Shoddy Battle 2

For the past couple of weeks, bearzly and I have been working on Shoddy Battle 2. This is the next version of Shoddy Battle and it is a complete rewrite. The estimated release date is 4-5 months from now (so September at the earliest), but this is not a hard promise.

For screenshots of the client, see here.

Background information

When bearzly and I started Shoddy Battle 1, not much was known about Diamond & Pearl, and as such, some things in the engine are not as well done as they could have been. Hence, Shoddy Battle 2 is a chance to implement the engine in a much more correct way, hopefully with radically fewer mechanics issues than Shoddy Battle 1--the goal is 100% compliance with the observable mechanics of Pokemon DPP.

Planned architecture & feature set

As mentioned above, we hope to have a much more faithful implementation of game mechanics than Shoddy Battle 1. There are dozens of outstanding issues on the bug tracker for Shoddy Battle 1, mostly related to mechanics issues; we hope to have this number be far smaller in Shoddy Battle 2.

The server is a cross-platform C++ application. The network protocol is much simpler than Shoddy Battle 1's, uses a lot less bandwidth, and overall should make the program much faster (Shoddy Battle 1's protocol is very bloated).

Shoddy Battle 2 supports both singles and doubles battles, as well as a more general mode that is not technically pokemon where you can have any number of pokemon out at one time (up to six). For example, you could play triples.

Database files (moves and species), as well as team files, are stored as xml, and will be human editable by hand. Shoddy Battle 1 team files will be loadable as well.

The program is internationalisable (there will be a file containing string literals that can be modified to translate the program).

Game logic (moves, abilities, and items) is written in JavaScript, so a compiler is not required to modify the game engine; it should be easily accomplished by anybody with a text editor.

The chat will be similar to IRC in terms of user and channel modes.

There will be more options for each battle, such as customising the timer settings.

The client will be revised in some respects to make it more user-friendly. For example, you will be able to see the stat changes of pokemon in the battle window, and it will be possible to inspect your idle pokemon in battle, including in a random battle.

The server listing will be done through http so essentially it will not go down ever.

There are also some minor issues that we know everybody hates about Shoddy Battle 1 that will be fixed in Shoddy Battle 2, such as: the chat will not scroll down when somebody says something, and the ladder match making will not give you the same person repeatedly. These minor issues are trivial, but I am stating that we have addressed them so that you know you do not need to post them.

What will not be in the initial release

There are no plans to implement generations prior to DPP at this point. We know this is a somewhat popular feature, but it is not going to be part of the initial release of Shoddy Battle 2.

Logistics

At this point, it is not clear how we can best split up the remaining work, so it is not a good idea to start writing code without talking to us; we will contact people as needed.

It is unlikely that bearzly or I will fix any bugs in Shoddy Battle 1 anymore, since Shoddy Battle 2 is an entirely new codebase; however, we will still accept work by other people on the Shoddy Battle 1 tree if anybody submits anything.

Like Shoddy Battle 1, Shoddy Battle 2 is free software (i.e. "open source") and the source tree is being worked on in the public Mercurial repository.

Purpose of this topic

What features would you like to see in Shoddy Battle 2? What are your biggest complaints with Shoddy Battle 1? What did you like most about Shoddy Battle 1 and would like to remain in Shoddy Battle 2? This thread is for general Shoddy Battle 2 discussion, but please do not repeat or ask things that can be found in the first post.

Database files (moves and species), as well as team files, are stored as xml, and will be human editable by hand. Shoddy Battle 1 team files will be loadable as well.