Will there still be a story mode? If so then all monsters should be hardcoded for that mode. Sounds maybe not though, that'd be cool if you could mod those at least in story mode.  I do like the idea of game modding but I'm not sure what you could do with it. Unless you undertook the arduous task of custom creating a dungeon of your own, which I know some people here would probably do.
It's good to see that your experience is allowing you to program less buggy stuff. That was one of the big reasons I didn't recommend people buy Entombed. Hard to say, but true.
What about gameplay mechanics? There were some big balance issues in etnombed 1 and I'm interested on how you plan to fix those up.

Yes, there will be a main story mode. Whether the player can modify the story or just extend it is something I have to experiment with.

I think it's more difficult to open a game up. Mainstream games like Skyrim have literally thousands of mods. You can always find fresh things to do and see. I hope to extend the life of the game with mods.

Of course, modding the game is completely optional.

Console games are not, however, PC games absolutely are. Steam has Steam Workshop for this very purpose. Most PC games are released on Steam and the ones that enable modding with Steam Workshop are generally more successful than those that don't. I don't believe there are any drawbacks allowing a community to change your game. Valve has said that a community of players altering and adding content to your game will dramatically extend it in ways you couldn't possibly do on your own. I agree with that.

@dingo, yeah, that is true. Modding is certainly not a bad thing, I just think there should be limits is all. I didn't know about steam workshop... that's actually kind of cool, though I don't think big name companies like Capcom, Activision and the like encourage modding, even though it may happen. too much modding can break a game, especially anything that's multiplayer. I agree to an extent with what Valve says, I just think that there should be allowances only to a certain point, as Jaybird said as well.

This thread makes it clear how absolutely clueless I am about the potential with gaming.  *smile* Even so, I am really looking forward to this new game, whenever it is released.

so he's Jason allan himself? Wow. Well keep up the good work.

Hi Dingo.
Great I'm very excited! I love entombed even if I don't particularly love it's gameplay. I think you should have a main story that you write yourself than have players write there own missions and monsters and things like that. Also I know you mentioned supporting sapi on windows but could you please also support nvda at least? I don't have jaws and I can't stand sapi so if it's not too much trouble could you add nvda support. I remember playing entombed when it first came out and I had to play it with microsoft sam it was awful sam could barely pronounce some of the content in the game and microsoft anna wasn't any better.
Also if you need help I can do monster sounds, charactcr voices, and things like that. I'll anmit one of my favorite things about entombed is it's music, character, and monster sounds.
And yes I'm definitley interested in iOs and android versions of entombed 2. I have an aiPod touch and a android tablet so if you need testers for those versions I would be happy to help.
Keep up the good work and thanks for keeping us updated!

Hi Dingo.

Amazing news. On the screen reader output level, i personally don't see an issue with sapi. People's usual problem with sapi is is not having a decent voice and falling back on windows defaults, however if you invest in a reasonable quality sapi voice it's not a problem, and now there are some comparatively cheap alternatives kicking around.

As regards modding, I love the idea of adding extra items, monsters, spells, story sequences etc to the game. Also, though you mention sound effect porting could be difficult I'd suggest this very much should be sometthing to consider. Remember, audio game ambience often comes from sounds and if the sounds are not alterable a player is forced to be in one location, sinse even if I could create items like bushes and tress, monsters like wolves and wood woses, if the ambience was still that same dungeon theme it wouldn't be a very convincing forest. Adding background ambience changes lets people create different environments, and that combined with the ability to create different story sequences could lead to some awsome creations. Indeed one aspect I would like to see looked at in Entombed Ii is some more interacttion between the player and environment, traps to disarm, perhaps veins of gold orgems to dig (angband had those), secret doors and maybe treasure chests, heck perhaps even foo. Including that sort of thing would also increase the modding possibilities as well.

As regards mods for cheats, one suggestion might be to create two versions of the game, a standard version with compressed or encripted data files that people couldn't just easily open and read, and a modable version with all the text files quite free to alter, however with in game story text replaced with example place holders. So to use Jaybird's example, in the main game you are given a quest to destroy the dragon and retrieve a magic sword from it's hoard, when killing it in the main game you get the message "with great difficulty you roll over the dragon's enormous scaly carcass exposing a pile of gold, gems and other stolen booty. You see a silver sword covered with moon stones gleaming in the pile, this must be what the wizard wanted"

While in the modable version you get "Example, kill dragon and retrieve the quest item silver sword"

Thus making the mod files not to be spoilers for people who haven't already finished the game.

There is probably more I could add in matter of suggestions, but I'll leave it for now, good luck with the development. I'll also add that the entombed list is still active and this is definitely news that the people still on there might appreciate hearing too.

That's something I've thought a lot about. This is a problem with general roguelike games too. Exploring the level is often tedious. One of my favorite roguelike games, Dungeon Crawl, actually has a button you can press to have your character auto-explore the dungeon. I'm considering something like that. Or some game design idea that removes the tedium from walking around empty halls trying to find your way out.

As for modding spoiling the game, that's true. One thing that's hard for developers to do, is just let players have fun however they want. So, if it's fun for you to make the game easier (or harder) then who am I to argue with that? You have the choice whether you want to play the game unmodded or change it. The benefit comes from players not just making the game super easy, but from extending it and changing it in new ways. So you win the game unmodded, then install someone's mod and you have a whole new game to play.

Another benefit to having the data available for everyone, is anyone can translate the game to their native language. I had a lot of requests for that for Entombed, but the text was scattered everywhere. Some in executable, some in the database, for example. I tried to export the text, but it only slowed the game down.

Cheers!
Jason

This is good news. Despite its flaws and bugs i loved Entombed. I do hope more skills will actuall be useful in the sequel. I never understood the logic behind the Thief having the ability to pick locks but not to find hidden things, especially since you essentially couldn't use one without the other.

One reason Entombed had less than interesting exploring is that there wasn't a lot to do in the environment. In Angband, (the only roguelike I've been able to play due to some very good large graphic tyles and supernova reading the screen), there are lots of things to find in the environment, items lying around, chests that might be traps, mushrooms you can risk eating, vanes of gold and gems to mine etc. That made the exploring much more interesting, and that is something I'd love to see in entombed, sinse while the combat was amazing, there is definitely more to do in a dungeon.

Also, I'd love to see the ability to add flavour text  descriptions to both the environment and the enemies you fight, after all how many people in entombed asked what a narl or a dungeon creep was? again, that is something that would make exploring far more fun.

I'm not against auto exploring, but I would worry if the game basically devolved into a set of fights one after another.

I've been thinking about this concept of the dungeon generation today and there are a few possibilities. As for more descriptions and things, that's a good idea. I actually seeded the original Entombed with minerals in the walls, but never got around to making them destructible. What I want to avoid is walking around lost or searching for something (like an exit) and not being able to find it.

The concept I've come up with is a circular outer hallway. Moving directly right or left will eventually lead you right to the exit. You'll never be lost. However, some exits may be guarded, so moving right there unprepared may prematurely kill you. Along the route to the exit are optional side halls that can contain traps, treasure, and encounters. These are randomized like Entombed to keep them fresh and interesting.

So you don't need an auto-explore function and exploring shouldn't be tedious.