Dungeon Game - Treatment

In your hometown, a remote medieval city, a group of workers accidentally opens a subterranean entrance to a dungeon while digging a cellar for a building. After a bloody encounter with a group of fearsome monsters, many of the workers are left dead. The lord of the city offers a bounty for any who can venture into the dungeon and expel the evil which lurks there.

Note: Player is referred to as he/him, but is intended to be gender neutral.

After a brief introduction, the player begins play in the town. The player is cued to visit the Duke's castle first. Upon visiting the castle, the Duke thanks the player and asks him to investigate the subterranean entrance and report back anything he finds.

The player then returns to the town proper, and is cued to enter the construction site and it's cellar. At the far end of the cellar lies the dark entrance to the subterranean dungeon. As the player enters the dungeon, the entrance closes behind him! The player then wanders around in a small area of rooms and passages, fends off some small monsters such as rats, bats, and skeletons, and finds a few modest items. The player comes across a room with a magically sealed silver door at one end. The door bears an insignia which depicts a brass skull with lightning coming from the eyes and a staff in the background. The next room contains a door, which when opened creates a new entrance/exit to the cellar. The player may now return to the Duke to report on what he has found.

The Duke is concerned with the presence of the insignia. The insignia is apparently the standard of a powerful evil wizard who resided in the mountains to the west. He was believed to be dead after the destruction of his tower by demons 10 years past. The insignia indicates that the wizard may be alive and up to no good.

The Duke gives the player a magical scroll of opening, which can be used to open the magical seals on the silver door. The Duke instructs the player to return any items found bearing the insignia for investigation. The Duke promises to reward the player for all such items retrieved.

All further visits to the Duke result in an automatic transfer of insignia items for gold, and possible extra quest instructions.

At this point, the player has full access to the town Blacksmith and Temple, and can come and go to the dungeon as he pleases. As the game progresses, the player will gain access to alternate entrances into the dungeon, such as the Sewer and Cemetery.

The player engages on continued forays into the dungeon, between which the player trades money and equipment at the blacksmith, and buys potions at the Temple.

The first time the player returns to the town after reaching a level-up point, the Training Hall becomes available, and the player can train skills there.

The first time the player returns to the town after reaching level 5, the Tavern becomes available, and the player can hire mercenaries. Mercenaries follow the player through the dungeon and have various behaviors such as attacking enemies, defending the player from hostile monsters, and casting helpful spells on the player.

The game is completed when the player kills the evil Lich mastermind.


• Multiplayer
  Multiplayer play will take place in a similar manner, and be cooperative for the most part. Player killing may be toggled on or off for each player.
  
  Exceptions are that the player will be assumed to have played the game in single player, so all town spots will be available immediately, except for the Crypt and Sewer entrances.
  
  NOTE: Multiplayer will not be supported in the first version.

The town is rendered as a flat painting with clickable hotspots such as the Duke's Castle, Blacksmith, Temple, Training Hall, Tavern, Construction Site, Sewer Entrance, and Crypt Entrance.

Clicking on one of these hotspots takes the player either to a special screen (Duke, Blacksmith, Temple, Training, Tavern), or into the dungeon proper.

The action takes place in an indoor environment. The layout of the dungeon is 2-1/2 D in the style of Doom, but with 3rd person perspective projection. Note that 1st person perspective has been chosen to simplify the camera usage. The dungeon will be divided into sectors as were Doom maps.

Use SDL to handle the platform-specific graphics layer, input events, sound effects, and networking.

Use OpenGL to render all graphics.

Use a homegrown OpenGL/SDL-based widget system to present user interface objects.

When a player starts a singleplayer or multiplayer game, the client basically spawns an internal server which the client communicates with. If the client has started a multiplayer server, then the server listens for and handles extra connections. The player also has the option of joining a multiplayer game.

If the player joins a multiplayer game, he has the option of creating a new character or loading one which is saved at the server.

If the player loads a saved game, then a new server is spawned and returned to a saved state. All player characters are saved in saved server states. Players may save and load both single and multiplayer games.

NOTE: Multiplayer will not be supported in the first version, but the client-server architecture should be in place.