Shattered Hourglass - Over 40 hours of gameplay

[sawworm]

Hello there! Shattered Hourglass is a huge time travel RPG I'm working on since 2012, well at least time to time. It's inspired by many popular titles I grew up with such as Breath of Fire, Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, Suikoden and of course Chrono Trigger!

It's now available on Steam!

SCREENSHOTS:

Spoiler

CREDITS:

Spoiler

Tileset:
Celianna
Enterbrain

Sprites:

ryz32 (Zulwhern's Battler)
heyixin0122 (Suan's Portrait)
Daniel Velez (Ion's Battler)
Paladin-Cleric of Awesome (Some Edited Battlers)
LunAtic DragOn (Many Dragon Battlers)
yutori-custom (???'s Battler)
bennyzien (One Female Arena Battler)

Music:

Aaron Krogh
Darren Curtis
Davey Brite RPG
David Vitas
Jasmine Cooper
Joel Steudler
Marcel Scheitza
Sonorode
Tungerman

Scripts:

ESTRIOLE: Variable Shop (Arena)
Zeus81: Fullscreen++
Yanfly: For almost every script
Kread-EX: Vampire State
Seiryuki: Categorised Menu
Rbahamut: Exp gauges
LUSHI: For deleting my map names
Cremno: For Screenshot button
TDS: For Pause button
Tsukihime: Some small and useful scripts
XaiL: History Book (Notes)
MOG: Music Box, Battle Combo and Map Name script
Modern Algebra: Quest Journal
Casper667: Bestiary/Identify Book
Wyrelade: Title Menu
Regendo: Game Over Screen

Special thanks to:

bigtime (grammar fixes through 2012-2013)

DOWNLOAD:
http://rpgmaker.net/games/3996/

Let's Play Videos:heccallan's Let's Play series

 

[shiori4me]

I don't know what music is from where and I don't know what to credit. Whereas me, I'd put like

"Miniboss Battle [shrine Chaos 2].mp3" or something for a song

and "dog2 [marcus_500].png" for a graphic.

Is any music on this game custom?

 

[sawworm]

No, all songs are from other games and some artists, I gave the credits to the companies and sprite artist.

To be honest, I forgot 1/4 of my original track names because of piano event I did, where you can play all tracks in game.

The credits are totally accurate (at least on my rpgmaker.net credits page is pretty updated).

 

[shiori4me]

Yeah, that's what I mean, like, I got better at crediting and when I download something or whatever I just say what it is or who it's from on the file

 

[shiori4me]

So, I'm almost 5 hours into this game, and I feel like there hasn't been as much of a time aspect as much as it's been fighting. There are some decisions, but they go by very quickly and seem to have less effort done in making them powerful moments. And so far I don't know how these moments affect the story. I mean, there was a girl that got frozen, and I decided not to help her, I took a letter to the owner near that pyramid place, and there's a man who I tricked into getting eaten by a spider.

And there are some few moments where the characters know more than I do, like, they know that the bridge is broken and that things seem to lead to say that that armored guy is in the tower on that icy island to the west, without me as the player experiencing it myself.

I do like the combat system though, as you have to watch your turns and see what's best to use at that moment. Whether you raise member's DEF to x2 really quickly, or wait for their x1 DEF buff to almost run out then boost it again, and who should heal who and using what. 

So I feel like it's not as much Shattered Hourglass so far as it is Shattered Bosses. Heheh.

The strategy lies in the timing.

With such a title, one would expect that this game would be heavily story-oriented.

But that can work in either a good or a bad way. You can spend your time working on complex stories and relations, but then if it ends up being uninteresting to people, then they'd want to skip it and go to the battles.

I like the Item Bag feature. You have to decide what tinkers are best for the characters.

On changing equipment in battle, I'm not for sure if that would be an important touch or not. Battles don't really change up the situations mid-fight. Except for bosses changing their strategies a tad bit at points. So it's more about surviving during battle and not about working against strategies or situations. Hence why the main character can heal and use supportive moves.

I look forward to progressing in this game.

 

[sawworm]

First Chapter starts very slow and your early actions in karma will change the party members, story, dialogues and ending.

The decisions you make are optional like saving the frozen girl or saving the miners. You can skip them if you want but you'll end up getting early bad ending if you do so.

Story expands and explains itself as you progress into Chapter II. Plot goal is going to be more clear but you are totally right about "Shattered Bosses", I always loved Boss Battles in RPG Games, so it ended up like that.

I tried Equipment change command in battles before, I can't say it's a good thing for my game since there are a lot MAX HP boost items you can easily exploit game mechanics.

 

[shiori4me]

Yeah I'm on the beginning of the 2nd chapter but I was tired and didn't feel like progressing through the volcano just yet.

I liked how that girl talks to a wall and tells you to leave her alone and appologizes to it.

What level am I supposed to be at?

I know you just wing it but I'm just curious. 

I try to grind so that I'm okay.

 

[Endafy]

This is very well done! I am loving it. Chapter 3 ... and im still rivited!

 

[sawworm]

Yeah I'm on the beginning of the 2nd chapter but I was tired and didn't feel like progressing through the volcano just yet.

I liked how that girl talks to a wall and tells you to leave her alone and appologizes to it.

What level am I supposed to be at?

I know you just wing it but I'm just curious. 

I try to grind so that I'm okay.

I don't think you need to grind in any part of the game, if you have right equipment everything is piece of cake, but boss battles takes quite time without knowing boss weaknesses.

This is very well done! I am loving it. Chapter 3 ... and im still rivited!

Thank you very much!

 

[shiori4me]

Even with the right equipment and weaknesses, I feel there is a little grinding needed or else even with the 2 DEF or MDF buffs your characters will still be healed slower than they will die and deal damage. The main character cannot equip that piece that helps with DEF and if he uses magic then he'll miss out on getting to buff or heal and that soldier girl is good for resistance but only gets powerful later on, whereas Treehop is strong but I suppose doesn't get any power moves or ATK/MAT buffs until later on. 

 

[CharRedBaron]

Played a little bit of your game. I like the way you implemented things. Good job

 

[sawworm]

Hello! I've come with the another content update after months...

Changelog:

Spoiler

Map Changes:

 

-Completely New Intro

-Re designed final map

-Some new routes to Ice Queen's dungeon

-A new underground map in starting forest that goes to your first boss battle

-Dark Tunnel is now bigger and better! Also got a new NPC that sells unique armors

-A new Inn between Haunted Forest and Dark Tunnel

 

Items:

 

-Mega Mushrooms are giving %5 bonus instead of 4

-Corrupted Bandits and Green shagins now drops "Broken Tablet I"

-Dark Fox now drops "Broken Tablet II"

-Hammer Staff named as "Magical Hammer" and now it's a "hammer" for Duran's early Hammer mastery

-Seran Shop now sells "Mastery Suit" which is an amazing suit that boost attacks!

-You can get "Spectral" weapons from Chronix and next shops

-Chronix's Health Cap collector now collects "Radar" and "Black Belt", make sure you have them!

 

Character and Skill Changes:

 

-Hiban now starts with "Yellow Belt" instead of "Black Belt"

-Hiban's main weapon now "Spectral", with this change Hiban is now a magic caster

-Hiban's main armor is heavy now

-To get Hiban's "Focus" skill just talk to Clown in Chronix, you'll automatically get the new skill

-Berserker Class now learns 3 "Rage" skills that makes the user uncontrollable berserker

-Assassin's Edge now can poison and blind an enemy

-Gambler now can learn "Gamble Self Heal"

-Hybrid Monk now deals %50 more magic damage

-Defending recovers %1 HP AND MP

-Black Serum item now removes all allies' debuffs

-Skills with the "BOMB" item now deals 1500 instead of 500. Healing Bomb now heals 1k

-Glacia's skills are now super annoying! Have fun!

 

[sawworm]

Hello there! It's been a while not touching or editing here, so I did it after 4 years! I really want to write a changelog for it... but I know it's impossible and nobody would read a wall of text longer than my life's story.

First of all I'm still working on my game even after finishing the main story completely. Instead of creating something like Shattered Hourglass 2, I'm making an expansion to where you can continue your game even after the ending credits, also creating new areas on old maps! I think every game needs post-game content where you can experience your accomplishments while playing the game, so I'm trying to create that AND THIS IS TAKING WAY TOO LONG!

Finally, my game got matured as with my age, so many things got changed and removed with it. If you've played my game years ago I'm super sure you'll get my point and I hope you enjoy the new Shattered Hourglass

Take care

 

[dnel57]

Played this quite a while ago.
More to it, now?
Expansion?
I'm on it!

 

[dnel57]

Seem to be missing something.

Can't open the doors in ice dungeon(where you get the Mighty Pencil).
Says doors fused to walls??

Also, I have the Tower Key, but, still can't release the person locked up.
I have defeated the Succubus.
He just keeps saying "Please be hurry!"


Are passwords supposed to be upper or lower case? I thought for sure I had one right,but, it didn't work. Solved

 

[sawworm]

Hello there, dnel57! One of the expansion areas is about 65/100 finished (the underwater map). I still need to add some stuff to it~ There are many planned areas for Shattered Hourglass. I just finished the pre post-game for the good ending :') I better start making Bad/Neutral ending pre post-game content, so much lore will be there :~D Ahhh, I have a lot to do!

Also, I'm glad that your issues are solved!

 

[Kojagiri]

Overall, great game. I reached out to sawworm on FB when I was stuck and was able to pull through.

Some minor improvements - but from the looks of it those are coming along as post-game enhancements. I look forward to playing the next version!

 

[sawworm]

Thanks, Kojagiri!

New updates are coming fast as possible. All I have to add post-game dungeons right now. I'm very relieved.

 

[granny steph]

Hi. I am stuck in the cave to the west area from the ice section. I have Esther in the party (hunter) looking for her husband that was killed. I cannot work out the coloured crystals puzzle. please can you help?

Also, how do you open the silver box (puzzler no. 2) please. Cant seem to activate the button on the floor.

 

[dnel57]

If you are in the wolf cave, trial and error worked for me.
Just remember the ones you try as you go.
Some bring you back to the entrance. Sawworm has a great sense of humor.
Sawworm may give you a more direct answer.
Where is the silver box you refer to?