see the hero's name, level, location. If we get fancy it could show the hero's stance animation (load the hero's head and base body depending on equipped items).

For now this menu can support a fixed number of save game slots. Let's say 4.

• New class MenuLoadGame, child of GameSwitcher
• List of the 4 save slots, click to highlight
• Buttons at the bottom: New, Delete, Load (active an inactive art for each)
• If the player clicks on an existing game slot, the Delete and Load buttons are enabled.
• If the player clicks on an empty game slot, the New button is enabled.

New Game

The new game menu could be the most complex, especially if I want to make room for interesting choices in the future.

• New class MenuNewGame, child of GameSwitcher
• Text box to enter character name
• List of portraits, choose one
• Config file that matches portraits with heads and base bodies
• Accept button (clicking causes switch to GameEngine state)

Each portrait could be tied to a base body type and have an associated head layer. If I have the time, v0.14 will have two base body types (human male, human female). So this menu will start with 6 portraits (3 male, 3 female). In the future I could add more base body types (maybe a bulky body type, or even an elf or dwarf race type).