What is Dragon Adventure?
Dragon Adventure is a text-based Console game written in C#. This game features an original story with memorable and creative gameplay. With many different challenging puzzles to solve using your character's unique abilities, you'll surely be able to defeat the dragon... right?
Main Features
Dragon Adventure consists of the following features:
- Character class selection, with each class offering different abilities for use in-game.
- Difficulty selection, to increase the challenge. If you think you're up to it.
- Full featured story, with creative, funny, and punny dialog.
- Two levels to conquer: The Cave, and The Dragon.
- Hidden treasures to find. Who knows what great things they will bring?
Why Dragon Adventure?
Dragon Adventure was made for the Computer Science and Information Systems course 2410 (Advanced Programming) at Salt Lake Community College. It was made for the assignment titled "A05 Team Assignment", where the purpose was to show we could write a fully-featured C# application. It features code principles such as generic collections, file input/output, LINQ, and an in-place user interface (no scrolling in the Console Window). As a team assignment, we worked on collaboration and communication skills, responsiveness, and time management to complete the project on time.
We chose to make a light-hearted, but fun and challenging game. Wanting to include bits of dorky humor and rich story-telling, we opted to make an adventure game. Our inspiration came from the likes of games such as Ultima, Zork, and other games of the DOS gaming era.
Demonstration Video
Coming Soon...
Starting the Game
Dragon Adventure is a purely text-based application. This means that there is no "pointing and clicking", you will interact with the program entirely with your keyboard by typing in what you want to do.
So, when you first launch the application, you will be presented with a menu, offering you some choices in your character selection and difficulty selection. Each character class has a different set of abilities, and once you choose your character class, you cannot change it. So choose wisely! Type the number corresponding to the option you would like and press Enter. The program will then provide additional instructions for next steps, which you may follow using the same proces (i.e. typing in what is requested and pressing Enter), or it will process your request - depending on what you selected of course.
In addition to your character class selection, the difficulty level you select will influence how the game plays. Make sure you choose the correct one suited to you! If you're not sure, we recommend starting with easy and working your way up.
Level Strategy
Dragon Adventure is separated into two levels. The first level is a maze, simply referred to in the game as "The Cave". The second part of the game (should you make it through The Cave), is the actual fight against the dragon. In order to get to the dragon though, you must have successfully navigated the cave. But, there's a catch - the maze is not as easy as it may seem! The torch you brought with you will go out once you start moving through the maze. Once this happens, use your special abilities to find your way through the rest of the cave! Depending on your difficulty level selection, you might find the light goes out sooner than you expect!
In The Cave, you will be presented with a random maze, which will be one of six built into the game. In the future, we may implement a way to import your own maze designs, as well as allow for random generation. For now though it is limited to 6 pre-determined mazes. Because your torch only lasts so long, it is recommended that you try to remember the general shape of the maze. Running into walls will cost you Health Points, so you will want to avoid that at all costs! Use your abilities to help you remember the layout of the cave.
Should you make it through The Cave successfully, you will be able to face The Dragon. In this level you will approach the dragon and converse with him. We don't want to give too much away, but try to use common sense in your conversation. You'll want to avoid saying things that might anger the dragon.
As you answer, pay close attention to what happens to the dragon's level. If the level gets to the top, you may just be successful in winning the game! Or not... Guess you'll just have to try it and see, wont you?
Helpful Tips
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During the first level, The Cave, you may see a small yellow character in the maze that is placed on the path somewhere. This is a gold piece. You might want to pick it up if you can. Though it likely is not easy to get to...
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Pay attention to your Ability Points! You only have a certain amount available, based on which Character Class you chose. You may find it beneficial to choose your ability with the proper number key, then read what it does before deciding for sure to use that ability. Abilities that cost more points are usually more powerful/useful, but should be used wisely lest you run out of AP.
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Because this is a console application, when it opens the Command Prompt window, you might find that the text is a bit small for your liking. We personally like to play with larger font sizes and recommend that you consider changing your console font size, too. To do this, you can take the following steps (we've also included a screenshot below):
- Open Dragon Adventure.
- Right click on the top left of the command prompt screen to get the drop-down menu. At the very bottom of the list you should see a link that says "Properties". Click that.
- It should bring up a dialog with a few tabs at the top: Options, Font, Layout, and Colors. Navigate to the "Font" tab.
- From there, the first option you should see will be labeled "Size". When playing Dragon Adventure, we usually play with font size 20 or 24. Note that this setting would only be for while playing Dragon Adventure. When you load up Command Prompt normally, this setting should not affect your default setting.
- Click "OK" in the bottom right corner. Your text should now be larger and your console window should resize as well.
Download
Before downloading, it is recommended you review the How To Play tab, which explains how to play Dragon Adventure. System Requirements and Installation Instructions can be found below.
This is the latest and recommended version of Dragon Adventure.
| Version | File Size | Date Published | Changelog |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1.0.3 | 194 KB | April 20, 2019 |
System Requirements
In order to play Dragon Adventure, you will need the following system specifications.
- Computer: Anything not a dinosaur
- Operating System: Windows 7 or newer
- Storage Space: At least 1 MB of free space (seriously, this is a small game)
- Other: Java 8 Runtime Environment or greater
Installation Instructions
Take the following steps to install Dragon Adventure on your computer:
- Download and install the Microsoft .NET Framework 4.6.1 if you don't already have it.
- Download the Dragon Adventure ZIP file
- Extract it to the location of your choice on your hard drive
- That's it. Now run the "Dragon Adventure.exe" executable file to run Dragon Adventure!
- NOTE: Once you reach the end of the game, the program will create a "scores.csv" file located in the same directory you extracted Dragon Adventure to. This file includes the game's high scores. If you delete this file, the record of your score will be lost. In future versions we will likely do away with the separate file and store the scores elsewhere.