Side-View Sprites as Over World Sprites?

[VirusChris]

I'm not sure if this is where I should post this question, but I'm not seeing a category for Requests/Questions so I hope it's fine here.

I'm asking if there's a Plugin or a possibility to use a different kind of spritesheet for Over World Sprites. Basically instead of the 4 (or 3) sprites for having the sprites move up, down, left, and right and facing those corresponding positions like most bird's eye view/top-down RPG games out there.

I was wondering if I can use Side-View Sprites instead? Where if you move left and the sprite faces left yet going up and down will keep them facing left when doing so and when you go right the sprite is always right when moving up and down as well. Like for example, Paper Mario. How Paper Mario faces either left or right but you move him up and down all over the map.

You know something similar to games like those action beat 'em games, River City Ransom or Maximum Carnage, where you scroll up and down on the field while facing in one direction. Kinda hard to find an example to what I'm talking about that uses mostly sprites to do this. Oh... I think Octopath Traveler is a good example of this in a way... except for the whole 3D aspect of it. I want to do this purely in 2D.

I want to have my sprites like this for a game idea I wanted to do. To use the Side-View Sprites as their walking animation and etc...

To keep it simple using the same sprites throughout the whole game. I like the idea of using Side-View Sprites as Over World Sprites as well. But if that's not possible at the moment, unless with a lot of events going on, I'm continue using the default sprites. I plan on making original Side-View Sprites for my game with its on style and thought this will help "cut corners" a bit while at the same time provide an unique spin on the game that's very useful.

So, any Plugins or something that can do this?

 

[MechScapeZH]

I'm not sure if this is where I should post this question, but I'm not seeing a category for Requests/Questions so I hope it's fine here.

I'm asking if there's a Plugin or a possibility to use a different kind of spritesheet for Over World Sprites. Basically instead of the 4 (or 3) sprites for having the sprites move up, down, left, and right and facing those corresponding positions like most bird's eye view/top-down RPG games out there.

I was wondering if I can use Side-View Sprites instead? Where if you move left and the sprite faces left yet going up and down will keep them facing left when doing so and when you go right the sprite is always right when moving up and down as well. Like for example, Paper Mario. How Paper Mario faces either left or right but you move him up and down all over the map.

You know something similar to games like those action beat 'em games, River City Ransom or Maximum Carnage, where you scroll up and down on the field while facing in one direction. Kinda hard to find an example to what I'm talking about that uses mostly sprites to do this. Oh... I think Octopath Traveler is a good example of this in a way... except for the whole 3D aspect of it. I want to do this purely in 2D.

I want to have my sprites like this for a game idea I wanted to do. To use the Side-View Sprites as their walking animation and etc...

To keep it simple using the same sprites throughout the whole game. I like the idea of using Side-View Sprites as Over World Sprites as well. But if that's not possible at the moment, unless with a lot of events going on, I'm continue using the default sprites. I plan on making original Side-View Sprites for my game with its on style and thought this will help "cut corners" a bit while at the same time provide an unique spin on the game that's very useful.

So, any Plugins or something that can do this?

I don't think you'd need a plugin- simply copy the right and left directions to the spots for up and down on the spritesheet.

 

[VirusChris]

That would be a simple solution, however it would lead to Left side being up and left and Right side being down and right.

I want something to allow me to have Left go up, down, and left when the sprite is facing left. But, when I face Right the sprite's is facing right while going up, down, and right.

That's what I'm looking for. I'll keep that in mind if I can't get a Plugin or something to do exactly that. Would feel a little weird to me.
thanks for the reply though.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

Pretty much this, you can easily just copy the sprites onto the character files. You can even change the character graphic to a different sheet and using "stepping" to show an animation then after the animation switch it back to the original one. That being said, it's pretty ghetto. I use https://quxios.github.io/plugins/QSprite and sprite mastersheets to setup all of my walk/run/attack/idle/etc animations.

 

[VirusChris]

Interesting. Stepping can be done via events, right? If I press right on the map, via parallel event I think, I can flip the sprite in that direction. As long as I don't have a Costume Change system in place.

Also that QSprite... going to take me time to study it. I'm a little lost at what to do. Though it will take some time to get it to work properly.
Thank you for the link. I'll experiment around when I can.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

Yeah I attached an example, just make those for each direction and change the sprites as you see fit. You can also do the same for any button press besides just directions.

As for QSprite, yeah it's pretty complex, but I haven't seen anything quite on it's level for MV. Yanfly did recently release something kind of like it....
http://www.yanfly.moe/wiki/Picture_Spritesheets_(YEP) it's a lot more limited than QSprite but might be easier to setup. Honestly with over 1,000 potential frames of animation available for each character I have I'm just not interested in calling specific frames one at a time, especially not when the QSprite Editor lets me visually build it all. So I haven't really put it to the test, but it could do what you need.

 

[VirusChris]

I see. Though if I had a Change Party Leader setup, like how the Tales series does it, how would be the best way to go about it? Though I have no plans to change which Avatar to use I like to keep a lookout for the future. Or even a Party Follow Leader setup would be tricky.

Ah, and on NPCs that wander the town. I guess I'll set a move route to do it. I should be able to do that for NPCs for fixed movements, right? Won't be a problem when talking to them as well.

Also, this would be a pain to add it to almost every map in the game. Is there a do the Parallel Events without having to put the same event over and over again on each map? Or do I tough it out?

Sorry. Just covering my bases.

I got the complete Full Collection of Yanfly's Plugins for MV (a shame to see Yanfly retire though, but I appreciate everything Yanfly and the others have done) so I'll check it out. Great to add more animations for special attacks and other debuffs on the characters. Really pushes the limitations of your imaginations.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

I'm rather unfamiliar with the Tales games, so I'm not sure what you're trying to do there.

For the town people just put their image changes, and stepping in their Autonomous Movement (which you set to custom). Then you can just set them to action button, and put whatever interaction you want them to have with the player in their regular pages.

As for using Parallel events on every map, you can use Yanfly's Event Copier or Spawner to put it on every map so you only have to make it once. That's what I do for my controller event.... Yep I have a plugin for exactly one type of event.

Yeah, I've been playing with animations a lot over the last couple weeks, and lamenting that QMovement hates Galv's Event Spawner, but makes diagonal animations with QSprite work automatically.

 

[VirusChris]

The Tales game has a key item that's called "Leader Flag" and sometimes an additional one called "Super Flag R". What it does is change the Avatar on the field you're using. For example you're using the Main Hero walking around in towns, dungeons, and such but you want to use the Main Heroine WITHOUT swapping out who's in the first slot.

You use the Leader Flag, with a Flag Icon on the Character's Status Icon in the Main Menu to show who's the current Avatar, and select the Main Heroine. Now it's her on the field instead of the Main Hero, however the Main Hero is still in slot 1 and you're still controlling him (if this was an action RPG in a sense). This can even be used on Reserve Party Members so you can keep the 4 default members in battle, but you can use the Flag to use one in the Reserve and not miss up with your current Party setup.

Does that make sense?

For Town People. Ah, so doing that with Action Button will force them to face the Player. Thanks.

Oh yeah! That's one of the recent one. What an amazing time for me to ask such a feature and have a Plugin to help make that work!
And Controller Event? I like to hear that... what are you doing with that in your game or project?

Oh yeah... I was thinking of a Diagonal Movement with this idea so you have 8-direction movements. Oh well, if I don't like I can go back to the regular default grid-based movement.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

Ah, I suppose the easiest non-plugin way to create that Tales system is to change the main character's image while on the map. So just have a variable setup say 1-4 (one for each character). Create a common event with a conditional for each number, then under each put a name change and a character image change. Then create an option or button that changes the variable and runs that common event. Before the battle switch the main character's image back to the normal thing, then when the battle ends run that common event to switch it back to whatever the variable says it should be.

As for my controller event. it serves a lot of purposes in my game...
1. It handles if the player is afflicted with confuse and adjusts their controls accordingly.
2. Disables the controls if the player is in a cutscene.
3. Disables the regular menu.
4. Changes the controls based on if the player is in the regular game, or my map based menu.
5. Serves as the only non-spawned event on any of my maps so it dodges mass despawn commands.
6. As my rooms are all generated on fly it executes commands based on if the room is new or old.

But I'm doing a lot of weird things with my game, you can probably skip all of that besides it handling the actual controls.

For Diagonal movement I actually use https://victorenginescripts.wordpress.com/rpg-maker-mv/diagonal-movement/ instead of QMovement. It's not a pixel movement, but my main game mechanic doesn't play well with pixel movement. So it at least provides diagonal event triggers, and lets the events take diagonal movements without me specifically routing them that way.

 

[VirusChris]

Hmm... that's a pretty elegant roundabout way of doing that. I'll keep that in mind. So basically the same Common Event for the Main Hero just spread to all the other Party Members. Clever.

Though how do I get that to work with Random Encounters? Though I plan to do On Field/Overworld Encounters instead (setting up the enemy parties and if you run away they return on the field, but there's a timer where they flash until they move again and cannot activate battle with them until they're done flashing) as I prefer that method of encounters. With a fun 7% chance of a rare enemy spawn which is 3 - 5x stronger with 3x EXP and Money drop if you manage to defeat them.

Lots of Events to do. That Event Copier of Yanfly is going to help a lot here.

Is that what you mean by Controller Setup? I thought you were doing something with the Game Controller. MV does allow for Game Controller Support by default, right? I haven't really gotten around or using MV that much since I got it off of Steam.

Oh! That's very impressive and would work well with my Side-View On Field/Over World walking system. Though is it compatible with Yanfly's Plugins? I hope to use mostly Yanfly for those sweet Limit Point system and the Cheat Code system (I plan to have the in-game cheat code in as I miss the days of Action Replay/Gameshark and it's completely optional).

Though I got to make my own Tilesets and set up Parallel Maps to envision my world, but I want a unique and original style for it so it's not entirely MV-style.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

Really depends on how you call the random encounters. You could just have a parallel event that generates a random number say 1-100, then if it's greater than something like 70, do a random encounter. And if it's greater than 93 then do your super strong enemy. If you do it that way, then just run image change before the battle command.

Oh and part of what my controller event does is remap the controls to what I want them to do. On the 4th page of a conditional branch you can select "If button is pressed" along with the button you want. Just make a conditional for each button you want to use. I'm just using it for more than controller manipulation, but I do have a conditional for each button. Just be aware that MV's controller support is awkward, and it will still want to do what that button normally does as well. So cancel still cancels, menu still menus, etc. The only work around I've found so far on that is to edit it in Input.gamepadMapper in the rpg_core.js file if you don't want it to do that.

As for Vic's Diagonal Movement, it's compatible with a lot of Yanfly's main stuff, no clue on his other stuff though. You'd have to test, though most people try and make their stuff compatible with Yanfly's due to how prevalent Yanfly's stuff is.

Also good plan on the art, most people I know IRL scoff at the name RPG Maker. They're probably not unique, so anything default is a very bad call if you want to avoid people automatically dismissing your game based on the engine. Kind of a shame really, the MV stuff actually looks pretty decent.

 

[VirusChris]

Sorry for not replying so soon. Busy and got a little sick.

So ala Pokemon Encounters? Though is that better than the default encounter? Then again I could use it for enemies in tall grass or something if I did the old random encounter way. But, I'll try to keep it to On Field Encounters. I always preferred that.

Is there a way to make it when you run for battle the enemy is frozen in place for a seconds before becoming activate again to re-battle when touched?

I'm just going to stick to the main character for now, unless the story demands it when the main character is not available.

Is there no Plugin for Game Controller support? I'm surprised MV doesn't have one or a good one by default. I would like to use my Logitech Controller to play MV games, but I guess the KB is fine for now. Though I usually use the default buttons like A for Accept/Execute, B for Cancel, Start for Menu/Pause.

I might have to look at that JS file in the feature then.

Good to know that the Vic's Diagonal Movement is compatible with Yanfly's Plugins... most of it at least.

I still need to practice first with my drawing skills. Got Paint Tool Sai, GIMPs andPaint.Net for my drawing needs and my Cintiq Tablet. My Avatar is from years ago back then and I've been trying my best doing different styles until I get that anime/manga look I'm looking for, for my characters.

I also have GraphicsGale for sprite making, the layering helps a lot, and months ago I got Aesprite and Pro Motion NG though I haven't touched them yet but they look like great sprite editing tools to use.

I've made a lot of Touhou sprites via GraphicsGale for RPG Maker XP for my friend, until my last computer got the Blue Screen of Death and lost all of my files and I never backed any of them up. Still time I got two HD along with a main HD to backup my files in case of a crash again.

I've seen a RPG Maker MV on YouTube called "Lunar Regalia" with custom sprites, drawings, and battle system it's so colorful, bright, vibrant full of life looking game. And I like the battle system and such and hope to get around to making something so unique myself. Sadly they seem to remove all of the videos on YouTube. Can't blame them too much, at least I know where their ******* page is to look up updates on the game.

I understand people scoffing at RPG Maker games because they use their default styles a lot thus making all the games look very similar to each other. And I admit I do like the MV look, they have such a bright and colorful design to them. Though I still miss RPG Maker XP's mapping system with the three layers and the weather system it had. Really in terms of XP its mapping system was the best. Only way for VX and MV to compete with it is Parallel Maps sadly.

Honestly do not like the mapping systems in VX and MV that much.

Well I guess that's all I need to know for now. Thanks for all the help ImaginaryVillain and MechScapeZH!

 

[VirusChris]

Oh! A quick question... I can also set it up when a button is not pressed for idle animation? Depending on which direction they were when you stopped they will face in that direction and they will "bounce" in place in a way?

Would be weird if they were static and stayed frozen in a walking frame or something. It would involve a lot of Branching What If commands?

 

[Kes]

I'm not seeing a category for Requests/Questions

If you mean plugin requests then try JS PLugin Requests. For questions about plugins your already have, then Javascript/Plugin Support is the place. Both are in the section on the front page directly underneath the MV section. A very small scroll down will show them.

[mod]As your supplementary questions relate to plugins you have, I shall move this to Javascript/Plugin Support.[/mod]
I have read these posts at some speed, so I may be misunderstanding, but I am concerned with the idea that you are going to be doing this using parallel processes. Unless they are meticulously planned, they will cause serious lag.

You have also bundled together a whole range of questions, making this thread difficult to navigate. We strongly recommend that people do one question, one thread. Not only does it make it less confusing, it also means that if someone else in the future has the same question, they have a reasonable chance of finding the thread with (hopefully) the solution. As it is, your other questions are unlikely to be picked up by anyone doing a search for them, as they are buried here. It is also less likely that new readers of the thread will bother going through it all, so you may well miss out on some insightful advice.

 

[ImaginaryVillain]

Honestly I tried the whole idle animation with parallels and common events. You're way better off using either https://galvs-scripts.com/2015/11/03/mv-character-animations/ or https://quxios.github.io/plugins/QSprite due to how such a process basically always has to be running to check for if a player is moving or not. The overhead on such an event is huge, but the effect of it is pretty minor. You can also just make your walking animation end on a standing frame unless you really want an idle animation.

As for the controller support, MV has built in controller support as long as you're just using it's normal button setup. What I was talking about was remapping the controls to do something else. Sounds like this is highly unnecessary in this instance.

 

[VirusChris]

Oh sorry for the late reply. I got sick and was bed-ridden for a while and was busy with work and such. Hehehe...

I was not aware the MV Plugins were in a section called "JS PLugin Requests" which is why it flew over my mind was looking for "MV Plugins".

Thank you Kes for moving my topic and my apologizes for adding more questions after my first question as more was revealed to me. I'll try to keep it focus next time.

Oh! Those Plugins Villain you posted will help a lot! It's definitely something I'm looking for, for this type of idea I want to experiment with. It even has a dashing action as well which is convenient.

I much like an Idle animation. Makes them more livey.

Oh, so that's what you mean. Well if default controller setup works for MV then it's all good.