itch.io

I do! thanks for playing the game! I do intend to create a discord at some point, maybe after the release of A Tales of Wind. Meet you then!

Can you share this with a team? Or do they to get their own pack? I bought the sfx but I’m not very good at picking the good ones so I was going to hand them off to team member if possible to pick out and design the game’s sfx

A compelling story is always going to hook the audience regardless of who they are. It’s in all of our blood. Stories are all around us. But it’s not the only thing that can make an RPG work. Intuitive and fun combat, or character customization and builds (Path of Exile) is the other part I’d say that’s most fun in an RPG game. Decoration and cosmetics are just part of that fun.

Thank you so much! (づ> v <)づ♡ 

loved the mechanic, this was so innovative and fun

I liked the story, protagonist and the environment. Very readable and fun although I got a bit lost after going to the South market. (Didn’t get to the bees)

Hi, I just had a quick run through of it. Some thoughts here

1) The menu/character creation could be a bit more streamlined. Maybe instead of having multiple screens, you could just have a single one?

2) The prologue/intro cutscene takes a bit too long I think

3) The text color and font for the game is really difficult to read. It feels like I have to lean closer to the screen to read the tutorial text.

4) I got soft-locked. After heading to the furniture shop, talking to bill and pressing buy, I thought the tutorial told me to talk to him. So I tried to talk to him, then when I went to press buy again; he was out of stock.

I'm guessing the game assumes the player will only open the buy menu once at this point; so if they end up not doing that, then they can't progress.

Wanted to change the UI in battle processing

Hi thank you for playing! That's so interesting! There's only 57 maps. I'll definitely look into it but I'm glad you enjoyed the story!

I got hit with a 

TypeError

Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'list') when entering the tavern

It might be intentional, I can't tell.

peak comedy and peak theme 

Everyone is making abstract references, I might just not get it but I didn't really get it unfortunately.  I also got thrown in the prison and nothing happened for a while so I left there.

I first off started really liking the environment, but the game needs more directions for the player. Since the enemies are all the same (at least to the point I was playing), and the player's skills and tactics are also all the same (Heal or AOE/Attack). Every battle is just tiresome to get through, especially without knowing what you get for it.

Then I got to  the loop hall and I kept getting in fights over and over. I left the game there because I wasn't sure where to go or what to do, and getting bogged down by the ghost killed my motivation to try to push past it.

Hi, thanks a lot for the free sprites!

Not again (˚ ˃̣̣̥⌓˂̣̣̥ )

I come from a screenwriting background, so I think more in scenes than event-pages. This meant the game had a ton of maps and transfers, which made it more prone to this specific issue. So sorry for the error, thank you for playing and I'm glad you enjoyed it so far. It was made in a rush so I needed the story to be compelling to make up for everything else ( ˶ˆᗜˆ˵ )

Hi! I made sure to check extensively and it should work now. I also uploaded a downloads options which is more stable. Hopefully this works!

I

It should be fixed now, I made sure to check several times that the file is inside. It’s the default battle1 from the engine, it should be there 
｡°(°.◜ᯅ◝°)°｡

There’s a download option now so I’m hoping that will be more stable, truly, so sorry. I’m still really inexperienced with the engine and debugging as a whole.

, 

hi, I encounter this issue myself in a lot of the scenes. However I find that retry usually fixes it? If not, please let me know and I’ll look into it

Hi! I’m just trying to get it to work on html right now. Sorry for the error!

deleted a bunch of the default assets i was using, anyway I can list out which one is used?

Hi~! I’d love it if you could try out my game that I made for the 10 day RTP rpgmaker challenge. I made it in a crunch but I ensured to try to get the story as compelling as I could with my limitations, I’d love a live reaction because I want to know if the story is working or not!

https://crimson-blitz.itch.io/homecoming

Reid, the Legendary Hero who inherited the Dragonblade has slain the Demon King and freed the people from his shadow. He is granted freedom by the King at last. But while his closest companions return back to their ordinary lives. He struggles to reconcile with expectations of a Hero with the life he truly wants.

Follow a narrative-driven fantasy adventure about heroism, obligation, friendship, and choosing one's own path.

This game was made for the RPG Maker RTP 10 Day Challenge

https://crimson-blitz.itch.io/homecoming

Cheap lazy low effort games made in bulk just to make a quick buck on unsuspecting consumers. 

Yeah but the thing with bouncing ideas with AI, or using it to help debug is that it never ends up in the final product. With art though? If I see an AI art capsule, I’m just gonna assume it’s shovelware and move on. If I see an AI Art asset in the game, I’m gonna assume it’s shovelware and move on.

I can’t explain why. I have an inherent distrust for AI art. It signals low-effort and a shortcut to try to raise production quality, even if a corner of my mind somewhere says “This is probably a placeholder” the majority goes to “Yeah, this game sucks.”

WRITING THE SCRIPTS, CHARACTERS AND OUTLINING A CHOICE'S MATTERS GAME

Difficulties:

Honestly, the most difficult part, besides mapping was actually writing out the script. Since the early game is carried by the narrative, I needed it to have strong characters, feel immersive, and that couldn't be done if I reduced the characters to the usage of the plot. It was also one of my first times actually writing for a narrative-branching game, and so I had to really understand what should affect what and not just add a new branch of story for every line of dialogue. The game didn't just exist around the player, it also had a world and history of it's own; and if I didn't understand  every character who was going to appear, it would lack the depth that would make up for the game's default assets.

I didn't want to write the other characters to just end up as plot challenges for the protagonist, I wanted them to have actual reasons for saying what they say, and doing what they do. 

After about three or four days of brainstorming, drafting and slacking off on the narrative. I eventually managed to wrangle out something I truly believe was compelling, compiled it into a flowchart and spreadsheet (for later usage) and finally was able to jump back into the game. Have a look!

Similarly to the example I made prior, depending on whether the player took the subtle hint to tidy up their room, perhaps do a little bit of exploration. The mother's dialogue changes, (and a variable increases)

If the player selects the bottom option, the story progresses as usual, and the two sits down for a meal. However, if the player took the time to explore their bedroom and tidy it up, they won't need to go back and do so!

THE SIGNIFICANCE

It was very important to me that the player gets the agency to decide their own speech immediately, and also; that the moment they start the game in the bedroom, the world is already paying attention to them. The idea is that something as mundane as 'tidying up your bed' can cause a dialogue change is the proof of concept of the game; It is very subtle now, but everything that the player chooses to say or do will eventually have great ramifications on how their protagonist views the world at large; but the important thing is. It's not about which worldview is right or wrong, It's about who you choose to be in this world.

ALARIC'S BEDROOM UPDATE

Also, I improved on my last iteration of the bedroom, trying out more parallax mapping for light/shadow. 

NEXT:

- Finishing the Breakfast Scene (Alaric's Father comes in)

- Starting the Town Market Scene (Will be the first instance of player reward, where they get to explore the town a little before meeting up with one of their companions and childhood friend.)

Let's go with Blitz, I'm turning 21 this August, and I'm pretty new here, having only started my own game dev journey around last week. I grew up playing a lot of videogames, strategy games like the Total War series, or FPS games like Rainbow Six took up most of my steam's playtime. I was an avid gamer, but as a developer; It was always a weird 'maybe' for me. I remember making player controls for a rolling ball in Unity, I remember some basic lua coding in Roblox, but neither really stuck. 

I went a really roundabout path back to game development, around the senior year of High School; after being emotionally touched by a story, I became intensely passionate with writing, so I began taking writing electives before graduating and entering a post-secondary program for screenwriters. I always had the philosophy that writing could exist in any medium, so when the school offered a game's writing stream, I was already leaning towards it. I wasn't sure how I'd use the education yet, but I just wanted to have it than to not.

We had a Twine course, and a DnD course; these two courses cemented my decision to go after the games writing stream. There's something special about designing player experiences and giving them agency, rather than making them observe a predetermined narrative. And so because of that, I picked up RMMZ a week ago after it went on sale and started my game dev journey.

There's this weird 'irk' I have against AI Art. even if I know the creator is using it as placeholder, I would be much more comfortable if they just straight up used RTP-assets. It feels like when someone uses AI art, they're trying to imitate/up production quality, without actually putting in the work for it.

I SPENT 60$ FOR ATMOSPHERE

THINKING PROCESS

After finishing up the protagonist's room, despite initially telling myself that I could make it work with just the RTP assets of RPGMaker; I suddenly felt like the room was too 'neutral' or 'blank'. It worked fine as it did, but it did not create the atmosphere and or tone that I needed, relying solely on the environmental storytelling to setup the tone.

So I spent the rest of my time finally delving into plugins; before snatching up Sang Hendrix's Realtime Post-Processing and Realtime Parallax. They're great because I wanted something quick and easy, rather than messing around with the old but powerful galv or visustella plugins. This is the result.

IMAGES/SCREENSHOTS

COOL FACTOR VS NARRATIVE DESIGN

While browsing Hendrix's catalogue of plugins, I found myself extremely tempted to snatch up all of the awesome stuff like; directional lighting, Action RPG, Smart speech bubble. But I decided against it, it wasn't central to the game or the narrative. It would definitely look cool and a great detail to have, but it wasn't going to damage the game as much as not having the right color-grading. It's very easy for RPGM devs to look at these massive library of plugins and forget that you also need the content to go along with it.

For this project, I'm aiming to be sort of the 'soft-world builder kind'. Meaning realistic scope, no adding content that doesn't benefit the narrative. As much as I'd like cool looking battle animations, It's just not what this game needs with the current team size.

WHAT'S NEW?

-> Color-graded, parallax mapped

-> A custom class called 'Aspirant' was made to immerse the player into the shoes of a young and weak child

-> Some custom weapon and armors mainly used for storytelling rather than stat-sticks

-> And yes, you can definitely make your bed and pull up the ripped curtains.

WHAT'S NEXT?

Now that I have a parallax mapping plugin and post-processing? Expect the next area (The family house) to feel more dynamic, and also.. consequential storytelling.

-> If you don't make your bed or pull up the curtains; your mother might ask you about cleaning up your room. Then you'll likely get the dialogue choices of

- Lie: "Yes I did" +Insecurity

- Truth: "I forgot."+Honesty

- (Reconcile?): "I'll do it right now." +Humility

These choices feed into a hidden personality system that influences how future dialogue and reactions are presented.

YOUR THOUGHTS?

I have to admit, I'm definitely an amateur at best when it comes to color-grading. I did my best to portray a bleak tone, and I think I did okay. At least, It's not as vibrant as that default RTP coloring. But how do you see it? Could be a bit darker? Maybe the bloom on the window is a bit too much?

Hi Hi~ I'm from Canada, and I recently started making games with RPG Maker! Nice to meet you! 

PROJECT KARDA

GAME SUMMARY

A narrative-driven JRPG game set in a fantasy world with consequential storytelling, the game pays attention to what the player does or says and aligns their identity according to their past actions, similar to telltale games.

SYNOPSIS

Alaric, a lowborn whose family has suffered from heavy taxation and oppression of nobility; finds himself amidst a changing time when the Empress Seraphyne promotes the scholarship initiative for the most prestigious academy in the Darsenian Empire. Wielding a rare affinity and immense talent, Alaric will soon prove to the haughty and arrogant nobles that there is no such thing as 'Divine Birthright'. But is it out of justice? or vengeance?

IMAGES/SCREENSHOTS

VISION

The game aims to be a short but compelling story that focuses on

-> Branching Storylines with multiple endings

-> Dialogue Choices with Lasting Consequences

-> Great character-driven narratives

-> Combats and encounters that feels deliberate/intentional rather than filler or random

-> Fully interactive environment that is tight and 'intimate' but extremely detailed

WHY THE RTP?

I initially considered getting proper artwork and sprites, commissioning them from artists; but it felt rather premature and reckless. It'd draw it up to the equivalent of getting a $1000 vtuber model... only to then realize you barely have any experiences streaming. So for this project, I'm planning to maximize the native base engine to it's fullest before crossing into the panic-inducing territory of plugins and sprites.

Anyway, It's been so fun working on this and I'm glad to be here!