Question about RTP in my commercial project.

[thejuice26]

I am beginning the development of my first RPG, a Steampunk Western set in a post-apocalyptic world.

I have purchased some assets and intend to do most of the character artwork myself, but there are some tiles and music that I would like to use in addition to the custom/purchased stuff. My question to the community (the first of many) is whether it is frowned upon to use some of the existing RTP tilesets and music in my game?

Thanks.

 

[ATT_Turan]

I would suggest you simply make your game.

A few things you might realize:
1 - The "community" here is, for the vast majority, not a part of your potential consumer base. So, ultimately, our opinions have little sway over whether anyone purchases your end game.

2 - There are commercially successful games using, to varying degrees, the RTP. There are well-received free games using the RTP. Relatively few people have the funds, artistic talent, or time to entirely create all of the artwork, sound effects, and music for their game. That's why professional studios have large teams of people. So even if you get people telling you "teh RTP is evul!" what's the alternative? You use what you can.

Good luck with your project!

 

[ShadowDragon]

RTP on it's own can be nice to start your first game, and some use only RTP
with nice lightning effect on them.

it's more how you present the maps and game using RTP as there are some
very good looking using RTP as well as ugly maps and game using RTP.

you could also use RTP as placeholders, and replace it later with your own
or bought tilesets or free ones around the web.

I use RTP as placeholders as well for combining it with other RTP and paid
for more unique tileset.

 

[thejuice26]

I would suggest you simply make your game.

A few things you might realize:
1 - The "community" here is, for the vast majority, not a part of your potential consumer base. So, ultimately, our opinions have little sway over whether anyone purchases your end game.

2 - There are commercially successful games using, to varying degrees, the RTP. There are well-received free games using the RTP. Relatively few people have the funds, artistic talent, or time to entirely create all of the artwork, sound effects, and music for their game. That's why professional studios have large teams of people. So even if you get people telling you "teh RTP is evul!" what's the alternative? You use what you can.

Good luck with your project!

Thank you!

I will say this. I'm not here to find a consumer base. I just want feedback. I made a mod for Shadowrun Dragonfall that took me the better part of a decade to complete. I found that over time the mod became better and better based on the feedback (and constructive criticism) of people within the Shadowrun community.

That's what I'm looking for: feedback from the RPG Maker community

I appreciate your response and I will be here asking a lot of questions, lol.

RTP on it's own can be nice to start your first game, and some use only RTP
with nice lightning effect on them.

it's more how you present the maps and game using RTP as there are some
very good looking using RTP as well as ugly maps and game using RTP.

you could also use RTP as placeholders, and replace it later with your own
or bought tilesets or free ones around the web.

I use RTP as placeholders as well for combining it with other RTP and paid
for more unique tileset.

Thanks for the response. I appreciate the feedback. I like the idea of using the RTP as placeholder graphics. It allows me to become more familiar with the editor. I'm not expecting to finish this game anytime soon, so it's definitely the approach I will be using going forward.

 

[dennis_the_tennis]

As someone who just released a game that uses (mostly) freely available graphical assets, a small number of which are RTP, here's my advice:

1) Make sure your game looks visually coherent, whether or not it has custom assets. Use image editing software to do things like change saturation, apply filters, etc. to make your different assets blend well together.

2) Don't make them the focus of your game. If you're using freeware assets, then you can't use the visuals of your game as a major selling point.

That said, what ATT_Turan said about the customer base being different from the RPG Maker community is very true. Most people won't notice if one of your battle backgrounds uses the default "sky" parallax from MV, or if some of your battlers are from Aekashic's free library. But they WILL notice if your game looks cheap, or clumsily assembled from parts that don't work together.

 

[thejuice26]

Thank you for the awesome response. I am in no rush to complete this game. I spent 8 years working on my last game and did it as a hobby. I expect the same thing here. I fully intend to spend a lot of time making sure the assets I introduce all look the same (art-wise).

 

[Bernkastelwitch]

For most people, their only choice for working on a game is either use RTP or don't make the game at all. There's people who genuinely believe replacing the RTP should be the very first thing to do when IMO, it should be the last thing to do if it's even possible because making the game itself is all that matters.

Some people don't have the skills or money or just plain bad luck getting an art or commissions. So just make it normally and not worry about it.

 

[123edc]

replacing it last is often not realy possible ...

when you already created all youre maps, to look good within youre setting ... you can't just swipswap around all the tiles and expect a good outcome

but i do agree with you, making the game comes first ...
you should at least understand the engine, it's assets, what you can (and can not) do with it ... before you choose to buy (or not buy) additional stuff

 

[Avery]

Good RTP (especially with some of the most common edits like round cliffs, larger doors, some neat clumpings etc.) is always better than aweful custom work (not trying to call anyone out here, just a basic statement).
A fully own graphicstyle is only possible if you a) have a SUPER high budget or b) can make it on your own. Otherwise a solid base (it doesn't have to be the RTP, it could be the LPC if you go for 32x32 tiles or maybe the Ancient Dungeon Style or a Retro style...) is your best bet, because recolors and edits are so much quicker to make.
RTP is the most versatile one and probably the only one where free requests are commonly successful - as they could be used by many people, so if you quit your game, the tile/char/whatever might still be used.

For Steampunk there are nice tiles in the Trinity Pack (if you don't already have it), but there are also neat tiles by NuraRay (if you own MV) that will along with the resources by some other artists will give you a very solid base to build upon. And as you can see in Nura's Screens - they look good. It doesn't matter that they are RTP, they give good results and that is what counts.

The screenshot below is RTP, just edited. All freely avaiable resources.

 

[knightron]

I am beginning the development of my first RPG, a Steampunk Western set in a post-apocalyptic world.

I have purchased some assets and intend to do most of the character artwork myself, but there are some tiles and music that I would like to use in addition to the custom/purchased stuff. My question to the community (the first of many) is whether it is frowned upon to use some of the existing RTP tilesets and music in my game?

Thanks.

There is nothing wrong with using RTP, especially if you're only using some of it.
The problem with the RTP is that many lazy or simply inexperienced game makers use it exclusively without changing defaults and then make bad games with too. This leaves a bad taste for RTP in the consumers mouth and they tend to associate RTP with bad games.

If you put in the effort then your game will still stand out, take a look at To The Moon for example which predominantly uses RMXP RTP.

I suggest looking at your game subjectively however and if there's something that you dislike, change it. For me personally, I dislike the RTP sprites beyond RMXP which is why I choose to use alternatives. I haven't changed the rest of the RTP however.

 

[thejuice26]

Good RTP (especially with some of the most common edits like round cliffs, larger doors, some neat clumpings etc.) is always better than aweful custom work (not trying to call anyone out here, just a basic statement).
A fully own graphicstyle is only possible if you a) have a SUPER high budget or b) can make it on your own. Otherwise a solid base (it doesn't have to be the RTP, it could be the LPC if you go for 32x32 tiles or maybe the Ancient Dungeon Style or a Retro style...) is your best bet, because recolors and edits are so much quicker to make.
RTP is the most versatile one and probably the only one where free requests are commonly successful - as they could be used by many people, so if you quit your game, the tile/char/whatever might still be used.

For Steampunk there are nice tiles in the Trinity Pack (if you don't already have it), but there are also neat tiles by NuraRay (if you own MV) that will along with the resources by some other artists will give you a very solid base to build upon. And as you can see in Nura's Screens - they look good. It doesn't matter that they are RTP, they give good results and that is what counts.

The screenshot below is RTP, just edited. All freely available resources.
View attachment 247397

Wow! That's honestly really cool! How did you get the rounded shape of the rocks and beach?