This is just a general update for my followers.

It may appear to you nothing is happening is right now, well nothing could be further away from the truth, but the point is, when setting things entirely from scratch you got a lot of preparational work and that gives a lot of work for very little progress. I’m still working on the very first dungeon and after months of works that seems very little, however I already did a lot. To name a few things I did.

1. I set up the LAURA II engine from scratch. It’s first of all set up to work with my new file system JCR6 (which was also written from scratch and this is the first game to use it), and works with the Kthura engine, also new, more importantly, it’s underlying structure is entirely different from LAURA I and I believe more efficient.

2. Well, I named it the Kthura map system, an object oriented map system which supports some tricks a tile based editor like Teddybear could never provide. I’m still trying to think a few things up to make it work faster, but overall, it works :)

3. Though I can’t deny recycling some stuff from Dyrt (unavoidable or the project would take double, if not triple the time), however I wanted a complete new interface completely different from Dyrt. What I have now should suffice.

4. In Dyrt all the character stuff was written in Lua, and it was a very dirty method I never felt good about from the start. LAURA II has a steady system for this built in, but with links to Lua to improve everything. It was originally designed for my cancelled project Realms of Ryromia, or rather the DuCraL engine it uses, but I did intend to use it for Star Story too, as this project was already planned after Ryromia would be finished, or in this case cancelled.

5. The savegame system has been designed to be more able to handle stuff than the LAURA I engine could.

6. I also rewrote the GameJolt contact routines and the security routines behind them. I am trying to make them handle a sync in case you had trouble login, however this is a hard thing to test, so I didn’t yet start on syncing, but the new setup has been designed with this possibility in mind.

7. Not implemented yet, but I did set up the game that way that, after beating the final boss, you can restart the game in a (much) harder version of the game, however with your levels, inventory (except for key items), money and obtained spells/abilities transferred. Of course, this is not yet possible as the final boss has yet to be scripted, but I set up the base to make this possible and for this I needed to have a completely different approach on things and this approach has been implemented. I’m not promising this will happen, but I am trying to go for this.

Now before process is really gonna happen there is still a lot to do, but my first concern is now…. The combat engine.

My plans on combat, though I cannot yet promise they are all going to happen.

1. The timed based battle base used in Dyrt will remain the same. Only in a different layout.

2. In Dyrt, all characters (except Dernor) got their new moves simply by levelling skills. In Star Story all characters will have their own unique requirement system for learning a new move.

3. Darkbloodbane requested a kind of a requirement list. In Dyrt that was no longer possible unless I rescripted very huge parts from scratch, however as this game has to be rescripted from scratch due to the different structure of LAURA II, I could take this with me. Now in the ability selection screen you can see what you have to do in order to obtain your next move, unless your character already has all moves. Most notable exception will be Crystal as she learns all her new moves by finding certain items in the field or as reward for beating optional bosses. As you can see Dark, suggestions are heard ;)

4. We all hate RANDOM encounters. In Dyrt I placed them in, in order not to make things more complicated then they already were. Now in Star Story I am going to investigate the possibility to put monsters in the field and engage in combat if you touch them. I am planning to give you the initiative when you touch the enemy in the back and to give you an ambush if the enemy touches you in the back. This system is not promised, as this was planned many times before for an RPG idea and dropped all the time due to technical difficulties, but I am going to try it again. I am also planning to make it easier to avoid enemies for which your level is too high, but enemies whose level is higher than yours are harder to avoid.

5. Should the enemy in field system once again fail, forcing me to go with random encounters, I will (just like in Dyrt) give you the possibility to turn off random encounters in Dungeons you visited before (or for which a special task has been performed). However I do plan not to need this option.

6. In Star Story you will have in the end have a full party of 6, of which you can place 3 at once in battle, however you can change party members at will. Party members who are in the back will recover their AP quicker than characters who are up front (except for Crystal who uses ammo for her abilities, she will recover HP in stead). So if you want to keep up with full access to your special abilities, you may want to change a lot. This way I hope to make the option to switch characters in stead of only using the same ones all the times a lot more appealing.

7. In the current plans you gain EXP instantly upon killing a monster and not after battle. Meaning you can gain a level in the middle of a battle.

Now I hope to make an update like this at least once a month. Things are on the move, and in my experience things can go incredably fast once the combat engine has been fully completed.

See ya on my next update ;)