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Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

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Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#31

Post by LanceH »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #29
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Are you shitting me? This is the worst and most worthless type of post HN has to offer. It serves no purpose other than for the commenter to try and make themselves sound smart. Given the context here that's delightfully ironic. These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason. Those people are game developers and the reason is video games. Diablo, Dungeon Keeper, and TinyDungeon all have dungeons crafted quite…

He's got a point. Almost none of these algorithms produce a bathroom that's any usable distance from the front door. Imagine you're the resident ogre just back from pillaging and you've got nowhere to go. And the absurdity of a minimally connected dungeon shows itself the first time you have to run to answer the phone.

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#32

Post by PhasmaFelis »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #29
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Are you shitting me? This is the worst and most worthless type of post HN has to offer. It serves no purpose other than for the commenter to try and make themselves sound smart. Given the context here that's delightfully ironic. These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason. Those people are game developers and the reason is video games. Diablo, Dungeon Keeper, and TinyDungeon all have dungeons crafted quite…

Dungeons in games have to do two things: serve as spaces of play, and provide verisimilitude, suspension of disbelief. Most often, the first takes high priority, and the second shows up only as set dressing: cells in a prison, waterways in a sewer, altars in a temple, etc.

If you look at classic tabletop dungeons, though--the games that gave us the modern meaning of "dungeon" as "enclosed space full of loot and danger" as opposed to the dictionary "underground prison"--you're more likely to see a balance between the two. Everything still serves the needs of play, but within that framework you'll find bunkrooms, kitchens, storage rooms, training areas, etc, etc, sometimes even with discussion of schedules and which characters are likely to be where when, which the players can attempt to learn and take advantage of. It's more work, but it does make the gameworld feel more immersive, more real.

Either approach is perfectly valid. In a fast-paced hack-and-slash game, you're not likely to stand still long enough to notice the set dressing; you just need a space in which to kill monsters, and anything more is a waste. In a more thoughtful/exploratory RPG, the game can really benefit from a thoughtful layout.

Now isn't it nice when we can disagree without getting all huffy and belligerent?

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#33

Post by fapjacks »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #29
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Are you shitting me? This is the worst and most worthless type of post HN has to offer. It serves no purpose other than for the commenter to try and make themselves sound smart. Given the context here that's delightfully ironic. These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason. Those people are game developers and the reason is video games. Diablo, Dungeon Keeper, and TinyDungeon all have dungeons crafted quite…

I would rather play a game involving a dungeon that was created out of realism than something like "this room is this size because the slime monster that lives here is what the PCs need to encounter now". Also I find your comment needlessly aggressive, in addition to it smelling like you are the only one that knows what is best for gamers and game designers.

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#34

Post by lotharbot »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #29
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Are you shitting me? This is the worst and most worthless type of post HN has to offer. It serves no purpose other than for the commenter to try and make themselves sound smart. Given the context here that's delightfully ironic. These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason. Those people are game developers and the reason is video games. Diablo, Dungeon Keeper, and TinyDungeon all have dungeons crafted quite…

HN staff has made a concerted effort to eliminate gratuitous negativity [0]. It's simple in the case of your post -- eliminate the first and last paragraphs, keeping only the substantive argument ("These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason... video games... not making a city builder or world sim".)

[0] the following comes from https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say in a face-to-face conversation. Avoid gratuitous negativity.

When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#35

Post by fapjacks »

douche wrote: post #8
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Dungeons as portrayed in every video game ever are a fantastic concept. It's not like there are actually anything like real dungeons outside of our imaginations (digging through rock is hard). The closest real analogues would probably be cave systems, like Carlsbad Caverns or Mammoth Cave, which are formed by irregular natural processes.

Hawaii has dungeons. Defensive positions (and related) built after Pearl Harbor right into the rock. Dungeons exist insofar as dungeons are underground structures built by X that are now left to ruin and hiding strange creatures and hidden treasure. Those places exist on Oahu, among others.

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#36

Post by adnzzzzZ »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #32
forrestthewoods wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you shitting me? This is the worst and most worthless type of post HN has to offer. It serves no purpose other than for the commenter to try and make themselves sound smart. Given the context here that's delightfully ironic. These dungeons are indeed built by people for a reason. Those people are game developers and the reason is video games. Diablo, Dungeon Keeper, and TinyDungeon all have dungeons crafted quite…

Dungeons in games have to do two things: serve as spaces of play, and provide verisimilitude, suspension of disbelief. Most often, the first takes high priority, and the second shows up only as set dressing: cells in a prison, waterways in a sewer, altars in a temple, etc. If you look at classic tabletop dungeons, though--the games that gave us the modern meaning of "dungeon" as "enclosed space full of loot and dange…

I agree with both him and you. But I think part of his point is that often times HN comments tend to focus on kind of irrelevant stuff. I'm the author of this post and the top comment here bothered me a bit because it has nothing to do with the content of the article itself, it's just the top commenter giving his opinions on what types of dungeons he likes better. I didn't even post the article to HN myself because my past experience with comments here (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7540555) were similar in that discussion tends to not be that meaningfully related to what was written.

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#37

Post by forrestthewoods »

adnzzzzZ wrote: post #36
PhasmaFelis wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dungeons in games have to do two things: serve as spaces of play, and provide verisimilitude, suspension of disbelief. Most often, the first takes high priority, and the second shows up only as set dressing: cells in a prison, waterways in a sewer, altars in a temple, etc. If you look at classic tabletop dungeons, though--the games that gave us the modern meaning of "dungeon" as "enclosed space full of loot and dange…

I agree with both him and you. But I think part of his point is that often times HN comments tend to focus on kind of irrelevant stuff. I'm the author of this post and the top comment here bothered me a bit because it has nothing to do with the content of the article itself, it's just the top commenter giving his opinions on what types of dungeons he likes better. I didn't even post the article to HN myself because m…

Thanks for making the post. Sharing knowledge is great and I appreciate it.

I've written a handful of educational posts as well. I swear the majority of comments only exist to make the commenter try to show off how much smarter than the OP they are. Reddit is the absolute worst. But HN isn't far behind.

I'm sorry the top comment doesn't actually provide any value to any one. Please don't let dingleberries like him prevent you from writing more in the future. Thanks for sharing.

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#38

Post by SixSigma »

smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

Funny you should mention DF. You should look at the procedurally generated dungeons it makes!

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#39

Post by onion2k »

One of the best maze generators I've ever seen was in the ZX Spectrum (Timex in the US) game of Steve Jackson's Warlock of Firetop Mountain[1]. It's brilliant, coming up with a maze full of rooms and doors, with no islands, and relatively well placed monsters and items. And all in 48K of ram. Despite browsing the source code a couple of times I've never figured out how it actually worked.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Warlock_of_Firetop_Mountai...

Re: Procedural Dungeon Generation Algorithm

#40

Post by fenomas »

sago wrote: post #23
smlacy wrote: post #2

I've seen algorithms that produce results similar to this before, and I find them lacking in any sort of feeling of purposeful design. Dungeons are (in theory) built by intelligent people for a reason. There needs to be distinct working, eating, socializing, farming areas. There needs to be wider or thinner pathways between areas based on flow of people & goods. A good starting place to look for amazing looking dunge…

I agree, though the issue, I think, is wider than 'purposeful' design. The dungeon could be a range of things, but this one doesn't look like anything except an 'algorithmic dungeon'. Is it: a) an underground city (your analysis is spot on, doesn't look like that) b) a cave system c) a mine d) a prison e) the lair of some non-intelligent species f) a fortress to protect something Another option is that they're suppos…

Calling this a step backwards is patently unfair. The author is explaining a simple algorithm, simply enough for even beginners to implement, for building layouts of a given connectedness. They are not making any kind of argument that the results can be used as-is in any particular genre of game.

Honestly, you might as well attack an A* pathfinding article on the grounds that game units shouldn't necessarily take the shortest path to their goal. Algorithms like this are tools in a toolbox - obviously tweaking them is what makes any given game unique, but beginners still need to start somewhere.

(Also - Nethack? The game where you find potion shops eight levels underground that can only be reached via three rooms full of soldier ants, etc?)

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