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#464682 26/04/13 10:23 PM
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Incase you haven't heard, they "met" the last stretch goal. Though it was short $5k, as Swen said "It be stupid to not do this over $5k.." He also said they might find the $5k under a mattress.

Anyhow, this thread is to help them find a pool of games to get inspiration since NPC scheduling has been done before...but very rarely.

One game I can think of is for the Nintendo 64 called (can get at the Wii store to play in the Wii)
Legend of Zelda: Majoras Mask (or Mask of Majora). The game was heavily centered around NPC schedules.

Last edited by LightningLockey; 26/04/13 10:25 PM.

Every time there I run into trouble on the road, there is always a dwarf at the bottom of it. Don't they know how to drive above ground?
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Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny
Ultima VI: The False Prophet
Ultima VII Part 1: The Black Gate
Ultima VII Part 2: Serpent Isle

Using the Dungeon Siege engine (they are mods for it)
Ultima V: Lazarus
Ultima VI Project

Last edited by Jaesun; 26/04/13 10:34 PM.
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They won't need a mattress, Paypal is open another 2 weeks. And with the latest figures from the RPG Codex and RPG Watch, it's only 4k they need. smile

Also, Oblivion and Skyrim are other obvious games with NPC schedules. There's also Xenoblade Chronicles for the Wii.

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TES IV: Oblivion is the only one I've played. Though I really hope Larian doesn't take that as a model.

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IIRC Swen wants to do Schedules simillar to the one in Ultima VII. People wake up in their homes, and then go to work. At noon they go to an Inn and eat lunch. At night go to their homes and sleep etc..

Last edited by Jaesun; 26/04/13 11:11 PM.
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The Npc Schedule in The Witcher 1 and 2 is great

Last edited by Ananke; 26/04/13 11:21 PM.
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Originally Posted by Jaesun
IIRC Swen wants to do Schedules simillar to the one in Ultima VII. People wake up in their homes, and then go to work. At noon they go to an Inn and eat lunch. At night go to their homes and sleep etc..

Even more than that. With the weather system they should also react to the environment and search for shelter when it rains for example. smile

So the NPCs should act very realistically, according to the daytime and the weather and the circumstances....

Much work to do for poor Axel.... meh


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That's to simplificafed! We need other things they will randomly do, not only the basic ones.

Last edited by Sawovsky; 26/04/13 11:44 PM.
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There are more games out there with NPC schedules then I thought.

Some npc's will hopefully have complex schedules, but most will have to remain simple as this game will probably have well over a thousand NPCs.

The Zelda Game I mentioned has very complex NPC schedules. The game only has maybe 100 NPCs. I'm hoping that the quest NPCs will be as complex with majority of the NPCs just there creating an atmosphere of a busy town/city.

Last edited by LightningLockey; 27/04/13 12:15 AM.

Every time there I run into trouble on the road, there is always a dwarf at the bottom of it. Don't they know how to drive above ground?
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I once played a game called Cythera, an old Mac shareware game modelled after the Ultimas (especially U7, with which it shares a very similar visual style). Shopkeepers in a city would go to the market in the day and close down during the night, buildings would be locked and unlocked depending on the time of day, the students in the school of mages would eat at mealtimes between classes and sleep in their dorm beds at night, nobles would hold court during the day and spend their evenings in their quarters/study, etc. Excellent game.

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NPC schedules in Risen (probably in Risen2, but I havn't played it yet).

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Pretty much every Dragon Quest game has it, going back to the NES days. The Elder Scrolls series has it, but implemented it pretty badly until Skyrim. The Persona series sort of has it, but it's more that time jumps on after you perform certain actions as opposed to time smoothly moving forwards all the time.

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I just hope that things like shpping are taken into account for the npc schedules, e.g. that there is a quite shadowy figure luking in a dark alley of the town at midnight where you can sell your wares while your local and offical buyer is at home. Maybe this merchant has worse sell prices but in compensation some unique items on stock.

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I'd also love to see the guards or other NPC's get sick if they are standing in the rain for too long and then go take a hot bath. Wouldn't it be hilarious and cool to see the lonesome guard standing outside a door in the rain sneezing and sniffling. Or even your party members? it could affect moral.. don't think your in the best of moods when you have a cold.

There's just so much you can do with this =)
Good weather everyone is happy high moral, rain sleep and cold = bad moral


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Having a black market dealer come out at night would be great for shopping and atmosphere, but in terms of NPC schedules not getting in the way of what you want to do, there could also be some way to quickly pass the time (magic, not walking to the nearest inn and renting a room to sleep for a certain number of hours). Of course for some quests it could makes sense an NPC would be fine if you tracked them down at home, but if you wake someone up in the middle of the night to finish off something relatively minor, any rewards you receive (gold, reputation, etc) should realistically be reduced.

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Almraiven and Shadewood have NPC-schedules, as well as night- and/or day only encounters. There's also (of course!) A Dance with Rogues 1 & 2 (all are NWN 1 mod, by the way).


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LightningLockey , since apparently our forumers have a bunch of cool ideas for NPCs, can you rename this thread to ''Ideas for npc schedules and behaviours'' , so that people know where to put some interesting things regarding this last 1m goal, and maybe Larian guys can see something interesting and implement it in to the D:OS smile

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Originally Posted by Runeweaver: WoOS
Almraiven and Shadewood have NPC-schedules, as well as night- and/or day only encounters. There's also (of course!) A Dance with Rogues 1 & 2 (all are NWN 1 mod, by the way).


Ahhh yes Almraiven series - one of the best games/mods i played i have soo good memories of it.

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With NPC schedules in, it's probably a good idea to implement a Bethesda-style "wait/sleep X hours?" option. Just clicking on a bed and resting a fixed and hidden amount of time will probably be annoying if you want to wait for a specific NPC.


There should be a toggleable HUD element that shows the time and weather conditions as well. Or maybe that only shows up when the player brings up their journal. (Toggleable or configurable from the Options menu so players who don't want a lot of clutter on their screen can turn it off if the desire.)

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