FAQ - 2006/11/12
When is BowMaster 2 coming out?
After BowMaster Prelude
When is BowMaster Prelude coming out?
Sometime before Christmas 2006
What types of modes are there? Is it just like Bowmaster
1 where you defend your castle the whole time?
I have new modes with new objectives. For example, there is
a capture the flag mode and attack the enemy castle mode
Will there be population and farms?
Each game mode will have different objectives. For example,
a capture the flag match will end when you or your enemy captures
both flags or kills all units from the opposing side. In the
traditional 'defend your castle' mode your castle will have
hit points and enemies will stop to attack the castle rather
than walk off the edge of the screen. There may still be a
'prevent invasion' mode where enemies try to move all the
way accross the screen and this will be similar to how Bowmaster
1 works.
How do you command your allied units?
This is still being worked out. The ideas is that you'll be
able to click on a unit and click on something else to issue
an order just like an RTS game. I may have generic battle
strategy buttons that can be pushed to change the way all
of your units behave. For example, you can tell everyone to
advance, defend, or retreat with one mouse click. These features
are not finalized at this time.
How will friendly archers and catapults work? Do
you have to tell them how to aim like in BowMaster 1?
The great thing about B2 is how much smarter the AI is. Archers
and Catapults will acquire targets and aim at them automatically.
Their accuracy and range will be upgradeable (either through
upgrade purchases or leveling up) and they will calculate
the best angle and velocity to do this. You will even be able
to specify if you want them to do high arc or low arc shots
(Note that if a target is closer than max range then there
are two solution angles when firing at max velocity, at max
range the only solution is a 45 degree angle shoot).
What enemies will there be?
This is still being decided, but some likely candidates are
Footsoldier, Big Footsoldier, Archer, Priest, Mage, Warlock,
catapult, zeplin, dragon riders, dragons. There may even be
variations on the same type of units, such as elite versions.
There may even be beast type enemies like wolves, raptors
or maybe even fire spitting turtles. Priests will heal friendly
units. Mages will cast elemental spells like fire ball and
ice attack. Warlocks will be able summon skeleton warriors
from corpses.
What new weapons, upgrades, armors will there be?
How does the upgrade system work?
Your only weapon at this point is your bow. I might have a
weapon shop where you can buy new bows which have better stats.
Experience points will be earned a little bit differently
in this game. You will earn experience points for the specific
actions you perform. For example, if you use fire arrow a
lot then your fire arrow experience will go up and you will
unlock new fire related skills. I'm planning on having a tech
tree similar to World of Warcraft skills. As for buying things
such as equipment or soldiers this will be done through a
weapon-shop interface. You'll earn money by completing game
objectives and killing enemy units.
Can I save my progress?
This all depends on your computer's internet settings. Some
people have experienced problems with Bowmaster 1 not saving
their scores. I'm using Flash SharedObjects (flash cookie)
which store information locally in a temporary binary file.
If you computer is configured to not allow flash objects then
the game progress may not be saved. I'll try to post instructions
on how to ensure your progress gets saved. As for what will
be saved, the game is going to save more than just your experience
points. You'll no longer have to re-allocate all of your xp
points every time you revisit the game. The game will now
save all of the skills you've learned and the associated experience
levels with each. A new feature of the game is that you'll
be able to save multiple profiles on the same computer. This
means that if you can save your progress and someone else
can start their own game. At the beginning of the game you
just specify which profile you want to use.
What's this I hear about character classes?
You'll be able to specify your character class when you create
a new profile. Each character class will have it's own set
of special skills and spells (similar to World of Warcraft).
The three planned classes are Mage, Hunter, Engineer. The
Mage will have access to powerful elemental spells such as
FireStorm and Blizzard. The Hunter can set traps and call
upon nature for assistance (perhaps summon a pack of wolves).
The Engineer is a specialist in mechanics and demolitions
and has access to advanced siege weaponry such as cannons
and rifles.
What are the new Bosses?
BM2 May have up to ten unique bosses. The details of each
boss are secret at this time. There might be a dragon boss
hint hint, and maybe even a hydra. You may even see the return
of the big golden boss from BM1. You'll just have to wait
and see
Will the game ever end?
This time around I plan to have a story and ending. I'm planning
on having 100 unique levels with up to 10 different themes.
The difficulty will increase as levels increase but the later
levels won't take as long as they take in BM1.
How will level difficulty increase? Will it be like
BowMaster 1?
The enemies will increase in speed and hit points with each
level, but They will not likely move as fast as they do in
BowMaster 1 at high levels. The real challenge will be trying
to defeat the new types of enemies that keep showing up as
you reach later levels. I'm planning on having at least one
new enemy every five levels (or an upgraded version of the
same type of enemy, e.g. on level 1 an enemy archer shoots
regular arrows, but on level 5 they may shoot fire arrows).
How many units can you command? How many enemies
will be on screen at once?
I'm still in the process of optimizing the code and graphics
but in an early demo I was able to get up to 30 units on the
screen and have the game run pretty smoothly on a P4 2.0GHz.
I may allow the user to specify detail settings for users
that want to improve performance on slower computers. As for
how many specific types of allied units you can have on the
screen at once, that's both a performance and game-balancing
issue. However, I'll likely allow you to have more than just
four archers which is the limit for BM1. |
