daniel l.

RPG game idea:

You control three versions of the same person, at different ages: childhood, adulthood, and elderly. You must fight your way through a series of levels while protecting the infant version of yourself -- the infant is non-playable. If one of your group dies, the versions after him become inaccessible until you can bring him back. If the baby dies: game over.

Different ages have different skills.

1. Childhood: Low HP. Weak at magic and melee, but good with ranged and levels up extremely fast (XP is shared among versions with a special inventory item).
2. Adulthood: Well rounded, has decent magic skills, great with melee, and is okay with ranged. Doesn't level up as easily as Childhood, but still levels pretty well.
3. Elderly: Great magic skills (wisdom), but terrible at melee and ranged, has poor eyesight and cannot hear very well. HP isn't much higher than Childhood. Gaining XP as Elderly is nigh impossible.

The end goal is to rescue the final variant, Ascended, which the villain has imprisoned in a magical dungeon. The Ascended completely lacks conventional melee and ranged capabilities, but makes up for it with fully maxed-out magic abilities and total invulnerability to harm from any mortal enemy. The Ascended's purpose is to fight the main villain at the end, but even as powerful as it is, it can't win without the help of the other three ages, and constant care must be taken to ensure a stray shot or some unnoticed baddie doesn't kill the baby, which is an automatic game over.

Without a special item, only one age can be present at a time, the others going into the "Time Orb" until summoned. The special item would be available in tiers, starting with two ages for a short time to all four permanently.

and would have its own special "effect" that varies between levels, these effects would have an impact on the different skills of our ages.

I'm currently learning how to make computer games via Clickteam Fusion, so I might make this a reality someday in the future. But, for now, thoughts?

Wow, the forum looks really weird on the Lynx browser. :P

In the process of editing a thread, I was just required to pass a captcha test. Mods, is this new?

I just wrote a new short story.

https://www.wattpad.com/565904121-assorted-short-stories-by-d-p-leahey-chain-of

I'm kinda proud of it, actually. I feel as if I got my mojo back.

Anyway, please tell me what you guys think, and point out any typos you might see.

I just heard that Stephen Hawking has died.

So, I have an idea for a story.

Put simply: Something causes the Sun to die, ceasing to produce light. Earth and the other planets now orbit a dead cinder. Luckily, humanity has about a decade's warning from an "anonymous" source and is able to assemble gigantic underground shelters.

Following the sun's death, the story jumps through the years, different chapters focusing on different generations of people living in these shelters. Of course, the shelters are not a permanent means of survival for the human race, and one-by-one the shelter of the plot's focus gradually loses contact with its neighbors. So the only hope for humanity's survival is a distant exoplanet within the habitable zone of its star -- the source of the warning.

Hey umm... to those who don't know, it's my eighteenth birthday. So... yay?

Anyway, I'd like to quickly describe an idea for a story I just had, I was thinking myself and some other writers on this forum could do it as a collab novel (@Spaceception ?). So here's the idea:

The Construction-Vessel Conestoga is a hundred years (travel time) ahead of her mothership. Her mission is to assemble an inhabitable "inverted Dyson sphere" around the system's primary star, out of all materials in the system. This process will take approximately 90 years to complete with self-replicating nanites, everything seems to be going smoothly, until... Aliens! A hostile alien species objects violently to the dismantling of the system's planets and moons, its reasons for objecting are unknown. Now the crew of the Conestoga must fight for their lives; defend the growing shell of what will soon be the biggest "planet" in the galaxy; and defeat these aliens before the Conestoga's mothership, a defenseless leviathan housing millions of helpless colonists, arrives.

For those wondering what an "inverted Dyson sphere" is, here's my post from a couple days ago:

So, anyone interested?

Here's a wallpaper for ya glorious stand-up guys (My minor profanity has been automatically replaced! Mods, is this new?).

Raw Screenie^

Edited Version^

Tell me, is it landed on orbiting?

I wish a thousand happy New Years' upon the starlanes for all those who read my upcoming short story.

2017 was an odd year. In some ways, it went by in a flash. In others, it felt like an eternity.

I still haven't come to terms with the fact that it is soon to be over. It may take me a while for my mind to adjust to the new year.

Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas Eve, guys.

I have been playing around in Hitfilm again. Two more short videos, I have made.

At last! My life's work is complete!

I should probably clarify. I made this.

I'm working on a Sci-Fi short film. I've already completed the first five minutes of it.

Here is the premise: A tiny starship with an entirely transhuman crew of digitized minds explores the central pulsar of the Crab Nebula, and discovers something fantastic.

My goal is for it to be twenty minutes long, so it should be finished by the end of next week.

Anyone else wonder about the caves on Hyperion? What could we do with them?

And, on a sci-fi basis, what could they be hiding?

I've just released the first chapter of the first book of the Spiritwolf series: a novelization of Macey Dean's classic youtube series which inspired many to buy the game and has forever influenced stock space combat in KSP.

Here is the wattpad link: https://www.wattpad.com/story/124903164-spiritwolf-part-i-flashpoint

Here is a specially formatted PDF (It's what the E-books and physical copies will look like when I publish them.): https://www.dropbox.com/s/ranlyufmcda01vx/Document.pdf?dl=0

Idea pitch:

In the early 23rd century, an experimental vessel is launched from Earth-orbit. It is the first vessel to be equipped with a Quantum Drive (Just a handwavey space-drive-thingy.), capable of instantly accelerating the ship and all its contents to such high speeds as to be capable of crossing a lightyear in half a day (If you go fast enough, time slows down for you.).

Due to the dangers of testing this new drive with a live crew. It is manned by volunteers and ex-convicts who are offered freedom in exchange for a year of their lives aboard this starship.

The mission? Chart all star systems within a hundred lightyears of Sol. Then return with the information so a thousand new starships can be launched to seed the stars with life and expand humanity's horizons.

Unfortunately, after completing their first mission, they return to find Earth destroyed by an unknown calamity. Only a heavily-bombarded moon and a debris ring around the sun exists to tell of Earth having ever existed.

In their moment of despair, the crew suddenly gain a mysterious desire to reach the Galactic Core, from which something calls to them, touching the basest parts of their minds.

The trip will take decades, with stops required every now and then to refuel.

Imagine it as like Star Trek: Voyager mixed with Battlestar Galactica. Except there would be no real enemies, not hostile aliens or creations of Humanity. Just a vast universe with all its wonders layed open for the eyes of the last humans. And a mysterious goal, the center of the galaxy.

I can imagine it being highly mystical in tone, perhaps even with religious undertones. Except that everything except the starship's propulsion would be fully explained with actual science.

If it were a Television series. It would likely separate episodes by months, even years. The actors would be either aged via makeup and CGI, or the episodes could be filmed over the years to allow for natural aging.

What I'm doing right now is creating separate story parts. More than the original Nevil/Xf39b part. I've already uploaded the first parts of two new arcs. There is a third on the way, maybe a fourth. Then I'm going full speed ahead. I intend to get 65-90k words at completion.

Also, there is a series of events that are sinister. You can already see hints in the new chapters.

I have a few ideas @Spaceception concerning my story.

1. A secondary plot. Concerning something else, more sinister, that happens in the background of everything.
2. And a name change. The story was originally theorized as the exploration of space by a transhuman android. It has already evolved beyond that. Any suggestions?

Also, a little fact, the story is in constant WIP. Once I've finished writing all the chapters, I'll begin making adjustments. Merging some chapters together for example.

And, since I've been largely winging it so far, with only a vague image of the ending in my mind. Some things in later chapters might not match up with earlier ones. Please bear with me here. The adjustments should iron things out. If you want to read it without uncertainty or error, please wait till It's done.

BTW, I'm aiming for a length of about 50k words. I've decided to extend it into a Novel! Then I've decided to temporarily scrap earlier plans in favor of a sequel of similar length.

This new Word Processor of mine had made this a hundred times easier!

And... I was wondering if anyone could make me some better cover art? Are there any pro-artists seeing this?

I've finished 4k words of part 14 so far. I intend for a length of 5-7k

I've hit the 20k milestone! 20,000 words written!

Specifically: 20,085 words 116,792 characters

Part 12, 'Home' is out!

It's the first part written entirely on my word processor.

I may or may not have missed a typo in proofreading. Don't hesitate to inform me if you find one.