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Aaron edited this page Aug 18, 2017 · 69 revisions

What is OpenTESArena?

OpenTESArena is an open-source engine re-implementation for the game "The Elder Scrolls: Arena" by Bethesda Softworks, being developed from scratch in modern C++. It requires a copy of the original data from the floppy disk version to run (available on the Bethesda website here).

Documentation about the technical details behind Arena is either hard to find or non-existent, so for decoding many of the original file formats, either researching patterns in the data itself or adapting other existing open-source tools is necessary. Thankfully, the Arena manual is an excellent resource for understanding the game's rules and design.

Scope

This is a rough list of features acting as the long-term roadmap. Features may be added, removed, or iterated on as time goes by, so they might come and go from here depending on how the project is progressing.

Current priority (~0.5.0 - ~0.6.0):

  • Better pop-up functionality (chain pop-ups together, yes/no buttons)
  • Character creation questions
  • Collision detection
  • More software rendering functionality (diagonal walls, distant sky, lights, occlusion arrays, ...)

Next priority (~0.6.0 - ~0.10.0):

  • Clicking in game world
  • Doors and secret walls
  • Enemies
  • Load class data (to replace classes.txt)
  • Load original city/dungeon data
  • More game interface button behavior (spells, steal, use item, camp)

Later (~0.10.0 - ...):

  • Automap notes
  • Class rules and traits
  • Inventory and containers
  • Levels and experience
  • Load artifact data
  • Redesigned water shading (allow darkness and fog)
  • Reflections in windows and water
  • Wandering people

Outside scope (until more things are implemented):

  • Adaptive super-sampling
  • (new) Custom class creation
  • (new) Followers
  • (new) Journal tabs (player statistics, etc.)
  • Loading/saving redesign
  • Localization
  • Main and side quests
  • Modding
  • (new) New kinds of stores
  • Pickpocketing
  • Scripting
  • Services (bartender, priest, shopkeeper, wizard)
  • Spells
  • Sprite variation (clothes/hair/skin colors)
  • (new) UI scale
  • Vulkan
  • Wilderness (seed-based chunk generation)

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