The Dink Network

The Northern Lands: Chapter 1

January 21st 2018, 08:49 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
So I didn't want to make a thread on this dmod until I've done some serious work on it,
So.......I did.
I dunno when it will be released, or IF it will be released, but there's extremely high chances that it will be released. (If I do release it however, I do hope it will pass moderation unlike someotherharmlessfilesImade *coughredinkpleasecough*) And there's also even more extremely-er high chances that the dmod will be longer than AFNB and more enjoyable than AFNB.

So, as you might have guessed, the dmod is called "The Northern Lands", and, you guessed it ,it's about the southern lands! So the main character is called Taven. He lives in a nice small town by the sea, living his life, as one does. Until one day he recieves a letter from his father, who is king of the Southern Lands, who is also dying. In the letter he says that, you guessed it, he is dying, and Taven needs to go in the Northern Lands to find his uncle and take him back to the southern lands where he takes his brother's place on the throne.

The first dmod (The one which I'm working on) is Taven getting to his father, and the second dmod is...well....the rest. So I guess you can call it a duology.

So far I am done with the first half of the dmod, which is planned to be smaller than the second part. So in reality the dmod is 40% completed, although some may look at it and say "yeah, that's 50% completed!". I dunno why Im talking so much about percentages.

Obviously, what I told you is not the whole story, theres much more to do and uncover, but if I told you about everything then.....what's the point?

I can assure you the game features the following:
-Actual gameplay
-Actual story
-Custom tiles and sprites, some made by me, some made by kerrek, and some collected from the DN (There is a credits file in the dmod folder, so if your sprite appears in my dmod you'll be credited, don't worry)
-Custom midi's which I stole from other dmods or other sites.

All in all, the DMOD should last around 1 to 2 to 3 hours. Not everything is set so far, so I might go crazy and turn the second half into it's own DMOD, in terms of size.

Screenshots (featuring majestic tiles made by kerrek):

Docks

Marketplace

Abandoned House

Beheaded Ducks Salesman

Hopefully I've got you hyped up for my hopefully not shitty dmod. You'll hear more about it when it's released. Hopefully until March or earlier.

January 21st 2018, 11:09 AM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
Cool! The story line has piqued my curiosity. Also, the use of the new artwork, plus some creativity with existing Dink artwork, has made for some interesting screenshots.

So, I look forward to seeing more of this come springtime.
January 29th 2018, 05:26 PM
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Toof
Ghost They/Them
 
Until one day he recieves a letter from his father, who is king of the Southern Lands, who is also dying. In the letter he says that, you guessed it, he is dying, and Taven needs to go in the Northern Lands to find his uncle and take him back to the southern lands where he takes his brother's place on the throne.

This sounds awfully complicated. If I got it right, it goes something like this:

-Taven lives in southern lands. He recieves the letter from his father, the King, which means he doesn't live with his father, ha may or may not know whether his father IS a king, but once he finds out, he travels to North Lands to pickup his uncle, return him to South, and put him on the throne???

Can't he just... like... go Hamlet-ish all of a sudden, and kill his father with a pillow (hes dying already, no suspects), and send assassins to kill the uncle? Like, the assassins come, and tell the uncle "Yeah, your nephew arranged your ascension to the throne, please step onto the ship", then they throw him overboard, or make him walk the plank while shouting "Taven, ruler of Southern"...
January 30th 2018, 02:36 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Well I thought it's self explanatory that he knows his father is king. I mean, being king is a pretty hard thing to hide from your son.
Also, Taven doesn't want to be king himself, that's why he goes after his uncle.
EZ
January 30th 2018, 08:54 AM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
So, how do things look at this time?

What percentage of completion have you reached by now?

Does it look like 1 or 2 dmods today? I refer to the "duology", or turning "the second half into it's own DMOD, in terms of size.".

I split "The Last Quest" into 2 mostly so I could get a release out earlier. If you split yours then we could play it sooner. (hint ... hint)
January 30th 2018, 09:40 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
I have definitely made a lot of progress since I started the thread. But I really have to stop and think about how I go further because I could ruin it at any moment. I can safely say I have reached the half of the dmod.
Thing is, when I said that it will be a duology, I said it more because I want to take my time on the first chapter, seeing as it is only my second DMOD. Additionally, if i would've announced the duology as just one DMOD, I would have most likely hurried and messed everything up.
I did say I'd release it in about one or two months, but it's just an assumption. I won't release the DMOD until I'm happy with it, and that means I will have to work at least one or two weeks on each section to make sure it turned out exactly the way I wanted it.
It will be a long DMOD, as I dont want to make a romp, but it will most likely turn out a long-ish quest sized dmod, which is exactly what I want it to be.
February 3rd 2018, 04:53 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
UPDATE:
The development is going great so far, but I did encounter a bug in the engine which prompted me leave a note for the player which warns him about the bug. I'm 99.99% sure the code I wrote is not wrong and it is in fact one of the rare cases where the engine bugs out. So thanks Seth!
February 6th 2018, 12:15 PM
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quiztis
Peasant He/Him Sweden bloop
Life? What's that? Can I download it?! 
Report the bug plox.
February 6th 2018, 12:55 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
I basically made some portals and after entering, the screen doesn't light up sfter fading down unless the player moves around like an idiot for a few seconds.
February 6th 2018, 03:08 PM
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Skurn
Peasant He/Him Equatorial Guinea duck bloop
can't flim flam the glim glam 
do you have fade up after waits
February 6th 2018, 03:55 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
of course

it's quite simple code:
 fade_down();
 Playsound(18,22050,0,0,0);
  &player_map = 004;
    script_attach(1000);
    load_screen();
    draw_screen();
    sp_x(1, 304);
    sp_y(1, 322);
fade_up();


The code had wait commands in it aswell, but the result is the same. That's why I think it's a bug.
February 15th 2018, 04:12 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Alright, UPDATE:
Yeah this dmod is definitely not getting released in March. And Im at fault here. Mainly lack of motivation (like every dmodder's reason when they slow down progress). I can say I've reached like 60% and Im currently in an area, one of the few areas which I didnt plan on. So i dont exactly know what to do with it. But Im not ready to give up on this dmod yet. Dont lose hope, peoples
February 16th 2018, 08:57 AM
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jugglingdink
Peasant He/Him United Kingdom
Streetfish 
With your fading issue, are the portals touch-based? If so, have you made sure to stick
sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, 0);

as the first item in its touch procedure? Otherwise I imagine it's running multiple times, which would make it keep trying to fade down before fading up.
February 16th 2018, 10:18 AM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
(insert hope here)

February 16th 2018, 12:42 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
With your fading issue, are the portals touch-based? If so, have you made sure to stick
1.
sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, 0);

as the first item in its touch procedure? Otherwise I imagine it's running multiple times, which would make it keep trying to fade down before fading up.


I already set it to -1. Isn't it about the same?
February 16th 2018, 03:31 PM
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jugglingdink
Peasant He/Him United Kingdom
Streetfish 
Nope, the same thing used to catch me out too.

While it's set to -1, it will launch a new iteration of the touch procedure every frame that Dink is still touching it. This means that while the screen is fading down, it is launching several more copies of the procedure, which will then be running their fade down command while the first iteration tries to fade up.

If you set the touch damage to 0 in the first step of the touch procedure, it will ensure that no other iterations of the procedure are launched (this is because touch procedures only run if the damage is set to -1), so nothing will clash when fading up.

If that's what the problem was, hopefully this fixes it!
February 16th 2018, 05:03 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Hmm. Interesting. Ill try it when I have the chance and post about the results. Thanks!
February 17th 2018, 02:23 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Welp, I tried it and it didn't work. It just made the portals not do anything.

Here's the whole code file just to make sure:

void main(void)
{
        sp_nohit(current_sprite, 1);
        sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, 0);

 say("`4ENTRANCE", current_sprite);
}

void touch(void)
{
 fade_down();
 Playsound(18,22050,0,0,0);
  &player_map = 329;
    script_attach(1000);
    load_screen();
    draw_screen();
    sp_x(1, 304);
    sp_y(1, 322);
fade_up();
}


I also tried putting sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, 0); under void touch(void) but it didn't change anything.
February 17th 2018, 07:05 AM
anon.gif
toof
Ghost They/Them
 
I'm a bit rusty with DinkC, but maybe you should put & in front of a variable, and in front of sprites... so &current_sprite.
February 17th 2018, 08:49 AM
boncag.gif
jugglingdink
Peasant He/Him United Kingdom
Streetfish 
The touch damage needs to be -1 for it to run the first time. Think of -1 as a green light, and 0 as a red light. In your example you would put:

void main(void)
{
    sp_nohit(current_sprite, 1);
    say("`4ENTRANCE", current_sprite);

    sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, -1);
    //This tells the touch procedure to run if it is touched
}

void touch(void)
{
    sp_touch_damage(current_sprite, 0);
    //This tells the touch procedure not to run again if it's still touched

    fade_down();
    //all your screen switching stuff would then go here
}


What Toof said is true too, although I've been leaving that part out because TheDinkNetwork converts it into a weird character. As a side note, I'd also recommend using freeze(1) immediately before the fade_up and unfreeze(1) after, so the player can't move around blindly, but that's a matter of preference. Hope some of this has helped
February 17th 2018, 09:24 AM
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toof
Peasant He/Him
I disagree. 
TheDinkNetwork converts it into a weird character

Well that sounds like a job for... **cliche superhero music here REDINK1!!

Seriously though... that should be fixed, to avoid confusion. Coding things are touchy as they are already. sp_touchy(), if you know what I mean...
February 17th 2018, 01:45 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Problem solved! Thanks, jugglingdink! Expect spaghetti through mail.
February 28th 2018, 03:47 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
UPDATE: I resumed development on the DMOD!
March 1st 2018, 11:51 AM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
Hooray! How far along do you think you will be by the end of this week?
March 1st 2018, 12:51 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
If I keep going at it like this, I should get to the last stage of the dmod by tuesday/wednesday.
March 1st 2018, 12:58 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
Thing is, I'm following a certain technique of game making taken from Frictional Games (game company). The dmod is separated into areas which all have different quests to complete before moving on to the next area. The area which I am at now was in a weird stage so far because I literally just worked on the start and end, and was left to think about quests to do. It was an intimidating task which is probably why I quit temporarily. I got over it now but I seriously think this dmod contains an unhealthy amount of quests!
March 1st 2018, 07:53 PM
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That's actually kind of how the original Dink Smallwood plays out.
March 2nd 2018, 01:01 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
That's right, actually. The only difference here is that once you access a new area, you cant go back to a previous one.
April 14th 2018, 03:31 PM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
Any word on progress with your dmod?
April 14th 2018, 09:55 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
it's been put on an indefinite hiatus, unfortunately
April 15th 2018, 02:37 PM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
;(
April 15th 2018, 03:24 PM
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Skurn
Peasant He/Him Equatorial Guinea duck bloop
can't flim flam the glim glam 
so in other words, cancelled.
April 16th 2018, 02:36 AM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
You never know
June 15th 2018, 05:46 PM
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Bluedy
Peasant He/Him Romania bloop rumble
I like Frutti Fresh 
UPDATE:

This project is almost kinda dead. It's a real shame. But there is a giant lack of motivation. I haven't worked on this in months. It's a giant shame because I've gotten so far into development, yet I just...couldnt find the motivation to finish it. So I'll..of course release it as an unfinished dmod for public use and modification. For anyone who wants to do something with this, please play through the dmod first (until you get to the unfinished part). This dmod, in my opinion had a lot of potential, and I'd hate to see it go to waste if someone didnt play through it at least a little bit and got an idea about what I wanted to do with this. A LOT of work has been put into this. All of the mapping and scripting was done ENTIRELY by me, and the dmod also contains a few custom sprite sets for certain characters. And for anyone who has worked with sprite sets, you know how painful it is to edit each individual sprite.

Rest In Peace, Northern Lands. Or not. Depends on who picks you up.
June 15th 2018, 06:29 PM
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SlipDink
Peasant He/Him United States bloop rumble
2nd generation. No easy way to be free. 
Thanks for posting it as unfinished. No doubt someone will pick it up, perhaps even myself.