Shiny Rock Hunter Blog

This is a big update, and I think it all finally looks good.

If you are level 3, or higher, there is a new quest available from the Chieftan.  Completing this quest will gain you your first skill, fire-making.  That skill will let you do some simple crafting of cooked food.  You can eat the cooked food while in combat, and it will heal you.  While this is only one skill and crafted item, this update lays the foundation to add many more.

For the next week, I’m probably going to concentrate on some administration tools to make it easier to add creatures, items, quests, etc.  Although if there are any bugs, that will take a priority.

Have fun at the game.

There is a bug that has the program showing the “attack” button at places where you don’t have anything to attack (no Crogulo, you can’t take over the tribe by killing the chieftan or trader :D).  I’ve got that fixed for the next version, which should be going out Wednesday night.  Also, the creature will always miss on the last round of combat, since you attack first.  I should be able to clean that up for the next release too.  In the future, I’ve thought about the luck attribute determining who attacks first, you or the creature.

The next update will be a big one.  I’ve added a quest that gets you your first skill upon completion.  That skill will let you craft your first item, and that item will be the first thing that you can use in battle that isn’t stick or rock-based.  I have a little bit more to finish up on it and I should be able to finish testing Tuesday.  So keep your eyes open.

Today’s update cleans up the interface a bit.  The “Attack” & “Run away” buttons now appear in one place, at the lower part of the screen.  I’ve also moved the “Level changed” text back up into the middle area of the screen.

The experience points required for levels is being updated.  Unfortunately, the old values were the lower ones used during testing, so your character is a higher level that it would be under the corrected numbers.  I’m leaving all the characters at their old levels, which means that it will take a bit of time until you see your next level.  If you want me to, leave a message here with your character name and I can correct your level and hit points to what they should be under the corrected values.

I’m still working on the skills functionality, and am getting close to completing it

There is also going to be someone creating quests for the game now.  She’s a friend of mine who used to be a tester at a big game company.  So, new quests should be coming soon.

So you can have a better idea of the future features that I’ve been thinking of, here’s a list of the ideas I currently have written down.

Please post comments here to let me know what things you’d like to see first, what things you don’t want at all, and what things you’d like but aren’t on the list.  Thanks!

Game screens

• Quest list shows all details of quest
• Quest list has a link to quest location (so user doesn’t have to go to the map)
• Create “My Cave” page to show character information
• Add graphics to “My Cave” page (show trophies)

Community

• Players can create/join a tribe
• Tribe has shared inventory area
• Tribe leaders can create quests for tribe members
• Tribes can create a shrine (requires lots of gemstones) that provide stat bonus to tribe members after an offering is made at the shrine

Crafting

• Food/drinks (for healing and stat bonuses)
• Armor
• Weapons
• Jewellery

Features outside of the game

• Forums
• In-game chat/IM
• Wiki

Wild ideas

• Cave art
• PVP mode (if user opts-in)
• When player reaches the maximum level, they can evolve (Stone Age to Bronze Age [with mining and smelting] to Iron Age [better tools and machines])
• Let user customize their character’s graphics
• Animated game (Flash)

There’s a new update to the game.

When you are looking at your quest list, you can now see a list of the items needed to complete the quest.  It isn’t very pretty right now, but I have an idea for it.  For the next change I plan on removing that information from the list.  However, when you select one of the quests, underneath it you’ll see all the information about that quest - where you need to turn it in, where you need to get the items to complete it, what items are needed, and which of those items you have.

There are a few more little changes. On the login screen, you can see a list of the latest game updates and a list of the top 5 players by experience.  I may change that to rotate and show you the top 5 by wealth, or some other criteria.  Also, when you are in combat, you’ll notice that the weapon list drop-down now shows you the minimum and maximum damage that the weapon does.  This is in preparation for an upcoming quest where you can get a better weapon - a POINTY STICK!

Let me know what you think.