Let's discuss beta versions of our games!

[dreamfall887]

Hello everyone!

I love looking at concept art, unused audio and beta versions of games I love. I find it interesting to see the development and how even talented big names in the industry like Nintendo design their games. I thought it would be fun to share beta versions of our games. I'll go first. My game is called Souls & Sorcery. It's about a group of friends going on quest to defeat an evil prince. It is inspired by Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest and Atelier.

It was originally going to be a magical girl game inspired by Ni no Kuni and Magic Knight Rayearth. The game would have the party go to the real world and the fantasy world. I scrapped this idea because it was too much work for my first game. I also found brainstorming ideas for the fantasy world more interesting than the real world.

Here are some unused sprites and faces from that version of Souls and Sorcery.

Spoiler: Unused Casual Clothes and School Uniform Sprites & Faces

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[KakonComp]

This is a very interesting topic, also allows people who rarely go beyond the design stage to still share something with the class.
I really like a game that can go between settings like that; with MZ being the isekai maker, more games in that style may pop up

I've been doing game design for a while, but it was moreso to make systems for other people's games, and only one was a RPG Maker game. I can't find it online anymore, but it was called Fields of Eden, about a dude named Frederick who is forced by his boss to take an occult-like trial under the guise of a murder case.

At least, that's how it started. I honestly only made and tested the battles for it, and the person I worked with on it fell off the face of the Earth after I finished up the final boss battle. I did some digging and found an old image showcasing part of the battle system:

Spoiler

Cards would pop up on both sides, which was calculated along with the character and enemy's base stats. Skills could add another card to attack/defend with, and could also take a card away when attacking/defending. Its inspired by a game for the PSX called Battle Hunter, with a few tweaks and additions that I thought would have been cool.

I'm pretty sure it was actually finished, but even though I can find stuff about it, no download currently exists as far as I'm aware.

It's cool in current year that I'm making a RPG Maker game all by my lonesome, learning how annoying mapping can be, for an example that plagues many who have little experience with it.

 

[TheTitan99]

An old, old game idea that never left the early stages of development was a game about crashlanding on a planet, and trying to escape. It was a story driven game, but the story was more about character choices. I... don't remember if there was any plan for combat or not, to be honest.

As such, the "beta" was me mapping out all the potential story paths that you could go down. I quickly became overwhelmed by it all! Like, I was writing not 1, but 100 different games! I didn't want the choices to be superficial, the entire story had to change.

That was an early "build" that went nowhere. Is it even a beta if it never left literal paper?

The idea was restructured into a different game. Still about crashlanding, but the main focus was different. It was less about character choice in terms of story, but instead character choice in terms of survival. The idea had become something else entirely. That game also fell through, but some actual time and work went into it.

The main gimmick of the combat of the remade version was that you had 5 party members, but the 5th member was the "leader". The main 4 party members played like how any normal JRPG team would, taking turns hitting stuff, but the Leader was unbound to turns. Instead, you had the ability to boost your teammates in real time. So, Press "Q" at any point in time, and for a tiny window of time, all damage is 1.5 times higher. I was shocked that I actually got this to work!

I... never felt it was that fun, though. Haha, spent all that time hacking into the engine a sort of real time combat, but never really actually liked it!

This is why Betas and Minimum Viable Products are so important! You get to see if these ideas are any good before you start to invest months and years into them.

 

[AfroKat]

One I had was a virtual world that had a huge bug in it. So the creator sent his Strike Team to handle it. And of course they could only do that in the virtual world. So you make your own party and choose classes etc etc etc. Towards the end you realize the "bug" was the creators son inside the game changing everything. After the end of the game it's revealed it's not a virtual world at all. Entering the game just warps your mind into a human-esq robot on a different planet that's in medieval times. And that the son was trying to reveal this secret to the real world by doing... Stuff.

 

[Rubescen]

This thread is a great idea. Always fun to take a trip down memory lane. I just looked through my early stuff for Opal -- there's a lot of rough art that saw serious iterations and some that I'm not sure why I never polished/used.

I scrapped this idea

Similarly I recalled that my early plot hook was completely different. I even made an image for a letter to show. Forgot about that. Looking at my early notes there were a lot of different ideas in the earliest version.

In any case, I pulled some of my old concept art together (with a few comparisons to where it ended up) for fun. Check it out:

Spoiler: OPAL Concept Art

I quickly became overwhelmed by it all!

And seriously, choice based games are hard work (and multiple possibilities mean a lot of bug hunting too!). I swear I'm never gonna do a "your choices matter" game again. The problem is this is exactly the type of game I most want to play! haha