Modifying a existing engine

[hallsofvallhalla]

Was toying around with the idea of using a pre-made PHP engine like Dragon Knight or world of phaos and completely altering and adding massive features to it.

Since it would be open source I figured I could have the game open for play but also make video tutorials on how it was done.

Anyone have some suggestions on some open source PHP engines?

[hallsofvallhalla]

I found a game called The Merchant. It is long dead as far as I can tell but actually is a great start for a space game. I can't find the license on it for some reason but will find it. I have it installed locally and working. Maybe add some grand features to it to really bring it back to life.


edit: ah it is under the GNU General Public License (GPL) license. Will read up on it some more to fully understand it.

[OldRod]

I have messed with Phaos quite a bit and its pretty antiquated. Just getting it working with the latest PHP/MySQL was quite a chore. Never heard of The Merchant - please update with your findings

[hallsofvallhalla]

well there are allot of functions and areas in this code that has been depreciated or are just out date so it is throwing up allot of errors. I am going through first and getting the code up to date. There is tons of code so it should take a bit.

Next step after that is get the scheme looking like my own. Change the look to make it no longer look like the old game. Then I will start to add new features

a screen of it

[hallsofvallhalla]

wow this is truly a neat game. I am going to put it up for everyone to test it and then maybe we can turn it into a community project or just have a few people help me with it to learn.

I can see why it did not do so well. The navigation is a bit hard to see. Messages of what happened don't display in a readable manner. Once you get familiar with it however it is no big deal.

If I could make the GUI better and navigation more sensible it could turn out to be a very nice game.

First though I want to get more info on the license. I am not sure if I have to release my changes.

[Jackolantern]

Yeah, sounds better to go with that game. World of Phaos is ancient and when I took the vanilla files and tried to put them up on WAMP, everything was broken. Not worth the effort for the mediocre feature list.

[hallsofvallhalla]

wow that was hell but i finally got the game up. it does not agree with hosting sites whatsoever.

I updated many of the files and basically built some from ground up.

if you get a chance check it out in its original format
http://indie-resource.com/planetarywars/index.php

here is the beta key
nbetap

I did change the name in a few places to Planetary Wars. Do put in a proper email. I am using the email authentication.

Play around and see how you like and what we can do to make it better.

[hallsofvallhalla]

wow i am actually very pleased so far with what I see. I am going to go ahead and start modifying this to make it my own. Going to name it Planetary Wars and actually add to it a Planetary War scene. Where planets are actually waging war and factions/Alliances can take over planets.

I will be looking for help. Coding, ideas, GM's ect...

GM's will be chosen from those that test and play the game and give great feedback.

[hallsofvallhalla]

i have to work on the tutorial to get it to work, here is a direct link

http://indie-resource.com/planetarywars ... torial.php

it is out of date, there are actually 50 goods, other things have changed but it gives you a basic idea

[hallsofvallhalla]

some helpful hints while playing...

The sell locator does not show you the current market price at that station, not sure if the number it shows is the current galaxy price or what, but I bought 50 iron for 4 bucks a piece. I flew around and found a shop that was completely out of iron, they were paying 257 bucks a piece! Made 12,000! The sell locator said $4. Might be last price you seen there.

Bad things is every round (20 minutes) it changes.