Design Documents (Part 1) and Projects We Love!
almost 2 years ago
– Wed, Mar 01, 2023 at 08:35:21 AM
Converting 32 year old docs from MacVenture to NES style: Part 1
Let's talk design! I shared some images from the original BSG design doc in the last update. Our lead designer Chris Moseley (we love 'im) had the arduous task of taking the four binders of that very design and making them work in our new game! Let's see what has to say in part 1!
"We were lucky enough to have the original design documents from 1990 to assist us in building this version of Beyond Shadowgate. While there are advantages to having a design template to work from rather than starting from scratch, the process was not as trivial as we hoped. The first hurdle we encountered was understanding the original design documents. The template we have for Beyond Shadowgate exists as several spiral binders filled with hundreds of pages of text and artwork. The art binders are separate from text binders and lacked any index or table of contents. Before we could do anything, we had to scan each page to create digital copies, a task that Dave Marsh was kind enough to do by hand.
It took weeks to build the world map and match the artwork with the game text data. The task was difficult for several reasons. The art binders contain images that were tied to a game code system that no longer exists (the original MacVenture codebase) so it would appear as if the reference names and relevant images were not grouped correctly. For instance, the art for a single city building is located with the art for an unrelated segment of caves. Luckily, the artistic themes helped us aggregate images for specific areas.
Finding associated text descriptions and interaction instructions for an image was even more difficult. Page 1 of art document #1 contains the following information: “R-Cell_Fenling” pertains to an individual room while “O-Brick_Manacle” refers to an interactive object within the room.
Even with digital copies of the game text data binders, text recognition software is imperfect, so searching for specific terms like “R-Cell_Fenling” often fails. To find the relevant text data for an art piece, we had to read and manually annotate the documents. The corresponding text is found on page 5 of the game text data document #1:
This process took a long time. The binders containing text were several hundred pages of single-spaced typing. Luckily, these had a general header preceding the document like “Dungeon” or “City” and unlike the art, most of the text data were grouped appropriately. But we still had 51 pages of city text to comb through to find a description of a fountain. Eventually, we developed a reference system to identify the location of key components. Fountain text: D2P27 means the fountain is located in document 2, page 27.
After sorting through the template and identifying our foundation, we had the difficult task of translating a Macintosh Computer game design to accommodate the limitations of the Nintendo Entertainment System style..."
More in the next update!...
Projects We Love
We want to give a shout out to a project we love and hope you might consider backing!
Monstrous Heroes | 5e Monster Classes
Our friend, Esper the Bard, has been running a YouTube channel forever and it's one of the most unique channels I've ever come across relating to D&D. His latest Kickstarter is a great handbook for anyone playing D&D and other fantasy roleplaying games!
Also, he and his friends did a great playthrough of the Beyond Shadowgate demo so if you don't mind spoilers, check it out!
I personally love this project because 1) I appreciate the unique narrative of Esper's Youtube channel and how he combines game design, narrative and illustrations into a DM setting. 2) Because of my ties to D&D (I grew up outside of Chicago and would get my mom to drive me to Lake Geneva WI in the late 70's where Gary Gygax created D&D. Actually met him a few times at the Dungeon store there!)
Anyway... on to Esper's Kickstarter!
Monstrous Heroes is a 5e book that gives you more than a dozen new classes inspired by monsters. It gives players tons of options to play monstrous characters, and it gives GMs resources for more in-depth monster NPCs and unique campaign settings.
Monstrous Heroes is all about playing monster classes. These serve as both your character class and your race/species. Feast your eyes upon an incredible 14 classes, complete with subclasses and new spells. Minotaurs, vampires, ogres, elementals, dragons, and more await you, so come embrace your wild side!
No more need to play a “monster-lite” kind of race that has just a tiny puff of monstrous abilities. Dive in and play characters that go beyond the typical limitations that hold you back.
Monstrous Heroes is also great for GMs who want in-depth options for advancing basic monsters into more dynamic enemies and NPCs.
If you are a role playing player or just love these kinds of books, please consider backing Esper's campaign!
Thanks!
Dave Marsh
