Any Robo Rally Fans out there??

[wolph42]

After playing Robo Rally this weekend again it reminded me how much I love that game.

Hence I'm gonna take a stab at the game to convert it to maptool.

As this can be quite an undertaking I was wondering whether there are any other fans out there who are willing to chip in in the creation process. Note: coding skills are NOT required. Lots to do outside of it, if not only helping in the brainstorm proces.

Let me know! (just reply in this thread)

[CoveredInFish]

Somehow I never had contact with RoboRally, but consider me interested. It looks really cool.
If my coding skills (that are way less tidy/structured than yours) or my photoshop skills are of any use, I might find some time to help.

[wolph42]

Somehow I never had contact with RoboRally, but consider me interested. It looks really cool.
If my coding skills (that are way less tidy/structured than yours) or my photoshop skills are of any use, I might find some time to help.

Cool. I've just finished the first steps (starting game, layout and dealing cards). I've used stuff I scrounged from the interweb mixed with some dabbling in photoshop. Have a look, the campaign file is b90 compatible and in the root.

There's also a map dir that might be a bit big (overall the dir is 900 mb (just checked) ). If thats an issue let me know and ill move the maps out of there.

edit: some more info: if you feel upto it, just grab something todo what you like. I've not yet formulated a structured plan, save the basics:
1. collect image material (done)
2. photoshop material as far as necessary (done)
3. create MT campaign file (done)
4. create layout and drag all images onto map (nearly done: need to add 'damage' and 'player' tokens)
5. script basic code so the game can be played online, this basically means:
- create deck (done)
- properties (done)
- lib token (done)
- start game macro (done)
- deal cards macro (done)

----- from this point onwards their are two routes (note CORE system only for now):

1. the images: improvement and add-ons.
- For one I've used the 'scanned' images for the cards, but they need to be replaced with the 'unofficial' ones which are more slick (and not scanned). But this need to be done on a one by one basis (that is check if the numbering and type per card is the same as the original).
- another is photoshopping certain elements to transparency so they can be used as overlay (done that for e.g. the 2 beam lasers)
- add numeric states so the 'round based elements' can be set to those states (crushers and pushers go of on e.g. round 2 and 4 or 1 and 3 or 1,3 and 5 etc.)
- remove numerical references from current elements (done AFAIK for the BASE/CORE set)
- create more slick tiles
- conveyer belts. There are two types: normal and express and there are 6 different types for each;
+ straight (one straight arrow)
+ turn left (one bend arrow)
+ turn right
+ straight and turn left (one straight and one bend arrow)
+ straight and turn right
+ straight, turn left and turn right (one straight and two bend arrows, one on each side)

2. automating certain aspects of the game. Which starts out with a brainstorm session. Feel free to collaborate.
Brainbreakers that I've identified so far:

a. when a robot moves to a spot where another robot is, it pushes that other robot away UNLESS there is a wall
--> its possible that you have three or more robots in a row with one pushing the lot. thus the only feasible way to resolve this is a recursive loop (which 1. checks whether the robot can move and if so the effect of the new tile and 2. returns a bool 'hasMoved')

b. lasers... both graphically (there can be 1,2 or 3 beams, only stopped by walls and they can originate from opposite position) and programmatically (laser beams are 'disrupted' by a robot, that robot takes damage equal to the amount of lasers but the laser stops there meaning that another robot passing by (at the disrupted side) in the same round will not take damage. You can potentially have laserbeams spanning the entire board so again possibly a recursive loop?

c. angles and directions. This is a REAL pain as maptool has this suck system of -180 to +180 and 'null' when not rotated. Knowing however the direction of both the tile and the robot and the travel directions are vital.

d. some form of animation. I've done this before so it should be doable, but when a round is 'resolved' you should see some form of animation. Although I guess a 'next' button for starters will suffice initially.


directories of interest (in dropbox):
- \Board Tiles\ (all the tiles required and an explanation per tile)
- \Program Cards\ (these are fan made and contain more than the core set. They still need to be transferred into maptool)
- \Roborally_1994_Avalon_Hill\Program_Cards\ (currently used program cards and consistent with core system)
- \Overig\ (contains player cards, which might also be usefull but take a lot more space than the current layout. Suggestions are welcome)

[CoveredInFish]

Working double duty this week I'll wont be able to start a thing till next week, maybe weekend.

[Jagged]

Love Robo Rally. Found your other thread first, replied there

[wolph42]

Love Robo Rally. Found your other thread first, replied there

let me know if your willing to contribute?