73 lines
3.3 KiB
Plaintext
73 lines
3.3 KiB
Plaintext
========================================================================
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CORE DESIGN PRINCIPLES
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------------------------------------------------------------------------
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0. Challenge assumptions from other games.
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- Do not blindly accept "intuition" which is actually learned.
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- Offer a unique experience, push the engine boundaries.
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1. No in-game GUIs.
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- Zero formspecs in gameplay.
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- Minimize use of HUDs; remove any standard ones feasible.
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- Player's guide only, must remain relatively isolated.
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2. Interact in node-space.
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- Everything possible should be a node.
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- Minimize use of off-grid entities.
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- Avoid encapsulating things in inventories or complex machines.
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- Crafting and transforming in-world.
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3. Focus on gameplay mechanics.
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- Focus will not be on visuals, mood, theme, storytelling.
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- Minimize elements that vary only in form, not function.
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4. Emergence from primitive elements.
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- Each node should do one job (or one part of a job).
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- Only include the most primitive, fungible components.
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- Mechanics of each element should interact with others.
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5. Puzzle challenge. No pre-hoc shortcuts.
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- Limited inventory, complex processes, environmental
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and process hazards.
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- Alternative processes must offer a new challenge compared
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to existing ones; requirements cannot be a subset.
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- Conveniences must be higher on tech tree, require some work
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to gain access.
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6. Transparency of the player character.
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- Focus is on builds and resources.
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- Player-centric mechanics like hunger and health are
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de-emphasized.
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7. Depth and subtlety.
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- Focus on quality over quantity.
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- Distinct, unique materials and mechanics instead of e.g.
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ores that mostly just vary by color.
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- Processes easy to basically solve, but leave much room
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for optimization.
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- Modeling using [piecewise] continuous functions instead
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of simple boolean expressions.
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- Wide range of process behaviors and time scales.
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8. Integrated cohesive experience.
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- Each element designed to fit with other elements.
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- Elements designed to take advantage of other existing ones
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and build longer, deeper gameplay.
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9. All core materials sustainable/renewable, focus on processes.
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- Support skyblock and other mapgen-constrained gameplay.
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- Material synthesis as an alternative to exploration.
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- No material other than time should be absolutely lossy.
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10. Mach relativity: everything should be transplantable.
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- No dependence on world elements that cannot be moved by
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the player, such as special coordinates, or mapgen biome
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parameters.
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- Only universal fine-scaled features can vary gameplay,
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such as mapblock boundaries.
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- Players should be able to detect normally-invisible features
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like mapblock boundaries.
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11. Rolling releases, early access, development transparency.
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- Everything is kept in public git repos.
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- Notes marked with spoilers as needed. Code assumed always
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to contain spoilers.
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- Frequent releases to ContentDB for players, when stable.
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- Automatic CI/CD to separate Alpha edition in ContentDB from
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latest development stream.
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12. Flexible adaptive direction.
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- Any/all of these goals are subject to change based on
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experiences or other new information.
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........................................................................
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========================================================================
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