Questions before I might commit to using RPG Maker MV

[Tectus]

Hi. I hope you are doing fine. I hope that you are able to properly advise me.

I had a plan for a game and was already busy with it. Because of circumstances I had to set it aside for a while. Now I am doing research on how to best proceed, when the time is right to actually go at it once more.

The game was not exactly an RPG in the normal or typical sense, but rather among other things a kind of adventure game and shooter with RPG elements (story, e.g.). The graphics were going to be in 3d, but 2d should work just fine. I had not so much planned RPG elements in the typical sense, but I suppose they would work out.

So the first question is this: how easy would it be to bend RPG Maker MV to one's will using Javascript? The RPG elements, that can be used directly with RPG Maker may stay to some extent, but I want a character that is fully controllable, as if in an action game, that interacts directly with other things including enemies. There may not be (static) turn-based battles at all.

A second question, as I have not seen any indication of it anywhere after looking, might be this: is there an animation editor in RPG Maker MV? It is of course helpful to have many tools in one place. I saw that Spriter Pro might be the thing I am looking for, which one could easily use with RPG Maker MV.

A third question is this: how easy would it be to include multiple languages? Is there for example a kind of Excel table file to be used for this? I did see something about a Database option or some such thing in some thread. Or must I have workarounds which will cost me more time?

A fourth question: how stable is RPG Maker MV as software?

Question five: how efficient are the produced games in terms of automated optimization?

Question six: are used assets for the final product so processed that they are difficult to reverse?

Question seven: how good is the character creator? (Is there much room to tweak and get something original?)

I have already looked at other engines and what the game would be like: maybe RPG Maker MV or any previous version of it is not what I seek, or I turn it into an RPG with quicker, though still serious, results. I think another engine might be better for me, but I like some of the ease that RPG Maker MV would give me. I think that I could turn some things into something more fitting an RPG, but I would still need to have realtime battles and control.


Thanks for the help.

 

[Andar]

1) the engine is completely open and anything can be change in it, even the plugin system is intended to make replacing engine parts easy.
That said there is a big hurdle due to the fact that there is only limited documentation on the engine's code, and you'll have to learn most of that by experimenting yourself.
However there are a lot of plugin writers that have already done this and that are willing to answer questions about the engines code on this forum.

2) you have an animation tab in the database that can be used to create animations from pre-existing picture frames, and you can add new pitures to that - but those pictures have to be created by an image program outside of RM, the animation programming in the database is just to coordinate and time effects and sounds and picture-frames.

3) not possible by default, but there are already several plugins to add multilanguage-capacity to the engine.
However because they are plugins, the different languages have to be added from outside the editor (usually textfiles) and it is easier to do if you select one such plugin before starting game development.

4) very stable as long as you accept a few quirks.
The biggest problem is that due to the way the editor handles its file, it is a very bad idea to work inside a cloudsynced folder. You need to do your backups manually without automatic syncing, but if you follow that rule then the editor is extremely stable.
However if you mix plugins you'll have to check for their compatibility yourself.

5) depends on what exactly you mean.
updates will not be automatic unless you place the game on a website, but as said the entire code is free and can be modified

6) not automatically
there is an optional encryption but it is not a strong one.
that said, you can use third-party-wrappers to increase asset security if you need, and then it depends completely on what third-party-software you use.
However, there is no perfect protection anywhere, even AAA-Companies that spend millions on protection get their games hacked sooner or later.

7) the character generator of MV is the best so far (much better than the previous Ace version) and you can add new images to it, but remember that it is a 2D-based generator. That creates some limitations to what images can be made to fit the existing generator parts.
Check the website shop (links top of the forum), there have been some additions to the character generator (like the kids part or the beastmen-parts) that should be able to give you an impression on what the generator can do.

 

[Tectus]

Thanks, Andar, for your thorough response.

1: Is there an example of a game made with RPG Maker MV drastically using Javascript such that it has realtime battle?

5: By point 5 I mean the performance of the compiled executables.

7: I will have to check that out.

 

[Andar]

1) what kind of real-time battles? there are several battlesystems that all work in real-time but are extremely different to each other, that is why "real-time" is a useless distinction here.
you could have an ABS (action battle system on map) or an ATB system (active time battle on battlescreen) or several otherts

5) there ae no compiled executables at all, the RMMV engine is HTML5-based and interpreted javascript

 

[Tectus]

1) what kind of real-time battles? there are several battlesystems that all work in real-time but are extremely different to each other, that is why "real-time" is a useless distinction here.
you could have an ABS (action battle system on map) or an ATB system (active time battle on battlescreen) or several otherts

Like what I described in the first post:

. . . but I want a character that is fully controllable, as if in an action game, that interacts directly with other things including enemies. There may not be (static) turn-based battles at all.

About point 5: I was under the impression that final executables could be produced for Windows, and there is also the so-called YoYo compiler.

 

[Andar]

but as said above, even that description is not enough - ATB (active time battle) has no static turns either, but it is in a battlescreen. ABS (Action battle system) fights on the map. And nothing you said in either case determines if you want to fight on the map or on a battlescreen.

The "executables" are nothing but browsers running the javascript code.