Last time I wrote about item variants and randomization in roguelikes, and how Cogmind is purely based on a large set of static items, but more recently I’ve been running an experiment to play with not-so-static items. The entire mechanic revolves around a single new utility: the Scrap Engine.
A new utility is born.
The Scrap Engine operates like the Field Recycling Unit in that in addition to the normal inactive and active states it can also be cycled to COLLECT mode, during which it will “eat” items at the current location. These items are presumed to be disassembled and added to the Engine’s resources in order to be mixed with others and reassembled into new “constructs,” the name for a new category of randomized items. Instead of creating new ones it can also use these resources to modify existing constructs. Although in both cases the results are indeed based