RMRK RPG Maker Creation => Projects => Projects in Progress => Topic started by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 19, 2012, 04:41:08 AM
Title: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 19, 2012, 04:41:08 AM
(http://imageshack.com/a/img69/5461/joyx.png)
The new updated Demo Version 0.4 is now available for download! To Dowload the game click here. (http://rpgmaker.net/games/5150/downloads/4606/) For more Information about changes etc, click here. (http://rmrk.net/index.php/topic,47396.msg549020.html#msg549020)
Violent Whispers is my very first project, and from here on I will leave it to my presentation. I hope you will like it!
You will take on the role as a young Asperian Knight named Vincent Feracordis, and his journey to discover a secret that will change his life forever. At the age of ten, Vincent discovered a 'gift' (or a curse) involving the ability to hear distant whispers, and hallucinate events that are not a part of his own life. Growing up has made him accustomed to this defect in his vital system, and he has learned to live a normal life despite the echoing voices infecting his mind. But something is rising on the horizon, and chaotic and fearsome events are about to take shape, when King Zephyr of Asper suddenly decides to search for a long-forgotten artifact from an ancient era. Questioning King Zephyr's intentions, and with a deep worry of the king's recent obsession with the artifact, Vincent is being tasked to look for the second piece of the artifact in a sealed forest far across the ocean. All his life Vincent has questioned the very reason why he's the only one with the unusual vital defect, but he has never found an answer.... Until now..
Violent Whispers is a game about finding your true self, overcoming difficulties when your whole world is crumbling, and rise from the ashes even when the world is against you. The value of friendship, love and trust, and the ultimate courage of turning your back against everything you ever known for a greater good.
Age: 24 Years old. Occupation: Asperian Knight. Focus in combat: Damage dealer. (stimulates Destruction and Vital Auras) Weapon types used: Swords.
Short Bio: Vincent is the protagonist of the game, and is given a lot of focus during the storyline. Growing up, Vincent discovered that he's suffering from a defect in his vital system, that grants him the ability to hear distant whispers, and hallucinate events that is not part of his own life. Vincent is not sure if he shall see this defect as a curse or a gift, but his inner desire is to find the secret to his condition. Vincent appears as a very quiet individual, and illustrates a pretty low self-esteem. But on the inside, he has a gentle and strong heart.
Spoiler for Wiola:
Wiola Dolea (http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/679/lashkah.png) (http://img560.imageshack.us/img560/6022/14y01a1.gif) Age: 22 Years old Occupation: Academic Scholar/Protector of Forest of Pluvia. Focus in combat: Caster. (stimulates Destruction and Healing Auras) Weapon types used: Staffs and Wands.
Short Bio: Wiola is a young Academic mage, and her current occupation is to protect The Forest of Pluvia from Intruders. Her hometown, Town of Duke is located in the southern part of Aspicio, and here she was brought up by her Father and Mother, along with her younger sister. At a very young age she transfered to the Royal Academy and started her study to become a mage. 2 years after her sister was born, she left the academy to help her lonely mother raise the little girl. But at her sisters 10th birthday she was forced to transfer back to the academy to finish her studies. On her graduation, she had made a big name for herself, and her cunning in Destruction and Healing auras is well known across the land. As a person she is very energetic, helpful, caring, and has a strong heart for the nature.. almost to the brink of being a bit too extreme about it..
Spoiler for Clem:
Clem Dolea (http://img15.imageshack.us/img15/882/clem2.png) (http://img42.imageshack.us/img42/9930/1ijwcz.gif) Age: 17 years old Occupation: None, but is very skilled in Mech research. Focus in combat: Spellblade (stimulates Mind and Enlightenment Auras) Weapon types used: Spellblades.
Short Bio: Clem is Wiolas younger sister, and that is basicly everything that the two sisters has in common.. Apart from her older sister, she has no experience in academic study, and already at a young age she was forced to learn everything about magic and combat, all by herself. The father left the family when Clem was only 8 years old because of the sisters mother who fell sick. With her sister at the academy, she had to take care of her mother, and moved out from Duke. As a person, she can seem a bit shy at first, and the main reason for that is her rough childhood, which has made her very defensive. Deep down inside she is a happy young lady, that tries to hide the real pain that is burrowed in her heart. She has an extreme interest in technology and mechanics, and over the years she has become very talented in repairing broken mechs. She now lives alone with her dying mother, at the outskirts of Duke.
Spoiler for Judith:
Judith Suffert (http://imageshack.us/a/img17/1487/lfortunac.png) (http://img593.imageshack.us/img593/6169/o8wduq.gif) Age: 26 Years old. Occupation: Member of the Shining Spears clan. Focus in combat: Damage Dealer. (stimulates Vital Auras) Weapon types used: Spears and Javelins.
Short Bio: Judith is an experienced Amazon warrior, and a member of the Shining Spears. She is said to be the strongest member of the clan, and she is mostly famous because of her disregard of the use of magical resources. Within the Shining spears, she puts her faith in an ancient warrior that had the vision that the use of magical resources was an escape from reality and a disruption of the human focus. Along these lines, she has trained to be one of the best spear-wielding warriors across the land, even without the help of any magical resources. When she joins the party, she early on develops a high interest for Vincent.
Spoiler for Shane:
Shane Celeritas (http://img202.imageshack.us/img202/5766/lriona.png) (http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/1605/2wdyqae.gif) Age: 23 Years Old. Occupation: Hunter. Focus in combat: Damage Dealer. (stimulates Vital and Naturalistic Auras.) Weapon types used: Bows.
Short Bio: Shane is an experienced archer from the northern part of Aspicio. His family name Celeritas comes from the same area that he was brought up in, high across the mountains. The basic structure of his childhood has made him an expert in archery, and his intense skill in rapid-shooting is legendary even outside of his own family-name. Because of his lifestyle, He was forced to grow up without any technology or any advanced magic, he had to hunt his own food for survival and use his bow for everyday life. During the yearly hunting events, he was always the one to shine the most, which is something that had an large impact on his gigantic ego.
Some early footage of the game, part of Beta Version 0.4
Spoiler for Screenshots:
(http://imageshack.com/a/img59/7426/f7db.png)
The Forest of Pluvia: (http://img542.imageshack.us/img542/2898/pluvia1.png) (http://img577.imageshack.us/img577/6883/pluvia2.png) (http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/148/pluvia3.png)
- A Dynamic world, your choices will have a big impact of your surroundings, and decisions you make can alter events during your gameplay. People will have different opinions about you and your party, depending on your actions. (Example, a town might burn down if a criteria is met. People will not welcome you, and try to chase you away.. etc)
- 2 secret endings, aquired by special criteria.
- Lots of Quests and Side-quests that will have a big impact on the world. This accompanied by a questlog to always keep track on what to do.
- choises that will give you different quest-lines, cutscenes, dialouges and possibly skills.
- Achivements! Will keep you occupied, and another playthrough is required to catch them all.
- Simple battle system, with skills as you level up (but as the game progresses you will buy skills by certain criteria)
- The skill animations will be scripted and customized by myself, some including movie clips.
- Out-of-Combat skills that is needed to get secret items, and progress in puzzles.
- Interesting and different characters, alot of tension will storm up between them.. and love, sorrow, hatred, along with different opinions will blossom through the storyline.
- Interesting twist, that wont struck you once.. but possibly twice!
- Different Tier items, and the Legendary once will be hard to aquire.
- Ingame Npcs based on my favourite youtuber (for the luls, and because I really love his work), and also Npcs based on some of my real friends.
- Special skill shops depending on the users aura (Achademic scholars can teach new skills because of their Knowledge auras if you bring them the needed skills and items).
- Special upgrade system that's depending on the users aura. The blacksmith in each town will aquire new recipes as you find new weapons, and they will need a magical resource called Krytos + a weapon that has the ability to be enchanted. Depending on which character that's using the weapon, you will need different kind of Krytos to stimulate the proper aura. The outcome will present the player with a upgraded Krytonian weapon. Different tiers of Krytos is needed to upgrade specific tier items, Kryton fragment will upgrade Tier 1 weapons, Kryton Ores will upgrade Tier 2 weapons.. etc.
Spoiler for Stuff I could really use some help with:
Thats all! Hope you enjoyed! All feedback and criticism are welcome! :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 19, 2012, 04:42:07 AM
Older Updates:
Spoiler for Updates:
2013 - 01 - 08
Spoiler for Date:
All enemies for the demo added, Changed Titlescreen, Thread Updated
2013- 01 -12.
Spoiler for Date:
Had a friend playtest the game for bugs, and hopefully most of these should be fixed. Thinking about if I should put in the first town to be playable in the demo, or just skip it for now.. it requires a bit more eventing if I decide to release the demo with the first town included. The playtime should be fairly long enough for a first demo even without the first town, so I will think about it for awhile. Apart from that, some more eventing and the demo should be ready for release. Also added updated Screenshots in the Main Thread, and might have a playtester for any grammatical errors, and minor bugs.
2013- 01 -18.
Spoiler for Date:
Been working on 2 of the bigger events in the demo, along with the database. All items for the demo is now added, and the quest journal is 100% complete aswell. Been fixing bugs after playtests along with some grammatical errors in the dialouge, and added a Menu-cursor, and some other minor features. All maps are done for the first town, but I have tons of eventing to do in there at the moment, so Im thinking about skiping the town for now. As for the demo, Its around 90% complete without adding the first town, and around 70% if I decide to add it. Slowly getting there :)
2013- 01 -22.
Spoiler for Date:
Done with most major events for the demo, and I have one left to finish up before everything is done. Also need to add all the enemy encounters on the maps (the game has no random encounters feature). I have decided that I will include the event for my first town, but I think I will skip the town for now since there is alot of events that I need to finish up, and it will postpone the demo a bit. Also need to work out the chase event script properly (It works for now, but not as I intend it to do.)
I changed the titlecommands to fit better with the titlescreen aswell, and added a logo to be presented before the actual titlescreen. I'm also trying to figure out how I will distribute the game without the RTP-folder included. Since the demo is soon to be complete, I have also added a date for release, and I plan to release the demo on sunday (The 27th of January).
Demo version 0.10 is now available for download under Chapter 4 - Demo and Features! There might be some slight bugs left in there, but almost all of them should be gone by now. There might also occur some misspelling, so if you happen to come across anything, I would appreciate if you could tell me :) The playtime for the demo should be around 45min - 1 hour, depending on how much you explore, and if you decide not to skip anything. All feedback on the demo is welcome!
2013- 02 -02.
Spoiler for Date:
Working on bugfixes for Demo-version 0.10, and will upload a fixed version later on! I'm also looking into some suggestions that have been stated for the demo, more of these are welcome if you think something is confusing or plain stupid inside the demo.
I Have also started working on the content beyond the demo, and Chapter 1. I'm not sure how much content the first chapter will include yet, but Chapter 1 is being developed as it is now. The game will later on be released in chapters, so I will put up each chapter here after they are done, starting with Chapter 1 - The Journey Begins. I have also added a new Save/Load screen for the fixed demo (version 0.2), and added a Bugreport section here in the Update-section with the bugs currently found and fixed in the current demo. If you have a bug to report you can always check in there if the bug is added and fixed. Would prevent people from reporting the same bug over and over (It's not that of a big deal anyway cause I am really greatful for all the bugreports of course!). Stay tuned for new updates about Chapter 1!
Also, made a quest for a friend of mine that is having her birthday today. I created the character to resemble her, and added a pretty funny birthday quest on her special day :) She was very happy about it, so I feel good about myself today ;D
2013- 02 -04.
Spoiler for Date:
Fixed the last bugreports for the new demo (V 0.2). Also added new features that will be available in the Full game (A combo system, Encyclopedia of Aspicio, and achievements.) Combo system: An in-battle combo system where you can link attacks together for a sweet total damage done display. Will have an achievement according to damage done and hits combined. Encyclopedia of Aspicio: A book you will find, that you can activate from the Key-Items menu. This book will keep track on enemies slain, Items/Weapons/armors found, States gained etc. Book of Achievements: Another book that can be activated from the Key-Items menu. This book will keep track of various challanges in your journey, and distribute points when you complete them (Some challanges will also reward you with items).
I have also added Achievements for Demo V 0.2, Question is: will you be able to fully complete the Demo's Encyclopedia and achievements? ;)
Made a slight change in the Quest Journal and divided Main, and Side quest in different tabs. Also added a function that will remove the completed main/side quests from the tab and only put it under 'Completed quests'.
Demo Version 0.2 is now available for download! (Changes from previous version can be found under Chapter 4 - Demo and Features).
Been working some on the content beyond demo V.02, and I'm now finished with everything in Town of Duke. I have also progressed on the main events, and added new enemies for the new maps.
A friend of mine uploaded a gameplay for demo V 0.10, so if you feel like watching the game in motion, you could always check it out! (Includes spoilers).
2013- 03 -17.
Spoiler for Date:
Been working alot on the content for Chapter 1, and I would say I'm about 70% done (Give or take). The playtime for the game should be around 2-3 hours+ now, depending on exploration and sidequesting etc. I have also finished one of my major puzzles that I will have in my game, It took me almost 4 hours to complete it but I'm very happy how it turned out (Even though it was complicated to work it out from time to time). I'm also thinking about posting a recruitment thread, since I'm in desperate need of help with the database, and skills etc. So you might see a recruitment thread from me in some days.
For now I give you a sneak peak of the puzzle that I just finished(took me 4 hours :mad:)
Most recent Update: 2013-09-25 Update can be found here: (http://rmrk.net/index.php/topic,47396.msg549739.html#msg549739) Bug Reports for Demo: (The name inside the () - bracket, is the founder of the bug. Thanks for reporting!)
Spoiler for Current bugreports and fixes for Demo V 0.10:
Forest of Pluvia:
Passage Error, on the cliff near the dogs grave. (Joel Sturesson) - Fixed. Sign south of the Blue Teleporter is not readable. (David Williams) - Fixed. Bush settings for red bushes inconsistant. (Milennin) - Fixed. Wrong passage setting for white flowers. (Milennin) - Fixed. Oracle sign "May her guide you on.." Should be May she. (Milennin) Able to walk between the treeline at the southeast part of the map. (Milennin) - Fixed.
UC Grounds: After getting out from Zetyas grave, you spawn to the far left of the grave. (David Williams) -Fixed Wrong passage setting for white pile of rocks. (Milennin) - Fixed. The outer walls for the old prision, is only 1 frame tall. (Myself) - Fixed. Zetyas grave - The vine in that room is climbable for no reason.(Milennin)-Fixed. Old Jail - One stack of gold that you can't pick up.(Milennin)-Fixed. Some misspelled words when talking to Zetya.(Milennin)-Fixed. Enemies are able to engage you while standing on higher ground.(Milennin)-Fixed. (Added a aggro switch when you enter the higher grounds, enemies will try to catch you, but wont engage you in battle while standing on higher grounds.)
Outskirts: None yet.
Wiolas House: Retrieving cloth and stuff after waking up in the burning house has a long pause (like 3 seconds of nothing).(Milennin)- Fixed Able to leave the area, when your objective is to save Wiola from the burning house.(Milennin)- Fixed Able to enter the burning house after Wiola is saved.(Milennin)- Fixed
World Map: When Wiola attacks with the Unholy Agenda staff, the game crash. (David Williams) - Fixed
Town of Duke: None yet.
Intro/Credits: Intro: Typo, Forgotten Forest written as Forsaken Forest (Myself) -Fixed Intro: Typo, Hotkey section: Press space to "Continute". (Milennin)-Fixed.
Other: Item: Feather of Wonders is missing an animation, causes crash (Cammi) -Fixed
Suggestions for Demo: Forgotten Forest - Make the map darker. (from Milennin) Secret Cave - Add jump points on some of the walls. (from Milennin) - Added Secret Cave - Might add a savepoint on the first floor.(from Milennin) - Added(Added the option to save at the entrance of the cave, the first time you enter). Secret Cave - The gaps can be really frustrating in It's current state.(from Milennin) - Changed Outskirts - Finding Hi-Potions that heal for 2.500HP seems like bit of an overkill, considering you only have 750HP at this point or so.(from Milennin)- Fixed It would be nice to be able to examine Zetya's grave for additional background about the character.(from Milennin)-Fixed. (Added a 'Inspect the grave' option, where you will find out who is buried down there, and why.)
Spoiler for Current bugreports and fixes for Demo V 0.4:
Forest of Pluvia: None yet.
UC Grounds: None yet.
Outskirts: None yet.
Wiolas House: None yet.
World Map: None yet.
Town of Duke: None yet.
Intro/Credits: None yet.
Other: None yet.
Suggestions for Demo: None yet.
Currently working on: Events for Chapter 1
Intro -Done World Map for Demo. - Done! Last Exterior + Interior maps for the Demo - Done!
To Do List:
Add Information about In-game features - Done! Title Screen - Done! Database for the demo - Done! Release First Demo - Released! Release Fixed Demo Version - Pending. Release completed chapter 1 - working on
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on December 19, 2012, 06:43:52 AM
Can't wait to see a demo! :tpg: It's lookin' really good so far~
That rainy-like map is a tad bit bright (lightning strike moment?), but otherwise you have some damn good maps for just starting out. :drsword:
The character edits look good, too~!
^_^
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 20, 2012, 04:20:57 AM
Can't wait to see a demo! :tpg: It's lookin' really good so far~
That rainy-like map is a tad bit bright (lightning strike moment?), but otherwise you have some damn good maps for just starting out. :drsword:
The character edits look good, too~!
^_^
I hope I will be able to get the demo uploaded in a week or 2, I have fallen a bit ill so I cant play around with my project as much as I want too.. most maps are done for the demo, I just need to polish them a bit before a final release :)
As for the rainy-like map, ye Its because of the lightning.. happened to snap it right when the lightning struck.. But I will update in the coming days, and hopefully add some more screenshots later on.
Thanks for the feedback!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: bluntsword on December 22, 2012, 02:30:11 AM
Looking good!
I must note however: Your main character has amnesia, is named Vincent, and your avatar is Cloud Strife.
That is all ;)
No seriously, can't wait for your demo. Everything looking good except this sentence in your story:
...as to avoid any conflicts regarding to war.
Did you mean "to war"? That doesn't make sense!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 22, 2012, 03:44:04 AM
I must note however: Your main character has amnesia, is named Vincent, and your avatar is Cloud Strife.
That is all ;)
No seriously, can't wait for your demo. Everything looking good except this sentence in your story:
...as to avoid any conflicts regarding to war.
Did you mean "to war"? That doesn't make sense!
Crap, I feel a bit ashamed that it was so easy to figure out I named my main char after Vincent Valentine :( Oh well, yes you are right Im a big fan of Final fantasy 7 ;) Its still probably my most favourite game of all times.
I did my best to put up a good thread, but I will work on making it a little bit more appealing, and hopefully I will have a release of the demo in a week or 2. Im trying to read everything in my texts over and over again, since English is my 2nd language there are bound to be some spelling errors and things like that.
About the specific sentence that you mentioned.. uhhm Im not sure what Its suppose to mean.. "as to avoid any conflicts regarding to war" , if I translate it to Swedish, it would be.. Att undvika eventuella konflikter om/att krig/a.. so ye I can see what you mean, doesnt make alot of sense xD
I changed the sentence to: "as to avoid any conflicts, that could lead to war", and hope it makes a little more sense :)
Thanks alot for the feedback!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: bluntsword on December 22, 2012, 01:40:49 PM
If you need a playtrster for bugs and grammar I can do that. Just PM me. I'm not the best at English (which is sad because its my ONLY language) buyninregularly proof a korean friend of mine's papers.
You're doing a great job so far, don't get discouraged!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on December 22, 2012, 06:54:08 PM
If you need a playtrster for bugs and grammar I can do that. Just PM me. I'm not the best at English (which is sad because its my ONLY language) buyninregularly proof a korean friend of mine's papers.
You're doing a great job so far, don't get discouraged!
That would be really awesome :) Im soon done with the Intro, and the world map for the demo. Im going to put up a bigger update once most things are done. Im trying my best not to get discouraged, and I really hope that the demo will turn out okay :D
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 05, 2013, 01:04:18 AM
Small update: 2013-01-05
Working on adding some more screenshots for the thread, and I am also working on eventing inside the game.
I think it turned out pretty okay, but I have no Idea why that white boarder around the logo is there..
Feedback on the titlescreen would be much appreciated.
Edit: Crap, just noticed I double posted.. Will keep the updates in the update section from now on.. sorry!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 05, 2013, 05:06:52 AM
I wouldn't worry about double-posting on your own threads. :) (I do it all the time >_<). Either way, I think it's better to double-post after a little bit to nab some attention, because if you just edit your post, no one can see the update. :( So, I actually recommend double-posting in this case, haha. xD
Okay, onto the feedback! I really like the image as a whole, but the logo does seem a little dark and unsetting...I would try making the text bigger (on the logo), and maybe more of a soft color for the text. I think the black part would do well as a lighter color. :) I'm a huge fan of big, fantasy, breath-taking images, so I give you a thumbs up for that! xD
Now, what I would suggest...hmm...maybe making a few of the faces into big, slightly visible images fading in the background. =o (rather than having them all clumped together, but that still looks pretty nice, too xD). That's really just a little recommendation. :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Little Psycho on January 07, 2013, 10:53:40 AM
Wait... WUT??????? What am I being thanked for? Being nice and supportive?!?
Anyway... I like the look of this and I love how you gave us the history of the world without revealing anything about the ingame stuff :) Looking forward to playing this!!! But... I don't want to play any demo's (I have a hunch that I might want to keep playing and be mad because I can't :yuyu:)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 08, 2013, 03:54:12 PM
I wouldn't worry about double-posting on your own threads. :) (I do it all the time >_<). Either way, I think it's better to double-post after a little bit to nab some attention, because if you just edit your post, no one can see the update. :( So, I actually recommend double-posting in this case, haha. xD
Okay, onto the feedback! I really like the image as a whole, but the logo does seem a little dark and unsetting...I would try making the text bigger (on the logo), and maybe more of a soft color for the text. I think the black part would do well as a lighter color. :) I'm a huge fan of big, fantasy, breath-taking images, so I give you a thumbs up for that! xD
Now, what I would suggest...hmm...maybe making a few of the faces into big, slightly visible images fading in the background. =o (rather than having them all clumped together, but that still looks pretty nice, too xD). That's really just a little recommendation. :)
Okay, thats cool then :) Will put up "Update added" or something when I have something new to announce from now on, thanks for your enlightenment about that!
Ye I have thought a little bit about that aswell, but I have spent a pretty decent amount of time making the logo.. Since I dont have any good program to create fancy titles, I actually created it inside Sony Vegas Pro, because I have a decent amount of knowledge about that program. I agree that the text might be a bit hard to read, and a bit tiny so I definetely need to do something about that, and Im gonna play around some more in Sony vegas and see if I can make something out of it. Thanks for the thumb ;)
I thought excactly about that when I started making the title-screen actually xD (Sometimes it feels that you can read my mind, haha!) But since the picture of the actors are cut off around their chests, it came out a bit odd to me. Actually I was thinking about having 2 of the characters in a bigger format, one to the left and one to the right of the screen, and with added opacity. But like I said because of the "cut off" I worked it into Its current state. You seem to have knowledge about this stuff, maybe you could help me out a bit? :)
Wait... WUT??????? What am I being thanked for? Being nice and supportive?!?
Anyway... I like the look of this and I love how you gave us the history of the world without revealing anything about the ingame stuff :) Looking forward to playing this!!! But... I don't want to play any demo's (I have a hunch that I might want to keep playing and be mad because I can't :yuyu:)
Haha! Yes, that and for being a very nice motivator! You have given me alot of useful guidelines that has helped me out alot! Mainly in the "Keeping the spirit alive?.." thread that I started! When I think about it, most of the things you and other people wrote there gave me motivation to keep working on the project, and for that you should definetely have a big thanks! :)
Thanks alot, Ye I tried to give away a small history of what has happened before the actual game. You will get to know most of this stuff inside the game too, but Its just a small fragment of the legend and the backstory. I have been thinking, and I might put the game out in chapters later on.. sadly that might just be the same, if you think you might be mad about wanting to play further (Which I would really be happy about if you wanted too in the first place :)) Other than that I hope you will stay around for the full version, if you decide to wait :) And I hope I will be faster in my progress, when I get more experience.
Thank you both for the feedback! Stay tuned for updates! :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 08, 2013, 09:48:43 PM
Small Update: 2013-01-08.
Made some slight changes in the title screen, think it turned out much better this time around. Im thinking about making some small adjustment on it though..
New Titlescreen: (http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/1239/demoversion010.png)
Also updated the Main-thread and the Update-Thread.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 08, 2013, 11:49:44 PM
I didn't actually think about the whole "cut off" thing...that's a very good point. >_< I mean, there's ways around that (somewhat) but they can be tough to look right. It's probably better to leave it like it is, then. Haha sorry about that. xD
And WOW! I love the new logo!! :D It's very pretty and seems to sit much better with the background!
I don't know anything about Sony Vegas Pro, but that does look pretty damn good!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 09, 2013, 08:54:45 AM
Looking at the planned features list it looks like it's gonna be a big and ambitious project, good luck with that.:lol: I'm wondering why you spell the Crisis event in your storyline like Crysis (with y instead of i). Is there any reason for the slight misspelling?
By the way, your maps look pretty good.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Little Psycho on January 09, 2013, 08:33:39 PM
There's just one minor I found in your title screen. I think your windowskin looks a bit off when compared to the rest. I believe it would look nicer when you had a completely transparant background on that windowskin, just in the titlescreen!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 09, 2013, 11:18:45 PM
Looking at the planned features list it looks like it's gonna be a big and ambitious project, good luck with that.:lol: I'm wondering why you spell the Crisis event in your storyline like Crysis (with y instead of i). Is there any reason for the slight misspelling?
By the way, your maps look pretty good.
Ye, I got in mind that I will make it as big as I can, but Im always gonna keep my limits in mind so those are just planned features that I want to use in the game. There might be some features that wont be in there, because of my lack of knowledge etc, but I am determined to add as much of it as possible. I will make sure that I wont go too deep into the whole 'big game' idea, since I dont want it to ruin the fun Im having making it, so when I reach that point I will think about a closure of the main story. The maps I have posted on here was in a rather early state, so they were far from finished during the time I made the topic. Im really glad you think they look okay though! :), but I will put up some new screenshots when they are pretty much finished. Thanks for the good luck charm btw ;D
Thats a interesting find, I guess I have to blame it on the game 'crysis'. English is my secondary language, so there are bound to be some words that I will slightly misspell. I actually had the thought back in my head, that Crisis is spelled with a i, but then I thought about the game crysis, where Its spelled with a y, so I guess thats why I happend to spell it like that. I will make sure to look up the words Im a bit unsure of in the future, thanks for pointing that out!
There's just one minor I found in your title screen. I think your windowskin looks a bit off when compared to the rest. I believe it would look nicer when you had a completely transparant background on that windowskin, just in the titlescreen!
I totally agree on that one.. I would really want to make it customized and maybe have the 'start quest' 'Continue', and 'Exit game' in different positions aswell.. The thing is, Im not sure how I will do that without a script, and I have been searching for one that I can use but havnt find any yet. I also want to customize the game menu a bit, with Icons and such.. but Im pretty sure I need a script for that aswell. Im a bit afraid I might add too many scripts and mess something up, I have some pretty advanced scripts in there already like the battle animation script, and the Holders battlers etc. But I definetely agree about the title screen.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 10, 2013, 01:10:01 AM
I haven't tested this out, but it might be helpful! I mean, as far as getting rid of the windowskin and potentially replacing them with images. It's the best script of it's kind that I could find (or, at least by looks). Take note that it's in spanish, but the demo might be helpful, regardless. xD I hope it works out~
I haven't tested this out, but it might be helpful! I mean, as far as getting rid of the windowskin and potentially replacing them with images. It's the best script of it's kind that I could find (or, at least by looks). Take note that it's in spanish, but the demo might be helpful, regardless. xD I hope it works out~
*Portuguese. I have to admit, I always get tetchy and rage a little when I find scripts that are written in foreign languages. Especially the comments. I know I shouldn't, but sometimes I just want to know what the comments say and not have to resort to Google Translate to give me some half-cocked translation of it. I remember trying to convert a script that draw the tiles isometrically, but everything was in French, even the variable names. I know a bit of French but not that much.
/pauses-rant
You can double post in your own projects. You can post as many times consecutively as you want. Just try to make sure they are useful and meaningful posts and not just spam messages meant to bump the thread for no reason.
Good luck with the project. I'll give it a proper read when I get a chance, but it looks good so far for a first project.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 10, 2013, 01:26:53 AM
I haven't tested this out, but it might be helpful! I mean, as far as getting rid of the windowskin and potentially replacing them with images. It's the best script of it's kind that I could find (or, at least by looks). Take note that it's in spanish, but the demo might be helpful, regardless. xD I hope it works out~
:p Also, I'm still curious as to what you meant by this:
(I actually came up with an idea, almost the very first day I started to create my game, and I will ask for your permission in a PM later on ;D)
Wow.. those scripts are just insane.. There are some other scripts I have been looking for that is added in that master demo aswell, like the anti lag scripts and such. Im a bit confused though, since there are no script codes added for download.. or maybe Im just missing something. I tend to be able to work around scripts if I can get some instructions from the script itself, but it seems like I can only watch the scripts in action inside the demo. Though I learned alot about custom pictues when watching the demo, but setting them up to work the way I wanted would be a different story.
Oh, I completely forgot about that! Sorry! I will send you a PM right away ;)
*Portuguese. I have to admit, I always get tetchy and rage a little when I find scripts that are written in foreign languages. Especially the comments. I know I shouldn't, but sometimes I just want to know what the comments say and not have to resort to Google Translate to give me some half-cocked translation of it. I remember trying to convert a script that draw the tiles isometrically, but everything was in French, even the variable names. I know a bit of French but not that much.
/pauses-rant
You can double post in your own projects. You can post as many times consecutively as you want. Just try to make sure they are useful and meaningful posts and not just spam messages meant to bump the thread for no reason.
Good luck with the project. I'll give it a proper read when I get a chance, but it looks good so far for a first project.
Ye, I agree! Its unfortunate to not being able to understand what is written.. and as for myself not being good at working out scripts as it is, Its a bit frustrating when you cant read the comments. Google translation could work though, damn I never think about that neat feature!
Okay, thats nice to know! Yuyu informed me about that, but I understand that it should be some sort of update on the game and not just a random bump or similar :) The recent update was a bit small, and Its not my intention to just add a tiny update according to the title screen, and some changes in the thread.. I will keep my update posts a bit biger now, and not just a update about one little change :)
Thank you for the kind words, and I hope you will like the read!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 10, 2013, 04:16:27 AM
I got your PM! ^_^
Anyways, I still haven't tried the script. Hopefully I'll get around to it, and I can offer some advice on it. Still, it's probably more trouble then it's worth. D: It sounds pretty tough to get through, especially being in a different language.
Oh, I didn't even realize it was a list of many scripts...I was confused when I saw the "master scripts" title during the download. >_< Dangit.
Im a bit confused though, since there are no script codes added for download..
I might be drawing a blank, but I'm not entirely sure what you mean by no "script codes". =o I'm probably just not thinking straight right now (I was just talking to a friend on Skype for a long time and I'm all tired and distracted lol). xD
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 10, 2013, 07:56:19 AM
Anyways, I still haven't tried the script. Hopefully I'll get around to it, and I can offer some advice on it. Still, it's probably more trouble then it's worth. D: It sounds pretty tough to get through, especially being in a different language.
Oh, I didn't even realize it was a list of many scripts...I was confused when I saw the "master scripts" title during the download. >_< Dangit.
Im a bit confused though, since there are no script codes added for download..
I might be drawing a blank, but I'm not entirely sure what you mean by no "script codes". =o I'm probably just not thinking straight right now (I was just talking to a friend on Skype for a long time and I'm all tired and distracted lol). xD
And I got yours! ^_^
That would be cool, Im trying to look into it aswell.. but at the moment Im working some on my project :) Ye, it seems like there is a demonstration of alot of scripts inside that demo.. Really awesome scripts for that matther, I was kinda blown away playing it.
Im sorry if I am a bit unclear, but what I meant was that there is nowhere to download the actual scripts, only the demos for them. Usually I download complete scripts that I copy into the script section of RPG maker, and then I can read all the instructions inside that script. Im probably missing something here though, but Im not sure how I can make the script work, without actually adding the script into the Project :P
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 10, 2013, 08:14:51 PM
That would be cool, Im trying to look into it aswell.. but at the moment Im working some on my project :) Ye, it seems like there is a demonstration of alot of scripts inside that demo.. Really awesome scripts for that matther, I was kinda blown away playing it.
It was just a little thing I found. xD I wouldn't worry about getting a title screen script to work at this point. The best thing to do is to work on your game, for sure! :)
Im sorry if I am a bit unclear, but what I meant was that there is nowhere to download the actual scripts, only the demos for them. Usually I download complete scripts that I copy into the script section of RPG maker, and then I can read all the instructions inside that script. Im probably missing something here though, but Im not sure how I can make the script work, without actually adding the script into the Project :P
Ohhh! I think I see what you mean. xD Nah, it's my fault that I'm easily confused. :p Anyways, I think you can literally just copy and paste from the demo's script editor to your own. :) Just pull up both game files at the same time.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Captain Soobya on January 10, 2013, 11:05:50 PM
Your maps look neat and cozy, like I just want to run around in circles in them. I am liking the features you're planning but, won't the decision-making feature overwhelm you in the long run? So many events to do and look out for... But hey it looks like you know what you're doing, so I'm not too worried. Also did you edit the battle sprites? They look really nice (http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/members/5344081-albums998-picture9847t.gif)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 11, 2013, 07:14:14 AM
Your maps look neat and cozy, like I just want to run around in circles in them. I am liking the features you're planning but, won't the decision-making feature overwhelm you in the long run? So many events to do and look out for... But hey it looks like you know what you're doing, so I'm not too worried.(http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/members/5344081-albums998-picture9847t.gif)
Yeah, I was thinking this too. I've been putting some choices with different outcomes, including one big choice that branches off into 3 different paths. Takes a crazy amount of time doing this with this just one branch-off choice, and my game isn't even that big. Basically you put two or three (or however many branch-offs you make for 1 choice) times the amount of work into a single part of the game. After finally finishing up most of my branched off paths I'll say I don't regret making them, but I realise it cuts into the total gameplay: could've made 1 long path, instead of 3 smaller paths. Players who'll play my game only once miss out on two other unique and interesting parts of my game as well, so your time and energy just go wasted there. Anyway... as I was saying, I'd advice not to go crazy with the whole decision-making stuff, and try to keep it somewhat small, or you'll quickly overwhelm yourself. UNLESS - you totally know what you're doing, then just ignore my post.:lol:
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 12, 2013, 07:06:13 AM
Your maps look neat and cozy, like I just want to run around in circles in them. I am liking the features you're planning but, won't the decision-making feature overwhelm you in the long run? So many events to do and look out for... But hey it looks like you know what you're doing, so I'm not too worried. Also did you edit the battle sprites? They look really nice.
Thanks alot! Gives me tons of motivation, hearing stuff like that :) But like I have said before, the maps were in a pretty early stage when I posted them on here, so I think they look a bit better now (hopefully :)). I will put up screenshots for the completed maps when the demo is ready for realease. Yes you are absolutely right, but I will try keep it to a minimum really, and I have come up with an idea that might make it a bit easier for me to work it out. But I will still try and keep it to a minimum, because like you said, It will be overwhelming pretty fast. If you want to get a grasp of my idea, you can read my answer to Millenin further down in this post. Yes, the battle sprites are edited. They are called Holders animated battlers, so I give him all the credits :D
Your maps look neat and cozy, like I just want to run around in circles in them. I am liking the features you're planning but, won't the decision-making feature overwhelm you in the long run? So many events to do and look out for... But hey it looks like you know what you're doing, so I'm not too worried.(http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/members/5344081-albums998-picture9847t.gif)
Yeah, I was thinking this too. I've been putting some choices with different outcomes, including one big choice that branches off into 3 different paths. Takes a crazy amount of time doing this with this just one branch-off choice, and my game isn't even that big. Basically you put two or three (or however many branch-offs you make for 1 choice) times the amount of work into a single part of the game. After finally finishing up most of my branched off paths I'll say I don't regret making them, but I realise it cuts into the total gameplay: could've made 1 long path, instead of 3 smaller paths. Players who'll play my game only once miss out on two other unique and interesting parts of my game as well, so your time and energy just go wasted there. Anyway... as I was saying, I'd advice not to go crazy with the whole decision-making stuff, and try to keep it somewhat small, or you'll quickly overwhelm yourself. UNLESS - you totally know what you're doing, then just ignore my post.:lol:
Yes, your advice is very welcome and I know that Its alot of work behind it :) Those features I have there is first of all just what I got in mind to add into the game, Im pretty sure that there are some features that I wont have the knowledge or motivation to implement into the game, but I will do my best to get as much in there as possible. Onto the 'decision'-making though, I came up with an idea that might work pretty well according to what I have in mind. The system will work like this: On specific quests you will get key items that adds a variable to the game. I will then put in events inside the Npcs of my game, with conditional branches, and depending on which of the 2 keyitems you decide to get, and how many of them you have, the Npcs will act and say different things.
The more of a 'game breaking' choice that you will have, indicates which of the two key items that you will be given from these quests. At 1 part of the game you will have 3 pieces of each keyitem (lets call them black key item and white keyitem to make it easier for me to explain). And at the choise you will be presented with 1 piece of each key item (1 black, and 1 white), but you may only get the option to pick up one. The varaibles of the game will then calculate if you have +4 of 'x' key item, or +4 of the other. I will then event different storylines depending on what value you get out of those 2. So once you have decided which key item you want to pick up at that sort of 'game breaking' choice, you will only get that specific key item, ex.(black ones).
The game will then follow the variable for the black key items, and by storing that value different dialouges and events will happen, in comparison to if you made the choice to pick up the white key-item.
I hope you get my point, Its pretty complicated to explain but I think this should be pretty viable if it will work like I intend it do.. before going into the whole system, I will test it out in a smaller event and see if I can work it out :) But yes, you are absolutely right, I will surely keep my limits about this and I have only meant it to be a minor sidethingy as it is.
Ohhh! I think I see what you mean. xD Nah, it's my fault that I'm easily confused. :p Anyways, I think you can literally just copy and paste from the demo's script editor to your own. :) Just pull up both game files at the same time.
Ye, I was looking for a project inside the master demo, but the file was encrypted so I couldnt open it. I guess that the projects wont be encrypted if I decide to download the demos for the scripts 1 by 1. I was just a bit confused since the file was encrypted, and I didnt know howelse to get the codes for the scripts! xD Anyway Im gonna try download the demos 1 by 1 later on, and see if those arent encrypted :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 12, 2013, 10:03:15 AM
2013-01-12 New Updates added.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Captain Soobya on January 13, 2013, 09:34:09 PM
Quote
I hope you get my point, Its pretty complicated to explain but I think this should be pretty viable if it will work like I intend it do.. before going into the whole system, I will test it out in a smaller event and see if I can work it out But yes, you are absolutely right, I will surely keep my limits about this and I have only meant it to be a minor sidethingy as it is.
Mmm I see! Don't worry about it too much, as long as you know what you're doing it should be fine.
As for the demo, I think you should go ahead and include the town so you can improve it early. Or you could save it for later if it's going to take awhile to event it properly. Either way it's really up to you (http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/members/5344081-albums998-picture9855t.gif)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 18, 2013, 09:12:40 AM
Mmm I see! Don't worry about it too much, as long as you know what you're doing it should be fine.
As for the demo, I think you should go ahead and include the town so you can improve it early. Or you could save it for later if it's going to take awhile to event it properly. Either way it's really up to you (http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/members/5344081-albums998-picture9855t.gif)
Hopefully I know what I'm doing haha! But like I said I will test it out and see how it goes, and if I can make it work with a smaller event it should be possible to implement it like I want it too :)
The first town of the game needs a bit of eventing. All the maps are done, but I will need to add all the npc events and a quest or 2 (Including the main quest). I think the playtime of the demo should be around 25-30 minutes if you play it for the first time, and before reaching the first town of the game. First of all I will fix everything up to reaching the first town, and then I'll see if I decide to include it in the demo aswell :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 18, 2013, 04:58:06 PM
2013-01-18 New Updates added.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 18, 2013, 06:11:05 PM
It would be nice if you could tell us what exactly you added to the game in your new post.=P
I'm sorry, I guess I have been a bit unclear about the updates. But below the mainthread is the 'Update section' where I put the comments for the changes I have done. When I post a update like the one in your quote I just write down the date of the update, since you can read about it under the mainthread, and under 'Most recent update'. The date there will tell you what updates I have done, sorry for being unclear about that :-[
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 18, 2013, 09:12:04 PM
I'm sorry, I guess I have been a bit unclear about the updates. But below the mainthread is the 'Update section' where I put the comments for the changes I have done. When I post a update like the one in your quote I just write down the date of the update, since you can read about it under the mainthread, and under 'Most recent update'. The date there will tell you what updates I have done, sorry for being unclear about that :-[
Oh, lol. That's where you put them. So, when do you think you have the demo up?:D Should be soon, right? Considering you're at 90% now?
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 18, 2013, 09:20:13 PM
I'm sorry, I guess I have been a bit unclear about the updates. But below the mainthread is the 'Update section' where I put the comments for the changes I have done. When I post a update like the one in your quote I just write down the date of the update, since you can read about it under the mainthread, and under 'Most recent update'. The date there will tell you what updates I have done, sorry for being unclear about that :-[
Oh, lol. That's where you put them. So, when do you think you have the demo up?:D Should be soon, right? Considering you're at 90% now?
Ye, shouldnt be much longer now. I will have tons of time this weekend to work on the project aswell, so I hope I will be able to put the demo up sometimes next week. Im trying to figure out how to distribute the game without the need of the RTP folder though, so I hope I will get around that aswell :-\
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 22, 2013, 10:22:26 PM
Looking good... Finish it quickly, please.........
Will surely take awhile before the complete game is done.. sadly :-[ But I hope that my progress in learning the maker will speed up alot, and I'm pretty sure it will. I am making events and everything alot faster now than when I just started out. My cousin played the full demo yesterday, and It's about an hour of playtime if you don't skip anything. The release of the first chapter of the game shouldnt take too long though, but I'm not really sure how much playtime the first chapter will include yet :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo V 0.10] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 27, 2013, 10:03:10 PM
2013-01-27 Major Update added.
Demo Version now available for Download.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: yuyu! on January 28, 2013, 03:18:11 AM
Sweet! :) I'll try it out sometime and give you some feedback~
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 30, 2013, 08:56:52 AM
I'm playing the demo right now, going to write this post as I play through it. First typo I found was on the instruction screen where it shows the controls. It says "press space to Continute" (continue). I noticed several other typos during the intro along with a few random capitals, nothing big, though.
In the first map in the forest, I seem to be able to walk over regular bushes and yellow or pink flower bushes, but red flower bushes block my path. The white flowers show over the hero. Another small thing, since it's raining and thundering, it would be nice to darken the map a little more, or lower the brightness. At Beatrice's shrine it's possible to walk up on the cliff if you go right. Queen Slith stopped attacking me after a few turns (this happened with only 1 of them, it just sat there for like 5+ turns until I finally killed it). There's a somewhat hidden path in the south east corner that leads to the edge of the screen, but doesn't teleport to the next map? There's also no text or something if I interact while standing on it.
I activated 3 statues with the teleport orb, not sure on where to go to now, and I have to leave soon. I noticed there's another statue in the south west corner of the map, but the only way to get there is through another map? I also found Beatrice's shrine that didn't seem to do anything besides giving me some text. There was also this blue flame, my character said it's probably useful, but didn't do anything with it, or explain what it could be used for. I found a crack in the wall, but couldn't do anything with it. The save point was nice, I like how it rewarded exploring a bit.
The battle system is nice. I like the character's sprite, if you made that, that's pretty sweet. Enemy strength was just right, not too weak, not too strong either. The forest map looks nice. I like the choice of music throughout the intro and the part of the game I've played so far. I'll play more if the demo is supposed to go beyond this, and if I find out where to go next.=P Anyway, the game has a ton of potential to be really good. ;D
EDIT: I'm back, time to play some more. On one of the signs that tells you of the Oracle of Salvation, it says "May her guide you...", but should be "May she guide you..." One of the signs has no text on it.
LOL, I'm so stupid. Use the activated statues to teleport. That happens when I play in early mornings. ;D Anyways, back to the game.
In the Secret Cave I can walk over the sand-coloured pile of rocks, but not over the white pile of rocks. As a convenience thing it would be nice to add some spots to the walls that the player can jump down from. I kind of walked the whole way over the wall, but there's no quick way to get down again. Lol, Battle Cry = Guild Wars Warrior skill icon. ;D (in fact, all the skills are from Guild Wars, I just noticed xD)
Oh, wow. I tried walking over the gaps in the floor in the basement in the Secret Cave, and it made me go instant Game Over... Don't feel like going through that again, would be nice to have a Save Point/Check Point somewhere in the Secret Cave.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 30, 2013, 03:19:16 PM
I'm playing the demo right now, going to write this post as I play through it. First typo I found was on the instruction screen where it shows the controls. It says "press space to Continute" (continue). I noticed several other typos during the intro along with a few random capitals, nothing big, though.
In the first map in the forest, I seem to be able to walk over regular bushes and yellow or pink flower bushes, but red flower bushes block my path. The white flowers show over the hero. Another small thing, since it's raining and thundering, it would be nice to darken the map a little more, or lower the brightness. At Beatrice's shrine it's possible to walk up on the cliff if you go right. Queen Slith stopped attacking me after a few turns (this happened with only 1 of them, it just sat there for like 5+ turns until I finally killed it). There's a somewhat hidden path in the south east corner that leads to the edge of the screen, but doesn't teleport to the next map? There's also no text or something if I interact while standing on it.
I activated 3 statues with the teleport orb, not sure on where to go to now, and I have to leave soon. I noticed there's another statue in the south west corner of the map, but the only way to get there is through another map? I also found Beatrice's shrine that didn't seem to do anything besides giving me some text. There was also this blue flame, my character said it's probably useful, but didn't do anything with it, or explain what it could be used for. I found a crack in the wall, but couldn't do anything with it. The save point was nice, I like how it rewarded exploring a bit.
The battle system is nice. I like the character's sprite, if you made that, that's pretty sweet. Enemy strength was just right, not too weak, not too strong either. The forest map looks nice. I like the choice of music throughout the intro and the part of the game I've played so far. I'll play more if the demo is supposed to go beyond this, and if I find out where to go next.=P Anyway, the game has a ton of potential to be really good. ;D
EDIT: I'm back, time to play some more. On one of the signs that tells you of the Oracle of Salvation, it says "May her guide you...", but should be "May she guide you..." One of the signs has no text on it.
LOL, I'm so stupid. Use the activated statues to teleport. That happens when I play in early mornings. ;D Anyways, back to the game.
In the Secret Cave I can walk over the sand-coloured pile of rocks, but not over the white pile of rocks. As a convenience thing it would be nice to add some spots to the walls that the player can jump down from. I kind of walked the whole way over the wall, but there's no quick way to get down again. Lol, Battle Cry = Guild Wars Warrior skill icon. ;D (in fact, all the skills are from Guild Wars, I just noticed xD)
Oh, wow. I tried walking over the gaps in the floor in the basement in the Secret Cave, and it made me go instant Game Over... Don't feel like going through that again, would be nice to have a Save Point/Check Point somewhere in the Secret Cave.
Spoilerfor:
First off, thanks alot for your post Milennin! :)
I will add everything you have found in the bugreports section and fix them for a new demo release. The thing with the bushes is also something I need to check, I think I decided that you will be able to walk over all the bushes with the 'bush' passage setting active. About the brightness on the forest map, I have to agree on that one. I'm not really sure how to adjust the brightness of a map though, and I'm planning to have the Secret cave totally dark and add light effects on the torches along with a lantern that you can equip. But, I'm pretty Inexperienced when it comes to shadows, lightning effects and brightness reduction etc.
I'm not sure what's up with the Queen Slith not attacking you, that's nothing that have heppened before when I have playtested the game. I'm gonna look into it though, but I'm not really sure why that happened. I'm not sure what you mean with the hidden path in the south east corner?, is it possible to walk between the trees or something?, if so that's something I need to fix aswell.
Seems like the teleporters might confuse a bit perhaps? Do you think I should make it more clear on what to do with them (especially the blue one?), I put in some hints on the item notes though. Beatrice's shrine is supposed to only deliver the text, It's supposed to resemble a shrine or a grave for a little dog :( I'm happy you enjoyed the save-points, and the battle system so far.. the sprites is not made by me though. They are made by a guy that calls himself Holder, and the sprites are called Holders Animated Battlers, so all credits goes to him :)
About the 'jumping points', I would say that's a really nice idea! I didn't think about that, and I agree that it can be a bit frustrating having to walk all the way back. That's something I definetely will keep in mind when I release the fixed demo! Haha! oh, really? I had no idea that the skill icons were from Guild wars haha! I just thought they looked sweet!
Ye.. I'm sorry about that little incident. I have actually thought about those gaps a bit, do you think I should make the player more aware of them, and warn them before hand? There is actually a savepoint on the base floor of the cave, in the northern part where the spikes are. Do you think it would be better for me to add a savepoint on the first floor aswell perhaps? There's also a savepoint after you have climbed down the crack in the floor.
Thanks alot for your post, and all the reports! I'm very happy that you think that the game has potential!, and I hope you get the energy to pick it up again sometimes, so you can check out the rest of the demo.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 30, 2013, 05:25:29 PM
I will add everything you have found in the bugreports section and fix them for a new demo release. The thing with the bushes is also something I need to check, I think I decided that you will be able to walk over all the bushes with the 'bush' passage setting active. About the brightness on the forest map, I have to agree on that one. I'm not really sure how to adjust the brightness of a map though, and I'm planning to have the Secret cave totally dark and add light effects on the torches along with a lantern that you can equip. But, I'm pretty Inexperienced when it comes to shadows, lightning effects and brightness reduction etc.
I'm not sure what's up with the Queen Slith not attacking you, that's nothing that have heppened before when I have playtested the game. I'm gonna look into it though, but I'm not really sure why that happened. I'm not sure what you mean with the hidden path in the south east corner?, is it possible to walk between the trees or something?, if so that's something I need to fix aswell.
Seems like the teleporters might confuse a bit perhaps? Do you think I should make it more clear on what to do with them (especially the blue one?), I put in some hints on the item notes though. Beatrice's shrine is supposed to only deliver the text, It's supposed to resemble a shrine or a grave for a little dog :( I'm happy you enjoyed the save-points, and the battle system so far.. the sprites is not made by me though. They are made by a guy that calls himself Holder, and the sprites are called Holders Animated Battlers, so all credits goes to him :)
About the 'jumping points', I would say that's a really nice idea! I didn't think about that, and I agree that it can be a bit frustrating having to walk all the way back. That's something I definetely will keep in mind when I release the fixed demo! Haha! oh, really? I had no idea that the skill icons were from Guild wars haha! I just thought they looked sweet!
Ye.. I'm sorry about that little incident. I have actually thought about those gaps a bit, do you think I should make the player more aware of them, and warn them before hand? There is actually a savepoint on the base floor of the cave, in the northern part where the spikes are. Do you think it would be better for me to add a savepoint on the first floor aswell perhaps? There's also a savepoint after you have climbed down the crack in the floor.
Thanks alot for your post, and all the reports! I'm very happy that you think that the game has potential!, and I hope you get the energy to pick it up again sometimes, so you can check out the rest of the demo.
I don't know about VXA, but in RM2K there's a simple event to set Screen Tone, which lets you change the colours and brightness. You could look for that? About the Queen Slith, it might have been a crazy long stun-lock by my lightning skill (I think she stopped attacking me after I used that skill), but I don't know if that's supposed to be possible to happen.
About the teleporters, it was probably just me being still sleepy (I first thought I was supposed to find and activate all statues in the area to be able to move on, lol) Although it might not hurt to make the character say something like "OK, let's try out this teleporter thingy." the first time you activate a statue.
About the gaps, I knew they were bad to step on, but I just wanted to see what happened (sort of a testing thing). In most games with something like that it teleports you back and lowers your HP, I didn't expect to go Game Over there. As for a saving point, I understand why you didn't put one at the cave's entrance, because then the player could just battle monsters and heal back up right from the start and it would take away some of the challenge and danger from the new area. But maybe have regular save points (they let you save your game, but not heal your stats). I did like how the area felt more dangerous for not having a healing save point nearby, and also how I was required to keep using my potions to stay alive. It gives somewhat of a survival feel to it. ;D
Anyways, I really liked the demo, the bit I've played so far. I'll go back to it some time later, maybe this weekend. 8)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on January 30, 2013, 07:02:43 PM
I don't know about VXA, but in RM2K there's a simple event to set Screen Tone, which lets you change the colours and brightness. You could look for that? About the Queen Slith, it might have been a crazy long stun-lock by my lightning skill (I think she stopped attacking me after I used that skill), but I don't know if that's supposed to be possible to happen.
About the teleporters, it was probably just me being still sleepy (I first thought I was supposed to find and activate all statues in the area to be able to move on, lol) Although it might not hurt to make the character say something like "OK, let's try out this teleporter thingy." the first time you activate a statue.
About the gaps, I knew they were bad to step on, but I just wanted to see what happened (sort of a testing thing). In most games with something like that it teleports you back and lowers your HP, I didn't expect to go Game Over there. As for a saving point, I understand why you didn't put one at the cave's entrance, because then the player could just battle monsters and heal back up right from the start and it would take away some of the challenge and danger from the new area. But maybe have regular save points (they let you save your game, but not heal your stats). I did like how the area felt more dangerous for not having a healing save point nearby, and also how I was required to keep using my potions to stay alive. It gives somewhat of a survival feel to it. ;D
Anyways, I really liked the demo, the bit I've played so far. I'll go back to it some time later, maybe this weekend. 8)
Spoilerfor:
Ah, might have missed that one actually. Gonna see if I can find something like that :) Hmm.. It shouldn't be possible to have the enemy stunned for 5+ turns that's for sure. The skill is set to stun the target between 2-3 turns, and when I have playtested the game I have never experienced that It stuns for more than 3 turns. I'm not sure if I have to do something with the skill, but the parameter is set to be 2 ~ 3 turns on the state tabs.
That's also a good suggestion, I will see what I can do with the event.
Ye, like I said in my previous post.. I have thought alot about those gaps.. and maybe It's a bit overkill to send the player to the Game Over screen for falling down the gap. But I guess I just kept thinking that if you fall down a big hole, you sure can die from the fall xD. I might change that though, cause I agree that It's a bit frustrating to end up at the Game Over screen, especially if you havn't saved in awhile. I have a similar event with some sharp spikes, that lowers your hp when you step on them. I might implement what you said though, as to work in similar ways like in Zelda: A Link to the past.
Ye, that was my intention from the get-go. I didn't want the player to just fight some mobs and then safely just go and fill up the hp again. So I thought they had to check out the area some first, before they can feel safe again. I'm thinking about adding a pop up screen when entering the cave for the first time, asking if the player wants to save.
I'm really glad you enjoyed it so far! And if you happen to play some more later on, you are more than welcome to add some of your feedback for the rest of it. It sure has helped me alot already, so Thanks! :)
Edit: Oops, forgot to ask! Did the fonts work without having to install them to your windows directory?
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on January 31, 2013, 10:20:00 PM
-LOL, you used the same riddle in your game as I have in mine. I'm lucky there, cause I suck at riddles.:lol: Would've been stuck there for life otherwise. -Misspelled entirely and exactly in Zetya's dialogue. -Misspelled tired in Vincent's dialogue to Zetya. -It would be nice to be able to examine Zetya's grave for additional background about the character. -The vine in that room is climbable for no reason. Also let's you enter the staircase from up the wall. -Using the staircase back teleports me in the middle of the room, instead of the gate. -The room behind the door of 3 levers has one stack of gold that I can't pick up. -Oh, hidden items in the wardrobes.=O -Woah! Woman says urself instead of yourself. -Having to speak to her again to make her leave seems a bit unnecessary (unless you plan on having different things happen, depending on whether you speak to her again or not). -Finding Hi-Potions that heal for 2.500HP seems like bit of an overkill, considering I only have 750HP at this point or so. -In the battle vs. the soldiers, one of the soldiers doesn't seem to be doing anything? -Misspelled weren't as wasn't in the dialogue with Wiola. -Retrieving cloth and stuff after waking up in the burning house has a long pause (like 3 seconds of nothing). -I'm in a testing mood, so I left Wiola in the burning house. To prevent the player from leaving her you should place some invisible barriers or an event that keeps the player in the area of action. -Also, maybe keep player move speed up while not carrying the bucket with water to show he is really trying to hurry to save her. -Misspelled hometown in the dialogue after they exit the burning house. -I can enter the burning house after I saved her. Not intended to I think?
Going to take a break at this point. Will continue some time later. I like the pacing of the story. There's not too much at once, but I get enough to get a feeling for where the story is heading to and learn some about the main character. I really liked the dialogues with Wiola. It shows Vincent's personality in a nice and also funny way. The underwear sprite made me laugh.:lol: It was kinda sad when the house burned down. I felt at home in the basement, it looked nice and the music made it feel cozy (lol).
The boss battle against Zetya was good too. He was pretty tough, had to take some potions, and use special skills to survive against him. I felt the soldiers were a tad easy, but maybe it's because I never saw the 3rd soldier attacking me. I didn't mind them being a bit easy since I was still low on potions after the fight against Zetya anyway.
Anyway, besides running into some issues that I listed above I'm enjoying the game so far.:lol:
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 01, 2013, 06:04:56 PM
-LOL, you used the same riddle in your game as I have in mine. I'm lucky there, cause I suck at riddles.:lol: Would've been stuck there for life otherwise. -Misspelled entirely and exactly in Zetya's dialogue. -Misspelled tired in Vincent's dialogue to Zetya. -It would be nice to be able to examine Zetya's grave for additional background about the character. -The vine in that room is climbable for no reason. Also let's you enter the staircase from up the wall. -Using the staircase back teleports me in the middle of the room, instead of the gate. -The room behind the door of 3 levers has one stack of gold that I can't pick up. -Oh, hidden items in the wardrobes.=O -Woah! Woman says urself instead of yourself. -Having to speak to her again to make her leave seems a bit unnecessary (unless you plan on having different things happen, depending on whether you speak to her again or not). -Finding Hi-Potions that heal for 2.500HP seems like bit of an overkill, considering I only have 750HP at this point or so. -In the battle vs. the soldiers, one of the soldiers doesn't seem to be doing anything? -Misspelled weren't as wasn't in the dialogue with Wiola. -Retrieving cloth and stuff after waking up in the burning house has a long pause (like 3 seconds of nothing). -I'm in a testing mood, so I left Wiola in the burning house. To prevent the player from leaving her you should place some invisible barriers or an event that keeps the player in the area of action. -Also, maybe keep player move speed up while not carrying the bucket with water to show he is really trying to hurry to save her. -Misspelled hometown in the dialogue after they exit the burning house. -I can enter the burning house after I saved her. Not intended to I think?
Going to take a break at this point. Will continue some time later. I like the pacing of the story. There's not too much at once, but I get enough to get a feeling for where the story is heading to and learn some about the main character. I really liked the dialogues with Wiola. It shows Vincent's personality in a nice and also funny way. The underwear sprite made me laugh.:lol: It was kinda sad when the house burned down. I felt at home in the basement, it looked nice and the music made it feel cozy (lol).
The boss battle against Zetya was good too. He was pretty tough, had to take some potions, and use special skills to survive against him. I felt the soldiers were a tad easy, but maybe it's because I never saw the 3rd soldier attacking me. I didn't mind them being a bit easy since I was still low on potions after the fight against Zetya anyway.
Anyway, besides running into some issues that I listed above I'm enjoying the game so far.:lol:
Spoilerfor:
That's good to hear :)
I can't stress enough on how glad I am for your posts! There are alot of things that I'm not thinking about, so having another angle from someone else is really welcome! Will help me tons when I will release my new 'fixed' demo for sure!
Once again, I will put up everything in the report section of the post so I can keep track on everything, thanks alot like always 8)
About the spikes and the gaps, I agree that it is kind of bad game-design on my part. I have fixed the gaps now though, and instead of bringing the player to the Game Over screen, it will transfer you to the start of the floor and reduce your HP. The Black coat is first of all a typo from my part :-[ It's supposed to be a Black Cloak, worn commonly among soldiers (As in wearing it ontop of their armor or clothes, on the back). So in other words It's not a typical armor, more of a cloak. I do agree on the armor difference, and I'm planning on reducing the cloaks armor to +1 or something, I hope that wont break the difficulty too much though. I have reworked the map a bit (Secret Cave), for the next demo. Including more debris and barrels etc, so adding more hidden items is something I plan to do.
Hehe, wow same riddle? I guess good minds think alike? haha! Though, I have a event going to prevent the player from getting stuck on the riddle. If you happen to answer the riddle wrong 3 times in a row. Vincent will find another inscription on the statue that will inform the player that a hint to the riddle is hidden inside the Workers Journal on the first floor. (Needs a bit of backtracking but that should solve the player from getting stuck).
Everything else that you covered is something I will look into. Alot of what you find and have opinions about, are really good points! :)
I'm happy you think the pace is good, and that the information that is given isn't to much to take in. I'm also really happy that you think my presentation of the characters are noticable in some way, I tried to make the scene a bit humorous, while still being pretty serious. Wiola on the other hand should resemble a slightly dimwitted, 'close to nature' and caring person. Her personality also resembles a person that doesn't care to much about small things (like seeing people naked, or spilling coffe on the new carpet etc.) A person that live life to the fullest, and wont waste energy on small things or so.
My intention was to build up some sort of 'feel like home'- feeling after everything that has happened to Vincent, and then turn it around and drop him (or them), off in the same situation as before. So I'm happy you could resemble that a bit :)
It's great to hear that the bossbattles were fairly challanging (but not over the edge), I'm not sure about the 3d soldier not attacking you though? The thing I tried to make with that battle is to start it off very defensive, stunning one of the soldiers to prevent them healing themself up, and buff themselves (and the commander). Once one of them is gone It's pretty much just going to the offense and take the other one down. I wanted the fight to be some kind of 'If you dont kill the soldiers fast, the battle will be very challenging). I actually playtested the fight without killing the soldiers, and it ended up with them healing themselves up constantly and buffing the commander to hit me for over 300 damage. So, in that aspect I think I have succeded in what I wanted with the fight. Might be that your strategy was flawless though, and that's why you didnt experience any trouble whatsoever ;)
I will start working on the issues in question, and I'm happy the game was enjoyable for you, thus far!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on February 01, 2013, 07:17:56 PM
-LOL, you used the same riddle in your game as I have in mine. I'm lucky there, cause I suck at riddles.:lol: Would've been stuck there for life otherwise. -Misspelled entirely and exactly in Zetya's dialogue. -Misspelled tired in Vincent's dialogue to Zetya. -It would be nice to be able to examine Zetya's grave for additional background about the character. -The vine in that room is climbable for no reason. Also let's you enter the staircase from up the wall. -Using the staircase back teleports me in the middle of the room, instead of the gate. -The room behind the door of 3 levers has one stack of gold that I can't pick up. -Oh, hidden items in the wardrobes.=O -Woah! Woman says urself instead of yourself. -Having to speak to her again to make her leave seems a bit unnecessary (unless you plan on having different things happen, depending on whether you speak to her again or not). -Finding Hi-Potions that heal for 2.500HP seems like bit of an overkill, considering I only have 750HP at this point or so. -In the battle vs. the soldiers, one of the soldiers doesn't seem to be doing anything? -Misspelled weren't as wasn't in the dialogue with Wiola. -Retrieving cloth and stuff after waking up in the burning house has a long pause (like 3 seconds of nothing). -I'm in a testing mood, so I left Wiola in the burning house. To prevent the player from leaving her you should place some invisible barriers or an event that keeps the player in the area of action. -Also, maybe keep player move speed up while not carrying the bucket with water to show he is really trying to hurry to save her. -Misspelled hometown in the dialogue after they exit the burning house. -I can enter the burning house after I saved her. Not intended to I think?
Going to take a break at this point. Will continue some time later. I like the pacing of the story. There's not too much at once, but I get enough to get a feeling for where the story is heading to and learn some about the main character. I really liked the dialogues with Wiola. It shows Vincent's personality in a nice and also funny way. The underwear sprite made me laugh.:lol: It was kinda sad when the house burned down. I felt at home in the basement, it looked nice and the music made it feel cozy (lol).
The boss battle against Zetya was good too. He was pretty tough, had to take some potions, and use special skills to survive against him. I felt the soldiers were a tad easy, but maybe it's because I never saw the 3rd soldier attacking me. I didn't mind them being a bit easy since I was still low on potions after the fight against Zetya anyway.
Anyway, besides running into some issues that I listed above I'm enjoying the game so far.:lol:
That's good to hear :)
I can't stress enough on how glad I am for your posts! There are alot of things that I'm not thinking about, so having another angle from someone else is really welcome! Will help me tons when I will release my new 'fixed' demo for sure!
Once again, I will put up everything in the report section of the post so I can keep track on everything, thanks alot like always 8)
About the spikes and the gaps, I agree that it is kind of bad game-design on my part. I have fixed the gaps now though, and instead of bringing the player to the Game Over screen, it will transfer you to the start of the floor and reduce your HP. The Black coat is first of all a typo from my part :-[ It's supposed to be a Black Cloak, worn commonly among soldiers (As in wearing it ontop of their armor or clothes, on the back). So in other words is not a typical armor, more of a cloak. I do agree on the armor difference, and I'm planning on reducing the cloaks armor to +1 or something, I hope that wont break the difficulty too much though. I have reworked the map a bit (Secret Cave), for the next demo. Including more debris and barrels etc, so adding more hidden items is something I plan to do.
Hehe, wow same riddle? I guess good minds think alike? haha! Though, I have a event going to prevent the player from getting stuck on the riddle. If you happen to answer the riddle wrong 3 times in a row. Vincent will find another inscription on the statue that will inform the player that a hint to the riddle is hidden inside the Workers Journal on the first floor. (Needs a bit of backtracking but that should solve the player for getting stuck).
Everything else that you covered is something I will look into. Alot of what you find and have opinions about, are really good points! :)
I'm happy you think the pace is good, and that the information that is given isn't to much to take in. I'm also really happy that you think my presentation of the characters are noticable in some way, I tried to make the scene a bit humorous, while still being pretty serious. Wiola on the other hand should resemble a slightly dimwitted, 'close to nature' and caring person. Her personality also resembles a person that doesn't care to much about small things (like seeing people naked, or spilling coffe on the new carpet etc.) A person that live life to the fullest, and wont waste energy on small things or so.
My intention was to build up some sort of 'feel like home'- feeling after everything that has happened to Vincent, and then turn it around and drop him (or them), off in the same situation as before. So I'm happy you could resemble that a bit :)
It's great to hear that the bossbattles were fairly challanging (but not over the edge), I'm not sure about the 3d soldier not attacking you though? The thing I tried to make with that battle is to start it off very defensive, stunning one of the soldiers to prevent them healing themself up, and buff themselves (and the commander). Once one of them is gone It's pretty much just going to the offense and take the other one down. I wanted the fight to be some kind of 'If you dont kill the soldiers fast, the battle will be very challenging). I actually playtested the fight without killing the soldiers, and it ended up with them healing themselves up constantly and buffing the commander to hit me for over 300 damage. So, in that aspect I think I have succeded in what I wanted with the fight. Might be that your strategy was flawless though, and that's why you didnt experience any trouble whatsoever ;)
I will start working on the issues in question, and I'm happy the game was enjoyable for you, thus far!
Lol, you're welcome. I really do like testing, but I didn't want to get too much into it before finishing my own stuff, or else I get jealous of other people's things or may be tempted to steal good ideas.:lol:
About the black cloak vs heavy plate, instead of changing the stats on the cloak, maybe turn the heavy plate into a light leather armour instead? And keep heavy plate for further into the game, as it would support the higher stats that would make it more realistic to what it is.
Good to hear about the riddle. I like how you don't handhold players throughout the game, but give just enough to keep going with. For example, I wasn't sure what to use the pickaxe for, until I checked its description in the items menu. I'm really not a fan of handholding, but lack of directions is a bad thing too. Finding the sweet spot in between those two is pretty tough, but you hit it.=P
I feel Wiola is a nice character to have added to the party. She complements pretty well with the main character, as she's very open and not afraid to say things, while the main character is a bit more on the quiet side. I could definitely see her spicing things up in some situations, and looking forward to it.:lol: (if you couldn't tell by now, I like seeing fun or interesting characters in games)
About the soldier battle. I'm quite sure I hadn't seen the 3rd soldier attacking me once. If he used support skills they didn't have an animation, or text went too fast for me to notice. I killed that guy first. The second one I killed was the captain, since the other soldier kept healing itself and boosting its attack, but still pose less of a problem (more of a matter of stalling). I'll be honest, I can't remember too well what the captain was hitting me for - I think it was around 150s per hit, but I don't remember him to be a major problem. It was just that the combined consistent hits of captain + soldier kept bringing down my HP.
Good to hear you're looking into some of things I wrote down. Do I still have a significant part of the demo to go, or should I wait for the next version to come out, so I can play more at once?
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 01, 2013, 09:23:11 PM
Lol, you're welcome. I really do like testing, but I didn't want to get too much into it before finishing my own stuff, or else I get jealous of other people's things or may be tempted to steal good ideas.:lol:
About the black cloak vs heavy plate, instead of changing the stats on the cloak, maybe turn the heavy plate into a light leather armour instead? And keep heavy plate for further into the game, as it would support the higher stats that would make it more realistic to what it is.
Good to hear about the riddle. I like how you don't handhold players throughout the game, but give just enough to keep going with. For example, I wasn't sure what to use the pickaxe for, until I checked its description in the items menu. I'm really not a fan of handholding, but lack of directions is a bad thing too. Finding the sweet spot in between those two is pretty tough, but you hit it.=P
I feel Wiola is a nice character to have added to the party. She complements pretty well with the main character, as she's very open and not afraid to say things, while the main character is a bit more on the quiet side. I could definitely see her spicing things up in some situations, and looking forward to it.:lol: (if you couldn't tell by now, I like seeing fun or interesting characters in games)
About the soldier battle. I'm quite sure I hadn't seen the 3rd soldier attacking me once. If he used support skills they didn't have an animation, or text went too fast for me to notice. I killed that guy first. The second one I killed was the captain, since the other soldier kept healing itself and boosting its attack, but still pose less of a problem (more of a matter of stalling). I'll be honest, I can't remember too well what the captain was hitting me for - I think it was around 150s per hit, but I don't remember him to be a major problem. It was just that the combined consistent hits of captain + soldier kept bringing down my HP.
Good to hear you're looking into some of things I wrote down. Do I still have a significant part of the demo to go, or should I wait for the next version to come out, so I can play more at once?
Spoilerfor:
Ye, I feel the same way. I'm not a fan of handholding either, and that might be the reason why I wont spam the player with important information or hints on what to do. In my opinion I think It's more fun if you have to think for a bit, or keep things in mind without having a text telling you what to do every 2 minutes. (Like the thing with the woodcutter axe, It's not really explained why you would need a woodcutter axe.. but if you think for a minute it should come pretty natural that you need it to escape the forest etc.)
I will playtest the battle with the soldiers a bit more, and see how it turns out.. I might have to do something with it, but I was pretty sure it worked the way I wanted it too. But according to your experience I might have to look it up again :)
If you are outside of the burning house, there's not much left of the demo. You can play it if you want to try out Wiola a bit and see how she works in battle, but the demo will end after you have left the forest, and out into the world map. After that, the only place you can enter so far is Town of Duke, and that's where the credits will roll so :) It's up to you though, but you are very close to finishing the demo.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 01, 2013, 11:57:09 PM
2013-02-02 New Updates added *Check 'Most recent update' for further Information.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on February 02, 2013, 08:33:07 AM
Ye, I feel the same way. I'm not a fan of handholding either, and that might be the reason why I wont spam the player with important information or hints on what to do. In my opinion I think It's more fun if you have to think for a bit, or keep things in mind without having a text telling you what to do every 2 minutes. (Like the thing with the woodcutter axe, It's not really explained why you would need a woodcutter axe.. but if you think for a minute it should come pretty natural that you need it to escape the forest etc.)
I will playtest the battle with the soldiers a bit more, and see how it turns out.. I might have to do something with it, but I was pretty sure it worked the way I wanted it too. But according to your experience I might have to look it up again :)
If you are outside of the burning house, there's not much left of the demo. You can play it if you want to try out Wiola a bit and see how she works in battle, but the demo will end after you have left the forest, and out into the world map. After that, the only place you can enter so far is Town of Duke, and that's where the credits will roll so :) It's up to you though, but you are very close to finishing the demo.
Heh, about the woodcutting axe, I was almost thinking the demo was ended there, because it didn't give me a sign of there being more to do. Then I remembered the blocked passage at the start of the game.=P
Alright, I can finish the demo, see what happens. I didn't know credits were included, is that a normal thing to do with a demo?
-LOL, Armageddon spell.xD -A random battle while not walking on the path on the worldmap made the game pause for like 2 seconds before starting the battle. -Wiola isn't gaining any MP. Is this intended? -Monsters on the world map drop way too many items. I'm swimming in potions after a few battles. Also, they hardly deal any damage to my characters (70's / 80's). Considering I have a healer in my team now, it's way too easy here. -Walking on the path to the Town of Duke gave me 2 battles, having to kill a total of 8 monsters. Walking to the Town of Duke not following the path gave me 2 battles, having to kill a total of 3 monsters. Either ramp up the encounter rate outside the paths on the overworld, or remove the battles while staying on the path. I do like having the choice to avoid random battles, or drastically lower the chances for them appearing. Random battles tend to annoy the hell out of me after a while of playing a game.=P
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 03, 2013, 01:32:39 PM
Heh, about the woodcutting axe, I was almost thinking the demo was ended there, because it didn't give me a sign of there being more to do. Then I remembered the blocked passage at the start of the game.=P
Alright, I can finish the demo, see what happens. I didn't know credits were included, is that a normal thing to do with a demo?
-LOL, Armageddon spell.xD -A random battle while not walking on the path on the worldmap made the game pause for like 2 seconds before starting the battle. -Wiola isn't gaining any MP. Is this intended? -Monsters on the world map drop way too many items. I'm swimming in potions after a few battles. Also, they hardly deal any damage to my characters (70's / 80's). Considering I have a healer in my team now, it's way too easy here. -Walking on the path to the Town of Duke gave me 2 battles, having to kill a total of 8 monsters. Walking to the Town of Duke not following the path gave me 2 battles, having to kill a total of 3 monsters. Either ramp up the encounter rate outside the paths on the overworld, or remove the battles while staying on the path. I do like having the choice to avoid random battles, or drastically lower the chances for them appearing. Random battles tend to annoy the hell out of me after a while of playing a game.=P
Spoiler for answer to Milennin:
Hehe ye, that's what I wanted to do! Have the player stop for a moment to think about why you would need the axe. If you leave the cave though you will get a hint on why you need it, but even so I wanted the player to think for awhile just like you did, and hopefully remember about the blocked entrance ;)
I'm not sure if It's normal to include credits in a demo hehe, It's my first game ever made so I'm not really sure. But I added the credits because I havn't added everyone in my post yet, so I thought I could go ahead and include everyone in the ending credits instead.
Hehe ye the armageddon spell is a bit of an overkill at that point, but It's just a little sneak peak on some of Wiolas more powerful attacks that you will aquire later on :) Ye, that's something that I need to fix. I'm not sure how I will implement battles on the world map yet.. I don't want to have random encounters, since the road is supposed to be a safe spot if you want to avoid any combat. The 2 seconds before a battle actually starts is also something that I need to change. The 2 encounters on the road is a one-time only sequence, for the first time you enter the world map.. they wont reappear again.
I'm thinking about, maybe marking the locations where you will encounter enemies.. since they have an erase event command it might be hard to find any new encounters once you have killed alot of them. To get them back you just have to leave the area and get back to the world map. But I can see some problems once you have alot of events being erased.. I'm not sure how I will go around that yet..
About Wiolas MP, she's not supposed to regen any mana without buffs or items. Since she will have quite a large mana pool later on, I felt that it would be weird if she automaticly recieved some MP back, and it will also make it harder to balance her between healing and going to the offense. There are items (and later on a new character) that will be able to regen her mana though. Once you have this character in your party, I'm thinking about lowering the droprates of potions and mp regen items, to make it more tactical in boss fights and stuff, so you will have a good use of the 'spellblade' character (spellblade will be more of a buffer and regen kind of class along with some offensive skills).
The enemies that is spawning on the world map, will change in the fixed demo for sure. At the moment of release I had no new enemies added for the world map, and since the demo is almost over once you enter the world map I thought I would just add some random encounters with the enemies that I already created. The droprate will be much lower, and include different loot whatsoever. The new enemies will also be alot stronger, and suitable for 2 characters.
I have the same experience with random encounters, I usely get around them just fine in the start, but when you want to go somewhere fast, without having to fight.. those darn random encounters can be a pain in the ass. That's why I wanted to add a safe spot (the road), so the player can decide for themselves when they want to fight or not.
Sweet! :) I'll try it out sometime and give you some feedback~
That would be sweet! ;D I will upload a fixed demo in awhile, but if you want to play through the current demo to report me some of those darn bugs, you could do that too ;) In any case, I really hope you will like the demo!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 04, 2013, 02:07:34 PM
2013-02-04 New Updates added *Check 'Most recent update' for further Information.
*Demo version 0.2 now available for download!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on February 07, 2013, 10:29:48 AM
I have played the demo until just after you get to the world map.
You put a lot of effort into this so far already! Bravo on your work. The puzzles and objects you need to find are not too difficult to look for, and the battle system looks very smooth and I like the character animation there.
Story is quite chaotic at times, with gods/celestial beings popping up and galaxies flying by in the background. But the main characters are nicely fleshed out so far, and have legitimate reasons to wander off together, and to get to know each other. They are very likable, which makes for a more enjoyable game play experience.
The music complements the areas well, although it lacks a bit of, eh, adrenaline in battles.
I enjoyed your forest, as my game is all about forested areas. Yours is a neat different way to make a forest, and it works as well (although I kept trying to click on holes in the ground, hoping for something to happen).
Love it so far!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 07, 2013, 04:07:44 PM
I have played the demo until just after you get to the world map.
You put a lot of effort into this so far already! Bravo on your work. The puzzles and objects you need to find are not too difficult to look for, and the battle system looks very smooth and I like the character animation there.
Story is quite chaotic at times, with gods/celestial beings popping up and galaxies flying by in the background. But the main characters are nicely fleshed out so far, and have legitimate reasons to wander off together, and to get to know each other. They are very likable, which makes for a more enjoyable game play experience.
The music complements the areas well, although it lacks a bit of, eh, adrenaline in battles.
I enjoyed your forest, as my game is all about forested areas. Yours is a neat different way to make a forest, and it works as well (although I kept trying to click on holes in the ground, hoping for something to happen).
Love it so far!
Thanks alot for trying it out! :) And thank you for the kind words! Do you think the objects are too easy to find, or is it ok in It's current state?
I can see what you mean with a bit 'chaotic' at times, but that scene with the ancient being has alot to do with Vincent, and the whole story.. It's just a bit confusing first (and I meant it to be), since I want to display what's going on inside Vincents head. I believe the chaotic feeling will dim away later on, when you get more answers though. I'm glad you think the characters are likable!, since I have done my best to show their personality.
About the adrenaline bit, do you mean in general or the boss battles? I have actually tried to find something that represents a feeling of danger or panic, but I havn't find a song that would suit what I want yet :(
I'm glad you enjoyed the forest!, especially since your own game is all about forests in particular! Motivates me alot hearing stuff like that, so thank you! I will keep in mind what you said about the holes in the ground aswell, I might work something out of that!
What's your opinion about the new features by the way?, with the books that you find. Is it too much, or do you think it compliments well with the rest of the game?
Once again, thanks alot for trying it out! And if you want too, stay tuned for information about Chapter 1 :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on February 08, 2013, 01:59:44 PM
For the music: the normal battle theme lacks a certain amount of excitement. The atmosphere overall is a bit too relaxed. You will need something faster-paced, and your choice in atmosphere. You can go for something that is more cheerful, or something more serious, but it needs to be fuller and faster.
If you refer to the 'test' achievement book - that one is really nice, and makes you want to complete the goals. This will likely cause players to search through your game for completion more. I didn't really look at the bestiary book. I like reading little stories about enemies, and those aren't there; that's just a personal preference though. :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 10, 2013, 03:32:14 PM
2013-02-10 New Updates added *Check 'Most recent update' for further Information.
*Let's play from Demo version 0.10, includes spoilers but you can take a glimpse from it to see the game in motion.
Spoiler for Let's play:
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 17, 2013, 01:19:40 AM
2013-02-17 New Updates added *Check 'Most recent update' for further Information.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Milennin on February 17, 2013, 09:33:23 AM
Lol, a lever puzzle I'm gonna suck at that.xP Will you have a new demo when chapter 1 is done?
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on February 17, 2013, 05:51:28 PM
Lol, a lever puzzle I'm gonna suck at that.xP Will you have a new demo when chapter 1 is done?
Yes, I will release a playable version of chapter 1 when It's done, and I'm thinking about releasing the game, chapter by chapter in the future. I don't think I will release a new demo version though, I might put up one with some small changes but that's all. I'm not sure if you will be able to play your old savefiles from version 0.10 when I release chapter 1 though, because I have added achievements and encyclopedia. I'm not sure yet though, so we'll see when Chapter 1 is soon to be released! :)
The puzzle is not really that complicated to be honest.. It was way more complicated to work it out the way I wanted it too, when I created it haha. Alot of events, switches and variables to keep track on!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on March 07, 2013, 01:15:58 PM
2013-03-07 Small Update
I havn't been able to work on the game for some time now, but now I'm sort of back in action!
At the moment, I'm working some on my second town and trying to implement light effects for some of my caves, and the earlier areas.
Any feedback on the thread, or the demo is still very welcome! It's a lot easier for me to change things if they are being brought to my attention! :D
A new Beta version (0.3) is soon to be released, so stay tuned!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on March 30, 2013, 04:15:40 AM
Major Update: [2013-03-28]
At the moment I'm working on implementing 2 new features for my game that both involves around the usage of Auras. My game is built quite a lot around these factors, and will play a big role in the game. I would appreciate some feedback on the features, and your opinions about them. Do they sound interesting? If so, please let me know! I will also ask for some suggestions about the topic further down in the post.
(Note that these are taken from my Instruction booklet that will come with the game).
Feature #1 - Personal abilities, decided by the stimulation of Auras:
Spoiler for Feature #1:
Destruction Auras:
Categorized in the red section of auras, and stimulates the Inner vital point of an individual. The destruction Aura represents the ability to control elemental forces such as fire and ice.
Mind Auras:
Categorized in the red section of auras, and stimulates the Inner vital point of an individual. The mind Aura represents the ability to control forces that will effect the mental and physcial state of the living.
Enlightenment Auras:
Categorized in the blue section of auras, and stimulates the outer-core vital point of an individual. The Enlightenment aura represents the ability to control forces that will have a positive effect on the wielders vital auras, and the ability to channel these to other individuals.
Resillience Auras:
Categorized in the blue section of auras, and stimulates the outer-core vital point of an individual. The Resillience aura represents the ability to control forces that will strengthen the vital aura and make objects (dead or living) more resilient.
Naturalistic Auras:
Categorized in the green section of auras and stimulates the Outer vital point of an individual. The naturalistc Aura represents the ability to control forces in cycle with nature itself.
Knowledge Auras:
Categorized in the green section of auras and stimulates the Outer vital point of an individual. This Aura has been technically manufactured and is the most recent Aura discovered to date. It represents the ability to control forces that will increase the learning curve in almost any subject, the practice of stimulating new auras is included.
Healing Auras:
Categorized in the white section of auras and stimulates the Core of an individual. The healing Aura represents the ability to control forces with healing attributes.
Vital Auras:
Categorized in the white section of auras and stimulates the Core of an individual. Vital auras are not looked upon as a magical resource as the rest of the Auras in the world. It holds the most important factors, and have a big impact on the functionality of the vital system. It's the aura that seperates the personality of every individual and the growth of the individuals physicial state. There are people that was born with a genetic code that only stimulates the Vital Auras.
Void Auras:
Categorized in the black section of auras and the stimulation of vital points is unknown. The void aura is an unknown force for the people of Aspicio, and can only be found in the legends of Serena. Not much is known about this aura, but according to ancient texts it was supposely banned from the world after the end of the first crisis. The void aura has been a big factor in the worshiping of the ancient civilization of Serena, and the Void itself, something that the religion of Serenivictus hold dear when it comes to their beliefs. Text and scrolls have reveleaed that void auras made it possible to use alien magic that could resort into teleportation, levitation, telekenesis and other abilities categorized under the banned void magic.
Feature #2 - Krytos Upgrade Mechanic:
Spoiler for Feature #2:
Krytos is a special magical resource that's used to enhance weaponry in different ways. The way it works:
Krytos resources are divided into 3 sub-categories:
- Fragments: (the simple one, the first type you will find.) - Ores: (the normal one, the second type you will find.) - Brimstones: (the complete one, the final type you will find.)
Different types of Krytos also holds different types of stimulation towards specific auras:
Red Krytos:
Destruction, and Mind Auras.
Blue Krytos:
Enlightenment, and Resillience Auras.
Green Krytos:
Naturalistic, and Knowledge Auras.
White Krytos:
Healing, and Vital Auras.
Black Krytos:
Void Auras (alien)
The krytos resources are mainly used by blacksmiths, and they are specialized in activating the chemical reactions to enhance weapons for the individual to use. Most blacksmiths has developed this ability through practice in the knowledge aura, and new and better ways to enhance the weapons are being found every year.
The process of an enhancement, is pretty simple but takes years of practice to master.
Step 1: The main resources for an succesful enhancement is:
- Any type of a krytos resource (Any color, fragment, ore or Brimstone).
- A weapon that is able to absorb the energies from a chemical reaction.
Step 2: - The outcome of the reaction will depend on the last person that interacted with the kryton resource that will take part in the enhancement of the weapon.
- The blacksmith can read the outcome of the procces before actually crafting the blade, which is pleasant for their customers.
- The blacksmith will then use the forces from his/her knowledge Aura to force
a reaction to burst out from the krytos and let the weapon absorb it.
- The outcome will present a enchanted Krytonian weapon.
The first feature of Auras, will determine the class/role that the characters will play. For example, Wiola has developed stimulation to Destruction auras and Healing auras. Later in the game the player will come across chain quests for each character that will be able to unlock a stimulation for a third aura (it can be new spells, and for some characters other neat out-of- combat-skills). The 'enchanters' in my game (not named yet), will then have new spells that the player can unlock etc.
The second feature with the usage of Krytos will work more as a enchantment system but with a little tweak. The player will get a hold on krytos resources in various ways during the journey, and they can be used to enchant the weapons to the better. Each of the Krytos will take the characters auras into account, and give different buffs when crafted. The weapons of my game are categorized into tiers (Tier 1, 2,3 and Legendary). And there can be 2 different outcomes in the process of making a Krytorian weapon (depending on which aura you follow, as an example: in Wiolas case the choices would be Destruction (Red Krytos),and Healing (White krytos). This means that Wiola could enchant a weapon with any type of red Krytons or white,and depending on which you choose the buffs attached to the weapon will be different.
- Please note that the types of Krytos is only used for upgrading Tiers; (A Tier 1 weapon needs fragments, Tier 2 needs Ore etc.)
So what is your opinion about these new features, and do you have any suggestions on how I would be able to implement something like this in my game? Please feel free to share, it would help me out tons! An update to the thread will be up shortly, so stay tuned for more updates!
Until next time!
Signing out..
~Dark.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on April 05, 2013, 01:38:20 AM
Sorry, haven't had much time as of late. I am dealing with various arrangements for my wedding (July 13th) so I've been kept busy. In any case, here'my 2 cents on your ideas:
Quote
The people of Apisico are born with a genetic code in their vital system, and this code decides the directions of the electrical pulses
One thing immediately came to mind: midichlorian count! George Lucas destroyed the mystique of The Force by explaining, in The Phantom Menace, that The Force are intelligent micro-organisms living in our cells. Counting the amount of midicholesterols could tell you if you were Jedi material. So -poof- gone was the mysteriousness, the magical. Explaining the magic behind your, eh, magic, can potentially destroy their essence. Think about the following: does this need to be explored? Will the game revolve around exploring individuals genetics, or genetic compatibility? If so, the setting would be quite modern, if not futuristic, with magic functioning widely through daily life. Remember - it wasn't until 1952 we were able to map DNA, and only around the 80's was it viable to use by the police for proving criminal activity.
Quote
eature #1 - Personal abilities, decided by the stimulation of Auras
This is a neat idea. Even without the explanation of Auras, this can be a core gameplay mechanic, as well as story driven. People with certain kinds of auras can be stereotyped, or fulfill roles other aura-bearers can't. You can play around a lot with this concept, and add depth to magic.
Quote
Feature #2 - Krytos Upgrade Mechanic
It is, indeed, an upgrade mechanic, and a good way to limit the player by making better resources available later on in the game. It seems like a natural way to link it to your weapon tiers, and making Krytorian weapons specific to the person's aura seems like a legitimate way to make logical magic-weapons.
As for your question - implementing it in your game - you have written it out yourself a little already. Auras have already been discovered and put to use; even blacksmiths are able to train in crafting weapons based on a person's aura. I find it neat that less-skilled blacksmiths can't predict the outcome of krytos weapons beforehand - which should lead to surprising magic abilities. I would even go as far as to say that you leave skilled blacksmiths out of this, as it'll stimulate the player more to experiment with different kinds of auras, weapons, and krytos. Making new weapons can become thrilling, as you never know what will be upgraded, gained, or lost. I would say that when the player explores the blacksmith in the first town, there's an option explaining it all to the player. Libraries or scholars can be the ones who better understand how auras work, as a simple adventurer would likely only know what powers he/she possesses - not how this really came to be.
All in all, these are fantastic building blocks for your game. I love upgrading swords and weapons - and have always found that NOT knowing beforehand makes it more intriguing. It also makes that one super-weapon you eventually gain all the more rewarding. Auras can also be a story-tool: factions of certain aura users who oppose each other, 'purist' aura users who only use one aura, power-hungry people who want to master all auras, and many more things can be possible. These are fun things to think of, and open a world of additional possibilities.
Go for it!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Demo] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on April 25, 2013, 11:35:20 PM
2013-04-14 New updates added! Check Most Recent update here: (http://rmrk.net/index.php/topic,47396.msg538479.html#msg538479) Major Update on Beta Version 0.3:
The release of the new demo (version 0.3) is soon here, and because of this you are no longer able to download version 0.2 anymore. This is due to the polished maps and the change of plotpoint that the new demo is released upon. I decided to disable the option to download the previous version to avoid any confusion about the plot change in the intro, and the unpolished maps that are available in 0.2.
The following changes in Version 0.3 are the following:
Polished maps with new areas.
Change in plot point
Changed Intro and opening scene.
New skills, Enemies and Items.
A new added Npc
New names for some of the locations.
New conversations and new events.
Fixed the issue with the battlebacks having the wrong resolution.
The skill Battle Cry should now work as intended.
Fixed a bug where the enemies wouldn't attack the player after entering the Uncharted Grounds (aka Secret Cave in version 0.2)
Bug fixed where you can't enter Pluvia after rescuing Wiola.
The player will now be able to try out Wiola in battle before the demo ends.
The new demo will be released somewhere between the 4th and 5th of May!
Stay tuned for more updates!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on May 04, 2013, 01:51:51 PM
2013-05-04 New Updates Added
The new Beta Version 0.3 is now available for download!
Comments and feedback on the new demo is much appreciated.
Stay Tuned!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on May 07, 2013, 11:57:31 AM
Am downloading it now. Considering your previous demo was very interesting, I am looking forward to playing it! I'll let you know within a few days what I think of it.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on May 07, 2013, 02:50:56 PM
Am downloading it now. Considering your previous demo was very interesting, I am looking forward to playing it! I'll let you know within a few days what I think of it.
That's great to hear! :)
I would suggest you to read the change log for the new version (If you havn't already) since the new demo can be a bit confusing otherwise (especially if you have played version 0.2). It's reply #62 in this thread.
I have to apologize for being a bit slow as well, and I will come back to you with a reply on the new features that I'm working on. I also promised to come back to you once I picked up Legend of the moonhunter again, but I have been kinda busy.. but don't worry, I have not forgotten about it! I assure you! :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on May 08, 2013, 04:51:47 AM
Quote
That's great to hear!
I would suggest you to read the change log for the new version (If you havn't already) since the new demo can be a bit confusing otherwise (especially if you have played version 0.2). It's reply #62 in this thread.
I read it, and now that I've played it, let me give you my (elaborate) impression. Spoilers!
Spoilerfor:
Step-by-step thought process: 01. was the intro always that serene and beautiful? Love the piano music. Nicely told creation myth, too. 02. Still the funn dwarves MINERS standing around doing nothing in the intro, hehe. 03. Ah, a better incentive to explore the forest: heal your fellow soldiers! Wait - I can't dash with shift? 04. Wow, is this the same forest? I don't remember the atmosphere and lighting to be this... awesome. 05. battles are still awesome. Battle Cry for the win! 06. Hunk! Why do you live in an old grave, you silly old man. 07. Ooh, I definitely don't remember such a dark Uncharted Grounds. Aah! The ghosts move now! 08. Treasure....gold....trasure... armour! 09. Somehow, this second time I play it, the impeding darkness of that guy's grave (zeyphyr? Zeyrmed.dsm..something?) is more striking now. 10. Love the new sprite for the mythical old man/god/deity. Works much better this way. 11. Yea! I can pull switches with my mind now. 8) 12. Better ask Hunk for permission to cut the tree. 13. Ha! You wrote that into the story! I can ask permission! Yoink, that treasure is mine. Poison ring? Where were you when I needed you before! 14. Wiola, don't be scared. I'm only a powerful mysterious man with a huge sword hiding behind the shrubs. 15. Did you increase the soldiers' and captain's difficulty? What a challenge now! 16. N-no, I don't want you to see me naked... 17. Fire! I remember this. And such a heartwarming way to team up after. 18. Love the overworld theme. Wish it would loop better. 19. Nice town! N-no! Demo, don't end! I want to walk around the town! 20. I want to keep playing! Demo 1.2 vs 1.3 My goodness, you were not kidding about the overhaul of the demo. Specifically the forest and Uncharted Grounds look gorgeous, and simply breathe atmosphere. I had to get used not being able to dash, as I love doing that in my game (and various others). In terms of story and mystique, you have added a lot of intriguing details and lore. The confusion and chaos is gone, and is, instead, replaced with a certain 'mythos'. I found various items in barrels and boxes, so those are nice additions as well. Hunk is a marvelous addition, just a bit silly he lives inside a grave, and doesn't have his own little cabin or so. The start of Vincent's quest, with the soldiers, gives you an immediate purpose and establishes his personality very well, too. From the get-go he is a likable main character, looking to help his fellow soldiers.
I suppose the biggest change, for me, is the atmosphere. I was looking forward to it, and instead of having a nice time, I got completely absorbed into the story. Battles are, still, very impressive, and the animations and sprites of the characters in fights are amazingly done. Skills look especially good, and I wonder how you did that, or what battle script you use.
The two characters, Vincent and Wiola, nicely hint to each other being special, which I think was there last time too. The little touch after you save Wiola from the fire (where she waits a little then mentions your name to thank you) is perfectly timed, and promises for a great friendship (romance?) to grow in-game. Gladly you spent a lot of time on them last demo as well!
There are still quite some spelling and/or grammatical mistakes here and there, of which I won't go into detail. They aren't bad enough to distract me from playing, and chances are you'll be on top of it anyway. I mean it when I say I didn't want to stop playing. I understand this will be a massive project, taking long to complete, but I will gladly follow your progress and give feedback. With a 1:45 hours demo done, I wonder what I should do next. Steadily keep working on my game, I suppose.
All in all, a great demo, of a game with an "it-sucks-you-in" atmosphere. Your work from 1.2 to 1.3 has vastly improved the experience, leaving me hungry for more.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on May 08, 2013, 03:26:19 PM
I read it, and now that I've played it, let me give you my (elaborate) impression. Spoilers!
Spoilerfor:
Step-by-step thought process: 01. was the intro always that serene and beautiful? Love the piano music. Nicely told creation myth, too. 02. Still the funn dwarves MINERS standing around doing nothing in the intro, hehe. 03. Ah, a better incentive to explore the forest: heal your fellow soldiers! Wait - I can't dash with shift? 04. Wow, is this the same forest? I don't remember the atmosphere and lighting to be this... awesome. 05. battles are still awesome. Battle Cry for the win! 06. Hunk! Why do you live in an old grave, you silly old man. 07. Ooh, I definitely don't remember such a dark Uncharted Grounds. Aah! The ghosts move now! 08. Treasure....gold....trasure... armour! 09. Somehow, this second time I play it, the impeding darkness of that guy's grave (zeyphyr? Zeyrmed.dsm..something?) is more striking now. 10. Love the new sprite for the mythical old man/god/deity. Works much better this way. 11. Yea! I can pull switches with my mind now. 8) 12. Better ask Hunk for permission to cut the tree. 13. Ha! You wrote that into the story! I can ask permission! Yoink, that treasure is mine. Poison ring? Where were you when I needed you before! 14. Wiola, don't be scared. I'm only a powerful mysterious man with a huge sword hiding behind the shrubs. 15. Did you increase the soldiers' and captain's difficulty? What a challenge now! 16. N-no, I don't want you to see me naked... 17. Fire! I remember this. And such a heartwarming way to team up after. 18. Love the overworld theme. Wish it would loop better. 19. Nice town! N-no! Demo, don't end! I want to walk around the town! 20. I want to keep playing! Demo 1.2 vs 1.3 My goodness, you were not kidding about the overhaul of the demo. Specifically the forest and Uncharted Grounds look gorgeous, and simply breathe atmosphere. I had to get used not being able to dash, as I love doing that in my game (and various others). In terms of story and mystique, you have added a lot of intriguing details and lore. The confusion and chaos is gone, and is, instead, replaced with a certain 'mythos'. I found various items in barrels and boxes, so those are nice additions as well. Hunk is a marvelous addition, just a bit silly he lives inside a grave, and doesn't have his own little cabin or so. The start of Vincent's quest, with the soldiers, gives you an immediate purpose and establishes his personality very well, too. From the get-go he is a likable main character, looking to help his fellow soldiers.
I suppose the biggest change, for me, is the atmosphere. I was looking forward to it, and instead of having a nice time, I got completely absorbed into the story. Battles are, still, very impressive, and the animations and sprites of the characters in fights are amazingly done. Skills look especially good, and I wonder how you did that, or what battle script you use.
The two characters, Vincent and Wiola, nicely hint to each other being special, which I think was there last time too. The little touch after you save Wiola from the fire (where she waits a little then mentions your name to thank you) is perfectly timed, and promises for a great friendship (romance?) to grow in-game. Gladly you spent a lot of time on them last demo as well!
There are still quite some spelling and/or grammatical mistakes here and there, of which I won't go into detail. They aren't bad enough to distract me from playing, and chances are you'll be on top of it anyway. I mean it when I say I didn't want to stop playing. I understand this will be a massive project, taking long to complete, but I will gladly follow your progress and give feedback. With a 1:45 hours demo done, I wonder what I should do next. Steadily keep working on my game, I suppose.
All in all, a great demo, of a game with an "it-sucks-you-in" atmosphere. Your work from 1.2 to 1.3 has vastly improved the experience, leaving me hungry for more.
Thanks a lot for the positive feedback! I'm very happy that the new version has improved the experience to the better, since that's what I wanted it to do. I tried to replace and add the things that I thought were lacking in the previous version, and which frankly didn't work so well. It's nice to see that It's noticable! :)
Some thoughts on your Impressions:
Spoilerfor:
1.The intro has been changed a bit, and the sort of mythical legend is presented differently. 2. That's something I could work on, adding some movement to them wouldn't hurt. (It's supposed to look like they are harvesting for ore, due to the 'sparkles' on the veins.) 3. I'm planning to add a item that will allow you to sprint (That you will recieve inside town of Duke). I'm not sure if this is possible to implement yet though, but that's mainly the reason why the shift is not working in the demo so far. 4. Nope, It's not the forgotten forest anymore! haha! I'm glad you like the new Forest of Pluvia, since I reworked it quite a bit. 5. Nice to see that Battle Cry is working as it should now, and that It's useful. (I might lower the TP needed to 20-22 though, thoughts on that?) 6. He's silly indeed! Odd old man.. 7. Uncharted Grounds have been reworked a bit too, mainly the darkness, new items, the possibility to lower those darn spikes and being able to jump off the ledges. 9. I assume you mean Zetya (weird name I know.) Glad you find it more striking though :) 11. Yeah! Telekenesis hand of doom! (Or maybe Chaos?.. but still!) 13. Yes you can, and I find it funny that you thought about it before it was revealed to you haha! Yeah, it sure could be useful inside UC, but hopefully it will be useful from this point too (It will.) 15. Yes, I reworked that quite a bit and made it possible for the soldiers to buff and heal Hank as well. Some more strategic approach is needed for the fight now, and it can end up pretty challenging. 18. Will see what I can do about the loop for sure! :) 19. I hope you will be able too in a somewhat near future :( 20. Those words are the most rewarding to hear, period. Feels nice that you felt eager to keep playing! I'm so happy about that, thank you. Differences in versions:
I'm glad that the overhauling is noticable, and I was a bit scared that the people who have played version 0.2 would think that the changes are barely there. My biggest goal with repolishing the demo was to add a bit more atmosphere to the maps, and to sort out the plot and the myth of the world. I tried to make it a bit more understandable and interesting, instead of it being all over the place (refer to the Chaos as you mentioned). I'm glad you find Hunk to be a nice addition, since I thought it would break the 'lonesome wanderer' effect a bit, and give the player some rewards for the overall cutscenes with Hunk. I agree that the 'living in a grave' part can be quite silly and fishy.. I guess I went a bit too far with Hunk's personality (He's very close to Serena and can speak the ancient language, and well he's quite an odd and silly old man overall.) I might have a look at that and change it to a odd cabin instead (somehow).
I'm very glad that the atmosphere and the story is interesting, and it's truly lovely to hear that you got absorbed into it! Hopefully I'm taking it in a better direction now :) The animations for the battles are done with a script, and they need to be coded with different script commands (I'm pretty new to it so I'm doing my best to make it look okay, and it can be quite hard and time-consuming, but It's really funny too).
It's nice to hear that there are moments that reflect upon a stronger friendship between Wiola and Vincent, because that's what I wanted it to look like. Friendship and love will have a strong part in the overall story, and there will be some room for romance as well (with a bit of drama of course). Wiolas personality will have a big impact on the friendship between them though, and It's a specific event that will build the friendship between them a lot.
The grammar.. oh the grammar. I just wish I could stop the grammar errors from appearing, but since it seems like a part of me, It's not much I can do about it. I usually tesplay a lot but seems like there are some errors that I miss. I do have some reports of grammar errors for the new version, and they have been fixed. So a new file will be uploaded with those changes soon. I hope that they will be completely gone some time around, and as long as I keep changing them it will be for the better.
It will indeed take a long time to complete, but since I have most parts covered now it will make it easier to work on the content. The first months of my project was spent to learn the engine, and get the resources for everything (which took me a lot of time). The only thing I need now is to implement my new features with the skill-system and the Krytos upgrade system. Once I have that down, I will have everything ready to complete the remaining content of Chapter 1.
Once again, thanks a lot for the feedback and It's awesome to hear that you are hungry for more! Gives me tons of motivation to keep working on the project!
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on May 18, 2013, 01:11:05 AM
Major update added! 2013-05-18
A new demo that will illustrate the functions of two of my features are now available for download! Feel free to download,and play it as any feedback or thoughts about the features would be insanely valuable to me! Further down you can read some information about the demo: (Taken from the readme file).
Skill system with Boosters:
A system that will teach the party new skills, and upgrade them to higher tiers. The skill system takes the auras and the vital-systems of the actor into consideration, and specific resources are needed for different stimulation of auras.
Krytonian Upgrade system:
This is a system that will let the party upgrade their weaponry into unique versions of them called 'Krytonian weapons'. This is a skill used by the blacksmiths of the world of Aspicio, and the way it works is that they scan the vital-systems of their customers in order to write down all the information of the unique and individual weapons that they can currently craft. In order to upgrade a weapon the blacksmith needs the proper magical resources for the weapon in question. Fragments, ores, and Gemstones of Krytos upgrades different Tier weapons, and older versions of krytonian Tier weapons are needed in order to upgrade the next tier.
To Download and test the features please click here: (https://www.dropbox.com/s/3ytd5hjencs7e5e/Feature%20Demo%20for%20Violent%20Whispers.exe)
Like I said earlier, any thoughts on the features would be very valuable to me! And I hope you will enjoy the demonstration!
Sincerely ~ Dark.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Major updates for Beta 0.3!] [VXA]
Post by: Geokoer on May 20, 2013, 03:56:32 AM
I have played the tech-demo yesterday evening. Well - was more like midnight, so I went to bed afterwards.
First of all: the aura and booster system is a bit tricky to fully comprehend, but fortunately any requirements for skills are mentioned. Making various 'crystals' for those auras/vital systems seems like changing the alignment of the character. It would be really impressive if this would change the chara's overall skills (meaning, only the skills from one colour aura can be used at one time), and if characters can then learn how to switch between auras independently... but granted, that would be a lot of work and scripting.
The upgrade system for weapons is simpler, where you use your old weapon with a new (upgraded tier) weapon to create more powerful outcomes. This is neat, and I love weapon upgrading in games. I look forward to its implementation in your main game. I understand how you say weapons will be uniquely upgraded per person - but this can only be applied if every character can use the same kind of weapons. Otherwise mentioning its uniqueness is redundant: weapons types (swords for one, staffs for another) are always unique to that person. Or was it that weapons are unique depending on the aura? That would be interesting...
In any case, I think tinkering with skills and weapons will be a great addition to the game.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on September 14, 2013, 10:18:27 PM
Update: 2013-08-27
Been some updates on the game-logo and Title-screen.
(http://imageshack.com/scaled/large/7/wk41.png)
A new support bar is also available, so feel free to use it:
(http://imageshack.com/a/img843/5552/47ht.png)
Beta Version 0.4 is now released, and down below is an update log for it:
Update log for Version 0.4 - Changed title screen - - New music - - Updated Status screens - - Implemented travel system - - New Items - - Item Indication - - Other maps have been polished - - Updated quest system - - Sneak peak on the new weapon and skill systems (a long with sneak peaks on some of the Tier 2 skills) - First choise quest available - - System Options added - - Save points have been removed and been replaced with the possibility to Save everywhere -
Stay tuned!
As always, Best regards!
~Dark
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on September 18, 2013, 07:44:31 PM
Update: 2013-09-18
Been working a lot on new areas for my game and thought I could share about an area in my game where the characters have to swim.
The area will be interactable, and the goal for the player is to drain different areas from water in order to advance forward, or refill it again in order to reach areas that can't be reached without the water being raised etc, etc. The out-of-combat skills will also have a big impact in reaching areas in this dungeon, and there will be plenty of events where the other characters have to stay behind, and leave it to the actor that can progress at that specifc time.
So will share some very early pictures on how it will look like:
Area filled with water, and actor has to swim:
(http://imageshack.com/scaled/800x600/7/5ls0.png)
The swim graphics is something that I could work on (It has no animation when the actor is swimming, and no graphic around the character that really indicates that he's in the water) but I am not really sure how I would work around that, so this is how it looks like at the moment. If you have any tips on how I could polish this up feel free to share! Also, any feedback on the idea. or the graphic of the characters when they are swimming, would be very valuable to me! [:)]
Looks Great :D But there is just one thing... This might just be a mapping pet-peeve of mine but on the water sections I like to do the "shift-click routine" for around cliffs or islands in the middle of the water, like so: (http://i.imgur.com/yKjWDpf.png) (Little rule of thumb: However many spaces the top portion of your island is, is the same amount of spaces as the water should go behind to.) (PS. If you did this, then I apologize, It just seems that way as the waves are hitting the top of the island)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on September 19, 2013, 08:28:01 PM
@Rekios
That's a valid point! I usually shift click like that overall, but I'm pretty unsure when it comes to 'blocks of land' that's partly under water like this. When you talk about the 'rule of thumb' do you mean the amount of tiles that's visible of the platform? Like for example, if the surface of the island is 3 tiles upwards the water would only flow 3 tiles up as well and then flow behind that point?
Since a part of the island is under water I happen to get a bit unsure on how I would shift click around this to make it consistent. Do you think it would look better if I removed the 'water flow' around the edges located to the left of the screen as well?
I do think that It's very obvious when you can see the platform that the 'cliff' is standing on (like in your picture), but I tend to get a bit unsure when you can't see that platform.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Rekios on September 20, 2013, 12:27:36 AM
Exactly!, But I was more or less looking at the small island in the center of the screen. I think that it would be more clear that it was protruding from the water like so: (http://i.imgur.com/uxP4Ocu.png) ( sorry for poor and speedy shop skills) opposed to this: (http://i.imgur.com/p4pvHC6.png) Then again, it's just a thought and other than that your game looks outstanding!, Can't wait for a demo! :lol:
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on September 20, 2013, 01:06:11 AM
Exactly!, But I was more or less looking at the small island in the center of the screen. I think that it would be more clear that it was protruding from the water like so: (http://i.imgur.com/uxP4Ocu.png) ( sorry for poor and speedy shop skills) opposed to this: (http://i.imgur.com/p4pvHC6.png) Then again, it's just a thought and other than that your game looks outstanding!, Can't wait for a demo! :lol:
Yeah, it makes sense and I will make sure to fix that! I'll try and keep the rule of thumb that you mentioned so that every block will stay consistent towards it. Thanks a lot for the heads up! :)
I'm glad you think it looks outstanding!, and there's already a demo up that you can download (currently version 0.4) even though It's not completely polished yet. I'm planning to release a full demo version as soon as possible where you will be able to use your demo save file for the content of the full chapter 1. But if you feel like downloading it just to check it out, feel free to do so :)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Rekios on September 22, 2013, 12:20:16 AM
I have finished playing it and overall it looks great! :D There is a few things that I have noticed though.
1.The description of the "Find a Way" quest is misspelled, I believe it should be 'must' not 'most'. (http://i.imgur.com/2pt8H2Y.png)
2.The birds that fly overhead of the player in Pluvia should have their frequency set to 4 or 5.This makes it so the birds don't just stop in mid-air during flight.
3.The candles don't flicker. It would make it seem a lot more realistic if the candle flames had motion. I would think you could just create an event and use a candle graphic with 'Stepping Anim.' turned on. (http://i.imgur.com/w9566wX.png)
4.The Battleback in the Uncharted Lands doesn't match the map. It has a white floor. I would think a good battleback would be to use 'Dirt Cave' as the floor, and 'Rock Cave' as the walls. (http://i.imgur.com/5fsp12U.png) I think this keeps the look of the map.
Otherwise the game is great! :lol: It just seems to have a few mapping errors here and there. But then again, it is only a Beta 0.4 so it's fine :D Keep up the good work! If you need any help with anything let me know, I'll be glad to help! ~Rekios
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Rekios on September 23, 2013, 01:42:45 AM
I have made a few changes to Zetya. I think he looks better darker, and without the necklace. Feel free to use these if you wish :lol:
I have finished playing it and overall it looks great! :D There is a few things that I have noticed though.
1. Thanks for spoting that, it has now been changed :D
2. I have overall problems with the motions of the animals.. They tend to stop moving for a while, and then continue with their pattern. I'm not really sure how to fix that, but I do know that there is a way to keep them moving all the time and in a very realistic and smooth manner. The settings I use for them now is stepping animation with normal speed and movement, along with random as move route.
3. That's true. I'll see if I can put the events as candles instead and still have the light effect added in the same event, and see how it turns out. Thanks! :)
4. I'll make sure to change the battleback, the walls for UC grounds have been changed as well so I'll need to fix the battleback anyway.
Yeah, there are still some errors here and there along with some placeholders that will be changed later on. Since I'm working on the content for Chapter 1 as well, there will be a little time before I will have the demo completely polished. I'm glad you think it was great though! :)
Thanks for the offer! I'll make sure to keep that in mind! I'm thinking about making a request later on since I need some help with the database.
2. I have overall problems with the motions of the animals.. They tend to stop moving for a while, and then continue with their pattern. I'm not really sure how to fix that, but I do know that there is a way to keep them moving all the time and in a very realistic and smooth manner. The settings I use for them now is stepping animation with normal speed and movement, along with random as move route.
Make sure you have the frequency set to either 'Higher' or 'Highest' ;)
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on September 25, 2013, 07:11:34 PM
Update: 2013-09-25
Done with the third puzzle of my game, and I'm really happy with how it turned out. (This puzzle will be located in the Town of Duke's sewers, for those that have played the demo). Took me about 3 hours to complete, but after some frustration I finally finished it.
I have also polished the demo up a bit, and changed some confusing scenarios. I have presented Vincent's condition in a more direct way now, since I wasn't really bringing it to the surface (in a good manner) during the length of the demo.
I have switched up some of the starting skills, and changed them accordingly (Mostly in a manner that will make Vincent more useful when being teamed up with more party members, since he was lacking a bit in the previous set up)
I have also included that the characters will gain 1-2 skills automaticly every 5 levels now as a contribution next to the Academic oracle system. So instead of starting the game with 1 skill (Fury of Thunder), and getting Vendetta and Battle cry at level 2 and 5 I have implemented so you start with 3 skills instead, and get another one at level 5. After that you can use the oracle system as usual in order to get new skills, and then an individual skill at every 5th level.
More than that I'm working on a boss list, where I'm trying to work out a combat pattern based a bit around the history behind the boss, and also a bit on how the fight will progress according to that (like strategical points, Boss behaviour, skills and turn patterns etc.) Still a work in progress but I'll try and polish up my boss battles once I have most of that done.
Lastly I'm working on my Kryptonian weapons effects, and how they will change the characters or the skills. While I have everything set in stone I'm thinking about posting a recruit request for some of the programming that involves around this in the database. So if you have good experience in the database, and feel like helping me out with this feel free to send me a PM about it. It would relieve a lot of stress and frustration if I could get some assistance in one or two areas, since It's so much work to do everything yourself.
That's it for this update, but remember to stay tuned for the next one!
As always, stay tuned! Best Regards ~Dark.
Title: Re: Violent Whispers [Beta Version 0.4] [VXA]
Post by: Dark_Metamorphosis on October 15, 2013, 06:06:47 AM
Update: 2013-10-14
Just wanted to share a small update.
I have started using an overlay script, so I can parallax my maps to make them look a bit better. So far I have parallaxed 5-6 maps, and I'm now working on spicing up Town of Duke a bit.
I'm really enjoying working with these overlays, and I'm about to add some glow and lighting effects as well. Looking forward to spice up some of my maps, and I hope it will turn out nice!
I'm also trying to implement my own light effects (in caves, inside houses, and glows etc) I decided to try this out since Khas script has giving me some struggles, as in frame drops, script errors, and weird tints.
Here's a screenshot of my progress (Any thoughts?)