The Telepath RPG: Servants of God downloadable demo has been updated to version 1.2, including all the changes made to the game since the release of the last downloadable demo:
The enemies in Telepath RPG: Servants of God are evolving! (Actually, I’m just rewriting their AI code again.) Some clever players have noticed that enemy attacks follow a familiar (and predictable) pattern of priorities, first targeting characters they can kill, then going for characters they can backstab, then going after characters who’ve already taken damage, and then simply attacking anyone they can get their grubby little claws on.
Well, now it’s the enemies’ turn to be clever. Once I’m finished rewriting the AI code, enemies will be less straightforward in their approach to choosing targets. Each enemy will take into account such factors as whether they can kill a character in one attack, whether a character can be finished off by someone else nearby, whether the character is vulnerable to a backstab, whether a character is a psy healer, whether the character is someone the player has to keep alive, whether a character is injured, and how many characters the enemy can hit in one attack. But the really cool thing is, they now take all of these things into account at once.
The new structure of the code may also have a side benefit of improving game performance. (Perhaps less impressive for you, but helpful for me, is the fact that this improved AI code also cuts out several thousand lines of now-unnecessary code from the game.)
I was thinking the other day. You know what Telepath RPG: Servants of God could use a little of?
That’s right: darkness!
Of course, that’s only one of the goodies I’ve added into the game over the past week. Another is the ability to skip characters’ turns in combat, then come back to them after the other characters have gone.
I’m also going out of my way to sprinkle little hidden treasure chests and other surprises around the game to help reward diligent exploration and foster the sense that hidden secrets are everywhere in this world. Few things help an RPG like a little sense of mystery…
The sun demo will come out, tomorrow!
The first downloadable demo for Telepath RPG: Servants of God, that is. What’s new with TSoG?
See you tomorrow, folks! 
When the first downloadable demo hits, you can expect some really nice renditions of the various characters based on Lethal Laurie’s designs. Here’s a sneak peek:
Meaner enemy AI, sound effects, the finished GUI–in a few days, the first downloadable demo for Telepath RPG: Servants of God will be yours. Keep an eye out for it!
I thought you might like to know that GameDevHub.com has published an interview with me about game development and Telepath RPG: Servants of God in particular. Here’s an excerpt:
GDH: When you begin development of a game, what area do you start with? For example, with the Telepath games, had you created the Cera Bella setting or was it constructed around the mechanics of the game?
Craig: It honestly depends on the game. It’s just a matter of what ideas I have going into it, and what area those ideas happen to reside in. With the Telepath games, I went in with a rather limited idea of the setting, and sort of built as I went. I come from a creative writing background, and I believe that as an author, it’s important for your understanding of story elements to arise organically. It doesn’t do to start off a game with hard-and-fast preconceptions, then try to shoehorn game elements to fit those preconceptions. That’s the sort of approach that leads to unconvincing plotlines, wooden dialog and flat characters.
For example, take character development. I learn more about my characters as development proceeds by thinking through the sort of conversations they would have with each other. I let the characters’ voices come through, and so I learn about them during the process of writing their dialog. That’s not something I can effectively plan ahead of time: the process is key. Cera Bella has been a lot like that: I learn about the world as I create it.
You can read the full interview here.
I’ve enlisted the services of talented games artist Heriberto Valle Martinez in redesigning Telepath RPG: Servants of God‘s interface. Expect to see some changes to the look of the game’s menus sometime in the next couple of months!
For now, here’s a neat initial sketch he did of a stylized game title:
Telepath RPG Chapter 3 is now Telepath RPG: Servants of God. Some of you may have noticed me quietly changing the name here and there over the past week or two. Hit the jump to read my reasons.
