The Story:At first sight Etched is a very simple story, two good friends want to explore an old series of caves that exist at the edge of a forest near where they live. A rite of passage for their generation, visiting the caves brings with it both excitement and fear as the stories behind the caves are as old as time itself. Most consider these stories urban legends, stories passed from one person to another as a way to liven up what could be dull lives with the mysterious. What really lies in the caves however, that is yet to be discovered…
Gameplay:Etched trades traditional RPG mechanics for puzzles and live action battles. As you explore the caves you will be crossed with challenges that test both your mind and your dexterity. While there are no conventional “RPG fights” you will find plenty of danger, and a dynamic on character health-system will give you that same feeling of suspense without a minute of level grinding.
Characters:Poe: The more levelheaded of the two-man group, doesn’t like danger, and was somewhat coerced by his friend to go on this journey through peer pressure. While he isn’t very dexterous he is more than capable of solving situations with his mind as opposed to his brawn.
Bishop: An adventure seeking type of person, who may not be the most quick witted, but is up for a good challenge. Was the first to hear about the caves and convinces Poe to check them out. While he may not believe the stories, he never misses the chance to over hype things to make them sound cooler than they actually are.
Features:- Hand drawn artwork helps move the story in special places throughout the game.
- A dynamic “Minis” system that allows a higher level of interaction with objects on the map. These pictures appear like text but instead show varying objects to give you a better idea of the atmosphere that surrounds you.
- A health system that avoids implementing a GUI and instead shows the health on your character itself when you take damage. This allows damage to be taken on the map in an interactive manner, without forcing you to move your eyes off the action.
- Boss battles that occur in real time and force you to use both your brains and brawn.
- An ingredient mixing system that dynamically allows you to create important items as well as bonus items that can help you at different points of the game.
- Several custom musical pieces that bring a higher level of immersion into the cave atmosphere.
Screenshots:Download:http://www.mediafire.com/?9soepu7cyv2egh8 (You will need the RPG Maker VX RTP, as well as WinRAR to unzip the file.)
(Also note that there is some foul language in this game, if you are easily offended you may want to skip over some of the text.)
Credits:Everything you see in the game that is outside of the VX/XP RTP was made in house by our three man team. This includes the custom art, custom music, and custom scripts.
A Note From The Team:Since we are very new on these forums as of the time of this post, we would like to assure everyone that this is not a post and run kind of situation. If you would like to read more about the motivations behind this and other projects we will be developing, we would appreciate if you looked at our welcome post here:
http://rmrk.net/index.php/topic,46896.0.htmlAlso, while the game has been beta tested to death, errors could always occur, feel free to post any errors you find here and we will correct them ASAP. If you have any questions, or just can't figure out one of the puzzles, we will be happy to answer by email or PM. Thanks for taking the time to look!
<The Team>