The first thing you're probably wondering is "Oh, Dorock, you're so
amazing! But you see, I have been living under a rock for the past
decade and I have no idea what the hell OHRRPGCE stands for!" Well
that, gentle reader, is easy to explain. It stands for "The Official
Hamster Republic Role Playing Game Construction Engine." Now stop
scratching your head! What it is in a nutshell is a program that
allows the user to create their very own role playing game using a
very simple editor. ( Okay, from here on out role-playing game is going
to be called RPG. I know most of you know what I'm talking about. I
just want to make sure we're all on the same page ).
Wow! You clicked the jump, well let's continue. First, a bit of its
history in detail. The construction engine was first created by James
Paige, who set out with a dream to make a tool that would be simple
and easy to use for the creation of RPGs similar to Final Fantasy VI
or any other RPG from the SNES era. That means it's entirely sprite
based! (Oh, those were the days… give me beautiful 16-color sprites
over 3D bouncing jubblies anyday) The engine first saw the light of
day over ten years ago. It was originally programmed in Quick Basic
(Yes, someone did actually program something useful in that archaic
language) and it was later ported over to Freebasic as support for
Quick Basic stopped sometime in this or the last millennium. So it's
ancient but it has aged quite well due to the constant support of a
rabid and unrelenting community (Hey, this sounds familiar). So after
years of working on the dream alone, in 2005 James released the source
under a General Public License and what followed was a massive orgy
resulting in the birth of a million tiny hamsters. However, these
bright young hamsters never reached adolescence due to the Hamster
Republic bill of 2005 that called for every hamster under the age of 3
weeks to be eaten by their mother. This event was follow by much
rejoicing.
Now that I've bored you tears and gotten some of the facts screwed up,
I'll give you a run down of what you can actually do with this thing.
There are two main components to the engine, first we have the
game-editor called the CUSTOM.EXE, and this is where you actually
create content for your game. All game content created with the
game-editor is stored in a single .RPG file. Next we have GAME.EXE,
where well…hmmm can you figure it out? That's RIGHT! (I knew you
weren't like the rest and actually have a brain in that hollowed out
pumpkin on your shoulders) It's the program that takes your awesome
<insertradrpgnamehere>.rpg file, and turns it into a bunch of pixels.
Then those pixels turn into something that looks kinda like a game.
Within the game-editor, everything and anything can be created - such
as maps, attack animations, items, vehicles, enemies, towns, evil
maniacal robots bent on taking over the world using their army of
rabid fans (you know that dream you never seem to stop having?) You
create graphics for your game by either using the built in editors, or
by importing images created by using some sort of a paint program. You
are only limited by your imagination, oh and your artistic ability.
(But hey, that's what ripping sprites from your favorite RPG is for.)
A lot can be accomplished with these basic tools. However, for the
more advanced user there is a scripting language called Hamster Speak.
This is used to make your game a bit more interesting; with it you can
create anything from a simple cutscene to having your game transcend
from a simple RPG to a sidescoller.
Well that pretty much sums up what the OHRRPGCE is, what it's used for
and whatever the hell else I said in the past six paragraphs. Now onto
the question: "Dorock, why should we care about this?" Well, my
pretties, anything that can keep a group of people banded together for
ten years is something worth caring about in my book. That and the
fact it gives you the ability to make your very own games without
actually needing to know how to program is a pretty good reason I
think! Plus it's a good way to get some understanding on how to
develop and create your own game. (Yes, I know maybe a tad contrived
game but still!)
Finally the last reason is that there are just so many great games
and some that aren't so great… made by a very talented community
that are just begging to be played.
For those interested in making their own games, check out
the
OHRRPGCE's project site to get started. Anyone that is interested in just
playing some of the games should head on over to
Castle Paradox It's
the most popular site for the OHR community and it features an active
forum and a gamelist.
I just thought I would try and bring a little attention to this very
talented community.
Games of Interest for those interested:
Magnus AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!! Lolz- Cult Classic that launched a thousand spin-offs.
Trailblazers – Sidescroller
Missing – A point and Click adventure
Darkmoor Dungeon – classic rpg
