More General Bits of News

Simba!

Some more quick news fluff from the front:

  • Congratulations to Gaslamp Programmer-Affiliate Ryan C. Gordon (better known as “icculus”, the great and knowledgeable), who is now the proud father of a lovely daughter. (This has slightly delayed our incoming patch yet more; just before dashing to the hospital, Ryan immediately said “Here! Have an entirely new SDL library and audio driver!” This fixes a lot of the stuttering issues, as well as various performance issues and crashes under OS X, but I’m currently quietly poking his changelist with a stick, somewhat afraid that it will bite me.) We have celebrated by having Chris Triolo produce this small homage to the Lion King.
  • We are pleased to announce that Sean Hamilton has joined the Gaslamp Games team. Sean will be working with us on Project Odin; since his arrival on the project, he has already produced three crates, a selection of small shanty houses, two logs, one ingot, and a mineshaft. Auspicious.
  • We are still looking for a character modeler and a gameplay programmer to do some contract work on Dredmor with us. I think we’ve got everything else taken care of  at this point. Exciting. If you think you’d be a good fit for either of these things, please drop us a line at jobs@gaslampgames.com ; I think, at this point, that we are restricting ourselves to locals after all for the most part.
  • There is vague talk of doing another Dredmor DLC pack, either as an additional paid expansion (of a form to be determined) or a free DLC package of some sort to be determined. Other than our continued commitment to patching and general subterfuge, is there anything else specific that you’d like to see from us? Let us know in the comments.
  • Finally, here’s another Odin teaser.

Posted in Dungeons of Dredmor, Games, Gaslamp | Tagged , , ,
58 Comments

58 Responses to “More General Bits of News”

  1. Chungyen Chang says:

    Could we have a section of the site dedicated to wallpaper-sized images of your blog post thingies? That would be fantastic.

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  2. Sheepyhead says:

    I’d like the ability to split stacks, I keep losing weapons on that bug.

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    • Crunchy says:

      Dude, just hold left alt as you click left mouse.
      Et Voila!

      You just picked one of the stack up. 🙂
      I had to hit the forums for that one myself.

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      • tejón says:

        That still makes this one of two operations I can think of which can’t be done with the mouse (the other being, sell an item when not adjacent to Brax). Could use work. Also a quicker way to split very large stacks… when I’ve got 200 lutefisk and want a pile of 100, it’s a bit tedious!

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  3. Razarus says:

    Yeah wallpapers would be lovely, i would like to have 1600:900 Diggles on my PC monitor ;D awsome!
    Also: Love you’re work guys (and girls?) 🙂
    PS: Make character skins ;O

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  4. Tanker says:

    Hey guys! I second the splitting stacks. Also, you can cast/shoot fine at the left/right/top side of the screen, but the bottom side where the UI is, you can’t see tiles to cast, just try casting a Tenebrous Rift to the bottom of the screen, the spell damages you (not because of Necro debuffs), because you can’t cast it far away (I’m playing with the default UI, 1024×768). So a Hide/Minimize UI feature would be fine. More “viable” mage skills (I mean damage skills, like Ice Magic). Let Killer Vegans step over animals (like they are pets), because it’s nearly unplayable and frustrating on early levels. Little balance changes (Archeology is plain overpowered, while I see no reason to use smithing at all) Make all skills to have 8 levels (or at least 6). Also, delete cheaters from top of leaderboards. I think this is all. 🙂 Dredmor is a fine game, I have spent countless hours in it, keep up the good work!.

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    • Tanker says:

      One more idea, make the game support steam overlay, if it is possible. Also, congrats to the baby! 🙂

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      • It already does; you simply have to run the game with -opengl as a command line parameter. (This is kind of undocumented and unsupported.)

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        • tejón says:

          I tried the -opengl switch and it did the opposite… still no overlay, and I stopped getting Steam achievements! This was with putting the switch on the launcher, since I didn’t see any other executables; did I miss something in a subdirectory?

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  5. Muscle Horse says:

    For Dredmor I really want some way for the floors to be mixed up a bit. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels a bit tired with floors one and two and something able to randomise them would be fantastic.

    At the risk of getting excited about something that isn’t going to happen, I’ve convinced myself that Project Odin is a more accessible Dwarf Fortress/Dungeon Keeper-like. Please? With little Diggles as DK’s imps.

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  6. Lordovos says:

    Some sort of storage bank or more inventory space would be pretty cool. I’m always running out of space holding onto materials, food, and items I’ve fooled myself into thinking I’ll need later on. 🙁

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    • Lisa says:

      That’s part of the game, deciding what you should hang on to and maybe messing it up. Plus I think there’s heaps of inventory space anyway.

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  7. Anon says:

    Congrats to Ryan, and also can’t wait for the DLC (as well as the current one somewhere else than on Steam) and Odin.

    But when are we going to get the update on our HIB pages? I’ve still got the december version that doesn’t really work.

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  8. MeVe says:

    I would say to do both a free dlc and a paid one in the future.

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  9. Kino5 says:

    Congratulations to Ryan!

    As for the suggestions for Dredmor, in the forums are conversations about several things that would be great if they were included. There’s a suggestion about a second skill belt, bags for crafting materials to improve inventory management, something about making the mod selection permanent between sessions… that’s only what I remember right now 😛

    As for project Odin… well, I just can’t wait! 😀

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  10. Gayo says:

    Honestly, the #1 thing I want to see from Dredmor at this point is expanded modding functionality, and I’m not sure you can sell that as DLC (though I’d buy it!). In terms of actual content, more non-bookshelf craftables would be nice, but adding many more would probably demand an overhaul of the crafting UI, since it’s already pretty crowded.

    OK, here’s a real suggestion: it’d be neat to have another monster AI pattern or two, with new enemies to exploit them.

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    • Gayo says:

      Oh, as an afterthought: in terms of new skills, I really like how Demonology expresses an “arc” rather than a straight progression, especially since you can choose just how far you want to go along it. It’d be neat to see another skill or two that worked that way, such that the nature of the skill tree changes substantively depending on how far you take it.

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  11. jordan shimmin says:

    I would like to see the ability to scroll when selecting skills so that i can have more modded skills installed. I don’t believed you have addressed this issue yet please fix.
    Thanks

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  12. Borsook says:

    If you add bigger inventory in a DLC, that would be a dream come true, and I’d gladly pay for that, even if it’s the only change…

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  13. sirspate says:

    I’m currently playing a game where I’ve got a stack of 3 presses. I can’t sell any of them because I can’t split them.. I got one more and I was like “yes! I can sell my stack!” Then somewhere between there and Brax I accidentally hit sort.

    While we’re on the subject of things that’d be nice to add, how about a “punt pet” option that can only be used on friendlies? I keep having to take Psionics so I can push back my fire elemental dude or golems because otherwise they box me in..

    DLC..DLC.. nope, sorry, no ideas, unless you’re considering a Bureaucrat or Politician skill. (It’s hard to give suggestions when you feel like you’ve barely scratched the surface of the base game, much less the existing DLC. I feel like that’ll be the case for me for a while–which I’m very happy about. 🙂

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    • Lisa says:

      I agree with the punt pet thing, I’m never using a Golem again! Or maybe if they simply switch squares with you when you try to move onto a square where they are.

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  14. MrAltamente says:

    “but I’m currently quietly poking his changelist with a stick, somewhat afraid that it will bite me” hahahahaha i loled sooo hard xD

    “(…)another Dredmor DLC pack, either as an additional paid expansion (of a form to be determined) or a free DLC package of some sort to be determined) – Pleeeease… no more paied DLC… at least for now!!

    Stuff looks great :p Keep up the good work guys 😉

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  15. Godwin says:

    Would love a new expansion! Would be cool to see the bug with timing of events (blackjack) fixed, although that’s a bugfix but it comes to mind.

    Expansion ideas: inventory space added, portals leading to random floors upon exit… now these are just patchlike content… ehmmm lemme think some more.

    New skills, monsters, taunts and floors would be cool. Maybe make 7-ish extra floors that appear randomly from level 3-15, replacing the floor that they appear on. For example you can then have no japanese woodlevel on floor 5 but errr… ancient spider cave? Each with their own flavour in mobs.
    Maybe one more very special ‘Dredmor-boss’-floor, number 16? Everything is made so as to be a real home lair with the last defenses of a very powerful Lich.
    Maybe the option to choose more skills? Like the potential to choose 9 total skills, and then also just 5 I guess, gives us more ability to tweak our player experience.
    More crafting recipe’s for sure.
    How about the ability to feed diggle eggs to diggles to make them nauseous? Would be a cool way to use healthgains offensively, or at least as a different way of defending.

    Hmmm thinking some more…
    How about a friendly town somewhere in the dungeon, random on which level it is located, like from 5-8 or so, and they give some quests and you can rob them or murder them or help them?
    Maybe put in a special sokoban tower 😀

    You could also think about some sort of major quest for a major reward, like a quest spreading 3 levels that you have to collect a lot of stuff to summon either an angel, a stone elemental (neutral), or a demon? He’s a permanent follower but if he dies he dies. You can feed it food to heal it. Maybe put in some very nasty optional monsters that usually need such a strong ally to win against, could be part of the Quest itself, and if your summoned one survives the battle all the better for you. Maybe make it the hidden force that helps to revive or that commands Dredmor?

    … that’s it for now 🙂

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  16. For DLC content, I’d love:

    Something useful to do with the 2 million zorkmids you’ll have by the lower levels. Either items that only appear in shops, or skills that use zorkmids to power effects, or some new that you donate cash to instead of lutefisk.

    Some way to improve the rewards from (reduce the arbitrariness of) Inconsequentia, Zoos, and/or the Lutefisk God. Especially the later because you save up all this fisk to donate, and then get an item that’s completely wrong for your build. Like basically a “This translation is all wrong power” that doesn’t change the bonuses, it swaps the base item out for a random base item of the same level.

    Rooms that can only appear in the mysterious portals, and/or some sort of reward for going through the portal and coming out the other side.

    Branchier dungeon with alternate floors like Godwin mentioned.

    A room or two that use the element. I know it exists and can somehow count down, but there’s no implemented example so I’m really confused how to set it up for use. Okay, so that’s kind of a modding capability request as well as DLC.

    Scrolls. There’s a .xml DB for them, but I’ve never seen one spawn, and I’ve played 340 hours of this game. Looks like you’ve got half the work done on them, might as well finish them up and implement them.

    New that do things we aren’t expecting.

    In other words, I’m looking for DLC content that can’t be done by modding (or at least can’t be done by modding until the DLC comes out and expands that functionality). We’ve got a thriving modding community, so anything that can be done via the existing modding capabilities, will eventually get taken care of by that community. You guys should focus on completely new stuff that will blow our minds.

    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    However, my biggest request for future patches is (you guessed it) expansion of modding capability. Here’s a few specific things I’d like to see:

    The ability for Macs to use more than one mod at a time.

    The ability to actually mod items. I want to be able to make my own Diggle God, as well as make or alter devices that convert items placed on them like the lutefisk shrine and bbq, If you could move their code to the xml, that would make me very happy.

    Fix so that weapons can actually use the tag. This will fix blue steel sword, timberbane, magma mace, etc, as well as open up modding functionality.

    Fix so that playerHitEffectBuff works. This will fix Spiked Leather Collar, and also open up further modding functionality.

    Monsters (and sprites in general) moved away from .spr files and into just .png or some other common graphics format that photoshop can open… and all of the files converted. That way modders can access all the resources that come with the game, regardless of platform and software.

    Ability to do total-conversion mods, or at least mods that alter the base game content, and still use the mod launcher.

    I’m sure there’s plenty of other things mentioned in http://community.gaslampgames.com/threads/modding-requests.1926/ that would make me happy if they were implemented. That thread is full of great ideas by the aforementioned molding community, brainstorming all the things they’d like to do, but can’t.

    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    Other things that need to be high priority:

    Getting Realm of the Diggle Gods onto formats other than Steam.

    Making sure that all updates get to all three delivery methods at closer to the same time. HIB is still on 1.0.9, despite Steam having 1.0.9 REV B for a whole month. Given that the change list is all “FIXED: crash that…” it’s pretty sad that the HIB folks are having to suffer through that for an extra month or more.

    { reply }
    • Oops! I used some code examples in that, and didn’t think about how the software would parse them (mainly it deleted them). Here’s a version that’s _not_ missing words:

      For DLC content, I’d love:

      Something useful to do with the 2 million zorkmids you’ll have by the lower levels. Either items that only appear in shops, or skills that use zorkmids to power effects, or some new element that you donate cash to instead of lutefisk.

      Some way to improve the rewards from (reduce the arbitrariness of) Inconsequentia, Zoos, and/or the Lutefisk God. Especially the later because you save up all this fisk to donate, and then get an item that’s completely wrong for your build. Like basically a “This translation is all wrong power” that doesn’t change the bonuses, it swaps the base item out for a random base item of the same level.

      Rooms that can only appear in the mysterious portals, and/or some sort of reward for going through the portal and coming out the other side.

      Branchier dungeon with alternate floors like Godwin mentioned.

      A room or two that use the clock element. I know it exists and can somehow count down, but there’s no implemented example so I’m really confused how to set it up for use. Okay, so that’s kind of a modding capability request as well as DLC.

      Scrolls. There’s a .xml DB for them, but I’ve never seen one spawn, and I’ve played 340 hours of this game. Looks like you’ve got half the work done on them, might as well finish them up and implement them.

      New elements that do things we aren’t expecting.

      In other words, I’m looking for DLC content that can’t be done by modding (or at least can’t be done by modding until the DLC comes out and expands that functionality). We’ve got a thriving modding community, so anything that can be done via the existing modding capabilities, will eventually get taken care of by that community. You guys should focus on completely new stuff that will blow our minds.

      +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

      However, my biggest request for future patches is (you guessed it) expansion of modding capability. Here’s a few specific things I’d like to see:

      The ability for Macs to use more than one mod at a time.

      The ability to actually mod element items. I want to be able to make my own Diggle God, as well as make or alter devices that convert items placed on them like the lutefisk shrine and bbq, If you could move their code to the xml, that would make me very happy.

      Fix so that weapons can actually use the resistbuff code. This will fix blue steel sword, timberbane, magma mace, etc, as well as open up modding functionality.

      Fix so that playerHitEffectBuff works. This will fix Spiked Leather Collar, and also open up further modding functionality.

      Monsters (and sprites in general) moved away from .spr files and into just .png or some other common graphics format that photoshop can open… and all of the files converted. That way modders can access all the resources that come with the game, regardless of platform and software.

      Ability to do total-conversion mods, or at least mods that alter the base game content, and still use the mod launcher.

      I’m sure there’s plenty of other things mentioned in http://community.gaslampgames.com/threads/modding-requests.1926/ that would make me happy if they were implemented. That thread is full of great ideas by the aforementioned molding community, brainstorming all the things they’d like to do, but can’t.

      +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

      Other things that need to be high priority:

      Getting Realm of the Diggle Gods onto formats other than Steam.

      Making sure that all updates get to all three delivery methods at closer to the same time. HIB is still on 1.0.9, despite Steam having 1.0.9 REV B for a whole month. Given that the change list is all “FIXED: crash that…” it’s pretty sad that the HIB folks are having to suffer through that for an extra month or more.

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      • Godwin says:

        Sorry but your posts look identical to me (apart from the very first sentence).

        { reply }
        • They’re not. The first post is missing 6 words, each from a different sentence, which rendered 4 of those 6 sentences unintelligible.
          For example:
          “A room or two that use the element”
          vs
          “A room or two that use the Clock element.”
          Without that one word, you can’t even tell what I’m talking about.

          { reply }
      • Gayo says:

        I agree that more ways to spend money would be nice. On the other hand, we don’t really need more ways for Tinkering and Smithing to be worse than shopping and artifacts, so it’d be interesting to see some more super-expensive one-use items — the most expensive edible thing is, like, 1000 zorkmids. Alternatively, there could be some shop/machine that gives an unlimited supply of something useful, but raises the price game-wide every time you buy one.

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    • You can already convert gold to lutefisk, although in a not-so-efficient way: just buy out whatever the store offers and stove it into the Cube.

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      • Wedge says:

        That’s actually a fairly efficient method if you’re buying from a throwing or bolt vending machine, especially with lower level stuff in it.

        { reply }
  17. Sandling says:

    I think it might be nice to have more resource-gathering skillsets (obviously with themed abilities later on to keep things interesting and combat related too)

    For instance, a miner skilltree that lets you get minerals from certain nodes.

    Amen to the inventory problem – It would be nice to have methods to store more stuff or to increase your bagspace. Or what about even having your own little house that you can decorate cosmetically and functionally (it having a container to dump stuff in).

    I’d like to see some more diversity in quests too personally, like saving certain monsters or guiding them from one place to the other, as well as quests that might put you at risk for accepting them, but reward you nicely in return (Turning you into a monster, giving you a slow draining disease etc)

    The idea of workshops had also been brought up with mods, places that can augment your crafting skill. I really like this idea too! 🙂

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  18. Boogdish says:

    I would love to see a more complex Auto-loot. For instance, if you’ve taken smithing but not tinkering having your character not pick up coils and plates. Or if you’re playing vegan, picking up non-animal based foods.

    It might make the game a bit too easy, but I’d also love an “Auto-Lute” where certain items can be designated to get tossed in the Horadric Lutefisk cube just by walking over them.

    Also, I’d love it if in the crafting system you could see the stats of the items you’re about to craft. It’s always a bummer to save up your ingots to get a piece of armor and find out it was worse than what you were already wearing.

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  19. Dervon says:

    Suggestion for DLC stuffs:

    Slight expansion with regards to food/drink, perhaps linked to a Gourmet Skill Tree (Food Crafts / Abilities / Buffs Gained While Under The Effect of Food/Drink Health/Mana Regen) or somesuch; stuff like a composite use for Ground Meat/Grated Cheese.

    More skill trees in general! The more the better! I prefer using officially designed skill trees to modded ones any day. And the more you add, the more complexity in skill builds we get!

    { reply }
  20. Teslacrashed says:

    I would love new paid DLC so I can support the game more.

    Something that adds new functionality to the game, to both spice things up for the regulars and for modders to have more tools to play with!

    I like the person above’s idea about replacing floor types randomly.

    Congrats to the new father!

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  21. Naiyan Lima says:

    First of all, congrats, Ryan!

    What I’d like? Some non-random way to teleport without line of sight!

    Besides that, well, a more connective dungeon. I mean, from the entrance, each door goes a different way, and they don’t meet. Made myself clear?

    Anyway, keep up the good work. This lil’ thing of yours made me waste a lot of time, and I don’t feel like stopping anytime soon!

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  22. UseTheValveHandle says:

    Please make a Diggle Wallpaper in high resolution!!!!!!!! Also another paid DLC would be more than welcome (1-2-3 DLC i’Ll buy them all! 🙂 )

    Also maybe a Android tablet version of Dredmor??? The control could somehow work on a tablet , but I am just dreaming here 😛

    Keep the good work guys , your company rocks and congrats Ryan 🙂

    Also can we get more Dredmor merch ??? 😀

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  23. tejón says:

    Crafting is a catch 22: invest in the crafting skill early so you can make things, but suck at using them since you haven’t spent points elsewhere; or spend no points on crafting until you’ve probably found all the gear you need anyway. Mainly this is an issue with smithing, but alchemy and tinkering are affected too, and there should be mechanical consistency between the crafts.

    I think the answer is to remove the skill prerequisites, allowing everything to be crafted by everyone (this makes bookshelves more interesting too), and give the crafting skills some more unique effects. For instance, smithing could allow (non-random?) artifact creation and transmutation of metals; tinkering could give your traps extra damage; wand lore could give you extra charges and a special wand-only power bonus; alchemy could give some resistances, stuff like that.

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  24. Blue Footed Booby says:

    I don’t know how realistic these are, but here are the things that’d increase my enjoyment of the game the most:
    -dungeon branches, randomized levels, or some other way to break up rhythm a bit
    -a few more static challenges, like the demon princes in nethack. I feel like they’d serve as set-pieces that give the player a better sense of a continuous personal narrative, like they’re going on an adventure and not just playing levels in a game.
    -boobies

    As for putting points in crafting gimping combat and putting points in combat gimping crafting, I feel like that’s sorta the point. You’re trading a bit of proficiency for certainty that you’ll never be limited by accessibility to gear.

    { reply }
    • tejon says:

      I understand and accept that the crafting/proficiency dichotomy is deliberate; I just think the balance is skewed too far away from crafting. Note that it’s not just “proficiency” skills that are messed up by crafting… in fact, probably the single worst thing you can do is take all four crafting skills!

      { reply }
  25. RoundhouseKitty says:

    More skill trees! I love how inventive and wonderful they are.

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    • RoundhouseKitty says:

      Also, perhaps add in the ability to actually -see- the stuff you’re wearing? I mean, the obvious stuff, not rings and tiny things. But armour, helmets, and more diverse weapon sprites, perhaps? I’d pay for that, gladly – but even so it could also just be free, with something paid on the side. Bottom line – this game is very good, and I’d pay for more content gladly, and would also like the whole visual thing.

      { reply }
  26. Phairoze says:

    I’d REALLY like to see an option, perhaps a “new mode”, (or simply a checkbox) for an endless adventure / dungeon. This would be the same as is now, just with infinite amount of floors, or at least as many as technically possible. All random, of course 🙂

    { reply }
  27. Vak says:

    Some of my friends and I have been talking about how it would be cool to have equipment show up on the character/sprite, though I’m not sure how much work this would involve.

    It would be very fun to see my lowly wizard roaming around in a traffic cone, or having to start the game more or less naked… not sure. At the very least, there could be a static sprite that showed your equipment/showed up on the highscores (those could use some work too) or something, it’d be neat.

    Also: Multi-tile monsters?

    { reply }
  28. tejon says:

    How about items that grant a spell when equipped? Something for non-casters to spend mana on…

    { reply }
  29. Sam says:

    Eyebrow armour

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  30. Tomzargh says:

    Just add some more skills, monsters and levels and i’mma throw my money your way. You guys’ve made an awesome game.

    { reply }
  31. Neocow says:

    Well hello my old friend.
    Give us DLC or give us DLC.
    If you can and Odin doesn’t start to consume your lives too fast, let us throw more money at you via Dredmor, please.
    PLEASE!

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  32. Neocow says:

    As for suggestions:
    * The biweekly/monthly challenges (is that still on the to-do list?)
    * Mini-game(s) or at least a way to add mini-games+triggers, (added to the framework) so we can make even cooler mods than you can even imagine. (no not really but what i’d like to make would be lock-picking minigames, avoiding trap minigames, ect.)
    * NPCs (neutral ofc; maybe with dialogue tree? or even just a box like brax, or maybe just, you know, tell us how to do it for mods)
    * Aperture Science Handheld… Demonic Displacement Glyph “Gun”
    * What ever happend with that diggle-issac crossover thing?
    * With that blog image, i want a diggle baby

    I asked IRC and:
    * Be more vague (Daynab said so)
    * Pidgeons (Loren)
    * Combat Milling – Turn your enemies into “delicious” flour! (Spadger)

    { reply }
    • Neocow says:

      (5:28:48 PM) Spadger: you have to carry a millstone which takes up 4 inventory slots and you have to deploy it
      (5:28:58 PM) Spadger: but as long as you stand next to it, you do massive damage
      (5:29:14 PM) Spadger: and then you can use the flour to craft stuff
      (5:29:19 PM) Spadger: like bread
      (5:29:52 PM) Spadger: i’d love a loaf of diggle bread

      I was thinking a skills like
      “giant Strength” Fee Fi Fo Fum
      Bone grinder
      Blood of the englishman

      Who doesn’t want Diggle bread?

      { reply }

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