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Soulash

Soulash is a fantasy roguelike where you play as a forgotten god set on destroying the world. · By Artur Smiarowski

More NPC interaction?

A topic by Keinname7 created Apr 30, 2022 Views: 412 Replies: 1
Viewing posts 1 to 2

So, this is something i thought was part of the game when i first saw it, but since the 1.0 already came out, i decided to ask here:
do you have any plans for adding a rudimentary system for interacting with NPCs (beyond the usual murder)?

What i mean by this:

Imagine that, instead of every NPC magically knowing you are the dark lord (How do they know that, anyhow? Do we subconsciously radiate an aura of pure evil?) they don't. So, a human character could, at least in the earlygame, safely (barring any thugs or thieves) explore a human settlement, talk to the NPCs (whose slightly repetitive and often unhelpful dialogue tends to get annoying), and even do some very basic quests for them - for which you will often be underpaid, undeappreciated, or just feel like you're wasting your time on  stupid menial task. Sometimes all three of the above, just to drive the point home on how annoying the NPCs are.
You know, typical RPG stuff. It's like deciding to take a week off on the farm, except with human (or non-human) interaction. Until the NPCs, possibly through a stray event, inevitably ruin everything by getting on your nerves or exposing you and you unleash hellfire upon them like they deserve.

Sure, it would be quite a bit of work from a technical standpoint: you need to add a (very) basic quest system, the talk option, more dialogue, and a reputation system that determines how well you will be treated by various groups of people (a human would blend into a human settlement, but a lich would get attacked on sight almost everywhere). And a shopping system, too. A human could exterminate orcs and goblins to gain some reputation among his kin. Of course, once you thoroughly start your genocidial rampage and/or people become aware of who you are, all you reputation will inevitably and irreversibly hit rock bottom.
Although it might be a lot of work for what's basically extra flavor, i think it's quite doable as part of a "big" update, and it would enrichen the shallow massacre with some more depth and flavor - plus, it might be fun to pretend to be a "normal person" in the earlygame and see just how far you can go with that roleplay until you inevitably need to show your true colors.

I would mod such a thing in myself - the possibility of custom campaigns is quite fascinating for me, and i'd like to one day make my own with the setting of "you are stranded in a fantasy world, but the world is full of cruel people and you don't have any plot armor. Have fun!". Basically any Isekai plot ever: the roguelike.
But from what i learned so far, (granted, i'm still new to this), the event system doesn't look like it'd be able to handle this kind of thing - or maybe it could, but "neutral" NPCs aren't a thing in this game from what i gather so far, so it would be tough to do a scenario like "damsel in distress, but she betrays you afterwards" or "buying items in shops" - especially since there isn't any kind of trading system.
Well, this all is probably just a pipe dream, but hey, doesn't hurt to ask, now does it?

P.S.: Have a nice day/evening/night!

(+1)

Last year we had a Factions system in our Kickstarter stretch goals that was supposed to introduce something like this, but the Kickstarter failed and we no longer can take the game in that direction, that would require a complete redesign of everything in it. It doesn't make sense for this character to run errands for mortals or gods, there's no point in trading since everything belongs to you. A lot of the questions you asked here should be answered as you level up and read the character monologues and dialogues with the NPCs. 

Factions, trading, and discussions are something that I plan to have at the core of a sequel however, it will lean more into RPG stuff like this.