Do You Want Your Possessions Identified? Let's Play NetHack

Well, I'm feeling that itch again, and the only way to make it go away is to torment myself further. I'm going to do an LP of Nethack, a game I'm at least competent on. Unfortunately, competency is not enough.

The format of the LP will be as follows -- I'll generate a character, and post screenshots as I go. If I die (and I will), I'll create another character and keep going. The life of subsequent generations will be abbreviated until I reach essentially the point where I left off (so you'll only see a highlight reel of the early game after the first run), although there might be an outtakes thread of the inevitable "walk two tiles, fall into a pit, die" games.

My character will be a Chaotic Female Elven Wizard. I chose this class because I wanted the variety spells would offer, and I think the game will be a bit more interesting early on due to the delicacy of the character. I also chose it because I'm very competitive, and I wanted to exceed the death toll in the Shadowgate LP. Unfortunately, I'm not really a good enough player to use any class/race/alignment combo, which is why this wasn't put up to a vote.

The reason I posted this early (with permission!) is that I do believe in limited democracy, and I need to gauge some opinions on things before we start on Sunday. (Due to the nature of the LP, I also need to pre-play a great deal as I have no idea how much content a given day of playing time will create).

1. Tiles of ASCII characters? This is a purely aesthetic and personal choice, and thus naturally has spawned emotional debates on the internet and destroyed friendships. I prefer, and am used to, tiles, but if there is a big upswelling in favor of ASCII characters, I'll go ahead and play that way.



Note that if we do use ASCII characters, the images will still be screenshots like the above, rather than simply pasting a fixed width font into the thread. This is just how the Windows version works. I will endeavor to get better at cropping though. (PS, if anyone has some webspace I can use, I'd really appreciate it. I'd prefer not to rely on Photobucket).

2. What would you like the heroine to be named (and no, unicode symbols are not an appropriate response). The beauty of this thread is I'll get to use nearly all worthwhile suggestions, because we can use a different name for each time we die.

3. Similarly, what should we call our cat? As above, I can use all suggestions, since we'll be going through characters rather rapidly.

Any other suggestions would be appreciated, but I won't be able to do things with significant effect on gameplay ("play the entire game blindfolded and never wielding a weapon!"). My apologies.

My first ascension was a female lawful dwarven archaeologist named Dez. So like, you could go with that maybe! Makes the gnomish mines super easy!

Also, use the ASCII tileset. I don't care how many votes you get for the graphical one, it is the wrong choice.

Also also, you fucking rule and this thread is going to kick more ass than anything ever. You sir are a crazy man and I salute you for it.

YES YES YES YES YES!

The cat should be named Autobahn.

Also I vote for tiles. ASCII is boring.

1. I kinda prefer the ASCII but am afraid that'll get really dull to look at very fast. But I have to look closer to see what's going on in the tile pictures so vote ASCII anyway.
2. Tall.
3. Guido.
4. Spork.
What do you mean there is no 4?

Tiles are far more boring than ASCII. You guys are just like 100% wrong.

Tourist conduct*. Just sayin'. Also, ASCII.

I hate Nethack (I think I made it out of the first floor in like one of the twelve games I played, and I can't abide a roguelike which practically requires spoilers to be able to win it) but maybe I'll do an LP of Angband one of these days. Now that would be boring!

Also, if you get the chance: I don't care if you savescum to do it, but you have to eat Famine.

* Didn't there used to be a tourist conduct? I guess it got removed when the tourist class was added, that should tell you how long ago I played.

Brick, it's impossible to be as wrong as you are on this without intensive training. Do you have some sort of Bad Taste Bowflex in your apartment you never tell us about?

ASCII! I mean is it even really Nethack with the tiles?

Also without the ASCII this wouldn't be the greatest metafilter post ever.

No. It's Fakehack.

I fail to see why ASCII is the defining aspect of Nethack. Brick and ravinoff are objectively wrong and history shall prove as such.

Clearly the only option is to do two separate Let's Plays.

Guys, the idea of an LP is to be inclusive, and tiles would really help with that. They'll be much easier for people who haven't already played Nethack enough to ascend to understand.

I'm glad I'm not the only person with nothing better to do on Christmas Eve night (Christmas E'en?) than debate this.

ASCII text is ugly to look at. Let's go with tiles, yes?

I played a good bit with tiles before discovering the One True Faith that is ASCII. The main advantage of ASCII for me is ease of recognition and speed of situation assessment. Once I learned the ASCII sizing up any given situation in Nethack seemed much quicker.

Also if you ever plan on playing Nethack on public servers ASCII is the only option. Nethack.alt.org gives you really great statistic tracking plus spectating on other's games can be interesting.

With either tiles or ASCII Netbrian is going to have to give plenty of explanation for people unfamiliar w/ Nethack to understand what is going on at all. I don't think tiles lessen the amount explanation very much. In other words tiles certainly seem more inclusive but I think in fact that are only marginally so. I could be wrong though, it has happened before.

Honestly they are both pretty ugly. Aesthetics aren't the appeal of Nethack.

ravinoff made all my points for me. =)

Aside from that though, if this LP is successful in getting anyone into the game, it will be better for that person to learn the ASCII rather than the tiles. The Nethack wiki and usenet group refer primarily to ASCII, for one thing, and I don't know of any public servers that use tiles.

Remember way back when I suggested the FF1 Let's Play, and asked if I should do the original ugly-ass 8-bit NES version, or the beautiful upgraded GBA version, with all the new bells and whistles, and people scoffed at the very idea? It's like that. Let's get the full-fat, full-force, undiluted Nethack experience. (Or at least as much as we can before Netbrian comes to his senses and abandons this folly.)

It's not so much the explanation time I think we'll be saving as the frustration on the part of the reader. Someone experienced with Nethack will be able to parse what's going on with the ASCII easily, but for others (myself included, I expect, despite experience with ADOM and Dwarf Fortress) tiles will be easier to remember from update to update. Having to remember that an f is one thing, but an F is another, and an f with a filled background is something else entirely is intimidating; but being able to pick out that one thing is a little dude with a bow, another is a dude with a tail and a club, and that the little orange kitty with a heart is our familiar is less so.

Maybe begin the LP with tiles while the audience is learning the ropes, then switch to ASCII later for the full experience once they know what's going on? Or would that be too confusing?

1. I fully concur with those that say playing Nethack without using ASCII is for pussies that can't hang and is, in fact, not actually Nethack. That said, if people want to go with tiles, I'm easy like Sunday morning.

2. Trixie

3. Patches

There's another good point to be made: Anyone who actually plays Nethack regularly, aficionado or not, is going to want to use the ASCII set. It's not as intimidating as you think, and looks clean and delicious compared to the muddy Windows 3.1 Background Blue-Grey that the tileset apparently uses for the dungeon floor.

Seriously, tileset guys: They are ugly and if there are ever large screenshots of more than a few squares, it will look AWFUL.

I'm sure our LP host will do a fine job of explaining what all those crazy symbols mean to us. You pick up on them a lot faster than you think you would, and I imagine part of the fun of LPing a roguelike would be teaching the audience how to play them (even moreso than other LPs, since roguelikes are nothing but mechanics - especially Nethack) and part of that is learning how to identify what that light blue semicolon is. (SPOILER: It fucking kills you.)

I'm voting tiles. I do play NetHack regularly, and I always play with the tiles. I tried playing ASCII for a while, but my time is short and I decided it was easier to stick with the graphical interface than memorize what all the characters mean on top of the sheer volume of commands and play strategies.

Like it or not, there are some people who are partial enough to graphics that they won't even consider a game that seems to be purely text/characters. I know elitism is kind of in the main in TT, but let's give the impatient people a chance to realize how wrong they are, and not potentially scare them away with something that, on its surface, is so different from what they're used to. (Of course it's going to be different beneath the surface, but hopefully they'll be in too deep before they realize that).

ASCII is the only way to go.

Also: I salute you for even considering this.

Something tells me these kinds of people wouldn't be interested in following a Nethack LP anyway, even with the tiles.

Hell, everything kills you in Nethack, including and usually yourself.

Wasn't that more to do with the GBA version being incredibly easy?

Stiv, I'd like to introduce you to the splitting headaches I get when I try to play Nethack without a tileset.

Wait, I actually wouldn't. Because I'm not a monster.

Awesome.

1) I abstain from the tiles vs. ASCII debate. Just because.

2) You should name your Elven Wizard "Valkyrie". Just to be confusing.

3) Given that, my wife suggests the cat's name be "dog". I concur.

I can't understand the ASCII at all. So I vote for ASCII as long as there's a detailed explination on what is what and what the heck is going on.

I also demand we do an IVAN bonus chapter just to show what another intentionally cruel roguelike is like. IVAN is great fun, but just expect to die. A lot. And in incredibly amusing ways.

1. If I have to vote, I'd toss my vote in for ASCII because that's how God intended Nethack to be played, and do we want to go against God*? But I also don't really care either way because Nethack is infinitely replayable and someone in the future may Let's Play it again using ASCII. Or Tiles. Or holographic brain scans.

2. Labarbra

3. Cuddles

*If this were a Megaten game, and for all we know it is, the answer is probably yes.