The Artificer Wheel

I spent some time in Sketchup... can you tell?

One of the things which made Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask so utterly addicting was that you had a magic tool which was your constant companion. Despite the game being relatively simple you always had this little blue trinket which could control all of space and time at a whim. It had its limits, but you felt like you would be able to control every polygon of this little world if only you had the right song to do so.

And to be blunt, I consider it to be indispensable to an Action RPG that you have a relic of great power with quirks which is required for the experience. So here's the Tome of Destruction's!

WHAT DOES IT DO?

It spins. The game is Literature based. Meaning you're inside the pages of books living out the worlds of these characters. Book related (Pagemaster-esque) themes are myriad. Every game tool is named after a book element from famous literature, etc. 

As you progress through the game, Grimm will give you a dozen Words of Power which allow you to do things:

• Slow Down Time
• Travel Back in Time
• Speed Up Time
• Pause Time
• Teleport to Places the Towers don't Reach
• Activate Ancient Memories

You'll have a Book GUI which contains these words, with tooltips, so that you know what word does what things.

To use them, you will literally spin the wheel, spell the word, and pull the lever.

It's that simple. If the word does something, expect a particle effect filled event in which whatever mechanic you'd triggered will <verb> the character to do-a-thing. There are about 1000 instances where you'll use this mechanic. And it's fairly central to the game as a whole.

MINOR USES & PUZZLES

What is the point of having an epic tool if you can't use it EVERYWHERE? When you enter Dungeons, some will make use of key words for secret doors. But the Myth and Riddle telling doors to get into them will speak riddles at you, and you'll have to use the keywords you've earned, while standing at their entrance, to trigger them to open.

I made an executive decision to forego making it MANDATORY that you already know the word to use it. These puzzles will respond if you guess the correct word. Which makes those following a FAQ (and who don't like to read) able to haphazard their way through puzzles and extra content.

But for the story's sake; Keywords for the Artificer Wheel can be found in bright colors in the Dialogue of Secondary NPCs throughout the world. As you unlock and restore things from the glowing cubes, these NPCs will expand what they say to you, and fill your book with Verbs and Nouns (People, Places and Things will be on their own Pages) as well as Historical Events and even Your Achievements. Knowing the 2-6 letter word to say near someone, or something, will result in secrets, stories, and rare items being given out to the player.

And if you know or can guess that word, you'll be able to unlock them even if you haven't spoken to the NPC yet. Hurray for time travel.

THE ARTIFICER UI

The tool sits on screen at all times and is triggered by the [Z] key on your keyboard. (The Artificer tools is missing the 'Z' letter, because it's triggered BY the key. And Yes, there's a lore explanation of this which links into the main Plot... and may be a Power Rangers pun).

It's a 3D item on the UI. So when you call it, it dismisses the rest of the UI, and slides out under the middle of the screen. You can still see most of the screen when using it. You can CHOOSE to open the book, and review the words you've collected from the full screen view. But it isn't displayed by default.

You're able to use the arrow keys on the UI to select the six characters you want to use, and then click the level to pull it. The device will then spin and if nothing happens in game, it will reset. If you hit the reset button, it will reset. And if anything is meant to happen, the device will come to life, dismiss itself, and the in game event it creates will trigger for you.

Every time you use it it should feel magical. And should help you to feel like you're in control.

It is the Third Large Scale Core Mechanic (Time Travel, Event Control, and Tool Based World Interaction) which we need to make this a Zelda-Esque game in function and experience. And I couldn't be more excited to wire the user interface.

TINY UPDATE

The Hub is done. 

You can now Travel to Any timeframe in the game (all 238) by way of the Hallway and the Doors.

The rooms are For the testers and will not be part of the retail release but are fully connected to the Debug Menu to allow time travel and control over the Fully Wired Time System.

The testers can pop around any of the zones, by way of the instance gates. And pause/accelerate time for testing.

And though the entire hub is wired, we still have 194 timeframes to add the new Time Codes to. Which will take me a couple more weeks to finish. 

Next up is the World Travel Variable Gate System where we connect the towers to their specific time instance. There are 21 Towers, and we place them about 60 times. So we'll spend about 20 hours creating mass-travel events based on the Time Stat on the Main Character, then place the gates in the instances. Which will take... time. Also, to be honest, I think I forgot to build 3 Gate Towers. Which will take about two hours a piece.

And then, before we call the Milestone Cleanup Tasks for 3.0 done, I need to build the Wheel UI, and actually wire it to the player. To build the story without it would be silly. It would require me to go back and refactor the whole thing. Might as well build the central mechanic in process.

I'll put out an 'exploratory build' to the testing team once we're done with the Milestone Cleanup and let people go romp.

That's it for now!

-Game on!