Dev Notes

Ideas on the Design So Far:

There need to be "procedural pattern" rooms for generating lots of random rooms that are following a realistic look and style. This is because many rooms need to go near each other in 3-D space, not just near the sides or front or back! So, I need to generate different room clusters for those groups (and I need to know what rooms go near what other rooms)!

This includes main hallways at the entrances. So, probably I'll have to randomly generate some mansion-shapes with different entrances and then attach random hallways at each entrance. Then generate the "procedural-pattern" room clusters. Then generate the pattern rooms, themselves. Note: anything that naturally belongs against a wall must be there in the pattern room, so lots of versions of each layout (then, other furniture, like couches, can get clustered randomly and it won't break my heart if they look a bit crazy, as it's only some middle-of-the-room stuff that's a bit off in rooms that maybe were ransacked or something!)

Make the basic "procedural-pattern" rooms with NO FRONT WALL! That needs to be on a separate layer, tiled about 16px high (so the lower half of my sprites will disappear under the front wall). Any higher than that (unlikely), and a bit of front wall WILL be necessary to block the movement of the sprites.

To summarize: the side and back walls of various sizes/shapes of rooms must be laid out with reasonable patterns (including the stuff up against the walls), and clusters of such rooms generated in sensible types of groups, and sensible mansion shapes with sensible entrances and hall placements generated. Then, the pieces can be fit together randomly, and filled with "middle of the room" furniture/decorations.

I still think a cellular automaton algorithm would make the most sense, if only I had one...

Room List (with preferred size suggestion):

1. Foyer/Hall (3+)
2. a Parlor/Living Room/Back Room (7)
3. a Drawing Room/Front Room (8)
4. Lounge/Library/Tea Room (6)
5. Drinking Room/Bar (6)
6. Game Room (4)
7. Conservatory/Greenhouse (6+)
8. Ballroom/Great Hall (10)
9. Dining Room (8)
10. Sitting Room (6)
11. Kitchen (5+)
12. Pantry (3)
13. Lavatory (3 or 4)
14. Bedroom (5)
15. Private Office/Study (4)
16. Guest Bedroom (5)
17. Private Gym (5)