Dweller

Dweller
Stable game
Developer	Bjorn Ritzl (formerly Bergstrom)
Theme	Fantasy
Influences	Angband, Crawl
Released	Aug 13, 2003 (?)
Updated	Apr 14, 2010 (0.15.0)
Licensing	Freeware, Closed Source
P. Language	Java Micro edition (J2ME) and Standard edition (J2SE)
Platforms	J2ME MIDP2.0 enabled handsets, J2SE enabled computers
Interface	Tiles, Keypad, Stylus, Mouse
Game Length	1 hour
Official site of Dweller

Dweller is the first roguelike created for java enabled cellphones. The project was announced and a first alpha version was released on the 12th of August 2003.

Description

Dweller is a fantasy roguelike for Java enabled cellphones. A version for desktop computers also exist, but the main focus of development is for mobile platforms. Some of its features are:

• Three player classes, the Warrior, the Wizard and the Ranger
• A simple end goal, kill the Goblin king!
• Random dungeons (with optional persistence)
• Several different monsters (Goblins, Orcs, Trolls, Oozes, Vampires, Rats, Bats, Skeletons and so on) with simple AI
• Items, item enchants and named artifact items
• Inventory and equipment
• Spells and ranged weapons
• FOV
• Save/Load
• ASCII/Graphics support
• Touch screen support

Dweller is designed to run on any MIDP2 enabled handset. Older versions also work on MIDP1 handsets, but in 2009 MIDP1 support was abandoned.

Download and Installation instructions

Mobile version (J2ME)

The easiest way to get Dweller installed on your phone is to point your handsets browser to the Dweller WML page at http://www.roguelikedevelopment.org/dweller/index.wml

You can also download the JAR and JAD files required to install the game here:

• Dweller JAR
• Dweller JAD

Old versions of the game can be downloaded from

http://www.roguelikedevelopment.org/dweller/old

Desktop version (J2SE)

Download the Dweller J2SE JAR here. Run it by opening a command prompt and type

 java -jar DwellerJ2SE.jar

You can also start the game straight away from your browser using Java Web Start. Click here to play now!

Donate

Dweller is free to download and play, but it is also a one-man effort to bring a full featured roguelike to cellphones and other mobile devices. If you like the game please consider sending a donation:

Make a PayPal donation!

Screenshots

How to Play

Note: All keys can be redefined within the game to better suit your handset. Since mobile phones have a somewhat limited set of input options Dweller also has a rather simplistic interface and way of game play. The game offers the following set of commands:

• Movement (one command for each direction)
• Interact (pick something up, open a chest, ranged attack on a targeted monster, descend stairs etc)
• Targeting (look around on the map and target distant monsters)
• Cycle target (only while in targeting mode)
• Exit/Cancel (closes a menu or leaves targeting mode)
• Inventory
• Main Menu

Movement

Use the Movement commands to move. If you have a touch screen enabled handset just tap on the screen in the direction you wish to move. Note: Orthogonal and diagonal moves take the same amount of time.

Combat

Move into monsters to attack them. Use targeting mode to attack with ranged weapons.

Doors

Move into doors to open them. Use targeting mode to close them.

Interact with items on the ground

Use the Interact command to stand still and search, pickup items, open chests and ascend/descend stairs. If you have a touch screen enabled handset just tap on the player character to interact with something on the ground below you.

Targeting

Use the Targeting command to switch to Targeting mode. While in Targeting mode you can use the Movement commands to move a cursor around on the map.

Press the Targeting command multiple times to cycle between equipment or plain inspection mode. If you have a touch screen enabled handset tap and hold for half a second to cycle equipment.

Use the Cycle Target command to cycle between visible targets.

Use the Interact command to interact with selected target using the selected equipment (or no equipment to inpsect a monster/item or close a door). If you have a touch screen enabled handset just tap on a target to immediately Interact with it.

Use the Exit command to go back to movement mode again. If you have a touch screen enabled handset tap the bottom of the screen to go back to movement mode again.

Menu

Use Menu command to bring up the game menu (inventory, character info, new game, save/load etc). If you have a touch screen enabled handset simply tap the bottom of the screen to open the menu.

Use the Menu command again to cancel/go back from the current menu. If you have a touch screen enabled handset drag left to cancel/go back from the current menu.

Inventory

You can access the Inventory from the main menu or by using the Inventory command. Touch screen uses have to go via the main menu to access the inventory.

Character stats

Your character has four attributes; Attack, Defense, Magic and Speed. When displayed ingame the are shown as Attack/Defence/Magic/Speed.

• Attack determines chance of doing damage in combat and the amount of damage that can be done in melee combat. Attack can be increased by using weapons and other items found in the dungeon.

• Defense determines your chance of negating incoming damage.

• Magic determines your ability to use magic items and deal damage with spell. It also increases your chances of resisting magic attacks.

• Speed determines the speed by which you act, allowing you to attack and move more often than your opponents.

Besides the four attributes your character has Hit Points (Magic Points was removed in a recent version). When Hit Points reach 0 you die and have to start over.

Inventory and Equipment

The inventory shows all carried and equiped items. Available equipment slots are:

• Melee Weapon
• Missile Weapon and ammo
• Armour
• Shield
• Helmet
• Boots
• Ring
• Amulet
• Cloak
• Trinket (wand or similar)
• Spell book

Use your inventory to equip/remove/drop/examine items you are carrying. Some weapons require both hands to use, thus preventing the use of a shield.

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank the following people for helping out with play testing, bug reporting, making suggestions for improvements and much more:

• ABCGi
• DarkGod
• David Damerell
• David Grenier
• DrG
• Haloocyn
• Harlander
• Jakub Debski
• Jeff Lait
• Kajetan Nieszporek
• Kostatus
• Marius Vasaasen
• Mateusz Porczak-Glanowski
• Paul Prestidge
• Pekka Nurminen
• Petr "JuPiTeR" Visek
• Philip Linde
• R.Dan Henry
• Rhialto
• Stephen Legate
• Terje S. B????
• Tim Allen
• Vesa Nieminen

Testimonies and reviews

"Just started playing Dweller on my new phone and it seems like a pretty nifty game :) Simple enough to pick up quickly and easy to control despite the lack of keys available." - daniel andersen

"I really love to play roguelikes and I think that dweller is a superb idea THX for all those who developed dweller for making it and working on it. If I can help just let me know ;)" - haloocyn

"Awesome game!!! I've been playing your game since your very first version and i always check your site for new version. It rocks!" - Ethaniel

"IT ROXX!!!" - mastaG

"Far more addictive than the all singing/dancing multi-coloured "Bomberman" that I spent ????5 on downloading. Well found. :)" - www.stumbleupon.com

"I think is the best Java Game I have ever seen, so addictive, so beautiful, and free." - Roberto

"Dweller is surely the best cellular game i've seen; really good job!! Thanks!" - Ci00rix

Article on Dweller at AtomicMPC http://www.atomicmpc.com.au/article.asp?CIID=24903

And of course Rhialto's Dweller fanpage (thanks!) http://www.rhialto.com/Dweller/

Blog

Follow Dweller development on my blog:

http://peeksandpokes.blogspot.com/search/label/dweller

RSS Feed with Dweller related posts:

http://peeksandpokes.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/dweller

Known bugs

• On some handsets the key names for joypad and similar non numeric keys aren't shown when using Defined Keys and Show Commands
• On HTC Dash handsets the player is rendered at the bottom of the screen. Probably caused by the handset reporting an incorrect(?) screen height
• On Nokia N73 handsets the double tile graphics doesn't show the correct graphics for out of sight tiles. The graphics come out as a black and white checkboard pattern instead of the intended black and transparent checkboard pattern

Todo list

Handset support

• Try to get the game running on Google Android

User experience

• Add more in-game help
• Make Dweller translatable

Inventory

• Add an option to Use Many (for instance use 3 Mushrooms of healing in one go, without having to go in to the menu between each use)

Map

• Place stairs further apart
• Perhaps add several stairs up/down, possibly to different branches ("You see a staircase leading down to the sewers", "You see a staircase leading down to a dungeon")
• Sewers: Add junk that can be searched for items (can spawn monsters and/or cause disease)
• New map type: Catacombs. Undead monsters mostly. Coffins that can be opened for loot/monsters
• New map elements: Altar (sacrifice items to gain favors), Teleporter, Fountain (healing, antidote, mutation, poison)
• Minimap
• Evaluate Fog of War monster "ghosts" - remove monsters and keep only items?

Monsters

• Add some kind of danger assessment to monsters (Harmless, Weak, Even, Dangerous, Deadly etc)
• Named monsters (mini bosses)
• Immobile monsters: Statues, Deadly plants
• Show monster description at first encounter of a new monster
• More monsters!
• Monsters should avoid undiscovered traps (they already avoid discovered traps)

Items

• Other lightsources (fires, torches)

Spells

• Curse (decreases chance of attacking/casting spells or maybe preventing items from being removed)
• Acid (damages inventory and/or equipment)

Death/Win

• Improve "game over" screen

Gameplay

• Investigate if a Rest command should be added (regain HP with the risk of monsters ambushing)

Change log

2010-04-30 v.0.15.1
NEW Dweller Desktop now properly resize the drawing area when the window is resized
NEW Greatly improved the error handling when loading/saving data
NEW Added a loader/progress screen when starting Dweller to give feedback while waiting for the game to start
CHANGE The bottom bar is now hidden when showing item categories
CHANGE Additional drops from dead monsters favor the cell the monster was in if it is empty, instead of spreading it to adjacent cells
FIX Some key codes on some handset models did not show correct key names in the Commands menu
FIX It was not possible to close an opened gate
FIX The Dweller Mobile code to properly resize when the canvas was resized (not sure if/when that ever happens) did not work

2010-04-14 v.0.15.0
NEW Desktop J2SE support
NEW Improved feedback from charmed monsters
NEW Added a monster kill tracker to the character menu. First time kills reward double the amount of xp
NEW All items now have a value in gold, in preparation for features to come...
NEW Monsters, primarily humanoids, now drop gold in addition to other loot
CHANGE Made targeting a bit more intelligent. If no previous target exists it is always the closest one that gets picked first
CHANGE Some keys are now locked so they can't be redefined. This is to prevent a user from redefining keys and completely block navigation within menues
FIX Targeting no longer incorrectly cycles through items when it isn't supposed to
FIX It is now possible to exit the hiscore and game over screen by pressing center/select, not only menu and exit
FIX Selecting an inventory category other than ALL sometimes caused the incorrect category of items to show

2010-03-30 v.0.14.0
NEW Door type: Gate. Blocks movement but not line of sight
NEW Added an About & Credits screen to the main menu
NEW Added a couple of items that increase the light radius
NEW Only intelligent monsters can open doors and pick locks. Stupid monsters need to rely on brute force to get passed a closed door.
NEW Added two handed weapons that prevent the use of a shield
NEW Added items of better or worse than average quality, prefixed "Fine", "Worn", "Strong" and so on
NEW Introduced weapon speed to allow for different playstyles using either hard hitting and slow weapons or fast weapons that hit for less
NEW Some monsters can now be generated in packs
NEW Improved fleeing and pursuing AI behavior
NEW Monsters no longer step on known traps
NEW Flying monsters (bat, wraith and beholders) are no longer affected by traps on the ground
CHANGE Bashing open a door varies in difficulty depending on if the door is locked, jammed, or if it is a gate
CHANGE The ranger has an increased light radius
CHANGE Hitpoints are always increased by 1 when gaining a level
CHANGE Visibility in the starting forest is no longer limited by the player's light radius
CHANGE Weapons with an added effect (Fire, Poison etc) no longer rely on the player's Magic stat when determining effect
CHANGE The bottom stats bar area is no longer taking up screen space on views that doesn't use it
CHANGE The damage from attacks and spells is now determined using a slightly skewed gaussian distribution instead of a linear
CHANGE Wands now have a limited number of charges. There is currently no means of recharging a wand
CHANGE Items are now ignored when cycling through targets
CHANGE When having an item with a beneficial effect selected in targeting mode only friendly creatures will be cycling through targets
CHANGE When having an item with a harmful effect selected in targeting mode a hostile creature is selected by default instead of starting centered at the player
CHANGE Targeting mode automatically targets an enemy if none is already targeted (previously the player was targeted)
CHANGE Minor change to the Drop one/all menu. If a single item is selected the Drop one/all will be replaced by a simple Drop command
CHANGE Improved touchscreen support, especially when moving around on the map
FIX Proper feedback is now given if the player tries to enchant an item that can't be enchanted
FIX Solved a fatal bug in monster movement code that could move the monster out from the map (and crash the game)
FIX Ammo with a limited amount is no longer kept equipped when depelted
FIX Removed double "You are no longer poisoned" messages when leveling up while poisoned
FIX Removed double death messages when killing a creature with a ranged weapon using enchanted ammo
FIX Made sure that tiled levels (the dungeon and sewer) are surrounded by an impassable border of wall tiles
FIX It is no longer possible to go back to a finished game after killing the Goblin King
FIX You will now get a proper win if you return to a saved map with the Goblin King on it and you kill him
FIX Solved the problem with text flooding the bottom edge of a text box
FIX Damage done and taken is no longer linear. There is less probability to do max damage.
FIX Solved a crash bug when explicitly saving a game with persistent maps, leaving the level, coming back and loading again
FIX You can no longer save scum chests. A chest will always contain the same item, no matter when you open it
FIX You can no longer save scum scrolls of enchants. The result of a particular scroll of enchant applied to a particular item will always give the same result
FIX Solved a potential problem when dropping parts of a stack of items or when cloning a monster
FIX It is no longer possible to resist magic cast by yourself on yourself (for instance resisting own teleports)
FIX Damage caused by displacement/knockbacks no longer reduce max hitpoints

2009-09-28 v.0.13.3
CHANGE Changed the targeting mode touch screen functionality slightly

2009-09-27 v.0.13.2
NEW Touch screen support has been added. Still somewhat experimental and needs to be tested on a real device
NEW Added a single use item, Bag of Monsters, used to summon an ally to fight by your side
NEW Added an option on the main menu to show the current list of highscores
FIX Solved issues with charmed monsters not attacking monsters adjacent to you
CHANGE Charmed monsters now give you some information about what they attack
CHANGE You can now swap places with charmed monsters

2009-09-24 v.0.13.1
FIX The probability of Dark Wizards were way too high (about 100x more likely than anything else...)
FIX Items and monsters out of sight are now drawn on top of the fog of war mask to make them easier to spot, especially in ASCII mode
NEW It is now possible when startign a new game to chose between playing a game with random or persistent levels

2009-09-22 v.0.12.1
NEW Added out of depth monsters to make things more exciting
NEW Added persistent maps (please report any problems you may experience with this!)
FIX Solved the problem with immobile and passive monsters
FIX Solved a problem with artifact naming
FIX Accidently allowed cloning of targets again (Oozes would clone you...)
FIX Dungeon theme wasn't saved when a map was saved. This could result in incorrect/no items being generated in a loaded game
CHANGE Reduced frequency of chest traps
CHANGE Rebalanced some items and monsters slightly
CHANGE Mushrooms can now also be found in the caves (previously only in the forest)

2009-09-13 v.0.11.2
FIX Solved a problem with incorrect target messaging when not in look mode and selecting a tile with a door or trap
FIX Solved a problem with incorrect item enchants being generated on items
FIX Saved settings weren't restored properly
FIX Touched up the character selection screen slightly
FIX Improved messaging when dying in melee combat
FIX Worg graphics were not included in the previous release
FIX Solved the problem with invisible monsters that block movement and stand still
FIX The stats at the bottom of the screen will now be presented in a more compact way on handsets with low resolution
NEW Added map description when entering the map
NEW Added the four most recent messages to the death/win screen
NEW Added a disarm ability to Orcs. Hold on to your weapons now!
NEW Added a knockback ability to Trolls
NEW Added poison antidotes
NEW Added more weapon enchants (extra damage, slowing, displacement, chaos)
NEW Added a debug screen to the main menu to improve bug hunting and bug reports
NEW Added random names for artifacts (highly enchanted items)
NEW Added some more room and corridor variations to the dungeons and sewers
CHANGE The target selection screen now remembers the most recently used item, and doesn't start the cycle from scrath
CHANGE Adjusted the speed of most monsters
CHANGE Adjusted the stats of a lot of items to improve game balance
CHANGE Monsters are now allowed to move diagonally in a single move
CHANGE Made some changed to monster movement when moving monsters randomly (if target direction is blocked)
CHANGE Rebalanced player classes: Ranger was a bit too easy and Wizards were a bit too hard
CHANGE The display of current xp and xp for next level is now shown for the current level instead of accumulated xp
CHANGE Equipped items are now always marked as "(equipped)" in the inventory instead of only when being selected

2009-09-07 v.0.11.1
NEW Started adding tutorial/welcome/help screens (help screens can be disabled from the main menu)
NEW Added a 'Restore Default Keys' option to the main menu to restore key bindings to the deault values
NEW Added some new monsters: Dark Wizard, Crazed Cultis, Sewer Troll, Sickly Rat, Worg
NEW Added descriptions to all monsters (can be viewed when inspecting a monster)
NEW Added descriptions of the player classes when creating a character
NEW Started work on themed levels (currently forest, cave, dungeon, sewer). More to come here!
CHANGE Improved the way poison works in the game
CHANGE Improved targeting interface
CHANGE Casters got a lot of xp for casting spells, regardless if the target was killed or not. Xp is only rewarded for kills now
CHANGE The Warriors speed has been increased
CHANGE Any class can now use scrolls again, not only Wizards as it was changed to in 0.10.4
CHANGE Removed scrolls with offensive effects (fire, drain etc)
CHANGE Chance to resist poison is no longer based on Magic but on unmodified Defense
FIX Solved a problem with item cycling while targeting when equiping both a book and a wand
FIX Solved a problem with item targeting for items that doesn't require a target (Wand of Mapping etc)
FIX You should no longer see multiple death messages when dying while fighting multiple/fast mobs
FIX Non-casters no longer use effects (poison, draining etc) in other ways than as a result of successful attacks
(ie a spider applying poison when biting, a vampire draining life when biting etc)
FIX Solved a problem with linebreaks when displaying text

2009-08-30 v.0.10.5
CHANGE Increased casting time of spells
CHANGE Animals no longer drop any loot when killed
CHANGE Vampire Bats are no longer of neutral alignment
CHANGE Improved some feedback messages when interacting with doors
CHANGE Renamed some arrow types
FIX Selecting a "non menu item" (version, memory etc) when having no active game no longer cause a crash
FIX Creatures no longer use effects (poison, draining etc) unless they are adjacent to the player or if they are casters
NEW It is now possible to disarm traps on chests
NEW It is possible to use double size graphics. Change graphics size from the menu on the fly

2009-08-25 v.0.10.4
CHANGE Removed MIDP1 supprt. Game is MIDP2 only. This means a single version for all handsets
CHANGE Merged graphics and ascii version into one. Change mode from the menu on the fly
CHANGE Removed Magic Points. Wizards can now cast unlimited number of spells
CHANGE Rangers now have unlimited number of normal arrows.
CHANGE A default set of keys are defined at start. Keys can be reconfigured as usual via the menu
CHANGE Changed a lot of stats on items and monsters
CHANGE Removed some monsters
NEW Added some monsters
NEW Added more items
NEW Current xp and xp to next level is now shown at the bottom of the screen

2007-02-05 v.0.9.10
FIX Inventory categories weren't correctly remembered when coming back
FIX Corrected yet another issues with cloning

Older changes can be reviewed here.