Category: Random
Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment in Final Fantasy, circa 1987
Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment (DDA) is something that has been popping up a decent amount in the video game world recently; games that automatically, or through player input, adjust the difficulty to make games easier or harder to play are appealing because they make titles usable by large ranges of the population. I realized this past weekend, while going nuts with the cgcmarathon, that it’s been around for a while and that the ORIGINAL Final Fantasy, a Dungeons and Dragons inspired 8-bit classic on the original NES, had a great self-DDA system that let the user choose how hard they wanted the game to be at the very beginning of the game! The only problem is that it isn’t clear at all that is what’ s happening, since it is the “party select” screen, and doesn’t give any hints about how hard it will make the game.
So how does Self-DDA work in Final Fantasy? Let’s examine, with this easy to reference formula.
How to determine game difficulty in Final Fantasy based on party make up
When choosing your party in Final Fantasy, there are six characters to choose from. I’ve assigned them numbers here based on their usefulness:
5 – Fighter:Can soak up damage, dish it out consistently throughout the game, and is cheaper than the mages.
3 – Black Belt: Cheap and damage dealing at higher levels, this character loses points for not being able to take a hit and for being relatively worthless in battle until around level 10 or so.
2 – Thief:A slightly less useful version of the Black Belt, except he never really gets good.
3.5 – Red Mage:Can deal damage, wear some armor, and knows both white and black magic spells to boot. A bit cheaper than his white and black variant counterparts.
1 – White Mage:Can’t take a hit, can’t deal damage, very expensive and his healing isn’t super helpful. This guy (girl?) sucks.
2 – Black Mage:Also can’t take a hit but at least can occasionally deal damage. Very expensive.
Modifiers:
-3 – No Magic: If you’ve got no mages in your party, subtract 3 from the total points. Magic is generally less useful than attacking but has a knack of pulling you out of a hard battle here and there.
-3 – No Class Change: Not getting the rat tail and doing a class change makes the end game harder as there will be weapons, armor, and magic that your characters can’t use. The end of the game is somewhat easier than the beginning though, so it’s not as damming as you might think.
Once you’ve made your party, add up the total number of points from your four characters and check against the list below. The difficulty level assumes that the player has a basic knowledge of what to do in the game but is by no means an expert who knows all the game’s secrets.
16+ points: Easy, grind free playing. Just walk through the game and kill anything in your path!
13 – 15 points: Medium difficulty, it shouldn’t be too much of a challenge.
9 – 12 points: Hard, and you’ll have to grind at points, but doable.
8 points or less: Grind-tastic. Enjoy your hard game full of pain, disappointment, and failure.
That’s it! Pick your party and you are ready to go, knowing that you have defined how difficult your game will be.
My “I want to take it easy and not have to grind at all” party? It’s these guys.
The party I played with during the CGC Marathon was probably the worst one possible. SCREW YOU, ALL WHITE MAGE PARTY!
March 5, 2010 | | Comments (1)
Category: Games, Numbers, Random
Tags: adjustment, belt, black, DDA, difficulty, dynamic, Enix, fantasy, fighter, final, mage, magic, NES, points, red, Square, thief, white
Inspector Gadget: Man or Machine?
We’ve been kicking this question around the office for a while and are unable to come up with a satisfactory answer. Is Inspector Gadget a man or a machine?
There is ample evidence that Gadget is some sort of Cyborg with extensive implants; that would certainly explain the fact that his limbs all seem to function in mechanical ways at times and “normally” at other times. It also explains his demeanor and human personality.
But at what point does one stop being a Cyborg and become a full fledged robot? Gadget regularly has things pop out of his head (see above image), implying that his skull is storage space and indicating that he may in fact be a robot. An alternate theory is that he is entirely human and has some sort of advanced nano-robotic implants which construct (and then deconstruct) his gadgets upon verbal “Go Go” commands.
The rabbit hole goes pretty deep on this one; if Gadget isn’t human, what is his relationship to Penny? Is she actually his niece, or perhaps some sort of highly trained and competent caretaker? Evidence in the cartoon show would certainly support this theory. And what about Brain? Does he have some sort of neuro-stimulation of his own going on? How else could we explain his extraordinary intelligence as a K-9?
What do you think? Let us know where you stand on this in the comments!
January 26, 2010 | | Comments (1)
Category: Random
Tags: 80s, Brain, Cartoon, Conspiracy, Cyborg, Gadget, go go, Human, Inspector, mystery, Penny, Random, robot, Theory, TV
Meet our team
Ever wonder who we are, and what it’s like working at Fire Hose? NOW YOU KNOW.
December 8, 2009 | | Comments (6)
Category: Random
Tags: autotune, bling, fire, hose, rap, t-pain, video
The Thanksgiving Pie Debacle
This Thanksgiving some friends of mine from RPI in good old Troy NY invited me to their annual Saturday night Second Thanksgiving Dinner, for people who couldn’t get enough on Thursday night. At the end of the night they have a tradition of eating pie. Specifically, 10 pies. Between 14 people. I’ll chronicle some of the more interesting pies here, in the order we ate them.
Chemical Pie: All of my friends were cracking up as this pie was served. I took a bite, and I didn’t get it – the pie tasted like an ordinary apple pie! When I said I didn’t get what the fuss was about my friends cracked up even more… and informed me that there were absolutely no apples whatsoever in the pie, nor anything that tasted like apples. I guess this was the pie equivalent of a Long Island Ice Tea, where many weird ingredients mix together to make some sort strange new flavor. Or maybe the local chemistry student made it and just dumped in a bunch of hazardous compounds that I just thought tasted like apples. Who knows.
Mince Pie: We were pretty worried about this pie, since we thought that it was a mincemeat pie and would be full of random animals. When we found out it was purchased by the resident vegitarian we were a bit less worried, but still disgusted when we found that it was chock full of vegetables, fruit, and turnips. Despite looking revolting it actually wasn’t so bad, but I’m not sure I’d get it again.
Protein Pie: Oh man, this was a doozy. You know how you go to Jamba Juice (or any smoothie place) and they’ll put in some protein powder in your shake? Ok, now imagine a pie made out of chocolate pudding, peanut butter, around 14 cups of that nasty powder, and topped with freshly cut banana. Yum. The maker of the pie (the girl in the pictures below) informed us that each slice had 40 grams of protein and twice your daily recommended intake of cholesterol. Eating this was like pouring cement into your stomach.
Granola Pie: This one was a lot better than it sounds. A bunch of granola and other yummy stuff all shoved into a granola crust and served with a heaping scoop of whipped cream. It was really good, but each slice probably could have been its own meal.
Mystery Pie: I have no freaking idea what was in this pie, and the nut who made it wasn’t about to tell us. My guess? Cap’n crunch and artificial flavorings. PROVE ME WRONG, CHEF.
Strawberry Mango Pie: This one sounded great on paper, and was the most vile thing ever once we started eating it. The strawberries and mangoes were in some sort of horrendous sugary goo type syrup, and the whole thing just tasted miserable. I’m pretty sure I developed diabetes after eating a bite of this one.
The other pies: We also had a few standard pies thrown in, like a homemade berry pie, a Hershey’s chocolate pie, a Boston creme pie, and of course a pumpkin pie.
The result: I made it around halfway through the lineup but I didn’t last. After an attempt to rally I just gave up and started collecting pie on my plate, taking care to eat at least a bite of every slice I got. At the end I was so far behind I did the only honorable thing I could think of and face planted in what was left and ate what ended up in my mouth. Only four of us failed to get through the whole ordeal, so I’m going to have to train hard if I’m going to be ready for next year.
Thanks to Bob + Turnip for inviting me, to Vona and Josh for egging me on and getting me to eat more pie than I would have ever though possible, and to everyone else who joined in the madness.
December 1, 2009 | | Comments (1)
Category: Random
Tags: apple, banana, Baniak, Bob, chemical, granola, Hershey, mango, mince, mystery, pie, protein, pumpkin, RPI, strawberry, Thanksgiving, Troy, Turnip
Excuse our mess
Over the next 24 hours or so this site might look a little bit messy as we redesign it. Yes, we’re going to edit a website while it’s live and yes, we know it’s a bad idea.
What are you going to do about it, punk?
November 10, 2009 | | Comments Off
Category: Random
Tags: bad idea, redesign, website
Happy Halloween from Fire Hose
Halloween at Fire Hose! This year I was Quote, the heroic robot from the best game you’ve never heard of, Cave Story. Made over the course of 5 years by the incredibly talented Japanese maniac/developer Pixel, it’s an amazing Metroid-esque 2D platform shooter, and it’s got a great story. It also happens to be free, so if you haven’t tried it I strongly suggest downloading it and giving it a spin.
I hope everyone had as much fun on Halloween as we did! We made our deadline, and we’re busy blowing off steam, decompressing, and taking care of our lives outside of development. I for one have around two months worth of laundry to do. Stay tuned over the next few weeks for lots of info on our game!
November 1, 2009 | | Comments Off
Category: Games, Random
Tags: Cave, cosplay, costume, Halloween, laundry, Metroid, pixel, platformer, Quote, shooter, Story
Welcome to the Ridiculous World of Fire Hose
We know you’ve been anxiously awaiting a taste of what’s to come in the ridiculous world of Fire Hose….so, here’s a screen shot of one of our whiteboards with some very important tasks that we’ve been working on.
All we can share right now is that this has to do with our submission to the Indie Game Challenge, sponsored by SMU/Guildhall and GameStop. Fire Hose is about to enter (and conquer) a brand new world. Word.
More updates to follow soon.
October 21, 2009 | | Comments (1)
Category: Random
Tags: Denis Dyack, GameStop, graphics, Indie Game Challenge, Level 3, NeoGAF, SMU/Guildhall, tighten, velociraptors
FH D&D Adventures Continue!
The Fire Hose Dungeons and Dragons campaign continues! Jeff Ward was awesome enough to do a second write up (after last time’s), so here’s a rundown of what happened.
The Players:
Nebin – halfling theif, bold + brazen and full of bravado
Silidhor – ranger elf, quiet with a dark past
Arranis – eladrin wizard, more interested in books and history than fighting
Lucian – elf cleric, a healer with a big freaking mace
After returning from our battle against the dragon, Alia immediately ran off to inform Taleh’s family of his apparent demise. Nebin, Silidor, Arranis and Lucian, meanwhile, investigated the contents the chest they had stolen from the dig site. Nebin, Silidor, and Lucian divided (and fought) over some gold, stones and potions, while Arranis spent some time with some very interesting looking (and magical) spectacles, which came with a note, apparently written in Abyssal, which he decided needed more investigation.
Follow the jump for more! (more…)
September 9, 2009 | | Comments (1)
Category: Games, Random
Tags: D&D, dragons, dungeons, Jeff, Ward
Gamasutra publishes Eitan’s article on UI Design
Eitan’s article on Usability Interface design was just published on Gamasutra today! The article talks about four key elements of UI – learnability, simplicity, efficiency, and aesthetic. Specifically, why these are important and how to critically balance these elements for your own game design. Eitan’s pretty passionate about UI, having written his master’s thesis on the topic.
It’s also filled with awesome pictures from some of our favorite games, if you’re not into reading lots of words.
Check it out, and we welcome your comments here or on the Gamasutra website!
August 19, 2009 | | Comments Off
Category: News, Random
Tags: Gamasutra, interface, Madden NFL, Rob Miller, Space Giraffe, Starcraft, street fighter, usability, Wii
Recap of our first D&D adventure
We recently finished our first D&D adventure here at Fire Hose, and Jeff Ward has been nice enough to write up a pretty detailed play by play for how shit went down. Enjoy!
After the rest of the party was separated from Nebin and Alia, we immediate set to questioning the remaining kobold about where our friends had gone. Of course, by we I mean mostly Taleh. After much cajoling, we convinced the kobold to show us how to rejoin our friends on the other side of the portal, taking him along for good measure.
Follow the jump to find out what happened next (more…)