[2k3] Final Fantasy V-II: Sacred Chains - ON INDEFINITE HIATUS (22/07/2012)

THE PROJECT IS ON INDEFINITE HIATUS (See HERE)

"The Sacred Crystals have always been used to conquer evil of the world with Warriors of the Crystals, using both magic the crystals bestow with the warrior's bravery and will, they conquer evil together to banish it into the realm of nothingness. The warriors are not the only guardians that could use the power of the crystals; legend has it that there are four dragons, which were put into eternal slumber due to their berserk nature and power to the destroy the world itself. Legend also says...if the power of the crystals fell into the wrong hands, the dragons could be revived...

...The revival of world destruction."

After the battle with Exdeath, Bartz, Lenna, Faris and Krile went their seperate ways.

As the new ruler of "New" Typhoon and with Faris gone back to her crew as their pirate captian, she stays along in the castle, always remembering the past she once had with her friends. She wants to go find them...but how will she be reunited with her friends?

As Lenna thinks of a way to reunite with her friends, we enter Zeke...

Zeke is a Mage with the power to change the form his magic takes, being it White, Black, Blue or even Arcane magic. Zeke suddenly woke up from being unconscious for an unknown amount of time, due to this, he suffers from memory loss and cannot remember anything except for his name. After waking up, he finds himself awake in a forest, since he suffers from amnesia, this forest is a mystery to him. As Zeke wanders the forest, he finds a man in shining blue and white armor camping in the forest...could it be...?

Name: Bartz Klauser
Age: 22
Element: Wind

After the battle with Exdeath, Bartz decided to go back to his home town of Lix, to finally settle down and live a peaceful life...but it wasn't meant to be. One night, he had a nightmare about the battle against Exdeath and the Void, and the death of his good friend Galuf, the dream got to Bartz and made him wonder "...Could I have stopped Galuf's death...if I was strong enough at that time...?". Even after stopping world destruction with his fellow warriors and friends, he could not shake the feeling of being weak and powerless, all because of this one dream. As he did before the great battle, he went off on a journey to become stronger, this time without his friends...

...Almost two years later travelling across the world, he still has the same dream over and over again, intensifying every night.

Due to the nightmare, his personality has changed, making him almost emotionally dead inside and silent. Even in this new state of mind, he still helps others when they are in need.

(New design coming soon)
Name: Lenna Charlotte Tycoon
Age: 21
Element: Water

Lenna is one of two daughters of the now deceased King Tycoon. After the great battle, she was crowned the Queen of Tycoon due to her sister stripping herself of her title. Lenna still remembers the time she had with her friends two years ago and still thinks about the times she had with them. Lenna still keeps in contact with Krile.

Lenna's personality has stayed the same for the past two years; gentle yet couragous and always helps whenever she can, also showing her love to all of the people of the Tycoon Kingdom.

Name: Sarisa "Faris" Scherwil Tycoon
Age: 22
Element: Fire

The first daughter of King Tycoon and older sister to Lenna, but was lost at sea at a young age. When the battle of Exdeath was over, Faris went back to the Kingdom of Tycoon to live with her younger sister as one of the rulers of the Tycoon Kingdom, after a few months however, she had a change of heart, going back to her pirate ways with her old crew and boat Syldra (named after her deceased pet and friend), because of this, her title was taken away as royalty of Tycoon, which Faris clearly did not care about.

Faris still has her very commanding nature due to being brought up by Pirates, but she does have a softer side to her, which is clearly seen when Lenna and Faris finally realise they are sisters.

Name: Krile Mayer Baldesion
Age: 16
Element: Earth

The Princess of Bal and replacement Warrior of Dawn after the death of her Grandfather; Galuf. Krile joined the other Warriors of Dawn after the sad death of Galuf, who was the current Warrior of Earth. She aided the warriors several times before finally joining them and gaining the powers her grandfather had, which she used to destroy Exdeath with the others.

Krile has since been the ruler of the Kingdom of Bal, but still has not been crowned Queen due to her being "too unruly and irresponsible", even though she is not yet the Queen, Krile has shown strong leadership when coming to ruling the Kingdom. Krile and Lenna have become closer as friends in this time too, helping the Kingdoms grow and prosper together.

Krile still has her bubbly traits, but with time she has also grown stronger, in both body and mind. Krile also still has her natural ability to talk to Moogles and befriend different animals and dragons.

(Mid and Zeke's bios coming soon)

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwtFBO_w398" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwtFBO_w398</a>

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPz_S6UohSE" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPz_S6UohSE</a>

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFT-uqFZDvU" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BFT-uqFZDvU</a>

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXwXB_hSV_o" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXwXB_hSV_o</a>

More available on the Channel

Spoiler for Mix of Old and Current:

New Menu



The World of FFV-II
(click for full size)

- Original Characters, plus some that were only NPCs!

- Job System, with 8 new jobs!

- New Summon Spells!

- New Character Designs!

- Full MP3 OGG Soundtrack, composed by the amazing artist Arlen!

Original Characters - Square Enix
Resources - Charas Project (Credits of resource sharers coming soon)
Custom Sprites - Tezuka, Shadowdude, Redwyn, JosephSeraph, Nich
Mapping - Shadowdude
Music - Square Enix, Arlen/Ryan Leber
Sounds - Square Enix, findsounds.com, nrsisyourbuddy
Beta Testers - cozziekuns

Alpha Tech Demo
Beta Tech Demo

Code: [Select]

Change log:

28/04/2010

Changes:

- Beta title screen added
- The boss battle dialogue has been re-written
- "Classic" style dialogue boxes are used in battle now
- Stats have been re-balanced
- A choice of two battle themes can be chosen (This release only)

Bug fixes:

- The "mini-menu" is now fixed (The position when highlighting "quit")
- Most grammar issues have been found and changed
- Dialogue for "Boco's Bit" has changed significantly
- Music now in battle (See changes)

Current bugs:

- The glyphs are incorrect due to clash with new RPG_RT (Will be fixed in next release)
- On-Key press code for title screen skip not implemented yet (Will be fixed in next release)
- Black Mage Job still unstable

NOTE: These are only tech demos releases and may contain many unknown bugs.

If you find anymore, please let me know.

The Official Final Fantasy V-II Website

Q. Why make a fangame? Why not be original?
A. For one, I LOVED Final Fantasy V and I see this more of a tribute than a fangame. Secondly, I asked members of RMRK before going forward with this project and as you can see, they wanted me to go forward with it.

Q. How would the Job System work?
A. In RPG Maker 2003, no scripting can be used, so it is all done using events, variables and switches.

Q. Why RPG Maker 2003? RPG Maker XP has way better graphics!
A. EXACTLY. I chose RM2003 because of the graphics. The graphics used in the orginal Final Fantasy V were very similar to RPG Maker 2003's.

Q. What are the new Jobs?
A. The only ones I am going to tell you about are Dark Knight and Paladin, the rest are a secret. =o

why make A FF game theirs already enough of them...just make your own game.....

Why? Because plenty of people wanted Tezuka to make this.

Personally, I can't wait to see how he pulls this off. I'm keeping an eye on this one.

Awesome Tezuka, can't wait to see this finished.

Thanks guys, I think I will be able to update this tommorow.

why make A FF game theirs already enough of them...just make your own game.....

Zylos really told you why I am doing this, but the other reason is that I enjoy it and I LOVE Final Fantasy V. Hopefully I will be able to tie this and FFV together without messing up the plot.

Added much more screenshots, I hope you like the look of the progress.

Anybody willing to help with mapping, storyline or even spriting would be appreciated.

I can probably help a little if you need anything. I assume this is RM2k3?

Out of curiousity, what are the 8 new jobs?

That is a surprise! When I am ready I'll add the new Joblist.

But I can tell you that two of them are "Dark Knight" and "Paladin", that is all I am going to tell you. So what would you be able to help me with?

I'm a horrid mapper (as you could tell by looking at my game), but I'm a writer by occupation and am decent at sprites. PM me what you would like and I'll see if I can help you.

Thanks Zylos, I will!

What I will be asking you to do will be what I will be doing also, spriting the characters, so it would not be a huge load.

*Added to Credits, +rep.

Very nice  , I don't know why you didn't finish it...

If you want i can try and make good maps for you every once in awhile or depending if i get a easy day from home and school, i can make alot hopefully.

Thank you for all of your support, I will be needing help with this soon.

Updated and organized project, enjoy the new video!

It looks great! I hope DEMO will be out soon or beta......

That's rm2k3?  Wow...there's still plenty i have to learn then eh?  There's some things you have there that i just dont know how you did...

Thanks for the positive comments, it is really motivating me to get this done, or at least bring out a demo soon!

Added FAQ and updated Credits.

This looks great, I hope all goes well.

I'm not particularly skilled in any area so I may not be of much use.

Bumping just to let you know that new screenshots and alpha demo release out soon.

Sorry to keep you all waiting, but this is quite a large project!

Take your time on this. I'll look forward to them demo!

This is looking awesome.

Woah awsome can u send me a demo soon? send on here or msn finalrage32@hotmail.com-msn

WOWOWOW nice mapping!

I suck so much at mapping,and great idea

UPDATE:

Sorry about the lack of updates, College Assignments has been eating up quite a lot of my time. I have added some people in the credits that are now helping me with this project.

A full update will be done in a few days.

HURRY UP D:<

Hey, don't rush him. He's very busy with college stuff or whatever he has to do.

Wow, You have done some great work!
Job system looks fantastic!
It really looks like the FF V, Good job.   

Not dead yet!

Yeah, I haven't updated my game in a while due to a lot of college work and not a lot of free time, but next week I have a week or so off, which will give me a lot more time for FFV-II.

Updates:

I had a try at making a better title image for the game, I haven't quite finished it, but here it is so far:



Criticism welcome, since I know it isn't perfect.


I have also made a few updates to the Job System, it may not be much, but I have already implemented the AP system which will come soon. Here is a short video on a few of the updates:



I also did quite the script re-write; I decided most of the script I wrote was bad and needed changing badly, so in turn, I had to change a lot of the game as well, including the opening, which you can see here:



Hopefully more updates next week. 

Double post.

Finished new title screen:



Criticism is highly appreciated.

Taken straight from the blog:

I will also be adding an alpha download of the game soon with about 10 minutes of gameplay, since I do need some help ironing out some bugs with the job system (lag on lower spec systems for some odd reason plus other bugs), so look for it in the downloads sections soon.

Even though I haven't posted here for over 60 days (thanks for the reminder ), me and the team have been working real hard on this project.

Things that have happened since my last post:

• Total Job System re-write
• New spritework
• Re-write of scripts
• *Job System lag bug has been fixed*
• Team expanded
• Website and forum opened

New screenshots and story up in the first post.

Quite nice. Can't wait to try it. 

Game name changed due to how stupidly cliché it sounded. I will have to re-create the title screen to show this as well. Hopefully this will also stop people from being scared to post in the topic. 

Hah, that's a good decision I think. Holk would approve.

I also took Falcon's advice and made the topic look a bit better, sadly I miscalculated the size of the banners, but my monitor's resolution is quite low (1280 x 720), so hopefully it looks better to nearly everyone else.

This looks very good...i cant wait for it...ive played all of the FF games...I love all FF remakes with RPG maker...Its very good!

The colors on the custom sprites sort of jump at you the contrast is off a bit.

Oh but by the looks of the videos and story this sounds like it'll be a nice fangame. 5 is one of my favorites >w<

The colors on the custom sprites sort of jump at you the contrast is off a bit.

Whoops, I forgot to replace the screenshot with a more recent one, I'll do that now.

Also:

A special release of FFV-II is coming soon for RMN's Release Something! June 20th event.

There are two things I can do, and I think one would be much more enjoyable than the other, but you'll have to wait and see what they are.

The team for the project have been away for quite a while now, which means I can release something on the day of the event, but it maybe limited due to half of the team going AWOL.

Music at the moment is still questionable, as the person which maybe able to compose some of the music is busy with his own projects, which I can fully respect and I don't expect him to stop or slow down what he is doing for something else.

Check back soon for more info.

So is this a continuance of FFV or a alternative version? Or just the same game remade?

Is there any spoilers?

So is this a continuance of FFV or a alternative version? Or just the same game remade?

Is there any spoilers?

It is an un-official sequel, so there are quite a few spoilers to the original.

Hey, this project has been nominated as a candidate for Project of the Month for June. Please vote here: http://rmrk.net/index.php/topic,33296.0.html

Best of luck;I think this shows a lot of promise Tez.

Haha, thanks Modern. I wasn't expecting this to even be nominated. 

Character bios will be added in the next hour, I have to wait for the artist to give me the portraits. If he doesn't arrive, I'll just add them anyway.

Bartz, Faris and Lenna's bios added. Title screen changed and one new screenshot showing the glyphs has been added.

EDIT: Krile's bio has been added.

EDIT 2: Could this topic be sent to Projects? It isn't what you would call "new" now.

You made me start FF5 again to get ready to play your game.

I'm really looking forward to seeing this in action, Tezuka. :3

Meh, I hardly know about FF and the only game I played is FF3/6.

But nevertheless, this looks good.

Wow, this game looks awesome. FFV is one of my fav games ever,and the job system was cool as well.
I also noticed Mid? Is he the same Mid? I hope so :}

Great job!

Hey guys, Redwyn here with a video showing the completed sprite for Bartz's Paladin class.

Hopefully it is decent, and I hope you enjoy.

Also, I forgot to set Bartz to step forward when he attacks with his weapon so that's why the attacking is kinda instant D:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr6X_suZcCk - in case the thing above does not work

Cool dude. It looks good. Good to hear some production is still chuggin along.

The sprite looks great. Good work Redwyn.

HURRY UP D:<

I like the game title >.<

New video:

I apologize for the video quality, it seems like I need to re-configure ffdshow again.

This is a quick tour of a replicated Tule, mapped by Kaidou(Redwyn). The only thing that is currently wrong with the village is that some of the trees around the village are not finished yet. The interior for the houses in Tule are not finished yet, but we will post a video of that and other things soon.

New video:

This is a quick tour of a replicated Tule, mapped by Kaidou(Redwyn). The only thing that is currently wrong with the village is that some of the trees around the village are not finished yet. The interior for the houses in Tule are not finished yet, but we will post a video of that and other things soon.

[/quote]

I definitely would want to try this game when it comes out. FF5 is my all-time favorite Final Fantasy. My new project that I recently posted. I was wondering what is your approach going to be in relating statistics to classes? It seems like it would be difficult to make it just like the original because of the limitations of RM2K3, so I was wondering was the class growth aspect worked on yet?

New video:

This is a quick tour of a replicated Tule, mapped by Kaidou(Redwyn). The only thing that is currently wrong with the village is that some of the trees around the village are not finished yet. The interior for the houses in Tule are not finished yet, but we will post a video of that and other things soon.

I definitely would want to try this game when it comes out. FF5 is my all-time favorite Final Fantasy. My new project that I recently posted. I was wondering what is your approach going to be in relating statistics to classes? It seems like it would be difficult to make it just like the original because of the limitations of RM2K3, so I was wondering was the class growth aspect worked on yet?

The job growth system works exactly like it did in Final Fantasy V, down to the very last detail, when coming to the Job System anyway.  When a job level has increased, the player is alerted after battle, but the AP is calculated and shown in the battle results:

Hmm, that sounds nice. It's good to know the AP system is pretty much to say. However, what I meaning to say is like this:

RPG Maker has 4 base statistics: ATK, DEF, INT, and AGI, basically. (Unless your game follows a different formula)

I was wondering how you decided to handle the job differences. For example: Let's say you change into the thief class. The thief is known for high agility compared to most classes in the Final Fantasy World. When you change jobs, will your statistics change into the new job, or will the statistics stay the same? Also I was wondering if there was a statistical bonus for the jobless class from levelling up certain jobs. =P Sorry if I'm asking too many questions; you could say I'm an FF5 nut.

Hmm, that sounds nice. It's good to know the AP system is pretty much to say. However, what I meaning to say is like this:

RPG Maker has 4 base statistics: ATK, DEF, INT, and AGI, basically. (Unless your game follows a different formula)

I was wondering how you decided to handle the job differences. For example: Let's say you change into the thief class. The thief is known for high agility compared to most classes in the Final Fantasy World. When you change jobs, will your statistics change into the new job, or will the statistics stay the same? Also I was wondering if there was a statistical bonus for the jobless class from levelling up certain jobs. =P Sorry if I'm asking too many questions; you could say I'm an FF5 nut.

The job changing part is actually handled by RPG Maker 2003 itself, it has a "change class" event which allows you to change class/job easily. For the jobless class, we don't know yet, we haven't thought of any good way to allow the Freelancer to get the bonuses from mastered jobs. To compensate for this, we have been thinking of giving everyone more than 4 new custom jobs, as the spriters have been coming up with quite a few ideas, along with the ideas in the FFV-II forum's User Request board.

And don't worry about asking "too many" questions, the more the merrier.

Wow! I love the new video, Tezuka! Its so cool that you kept it so close to the real FFV game.
I can't wait until the whole game is complete! I love V!

Its a gods game 

Keep up the nice pace! 

Story Video Time:

THIS SCENE CONTAINS SPOILERS, IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS, PLEASE DO NOT WATCH.

Thanks to our mapper Shadowdude for the amazing work!

Story from this point:

This scene is part of the script re-write, so bare with me here.

After Zeke bumps into Bartz, Zeke talks to Bartz how he does not remember who he is and needs help to figure out who he is and what he was doing in the forest he was unconscious in. Bartz decides to help him, which brings him to Tycoon, as he knows a friend that could help him find out who he is, sadly on arrival though, the guards tell Bartz Lenna has gone somewhere. While leaving Tycoon, Zeke senses a vaguely familiar aura coming from somewhere near Tycoon...the Winf Shrine.

As Bartz hears Zeke describe where he was feeling this, he knew where he was talking about, and was surprised that he would have to journey there again after so long.

What will Zeke and Bartz ifind at the Wind Shrine? Could it be a friend of Zeke's, or someone with malicious intent?

Only going through there will know.

There are a few glitches at the moment that need to be ironed out, hopefully none of them are visible in the video.

Enjoy!

Oh and here is a userbar I did in a few seconds:

Code: [Select]

[img]http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/1179/usrbar1.png[/img]

It's 4AM at the moment, so I'll do some better userbars tomorrow later.

I've decided to release a tiny demo in a couple of weeks time, just to show the basics of the game. It will feature one dungeon, a boss, one working job up to level two, and two characters in the party.

Like I said the demo will be small and is only to help people get the grasp of it before the later demo/full release. You won't be alone, though, you will have a guide which will tell you how to use the job system and how AP is earned.

Don't worry, your guide will be kind...and feathery!

The project post has been overhauled and all grammar mistakes have been resolved (I hope).

Take your time, Tez. I'm really looking forward to playing your game.

Congratulations Chainsaw! You have won Project of the Month for October!

This means your project will be stickied until November and is added to the Featured Projects section of Crankeye!

Again, congratulations; this project looks very good.

And, I will see if I can track him down in order to inform him that he's won.

Haha, wow. I wasn't expecting that.

Thanks you to everyone who voted for the project, and I hope you will enjoy the short demo which is coming soon.

Congratulations and you're welcome. You deserve it. :]

Looks great! I never realized how much images with text could impact a game's appeal on the website :-)

Thanks lost!

Well it seems like Final Fantasy V-II has been nominated for Project of The Month over at RRR as well.

Better not disappoint us then. Also I'm sort of curious as to why you've included a subtitle in the project name? Never actually paid notice to that before.

Spoiler for:

It actually refers to Zeke being linked with the crystals in some form, you can even say he is directly linked to the crystals in a way.

Thanks lost!

Well it seems like Final Fantasy V-II has been nominated for Project of The Month over at RRR as well.

If it is, it will destroy the spacetime continuum!

(Congratulations!)

Thanks Kentona, that means a lot coming from you, I am a big fan of your games.

So, I have been working on the game quite a lot today, most of it on the job system, then I discovered I can do something if I am careful.

A User Request on the official forum asked me if their would be different difficulty levels, I answered saying yes their will be, but I will not be thinking about implementing different difficulties until a bigger demo. While I was tinkering with the Job System, I found out that I can distribute AP by enemy, not battle, which in turn got me to post this with a question:

In the "Easy Mode", would it be better to leave AP distribution to the traditional way (per battle), or per monster, which allows them to run from battles with AP, even though they have not defeated the whole monster party?

This would make it easier for people who think they are too weak for the battles they are starting to encounter but still are able to gain something if they decide to try and kill a few of them.

ok I am impressed by the videos :-) More impressed by the wind shrine. I am no real fan of nogstalgia anymore, but the wind shrine looks great. I will download this and give it a try.

Credits updated, this video shows you why:

lol, Arlen. Did he do this specifically for you? Or did you just download something from his site?

Specifically, he is doing a big chunk of the OST for the project, but I don't know about all of it.

Great job on getting project of the month, Tezuka!
I'm sorry this is late, been working on some things.

You game defiantly deserves this, it looks so great! 

I'm happy for you, really! 

Well, I was going to upload the alpha demo today, but I didn't get time to finish the events that take place during the alpha demo due to other more important things that took place (yes, there are more important things to me than this project), but I'll finish it and upload sometime tomorrow, I promise!

Here it is!

NOTE: This is only a tech demo release and may contain many unknown bugs.

Known bugs:

• Menu maybe accessible during an event.
• Job System cursor not implemented yet (replaced by a temporary solution)
• Zeke's sprite not complete.
• The "1" being used to open the job system this is because it should not be accessible yet.

If you find anymore, please let me know.

Enjoy

YES! A DEMO! *downloads immediately*

...Taking the demo down again, WAY too many bugs, even some that make the next event impossible.

I also want to apologize for the quality of the demo; it is in the it's very early stages and the event you see there took 10 minutes to put together. The demo is only here so you can see how everything works.

EDIT: The demo is re-uploading, be sure to download from the same link again in 30 minutes for the working alpha tech.

EDIT 2: Done

Hey Tezuka, just letting you know that your game is a Wavemaker over at RMN's SNEWS newsletter:


http://rpgmaker.net/articles/194/

Congrats!

Whooo! I'm downloading the demo now!   So far, I love the Chocobo and Mog action

I'll edit this or repost when I'm done! :>
Oh, and when I'm in the Shrine during battles, is music suppose to play? You know, battle music?

Oh, and when I'm in the Shrine during battles, is music suppose to play? You know, battle music?

Yes it should, I assume you are having problems with it? I can't seem to find anything wrong with it here, try re-downloading it and see if that fixes the problem.  

Oh, it has the sound affects. Like the sword hitting the baddies, but the theme music isn't playing. 
Its still great, by the way! I adore it!

Oh, and I love how it has the FFV feel. When I saw the pictures, I was praying it would. I'm happy it does

A few months ago, I suddenly stopped updating the game's information on RMN, RMRK and YouTube. This happened due to college work...and lots of it. I have been studying for my final mark in these past few months, which is why this happened. While I was inactive in the RPG Maker community, tezukake.org went down without a warning from my web or domain host, leaving a few of you confused about what happened to the site and the game's web page.

Before I began my long run of inactivity, I uploaded a very short demo of FFV-II showing some of the sprite work and storyline. As the blog post says below this one, I fumbled and I uploaded one with the party position in the incorrect place. Luckily I was able to catch this before stopping work on the project for a while, unfortunately I didn't check if RMReckor only took out the resources that were not being used, which it didn't and wasn't noticed until only a few weeks ago when I was lurking one night. Even after catching this error, I decided not to upload a demo or fix for this due to the how much time I had at that particular moment.

With the Easter break here, I decided to do a bit of work on the project in the free time I have at during the break. I will not be working on it as fast I was before stopping, but I will definitely be doing something towards it, hopefully being able to release an updated version of the demo available at the moment, a "Special Edition" as you will.

For the people who are still watching this project; thank you and I hope we will have something to give you soon for your patience. =)

Also be on the look out for a new video showing a new feature soon!

I just played your techdemo today. I'm seriously impressed, it's pretty amazing. Especially how you managed to recreate the maps EXACTLY as how they appeared in FFV (Shocked at the world map) Just one thing. The neo-Exdeath you fight at the shrine was a little too time consuming considering it's just the first boss. Maybe tone down his HP a bit?

Yeah I know what you mean about that, the stats were pretty unbalanced in that demo. I am surprised someone was actually able to defeat the boss battle. :X

Me and Nich are currently working on the revamped Chemist job. The job was next to useless in the original, so we are doing something a bit..."special" with it at the moment. When that is done, I will release a new demo with more balanced stats.

Oh and just for future reference; put all things to with the game's story/battles in spoilers, just so they don't...well...spoil anything.

EDIT:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXwXB_hSV_o" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXwXB_hSV_o</a>

Don't you hate seeing the same screen for RPG Maker games? Well, after experimenting with a hack thanks to Cherry, I have been able to create on with a more "dynamic" feel.

The quality of the pictures used in this video is very low due to it only being a test. In the released version, the pictures will be in a higher quality.

Although this menu is fully working, it currently has problems using custom glyphs. What does this mean? It just means I need to PM Cherry to see if there is a patch for this. The worst case scenario; the nice looking menu gets scrapped.

And yes the image transitions will be skippable on key press. :X

SURPRISE

I have done two things I promised myself I wasn't going to do, but with the decline of popularity for the project and only me testing the game out at the moment, I almost have no choice.

The first thing; I need beta testers. When I say beta testers, I mean testers which will look at every knuck and cranny of maps, grammar and menus. At the moment I only need two. The two chosen will be sent closed betas now and then for testing, most likely for an open beta or an actual demo release.

The second thing is that a new beta demo is available to everyone. The release isn't much different from the first one, but it does have a few changes which will change how the game is played.

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Change log:

28/04/2010

Changes:

- Beta title screen added
- The boss battle dialogue has been re-written
- "Classic" style dialogue boxes are used in battle now
- Stats have been re-balanced
- A choice of two battle themes can be chosen (This release only)

Bug fixes:

- The "mini-menu" is now fixed (The position when highlighting "quit")
- Most grammar issues have been found and changed
- Dialogue for "Boco's Bit" has changed significantly
- Music now in battle (See changes)

Current bugs:

- The glyphs are incorrect due to clash with new RPG_RT (Will be fixed in next release)
- On-Key press code for title screen skip not implemented yet (Will be fixed in next release)
- Black Mage Job still unstable

You can download the new open beta HERE

Hah, I'm guessing you either used Auto Enter patch or PowerMode 2003 for the title screen. It looks really impressive

Auto Enter. 

I still need to contact Cherry about the clash between the AE patch and the glyph patching process. According to the instructions Cherry gave with it, I should be able to patch the glyphs in after applying said patch, but it just ends up crashing.

I guess I'll have to contact him and wait for a reply. 

So today I decided that the game's main image needs to be changed. Since it doesn't revolve much around dragons anymore, I thought it should show the most noticable element of the game: Bartz and his past.

After messing around in Photoshop and Bartz's Dissidia portrait, I came up with two similar images. Which one do you guys think looks better?

Or the more classic looking one:

The image used will most likely be a (long) temporary until I do one myself or get/pay someone else to do one for me, but I think a slight change for now will do.

Oh and added new demo link to the front page.

I like the second one

Yeah, the second one.

I honestly thought the same. I guess I'll change it now.

DOUBLE POST.

I decided to go in a totally different direction for the title menu. Instead of something ridiculously fancy, I went with just fancy.



This will be the last small update for the next few weeks. I am very close to graduation and I plan on doing a lot to this project in the three months I have before starting my freshman University year. So expect to see a lot of big updates after these couple of weeks.

I like the title screen. It reminds me of the old Final Fantasy V, which I think is what you were trying to do.

Agreed.

I just played the demo and it felt just like an NES game- minus the square controller. Well done, sir!

To Everyone who wants to become a Closed Beta Tester:

If you want to become one, please send me a PM so I can personally give you the details on what you will need to do with the closed builds I will give you.

I am only accepting 3 people at the moment, please bear this in mind.

EDIT: 2 Spaces left.

It looks good, you must've put alot of time into this. I'll beta test if you want, I might even Let's Play it later on as well.

I'll beta test for FFV-II also. Plus I'm trying to work on a Final Fantasy I alternative called Final Fantasy Alternate. But I'm a damned to hell newbie with RPG Maker. So if you or any of your developers can help me out with my game Tezuka, I'd greatly accept the help. I could use a mentor for how to use RPG Maker.

I'm very eager to see where this goes since you've been at it for such a long time. I did a quick write-up about it on my blog I hope that's alright with you. It's not much more than what you've stated here, I copied the storyline and just mentioned some of the new elements you're bringing to it with a link to Zukain Games. http://hawkeyegames.blogspot.com/2010/11/featured-project-and-update.html

Warning: this topic has not been posted in for at least 60 days.

Anyhoo...

I couldn't get to sleep tonight (It's 4AM here), so I did a little work on the project before my University term finishes.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vkuxnadxb4o" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vkuxnadxb4o</a>

Hey guys, I guess an update is way overdue. This is just a small update, showing the ability system more than anything. Included in this video is the taste of the tracks seamlessly looped and the skipable title screen.

The ability system will work just like the one in V, but with a few tweaks, including being able to equip 3 abilities at the same time, depending on the class. Although this could be done in V, it could only be done with the Mime class by replacing the Fight command.

The Job System has also been improved; instead of a bad smooth moving cursor, it has been replaced with a classic moving system, just a small aesthetic bonus.

I would talk about the project more, but I am quite tired. :X

Expect some sort of update during the weekend.

Links are not working for demos, just thought you should know

Also to explain my very long absence from RMRK, there were some clipping issues and I was stuck in a wall.

Links are not working for demos, just thought you should know

They will be back up in a few weeks along with a new demo.

Oh and as a small (boring) update; if you are interested to see what jobs/classes and abilities will show up in the game, you can take a look at the public list here. This will be updated as soon as a new job or ability is created or in the works.

Wow, I actually have a weekend to work on this project.

Sorry for the long, long inactivity over the past several months, University life pretty much cut into my hobby time for a while, but I have salvaged a weekend to work on FFV-II, so working on it I will do!

My goal for this weekend is to actually have another beta test ready by Sunday Monday night, showing off the new CMS I am doing for the game:



Once again, I apologize for the long wait, but I hope the update that will hopefully be done by Sunday will be worth (at least some of) it.

Also to everyone who has messaged me about being a beta tester over the few months, because of my delay, I am making all of you beta testers and I will send you a PM sometime tonight or tomorrow with the details.

More updates soon.

Well, this is it. The blog entry I never wanted to make, no matter how much I tried to keep the project alive, but sadly it was inevitable due to the consequences.

I will explain.

Over the past year or so now, my personal life and career took a...detour to what I was aiming for, which left me in a state that left me pretty down and, dare I say it, suicidal. Just to let you know before I carry on, things have become a LOT better and things have picked up lately so “those” tendencies are gone. But why am I ending/indefinite postponing this project?
My confidence. With what happened to me and what I did to myself, I have lost confidence in my abilities as a leader of this project and a “game designer”. In my current state, I do not want to make a half-assed sub-sequel to a game I love, it wouldn’t be right for both you guys as fans of both the project and the original game, and me. This project has been a good on-and-off ride for me; I’ve worked with amazingly talented music and graphical artists who helped me 110%, always willing to help me when they had the time. As I write this, I still feel bad for postponing this project; it was something I worked on and designed for six years. Imagine; I was 15 when I first came up with this! Which kind of explains some of the mess with mapping, but I’ll come back to that near the end.

During my time on RMN, I have gathered a bit of knowledge from members here, got recognition for FFV-II and even met with a valued team member here. I will still try to be active and around, I’ll probably try and give a few reviews as well (I’ve always wanted to do a review for I’m Scared of Girls, heh), just don’t expect literary genius in my writing!

During the project, I read the comments that accumulated on the project page. The one that caught my eye was about the “messy” maps and strange event blocks. This was due to broken chipsets that we created ourselves years ago by using an emulator and time. What we didn’t have those years ago was the skill we have/had now. We were going to fix this, but as of this post, it will sadly not come to light, but I thank you for pointing it out and even offering your help.

Even though my confidence and faith in my abilities are temporarily shocked, expect some surprises sometime in the future.

If you have read all of this, I personally thank you for your time. I am down but not out!

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