Making RPGs

Pictures, quotes, screenshots and inspiration for RPG creators. Plus updates on my book.

[rpgdan]

Dungeons and Dragons and Doors

If you play some of the earliest computer roleplaying games, you'll discover the doors are weird. Find out why and how they're weird and who

An investigation in why so many early CRPGs were weird about doors.

[rpgdan]

Wizardry was a game that was too old for me to experience first hand and by the time I had any interest it was a bit too cryptic to get into. But it was a massive event in CRPG history and in this article I go deep into it's feature set and implementation.

[rpgdan]

What are character classes?

Learn how RPG character classes evolved from the original D&D three to modern CRPG innovations, plus discover how different class mechanics

[rpgdan]

CRPGs of the 1970s

Uncover the weird and secret origins of computer role-playing games (CRPGs) in the 1970s. These are the big-bang titles that shaped the futu

[rpgdan]

It has been a while since I've posted. But recently I refreshed the site, so I'm hoping to start getting back into a groove.

Since I last logged into tumblr I'd been looking back at the very first RPGs that came out in 70s (that were multiplayer by default :o). You can check them out in the above link. Oubliette is one of the big ones.

[rpgdan]

Koen Witters is the developer of RPG Playground, a tool that lets you create and share RPGs - no programming required. After working in the mobile games industry for several years programming games such as Rabbit Wars, and releasing his own game, he decided to make a tool that allows anyone ...

[rpgdan]

It’s been a while. I’ve been working on markup language for writing JRPG conversations. I’ve called the language Discourse and I’ve written more about it over here:

http://howtomakeanrpg.com/a/rpg-dialog-language-discourse.html

[rpgdan]

JRPGs communicate with the player via textboxes. From the contents of a chest found at end of a forgotten dungeon to the ominious words of the games antagonist; it's the humble textbox that's used to deliver each message. It's worth getting them right! There are broadly two ...

[rpgdan]

A markup language for RPG conversations

Check out my latest post about creating a markup language for JRPG style conversations: here

[rpgdan]

How to Make an RPG : Brief Update

In case you're not signed-up to the mailing list: The price for the How to Make an RPG package is due to rise after the end of the this month. If you were thinking about picking it up, now's a good time! :)

Here's the sales page: http://howtomakeanrpg.com/a/how-to-make-an-rpg-release.html Here's the newsletter sign-up page: http://howtomakeanrpg.com/newsletter

[rpgdan]

It's no secret I'm interested in how games model conversation. It's an interesting challenge on several fronts; you need to consider how content creators author conversations, how the user experience plays out and how engaging it is as a gameplay mechanic. To this end it's instructive ...

[rpgdan]

Did you ever wonder where role-playing games came from? Yes, we all know Dungeon and Dragons played a part - but what did Prussia, H.P. Lovecraft, H. G. Wells and the University of Illinois have to do with it?

[rpgdan]

A new article about polishing the final mini-RPG from How to Make an RPG by adding a magic menu.

Check out the article here: Making a magic menu for an RPG.

This is a stepping stone to using spells and items on the map, so you can heal you party.

[rpgdan]

Check out another polish article about replacing all text with nice new crisp bitmap fonts: Polishing RPG fonts.

Not much meat on these recent polish articles but I’ll posting about more general topics again soon :)

[rpgdan]

A hyper-focused polish article that makes some in-game fonts a _little_ nicer!

Check it out here:

http://howtomakeanrpg.com/a/polish-04-stat-numbers.html

[rpgdan]

Designing For Realtime Combat

New article - it’s been a while! Check it out here: Designing a Realtime Combat System.

[rpgdan]

Improving the combat fonts. Check out the details here at the How to Make an RPG site.