Game Questions

[lunarrosecrow]

Umm, I didn't know where to post this (as in category) so I'll place it here if I'm wrong moderators, please forgive me and change it so I'm not in the wrong thank you.

Now on to the questions, I am currently developing 2 games at the moment and was wondering if anyone could help with just some knowledge excuse me if these things are obvious I'm rather new to this I'll just give you a brief description of the game so you have a little bit of an idea of what I mean. One game is based on fighting games as a whole just in RPG format so think Street Fighter, Tekken, Etc, and the other is a more slice of life game where you play as a female trying to make way through college and life.

1) I don't know if this is possible but one of the classes for my game involving fighting games is a puppet class but I haven't been able to find anything remotely close to what I'm looking for is there a way to make some sort of weapon or character as a weapon that can be used as another asset. For better Clarity is it possible to give a weapon a health bar, Change weapons in battle via menu or based on attacks, and if either of those isn't possible is there a Puppet weapon or String weapon out that can somewhat look like it.

2) When it comes to changing Outfits I've seen this done in VX but not in MV is there an outfit changing system in place as in the form of events or is it a plugin that needs to be put in place.

3) Love systems, are there any love systems in place inside of MV or are there plugins you need to install to place a romance gauge and system in place for event results and dialogue choices.

4) Is there a way to put in place a calendar system as in a day by day countdown/Calendar system so that every day that passes and you can put in place holidays, events and things such as freedays and workdays? Let me explain so you go to sleep and its a new day where it would tell you the day of the month and how many days you have left till X, Y, and Z comes along.


I've been searching on the forums and I feel something as obvious as this would be around somewhere but I'm probably not looking in the right place is there a MV Skill Crafting and Item Crafting system somewhere around or has it not been made?

 

[Andar]

not everything is done by plugin or comes prefabricated.

especially your point 3&4 are usually done by events and variables, with you as the developer writing those events.
For example friendship systems are done by simply assigning variables to store the friendship value, then when the player does something special in the game you use control variable to increase or reduce friendship, and in the events you check the variable value with conditional branch for what to do.

any plugin for that you might find will rarely be more than a HUD plugin that displays those values somewhere, but it cannot make the meat of the system for you - that will always be done by commands you place in the events.

and that is why you don't find any prefabricated plugins for such things: they cannot replace your work as the developer. There are plugins that can assist, but those are for general functions like display HUDs or so, so they won't answer to specific terms like you probably searched.

 

[Hyouryuu-Na]

I have close to no knowledge about battle related stuff so can't help with no. 1
2. You can change outfits using the change character image command. If you're talking about changing appearance based on equipment and weapon, you'll need a plugin for that. Something like this http://sumrndm.site/dynamic-actors/
3. You can easily event a system like this. The love point or whatever is just a variable value which increases or decreases based on interaction. So you'll need to make a gauge/meter to visualize the variable value. I like to use this plugin for HUDs and gauges: https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?threads/orange-hud.47186/
4. You can create a simple time system by using variables and switchhes alone. But you may need a plugin if it becomes too complex... Hmm, I don't think you'll need a plugin for this. But if you must, there's one for the holiday part https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?threads/cgmv-holidays.125489/

 

[Celestrium]

@Hyouryuu-Na has made some of the same suggestions and I would look into those.

1. There are summon plug-ins that can do what you want to do I think, you should investigate into those. SRDude has a plugin for summoning. Olivia has a change weapon plug-in as part of her Octopack system, but it affects all actors and is difficult to combine in systems outside of it. Combining it with Yanfly's Weapon Unleash and making animations using character sprites would work...just might break all other battle mechanics you had for all your other actors.

2. I would use @Hyouryuu-Na 's suggestion, or HudMaker combined with some menus.

3. Relationships have so many plug-ins! @Andar is right, just treat them like variables and you can event and do everything yourself. I am not familiar with @Hyouryuu-Na 's suggestion but Hudell whom makes it is an excellent plug-in creator, Frogboy was the creator that came to mind for me. You can use any plug-in that manages variables into a nice display pretty much, and combine with a HUDMaker and it can look awesome.

4. I feel time systems can get really complex. Hudell used to have the Orange Time System, Moghunter has one (use google translate if you can't read the language), Galv I think has one, and Caspar Gaming has his Holidays (mentioned by @Hyouryuu-Na. If you wanted to use real time, Atelier Irina has a real time plug-in (Part of her Animal Crossing Plug-In Inspirations).

I hope this helps and gets you on track to what you need! Google and look on youtube for the relationship system and time system. There are plenty of people with tutorials, Driftwood Gaming has tutorials on both!

 

[lunarrosecrow]

Well also to add to the 4th its a system that would be different from a simple one and it's extremely large as it will have to cover over 532 in-game days that have many different events something that large I figured would really mess with the size and coding of the game so I asked for a plugin.

I've also figured out from people messaging me that 1. is rather hard cause I tried and it breaks the battle system completely.

as for 2 and 3 thanks guys, these work well now I need to find a complex crafting system.

However, I have 1 more question.


Say you wanted to make a crafting system or recruiting system for large scale armies and crafting for large scale buildings such as castles and things on the level of Lord Of The Rings Helms Deep structures and armies. How does this affect the game in the long run if it was to make something of this scale is it possible without making the game into a 5 GB nightmare

 

[Andar]

it's extremely large as it will have to cover over 532 in-game days that have many different events something that large I figured would really mess with the size and coding of the game so I asked for a plugin.

Plugins are not miracle workers, and this is one of the points where things could be decided either way.

The problem is data input. No plugin can read your mind, so whatever data you need in the game has to be placed there by yourself. The difference is if it would be better to place that data by events or by plugin, and that requires a bit more planning than "that is a lot of work, a plugin make that work miraculously disappear" ;-)

The same goes for any other system has requires a lot of data, be it crafting recipes, many actors or whatever.
IF you can think of a structured way to place that data, THEN a plugin might be the better way.
If the plugin would end up with a long sequence of "if day n, then do that", those sequences would be better as events because then you would be able to change them yourself instead of going into javascript code.

As for your last question: it all depends on how it is done. Mega-castles are just large maps. Can be done, but is a lot of work - try to make a small castle map first, then you can better think on planning what to include.
And large scale combat can easily be simulated by grouping people together, but having every soldier be their own enemy or event will become very tedious for a player. It is fun to watch armies clash on the screen, but it is not fun to wade through a thousand enemy event battles to get the game on to the next chapter.

 

[Celestrium]

Suggestions from my experience...
A large castle can still be broken down into individual rooms and sections. Doing so makes events much easier. It's as @Ander said, it's just a large structure, but making it one large map places strain on the system sometimes and issues with tracking things, especially with timed events.
Also, does all 500ish days going to be unique? I made a game that I evented 12 hours in a hotel for 16 people, and that was difficult. You have to make each character constantly doing something, and you have to transition them from one event to the next or the game gets choppy. It's all about how many things you want people to do, and how much detail you want to place.

You said you were developing two games right? Are you doing them by yourself? The game characteristics above are very ambitious, and will take a long time to complete, with lots and lots of test play. Yanfly offered some advice to beginning developers and that was to take your project to a skateboard, to a scooter, to the car. My advice to you is to get a skeleton structure of your game of what's truly vital, and get from beginning to end. I would then start adding the details. My biggest mistake first starting as a developer, wanting to do it all. It bogs down the game and the player experience suffered. Sure there are games that benefit from lots of content, but it has to be high quality content and not always.

For instance, your summoner class. One character would break your battle system. Could you do the summoner class with dolls or spirits as weapons? Equip the spirit the summoner was going to use, and then use a Weapons Animation plug in to display the different ones? You could also create different animations and create different skills that have those effects (Make the summoned creature or spirit not replace the actor, but graphically be part of the animation and the skill, and make it so that the skills are only available when the spirit or whatever is equipped). Depends on what you envision...

There are plenty of great crafting systems for MV, it's all about how you put it together.

It sounds like you have a good project idea. Just work on making the main idea work well and be fun and add to it as you go. What sort of art and music style have you chosen? I look forward to hearing how your project progresses.