MetaCollider

MetaCollider
Defunct Game
Developer	Kevin James (Pointless)
Theme	Alternate dimension
Influences	Crawl, ADOM, Nethack, Rogue
Released	September 2008 ({{{relver}}})
Updated	Beta 8 on 29 August 2009 ({{{updver}}})
Licensing	BSD License
P. Language	Python
Platforms	Executable: Windows Source: All platforms
Interface	ASCII, Pygame, Keyboard
Game Length	Medium
Official site of MetaCollider

On 7th October 2009 author abandoned this project.

Description

MetaCollider is a unique game with numerous features that are new to the Roguelike genre. The structure of the game is complex, but most of the complexity is hidden, to give a solid gameplay experience that immerses the player. Metacollider is highly randomized, making each game exciting and new.

In MetaCollider, the point is to raise your chosen element to 100 by defeating monsters. However, using skills, items, equipment, and abilities will hinder your progress unless the power is the same element as the character. The current score in the character's element determines wide-ranged facets of gameplay, including dungeon generation, power allocation, monster difficulty, types of monsters faced, artificial intelligence, and the plot. The dungeon generator creates a wide range of interesting dungeon features, like rooms, corridors, loops, and obstacles. The artificial intelligence is tricky, and monsters can surround you if you aren't careful. Another interesting feature of MetaCollider is that the skills your character obtains determine which monsters are generated, forcing you to alter your strategy. The plot is a surrealistic pastiche of hallucinogenic scenes.

Platforms

MetaCollider is available as an executable file for Windows. The source is compatible with all platforms. To play the source, Pygame must be installed. The Psyco module is also recommended, because it optimizes the game considerably.

MetaCollider can be modified to be played in any supported resolution at any text size. Also, users can provide their own fonts for displaying the character and monsters.

Storyline

In the universe, all forces and beings which strive for some goal or purpose find their final end in something material. Beauty is found when a base material reaches its spiritual fulfillment: some dirt becomes a flower, a rock becomes a statue, or a painting become an idea. Sublimity, however, is found when the ends or purposes of all individual things are identical with some eternal, inconceivably simple premise that underlies all existence and meaning. Our universe is a perfect balance of those forces which have will, the material that will finds its fulfillment in, and the formless spirit that underlies both of them. Chaos is the final concept that energizes these forces where otherwise only balance could exist. But imagine a different universe...

...In the Metaverse, the world takes on a unique shape depending on who is perceiving. Two entities may interact and experience quite unique worlds for the same interaction. This interaction is called a collision, and the plurality of universes that results from this collision makes up the Metaverse. Each being has a specific predisposition to a certain Element, and each of that being's interactions with other entities is altered depending on the disposition of the perceiver. In fact, each person within the Metaverse creates the world they see before them, constantly making judgments about the quality, shape, and form of each colliding entity.

"But the Metaverse is not completely unrestrained. Matter, Will, Spirit, and Chaos are each irreducible patterns of existence called Elements. If the person strives to identify completely with a particular Element over all the others, then the person can master the shape and substance of every object that collides with the being. Each individual's pattern is called an 'entelechy'. An entelechy is the tendency of any object to reach its ideal state.

The Elements: Matter, Will, Spirit, and Chaos, sometimes manifest themselves individually in the regular universe during those rare periods of human history when one Element predominates. During ages of merciless war, brilliant knowledge, profound wisdom, or confusion and pain, the Metaverse comes alive and guides the heroes of those ages to its bizarre notion of reality with the hopes that the hero will become the purest representation of that Element. But beware, because you (the hero, by the way, didn't you know?) must face the bitter heroes from every age and from every period of time that have failed their quests for immortality. But only YOU can overcome all odds and find true freedom by shoving off every speck of impure reality! So enter the Metaverse and achieve your destiny!

Website

http://metacollider.sourceforge.net/