December Progress - Card Game!

After a small winter break, I decided to tackle something small(ish) as a target, and something I've longed to add to the RPG for a while now - a card minigame!

Tackling a whole RPG is pretty daunting at times so it's nice to set myself something that I can get to the end of, even if it's not always the highest priority at the time. I personally find that minigames and breaks from the standard gameloop add a lot to an RPG like this though, they're sometimes my favourite bit!

How to play

For those familiar with Triple Triad from FF8 it'll look and play similarly. A game similar to Reversi/Orthello where you win by flipping the most tiles over to your colour. The top-left shows the pattern of adjacent tiles that the card will affect, and to the right of that the element of that pattern.

Common patterns like the + affect tiles to the sides or x pattern affects tiles in diagonal directions. But many pattens will exist that will be introduced as the game progresses. For the basic game mode.

For elemental games, the affected tiles must also be an elemental weakness or the same kind. Here are the elements:

• Fire > Flora > Earth > Lightning > Water > Fire

• Neutral beats all and is beaten by all

Additional Features

The game has been tested with different formats which could be featured in rare instances, such as:

• Bigger grids

• More than 2 players (Only 2-player appears to be balanced when tested with AI vs AI)

• Additional AI behaviors (Not just easy / medium / hard, but reckless / cautious / optimal)

• Complex card patterns

• Additional elemental types like holy / shadow / poison / ice

• Using the mirrored deck that the AI uses

Local multiplayer to face someone taking turns is also there, and the possibility of online would be an easy addition if the rest of it is in.

Progress

The minigame itself is pretty much complete! The main things left to do is:

• Transition between world and minigame

• Player card album UI to allow collection / storage of cards

• Add 'play cards' option to dialogues with preset NPC decks

• Reward / penalty considerations

• Add cards to mobs

• Selecting cards to play against an AI

• Tutorial

So a chunk of bits outside the game need implementing. The player will also need 8 cards to participate, which will require a quest or two. Perhaps the basics with a pre-defined deck will be initially pushed to the playtest.

Additional Work

• Great progress on the dialogue system, will review it again soon

• Progress on title screen!

Finally

Thank you all for your support! It's a big undertaking so the support and feedback has been vital for me. I hope to accomplish a lot in 2025!