Centuries ago, a magical plague known as the miasma appeared, which began to devour the surface of the world. Unable to restrain this scourge, the inhabitants of the surface used another form of magic to extract from the ground a giant island the size of a continent in order to dwell in the sky, where the miasma would never be able to reach them. But this celestial island wasn't big enough for everyone, and thousands were abandoned to the miasma...
Time passed. Through the fires of wars, a kingdom appeared on the flying continent, whose citizens had long forgotten the tragedy of the forced emigration of their ancestors but also the other one, even worse, of the people who stayed behind and had to face the miasma. And everyone lives as happily as possible in a human society.
But it is several years now that the flying continent seems to slowly sink into the Sea of Clouds upon which it is yet supposed to fly. And the nightmare of the miasma surfaces again in the collective memory...
Now, a hero has to go back to the surface below to find a way to revive the apparatus which allows the flying continent to remain above the clouds.
Characters:
- King Cirrus: the ruler of the kingdom of Arcadia and a quiet man who seems unable to choose any course of action to save his people, so his citizens begin to question his authority and the social order slowly but surely begins to crumble.
- Honorius: the previous commander of the royal guard, recently retired, who kept many friends in the army like if he wants to secure his rear; some say the King kept him closer to him than his own friends, like a monarch is supposed to do with his enemies...
- Alasran: the junior son of Honorius, he's ready to anything to prove his worth to his father; he'll volunteer to scout the surface and, unvoluntarily, will trigger the events which will plunge the flying continent into chaos...
- Vlue / V. M. of D. T. (Basic Autosave script)
- Soulpour777 (Gameover Commands script)
- Galv (Region Effects script)
- Modern algebra (Website Launch from Title script)
- PandaMaru (sitting cat sprite + wolves battlers)
- Matseb2611 (Death theme B-E.png tilesheet)
- Tasharene (stormy sky photo)
- SoundJay.com (footsteps sound effects)
- D. C. Kairi Sawler (Yawning Sunlight & A Time Forgotten music tracks)
- TheBrogrammer (Abandoned Base (Dungeon Theme) music track)
- Aaron Spencer (Seeking Loot music track)
- Incompetech.com (Take a Chance music track)
- unless mistaken, all other ressources used are by me and only me
Features:
- custom backgrounds, parallaxes and battle backs made with 3DS Max (see attached screenshots).
- magical mechas ^^
- heavily story driven game
- gameplay system is the default, official one for now; this may or may not change in the future, varying with the feedback I get...
Note:
This work is only a pre-alpha "proof of concept" prototype and presents nothing definitive at the moment. All critics, comments, suggestions, feedback will not only be considered but also greatly appreciated. Thanks.
Just a quick post to let you know that I've just updated the prototype with several modifications and tweaks which should address most of the points mentioned by different people who tested this pre-alpha: in particular, I've added the second part of the dungeon in the mountains which present very different troops/enemies but I also added several classes for the various characters – all of this makes the game less grindy and overally more enjoyable IMO.
Please, don't hesitate to tell me what you think of this overhaul
I've just released a second prototype to get feedback onto some new features and tweaks.
What's new:
- changed the default battle system for Yanfly's Ace Battle System
- added three maps and three scenes (you can know visit the town of Milius at the beginning of the game and see what happens to Alasran after his quest in the Iceland)
We come closer to the demo with this new release which adds six dungeons (well, one full size and two others split in two and three respectively, for a total of six areas to roam for some loot and XP) and two shops (I thought it was a better idea to let the player choose his items instead of providing them to him) plus a third, secret one.
There are also a few cosmetic and musical changes as well as a link included into the menu screen towards a devblog which has still to be opened, so no need to click on it for the moment... ^^
Download link is the same than previously, for a significantly heavier file (280 Mb): thanks for any input on this pre-demo
I've played a little under an hour, and here are my initial thoughts. Some of this was written as I played, some I've added to my notes afterwards.
I want to begin by saying that your maps are simply lovely. Very nice to look at, easy to navigate. But see my queries below about them.
In the town: I assume that the shop will have a background to it, and not just be a black screen? I can walk all over the chicken. It needs to be “same as character”. Nice having the cheaper trader tucked away on the side. It was an interesting map to walk around.
However, the forest illustrates one issue very clearly. It’s a big map, beautifully detailed – and I can’t go anywhere except along the narrow path. I cannot explore, and therefore can’t find anything for myself. It is simply a mechanism for getting me from point A to point B. As someone who enjoys exploration I found this a pity. And this can stand as a metaphor for the feel of the game as a whole. I don’t have to do anything except walk along and fight a few battles; everything is handed to me, I don’t have to work for anything, discover things for myself - apart from one small section. This reduces the interest factor considerably.
The only thing I have to do is to guess that healing poison is going to be a necessity, and buy accordingly in the town. Your player cannot know your game the way you do, and it is possible that some (many?) players won’t buy more than one or two, or maybe none at all. Once they get to Iceland, the contrepoison drops are less than the rate of infliction, so unless they have a good stock with them, it will be game over, as it is not possible to go back and get any. In effect, because of not being able to go back, if they want any they have to start the game all over again, unless they have a save in town. Without a doubt, this will result in some players dropping the game at this point. At the very least, I suggest that Adrian give some contrepoisons as well as potions.
Now, the first time that I can explore is the time when I cannot see where I’m going – not the happiest design choice. I’m being hammered by the encounter rate, and inflicted by poison constantly. If I explore then I shall have to fight more often than my supplies permit; if I don’t I shall never get out. Oh, and btw, you have forgotten to change the typo in the database, so Rat is still Rate.
At the end of the top horizontal path under the 2nd ray of light, there appears to be something (a blue something?) next to the skeleton, but I can’t interact with it. Walking over it a couple of times to see if I can means, of course, that I get another battle, so it’s an expensive mistake particularly as this time I’m constantly stunned. Although the individual rats don’t inflict huge HP damage, the cumulative effect of them getting, in effect, free turns, is that I lose a lot of HP. If that isn’t something that can be interacted with, I suggest you tweak the appearance a little.
What are the two blue pillars meant to do? If they are healing points they don’t work, if they are ornamental they look out of place, and I would have expected the party to make a comment about them. Oh, there’s another one, so they aren’t healing points.
Now I’m getting all party sleeping infliction, so more free turns for the enemy. I’m now taking big damage. And now it’s the bats and the whole party is blind. I’ve used all the medicinal herbs to cure poison, so this battle takes forever and I’ve lost a significant amount of HP overall. Now it’s the wolves, but Joseph has learnt Cleave, so I have high hopes. However, it deals around one third of an ordinary blow, i.e. 90 damage to each wolf compared to around 200 for a single ordinary attack, so it is counter productive to use it.
Seeing the blue entrance I guessed what was coming up, so used nearly all my remaining stock of potions to heal up. Good thing I did as the fire spirit deals around 250HP per blow. As both blows landed on the same character in the first round, that would have been death, and as I had nothing to revive a character, I think I would have been in serious trouble, probably game over. Which would have meant starting all over again for the same reasons as I gave for poison above. Wow, I do like the dragon graphic. I have now got to what I think is the stealth bit.
Things have become more interesting, but I do think you need to do something about the forest and Iceland to make them more interesting. I'm glad I persisted, because it is definitely picking up, but if I had just gone by the first 30 minutes of game play I might very well have walked away. I can see the logic of not permitting backtracking, but you then need to consider more how the player is to be healed up. As I mentioned above, the player cannot know your game the way you do, cannot know how long a dungeon will last, and so on. S/he cannot know what the money will be needed for, and so will not spend all of it on items. Even a small miscalculation could lead to game over. In the forest, I used several potions to heal up immediately before I changed map and met the soldier who took me to Adrian, where I got a free heal. I therefore had wasted those potions. I was very fortunate that I had stocked up on contrepoisons, but even so, I ran out before the boss battle and used all the medicinal whatever they were called, even though I'd also bought some.
Given the nature of these early battles, I wonder if ‘Vanish’ is the best skill to give to Sirius as his first one? It causes him to be less targeted for 5 turns. However, I need to get these battles finished as fast as possible because I can’t get back to heal up or get more supplies, poison drains my HP, and the encounter rate is high. 3 turns does it, so a skill lasting 5 turns is not really needed. As a player, I am very reluctant to give up a turn for an actor which would prolong the battle so I would take more damage, and all it would do is reduce TRG, not give him immunity.
Can I strongly urge you to work with a native English speaker on your dialogue. I'll put in a spoiler what I found just in the opening few minutes, and it was like this all the way through. In addition to the language issues, however, I think you need to be careful about the long blocks of dialogue that you give. One mechanism for breaking this up would be to use those linear paths to advantage. They have to pass over certain tiles; so call up common events where the 3 of them chat a bit, and information can be passed to the player that way. Having those bits of conversation would also help to make the earlier sections more interesting because between Adrian and the fire spirit not a word is spoken. As one of the party is unknown to the protagonist, you have an excuse for either of them to ask questions e.g. "Have you been a soldier long?" "No, only since the threat of insurgency got so big." This has given you a snippet of the back story without someone delivering a lecture about how insurgency is getting worse. Having characters tell each other what they already know is not interesting for the player, and is a very unnatural way for your characters to behave. And you can use these snippets for character development. For instance, in the example I just gave, if it's Alasran who says the bit about "No, only since..."
then Sirius, who knows him, could say "Ha, it was obvious since you were four years old that you'd be a soldier. Always marching around and giving orders to the chickens to fall in line!" So now we know a bit about Alasran's personality and his history. Just keep these snippets short.
And now for what I spotted in the first few minutes.
On the first scrolling text
“King Cirrus was listening the report” (listening to the report)
“All our studies bring the same conclusion” (studies come to the same conclusion)
Because crystal shards are plural, it reads better: “There are not enough…”
“maybe a pair of months” (a couple of months)
Next scene
“for making father proud of me” (to make father proud of me)
“to volunteer for this mission I hear about since the very first hour of the day”
(mission I have been hearing about since )
“Here is why, and you know it” (That is why)
“- not due to his family name” (- not because of his)
“If he wasn’t already tasked to keep watch of this peasants village in the north”
(If he wasn’t already tasked with keeping watch on that peasants’ village in the north.)
However, that isn’t really a complete sentence, as the “If” implies something else is needed. What I would do would be to turn it round and combine it with the previous sentence so it reads:
“If he hadn’t already been tasked with keeping watch on that peasants’ village, my firstborn would be far better suited to go on the mission than you.”
After gaining control:
Old woman talking (forgot to note her name)
“Thanks you” (Thank you)
“Celestia sinks into the Sea of Cloud since several years now and…”
(Celestia has been sinking into the Sea of Cloud for several years now)
“It is indeed preoccupying” (worrying)
This section feels like an info dump. Our hero knows these things, so why is she telling him in this way? Needs re-writing.
e.g. something along the lines of
"Celestia has been sinking into the Sea of Cloud for several years now and the king seems unable to do anything to protect us. I’m afraid that there will be a (another?) peasants’revolt if he doesn’t do something soon. And I’m not the only one who thinks that way!"
"Yes, it is worrying. My brother is Captain of the troop keeping an eye on that village to the north."
“Maybe I’ll benefit of the sun in my garden today” (technically this could just be changed to ‘benefit from the sun’, but I’d change it to Maybe I’ll enjoy the sun…)
Overall, I think this game has potential, and I will be interested to play updates. But I do think that dialogue and healing are two major issues you need to address.
Thank you very much for this detailed and insightful feedback: truly deeply appreciated, really
However, and despite all your thorough argumentation, there's one point that I must stress out before proceeding on replying further: for being a story teller above everything else, I am basically a tyrant; therefore, my game is not and will not become one of these "open world" (for lack of a better term) projects with plenty of side quests and other things which detract players from the main plot – in other words, you follow me or you don't: it's your choice, and if the latter I beg you to not play my game...
As for the rest of your comments – which, I can't say enough, are very welcome – I tried my best to adress most of them, such as:
- allowing the player to come back to Milius from the forest
- make Adrian provide two medicinal herbs with the healing potions
- reduce the frequency of encounters in the Iceland cave
- added characters comments in the middle of the forest and about the blue pillars (this last one in particular really is a neat idea)
Concerning the other points, it will not be possible to modify them, because of technical limitations on my side (making the forest explorable for example) or because I frankly disagree (for all sorts of reasons I will not go in details about).
There are also other considerations, such as the Vanish skill of Sirius, which I don't really feel like pondering on: I actually use every actor class as is, having modified only the rate they obtain new skills to make the game more enjoyable as soon as possible, and I don't wish to spend a lot of time and energy trying different things when it works well already – to be more precise, let's say that for my first game, I prefer to keep things simple and concentrate on the aspects I master the best, like the visuals...
I have immensely appreciated your feedback on the dialogs and used your lines almost as you provided them. On this point, it's not that I did not try to find some help but noone seemed to be willing to give some, so I had to do without this... Would you be interested into lending me a hand? I am willing to discuss a remuneration if needed.
Again, thank you very much for your feedback: this was a great help, really
Having just played this demo, I agree with most of kjsp17's points. The lack of exploration and shallow RTP combat is what heavily drags this game down. If all you want to do is tell a story with some visuals you're better off dropping the combat system altogether and just make a visual novel style of game. People who like the story then won't have to waste time sitting through boring combat encounters, and those who want a more RPG kind of experience will know to avoid your game.
Graphiquement parlant... à quand l'adaptation en tuiles pour le prochain module téléchargeable payant? Parceque... 3D ou pas, une fois rendu vous savez que ces parallaxes-là sont transformables en tuiles! ^^
Graphiquement parlant... à quand l'adaptation en tuiles pour le prochain module téléchargeable payant? Parceque... 3D ou pas, une fois rendu vous savez que ces parallaxes-là sont transformables en tuiles! ^^
They could be, yes, but with quite some work so I don't have any plans for this at the moment. Maybe later though, if I can find a not too much painful way to do the job...
A quick post to inform all of you that I will not update this thread any more. Everyone interested into following the development of this project can now do so here. Or you can send me your e-mail for me to keep you informed personnally.
Again, thanks to everyone who offered help, recommendations and constructive criticism: this has been greatly appreciated and you can be sure I'll do my best to implement each of your suggestions.
Ah, yeah: I had to use a password protected file because the antivir of someone kept on finding malicious software in the .exe; I probably forgot to update it – pass is cotcw IIRC. But it should be updated with the pre-demo soon, let's say in something like a week or so.
Dunno what's happening with Dropbox: maybe they need money ^^
Don't worry: you'll get something as soon as I'll release the demo, it'll be available from the devblog I'll open and there shouldn't be any quota thing – worst case scenario, I'll put it on Mega or something like that...
Yay, now back in action Happy Christmas time, coming back!
Back in action to develop the indie game that has been long overdue... Final Fallacy. A game that keeps on giving! The development never ends as the developer thinks to be the smart cookie by coming back and beginning by saying... "Oh bother, this indie game has been long overdue..." How could one resist such? No-one c
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