Mr. Mario Donick, whom recently got back to roguelike development mode after a somewhat long hiatus, has released version after version of LambdaRogue, his main roguelike project.
Since yesterday’s release of version 0.3.0.2 of LambdaRogue, the game itself could be considered as nearly finished. All necessary quests are implemented, all textual content (except one textfile) is written and the game is winnable (technical and balancing-wise). So besides optimizing the existing content, fixing possible bugs and delivering the missing textfile, I could stop the whole thing and call it 1.0.
As you can see on by his own words, the game is finished. If you are a roguelike developer, you know how hard it is to call your game finished, specially if your scope is not 7DRL limited, or a proof of concept. If you are a roguelike player, there you have it, a complex, easy to play, indeep new roguelike, yours for the taking!
So, I recommend you to take a look at his game, it is interesting, important and not obsolete. Go forth, and look for the book of stars!
Temple of The Roguelike 
Thanks for this little article about my game. 🙂 Of course (and as my statement said), I COULD call it finished, but it isn’t; there is so much to improve, so 1.0 is far far away.
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Looks good.
Mr Donick fix you LOS routine please, LOS should not stop before blockable terrain but on it. Generally you can see mountains and walls without having to be one space away from it. Fix that and I will certainly play this. Also dependancy on the mouse is a little annoying. Thanks.
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Seconded… the constant need to reach for the mouse really kills it, for me. It seems like it could be interesting but the mouse dependency makes it unpleasant to play.
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Corremn, yeah, this LOS issue is really a little strange. I surely will optimize that.
Corremn and Andrew, mouse is TOTALLY OPTIONAL. You can switch it off by editing the file lambdarogue.cfg. There is a key “UseMouse” which is set to “= True” by default. Edit this to “= False” and all menus will be shown as in earlier versions of the game – textbased and reacting on key input.
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Another thing regarding mouse: If mouse is activated in lambdarogue.cfg, the player should really rarely need to switch between mouse and keyboard. Instead, movement and most actions are done using the mouse, with keys as optional alternative. The right mouse key here does the same as Enter or the action key (“U” by default). If one wants to use only the keyboard, mouse support should be deactivated.
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Ok this game is way better IMHO with mouse off. Thanks for the reply 🙂
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No problem and thanks 🙂 I think it is a matter of taste; in mouse-only RPGs like Diablo or Sacred (which are the main influences I have, combined with lots of Angband and Moria) you manage inventory and other menus with the mouse, too. For me its a comfortable way, but as many players of roguelikes are used to keyboard, I will always support this. (In fact, since 0.3.0.2, keyboard support is better than before).
(I also saw your posting in r.g.r.d, but as I answered already here, I did not reply there).
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When you open the game the first time, the game should say that it’s possible to turn the mouse off.
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I disagree. It need only be in the help files or the readme.
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Having to download and then patch four times to play, however, is a minor nuisance. Unless I have missed the obvious.
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Someone keeps hijacking your thread title (on rec.games.roguelike.development) to: Escape from Fobbahland
A bug: In console mode the shift and control keys do not work. Shift+key always returns S. Ctrl+key always returns C.
Nitpicks: Enter key with also act as get – undocumented. Having to constantly hit Enter to continue is annoying when in most cases
(e.g. picking something up) it is not needed. You want to minimize the number of keystrokes required.
I look forward to spending a little more time with this when I get home. Can’t concentrate at _work_ 🙂
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Brendan,
I agree that the way I released these patches was rather unconveniant, but at that time it was the fastest possibility for me. Beginning with next release, 0.3.1, I will split the game into three packages: The game itself, the graphic files and the sound files. As most changes regard the game itself, it will be easier for me to provide updates in a better way (hopefully), and, as bonus, if a player prefers the console mode of the game, he/she can avoid to download the increasing amount of graphics data.
Concerning the console bug: I assume you are using Windows, as this only occurs there. The bug is already fixed in my development version. The reason was that I used a “suboptimal” method to read out the returned key. I used a function that returns a whole string and then used the first character from that string. For Shift + C, for example, Linux here returns “S” – but Windows returns “CTRL + C” and as I only used the first letter of that string, I always got “C”. I now had a look into the documentation of FreePascal’s Video unit and discovered that there is a much better way to get the pressed character 😉 So the bug won’t occur in future versions.
Thanks you for your input!
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Sorry, I made a typo in my post. For pressing Shift + C, Linux returned “C” as String, while Windows returned “Shift + C”.
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