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Crystal Orb Adventures is a single-player text adventure game with a randomly generated map (and some graphics.) It is still being developed, but you can make a character, explore a wilderness, go on a few quests and kill some monsters.

http://www.marasmusine.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/OrbAdventures.zip (1.03Mb, version 080703, remember to unzip or you won't see any graphics, for some piddling reason.)

Requirements: A computer. Windows (works with 98, XP and Vista. Untested on other systems. Let me know.) Hard-drive, monitor and keyboard will all be useful.

Crystal Orb Adventures is written by Duncan Timiney.
It is thematically based on an old ZX Spectrum game, The Orb
The character sprites were designed by Philipp Lenssen and released under the Creative Commons license; my modified versions of the sprites are thus also CC-licensed.
The current playtesters are Victor Cheng and Derek Williams.

Make a character
Start making a character by first selecting a character class, or just press enter to start with a randomly generated character.

• Weapons
• Skills

Your dormatory
Your character starts in his bedroom with some clothes and equipment.
Type in commands using verb-noun syntax.

The first thing to do is type search cupboard or get all from cupboard. You may also like to just search the room.
You can then wear all to automatically wear and wield the appropriate items.
n,s,e,w,enter and exit will move your character around the world.
If you have one or more maps, map will bring up a diagram of the surrounding area.
The surrounding guildhall has many shops. Shop commands are list, buy and sell.

The next step is to find and chat to the guildmaster (stood near the statue in the guild), or just explore the surrounding wilderness.


Movement across the map is achieved with the n,s,e and w commands. Long journeys across the wilderness reduce your character's energy points. EP can be restored by eating, drinking and resting. Forests, marshes, hills, mountains and rivers are more exhausting to traverse.

Stock up on food by killing animals (if you are good at hunting and survival) or by finding taverns.

The scale of the map is deliberately vague; I imagine the distance between each wilderness location to be about a mile; the total map is about 4000 square miles.

Horrible creatures and wild animals live in the wilderness. Animals generally only attack when approached. Bandits and other evil creatures are likely to immediately attack, or even prepare ambushes.

Searching an area may reveal resources or detect ambushes.

Should you wish to fight one of the roaming beasties, type in kill <monstername>
This will initiate combat - an initiative check is made to see who can go first.

1 will attack the enemy's head; this is harder to hit but improves the chance of getting a critical hit.
2 will attack the enemy's torso; this is a standard attack
3 will attack the enemy's arms; these attacks have slightly reduced chance of hitting, with less chance of a critical. It is useful to perform against an enemy that has thinner armour in the arm, leg, hand or foot locations. It also has a chance of disarming the enemy.
4 will attack the enemy's legs; as with an arm strike, but has a chance of tripping the enemy over.
\, withdraw or flee will move you away from the enemy and attempt to leave the location (which isn't always successful)

If your chosen attack is not within range, you will move closer to the enemy. If this brings you into range, you will make a single attack.

If you are killed, type in recall to be taken back to the nearest temple.
If you defeat your foe, you can use the harvest or loot command. This will attempt to recover items from the nearest prone enemy, delivering killing blows if necessary. If you have a light bladed weapon (such as a knife), you will automatically attempt to create hides, pelts and other resources.
You can then take such items back to the shop to sell for silver coins.

Either during, or outside combat, these will change some combat settings:
stance will change between a ranged and melee stance (as some weapons, such as a club or throwing axe, can be used either way)
shift will change between one-handed and two-handed use of hand-and-a-half weapons
power will toggle between Power Attack usage (if the character has the Power Attack special skill)
expert will toggle between Combat Expertise usage (if the character has the Combat Expertise special skill)

rest will make your character chill out for one hour, possibly healing lost hit points. Resting where there is a bed present will restore hp faster. rest long will make your character rest for 4 hours.
eat and drink food and water will particularly inprove your lost energy points. Consuming items initially costs endurance points, but you get double back over time as the food or drink is digested.

A healer at a temple may attempt to treat you if the relationship isn't hostile and she has the appropriate spells.

greet will attempt to learn the name of an individual
chat will give several options; general chatter, asking for quests, diplomacy or asking to join/dismiss from a party.
kill, as described above, will enter combat
list will get a price list from a shopkeeper; this will automatically attempt a haggle
alert will attempt to get the attention of nearby guards
give and take to transfer objects about; this is only useful amongst party membersat the moment.

look at an object
appraise an object to determine a value, using the Appraise skill
wear or wield armour, shields, wands and weapons
remove or unwield
eat or drink food and liquid
use , break or read for runestones and scrolls

Should you have a character with access to spells, here's how they work:
cast runes target

The actual order of the runes doesn't matter, so cast am gobler will still launch magic missiles at a black gobler.
If target is left out from an offensive spell, it will default to whoever you are engaged with.
If target is left out from a friendly spell, it will default to yourself.

If you are not engaged in combat, and you cast a ranged touch spell (such as "acid orb") you will 'hold the charge', wielding it like a weapon until you are ready to attack.

spells will list all known spells based on the characters runes and thaumaturgy skill

If you have one of the creation special skills, you can use the craft command to make various magic objects. This requires a base component and probably the addition of other magical ingredients.

When learning runes, you can aim to have lots of different runes for lots of different spells, concentrate on improving your existing rune levels (which will increase the power of the spells you know) or have a healthy balance.

080703

• ai; changed char/ai_wanderlust to char/ai$ to allow different flags to control ai movement
• skills; subsumed use of "survival" skill into "hunting" (outdoors) and "dungeoneering" (indoors)
• characters; maximum party size is 4
• code; Some code optimization in natural_healing() (which occurs every tick)
• objects; Precision toolkit, used with mechanics skill; formalized tool usage.
• bugfix; helpless creatures now correctly have defense lowered (now easier to kill dying creatures)
• graphics; raised horizon to match height of terrain graphics. Possibility of different terrain having different horizons (mountains high, rivers low, for example)
• locations; enchanted grove->can find mana salts here (spell component) and "aura of magic" (used with rest, regain mana faster). Decided to make oasis/battlefield visible on map

080627

• Some monsters may have primary and secondary natural attacks.
• Fixed bug in poison routine. Poisons are assigned to either primary or secondary natural attacks.

Just noticed a bug in that sand-stingers appeared in cold moorland; will investigate.

080606

• Cannot improve magic ray weapon skill if character does not have any spell runes.
• When auto characters pick weapon-related special skills, they will select their best weapon group if possible.
• Special skills: "Close-quarters shooting" gives a bonus to hit with ranged weapons at "near" range or closer.
• "organization" type
• Option to start an extra character when loading saved position; Extra characters start with no equipment or money, but all player-created characters like to join partys.
• Starting to internally formalize character chat phrases.
• Traps; containers may contain weapon traps. There is a "practice chest" near the adventurer's shop to demonstrate this.
• Improved spellcaster's special skill advancement to "average", since spellcasting is still limited.

080523

• When equipping NPC weapons:
  • favours weapons from their highest ranking weapon skill
  • considers two-weapon fighing and dexterous fighting special skills
  • considers 1-1/2 hand weapons in one hand if skill is high enough.
  • gives ammunition for fired weapons (instead of treating them like thrown weapons)
  • does not consider "vial" weapons

080522

• Weapons:
  • Weapon Skill points instead of weapon proficiency special skills. Weapons are basic, simple, trained, martial, advanced, elite or exotic (generated from weapon stats on-the-fly.)
  • Hand-and-a-half weapons have two weapon levels; a basic two-handed value, and a higher two-handed value
  • Crossbows are slow to reload
  • Added fauchard (a trained-level poleaxe), dagger (simple blade), throwing iron (martial thrown), chakram (elite thrown)
  • "extra weapon training" feat gives a bonus 8 weapon skill points.
  • At least "simple" level is required to access the "weapon focus" special
  • This is particularly relevant with "natural" and "ray" which are no longer automatic proficiencies.
  • removed "unarmed expert" special skill; character now gets these bonuses if unarmed weapon skill is raised to "trained" level.
• Quests:
  • Questors now offer a selection of quests; prizes may include items.
  • Added "kill elite X" quests.
• Spells: Detect Nature, Detect Undead
• Objects: Worn items are tagged as "unpreferred" when passed over for another item during "wear all" command
  • Unpreferred objects are ignored in further "wear all" commands; status is reset if the player directly wears it.
• Creatures other than humans now also have variable attributes, including "heroic" template.

080509

• Monsters and NPCs:
  • Encounters are also by-climate as well as by-terrain.
  • Added sand-stinger, frost-worm, winter-snapper, flail-fungus, growl-snurt, red and green vile-skinks
  • Adjusted some monster's special skills.
  • Streamlined natural attack damages.
  • Decided not to let breath attacks hit members of the same party _at all_ (my wizards keep getting killed by their own summoned monster)
  • When recieving stock at midnight, only chars with the shopkeeper profession check, and they appraise quietly.
• Optimization:
  • map layers are now dynamic instead of static.
  • skills are stored as a string in character data, rather than a type of its own.
  • Altered the way text is displayed on the screen; double-buffered display.
• Greatbows, composite short, long and greatbows (actually added in the last update)
• Natural healing overhaul; athletics skill improves EP recharge, meditation skill improves MP recharge.
• Sidebar now shows seperate melee and ranged scores instead of generic "attack"
• Special skill "brutal throw" for thrown weapons; "mystic archery" is for bows only now.
• Poisons have more specific values, and may have multiple effects.
• Changed the way characters attributes are generated
• Magic
  • Expanded "create monster/animal" spells; acid dart fix (formalized object q values)
  • Spell resistance implemented (for planar creatures, etc)
  • Casting spells or using a potion or scroll no longer provoke a reaction attack; assumed enough room for character to maneuver.
  • Damage Reduction no longer effects energy attacks; other damage processing tweaks.
• Map graphics
• Fixed party bug in which all characters lost leadership status when new party is formed.

Version History