Cranium Periapts

In perhaps a nod to Problem Sleuth, I added Cranium Periapts. These will basically be the currency of unlocking things once the metagame is added.

Right now I spawn levelNum/5 every fifth level. I think this makes it have a constant expected reward stream that improves with your depth. The levels are pretty short now, so I think one of the game modes (primary game mode?) will be an endless mode. The challenge will be generating enough variety and difficulty to maintain that. Part of the solution to that problem is increasing the ecosystem of enemies. The other part is working on levels that have more variety.

There's really only one programming problem left which is to improve level generation (and the argument could be made that this is a game design challenge). I find that as I'm working on this that a lot of my game design intuitions are off. For example I'm not sure I can make this game difficult. With no performance related problems (you have infinite time to make your move) I'm not sure where the difficulty can be! I need better tools for spawning enemies in nasty configurations. Configurations that will force the player to solve the puzzle the right way, or really drain their resources in order to get past them.

I think the next big phase of this thing is to start integrating the monster placement with the floor generation. The two are almost completely decoupled elements right now. While I'm at it, integrating powerup placement with this will be important.

I think I need to formulate level elements (rooms for example) and store this stuff off when I generate the floor. These elements will dictate placement of enemies and powerups. This way I more predictably create interesting situations.

Get that Periapt, Hero!