Domo Arigato Gozaimashita Chris-san, SeaRex-san and Fuzzy-san!
And Thanks for your criticism Fuzzy-san and I would like to adress a few of your comments.
About Chanting: I have no idea how programming games work right now but the computer would "make" you possess what was right for the current puzzle/situation (like in the previous Oddworld games).
I really like your idea about other types of Muds. When I thought up the "plant life" idea I had those Muds with rice-picker hats in mind.
So for Example: You still need to get up to that cliff but you can't reach it, there is no Bounce, but you are left with a stump of a tree that has been cut down by industry. Go find a Native Mud, get to a transformation shrine, turn the Native into a "rice-picker" (i love those hats!), lead your new Treehugger to the stump, tell him to "work" and he'll start chanting to make the tree come back to life.
Another Example - Inside a giant Mudokon windmill is an inactive Transport Well. To activate the well you have to get the Windmill blades turning. To do this you need wind. Go find some Native muds, find a transform shrine, turn them into Shamans, lead them to the Storm Circle, tell them to work and they'll start chanting, the Storm Circle will activiate causing the winds to blow and the Windmill to spin thus activating the Well!
Regarding Farts - I was rushing to explain everything so let me explain "Fart Control" more: Pressing the Fart button will make Abe fart and can also get the attention of other creatures.
Example: Munch puzzles his way to a control port and jacks into the light controls dimming the lights thus creating a ton of shadow zones for Abe to sneak around in. Abe sneaks into a shadow zone and then farts to get the attention of a Slig (if you say Hello the slig will know its a Mud and shoot to kill). The slig will say something like "Somethin' Smells" and run to investigate it leaving the coast clear.
Now you drink a bottle SoulStorm from a Vendo (which BTW has limited uses in my game). After ingesting brew farting produces an explosive fart. Chant to posses this fart. Now i've come up with a simplier control scheme for Farts. Pressing the
Y button makes the fart rise up. Pressing the
X button makes the fart sink down. Using the analog stick moves the fart around the level plain like it would any character (those of you who have played
Zone of Enders for PS2 KNOW this control scheme can work!) And to detonate the fart simply unposses it.
I agree with your comment about Mud emmotions seeming shallow and maybe to complex but this time screwing up would not kill the Mud only reset the "conversation". Think about this: X-Box controller has two shoulder buttons and analog face buttons you can either tap or hold. This can give you up to eight or sixteen (depending on if you make the seperate shoulder buttons do different or same function) different "types" of things to say.
In my head (and this is probably a programmers nightmare) but there should be many different Mud voices (although not EVERY Mud should have a different voice, thats asking too much for now). Say "What's up" to a Mud and he may reply "Life Sucks". Now then one combo of Gamespeak could be the "Question" button and in this situation pressing it could make Abe say "Why do you say that?". Now the Mud could reply with a Depressing answer "Everyone's dead", an Angry answer "THEY KILLED TAD!", a Silly Answer "Pull My Finger!", and so forth. To deal with a Depressing answer use the "Sympathy" Gamespeak combo making Abe say something that pertains to the situation. The Silly answer could be dealt with using the "Aggressive" button or if the Mud takes offense use the "Laugh" button to appease the comedian.
You get the gist of what I'm saying. NOt just have him glow blue or red, but rather they each have individual problems and sayings and Abe deals with them individualy. In essence it's still shallow but superficially it sounds cool and innovative. Might be too complex for the likes of some people still.
Fuzzy-san you beat me to it! I was going to go back and edit SligSpeak so you could control Slogs.
Well this post took a while so if some more people have replied thank you as well!!
[ December 03, 2001: Message edited by: Eibu ]
[ December 03, 2001: Message edited by: Eibu ]