I put "repost", because I had come up with the idea for this (from FFIX), and posted a topic some time back about it. However, the forums were hacked or something, and it was lost amongst other threads.
It wasn't until recently that I remembered it, and as I recall, some other users thought it an interesting idea. Plus, it's something that hasn't been done yet, and I thought it could be a cool little way for creators to give their players an extra event or sidequest perhaps to do.
So I decided to repost it here, and well, here's how this works in Final Fantasy IX:
As the player walks into the room, the auctioner starts to announce the items for auction at that time (four at a time in FFIX). Then, he starts with the first one, calling out the opening bid. Those in the audience start calling out bids, raising it. The player can walk up to the auctioner, and through pressing the action button, a small menu pops up in the corner. It shows how much money the player currently holds, how much the item's bid currently is, and below that, it shows rows of 0s. To bid an amount, the player presses up and down to choose the digits and the price they're bidding for the item. They can't choose less than what the bid is currently at, and can't go over what they have for money.
When there's a pause in the bidding, the auctioner will ask, "Is that all?". When no one bids again, he'll say that the item's going, and the third time, he'll announce that bidding for the item is done. If the player bids at the last moment, right before the auctioner announces it's gone for good, and no other bids are made, the item is given to the player when the auctioner announces it's gone.
Once all the items are gone, the auctioner ends the auction. Once the player leaves the room and comes back in, it starts all over again.
So now that I've explained how it works in Final Fantasy IX, I figured that I should explain how I think this can be done. In the script written for this, can be lines indicating the items to be auctioned, and maybe how often they appear. As well as the starting bid for them.
I figured that the NPCs that are bidding can have a programmed code where they may bid higher for certain items, or bid more often; allowing the creator to function and make the bids seem more random, and yet organized for the player to have a real challenge. This could all be done in the script, and then be called through the events of the NPC bidders when the player walks into the room.
So that's the script, and though I have no real use for this myself that I can think of at the moment, I'm sure that others could find it fun to have and fiddle around with. If someone could make this, it would be most appreciated, and if there are any questions, please just let me know, and I'll be glad to answer them.
