Tristian: Lady of the Lion

[PixelLuchi]

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STORY:
 

Spoiler

 

 

 
                                                                                                          Prologue: The Fall of  Genoa.​

SCREENSHOTS
 
 

 

 

 

 

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WORLD:
 

Spoiler

 
 Continent of Eridanus
 
Kingdom of Genoa:
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Genoa, is the kingdom of Kingship, of stewardship, of bounty in government; in Paeryen lies the Regal Heart, the traditional seat of the High King of Genoa.
 
Capital: Paeryen
 
Climate: Temperate. The Grey Expanse lies further south, a land of swirling Mist whose origin dates back to the founders of Heim itself. It is this curious energy that gives the people of Genoa their magical abilities and fighting prowess. The most powerful users of these techs and magic are descended from four of eight founders of Eridanus: The Royal Family, their sworn knights of Houses Liangale and Avalon and that of the clergy.
 
Empire of Valthorme
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Valthorme in the east is the seat of battle valour, of haughtiness, strife, boasting; the men of Valthorme are the fiercest warriors of all Eridanus, and the kings and goddesses of Valthorme are associated with battle and death.
 
Capital: Charon
 
Genoa and Leitrim were once suzerian states of Valthorme, but after the ruling Emperor's son decided to break away from the royal family due to unresolved issues, he married the then ruling noble of what was to become the nation of Genoa. Even to this day, the Empire still believes that as a whole, both kingdoms are still under its rule. The fact that Genoa enjoys friendly relations with both Connaught and Leitrim will makes it a difficult target if invasion ever came into play...Their current Emperor is a pacifist however, who does not believe in the shedding of blood, and has a long-awaited dream of unifying and strengthening ties between both Leitrim and Genoa itself.
 
Connaught
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Connaught in the south is the kingdom of learning, the seat of the greatest and wisest druids and magicians;  It is also the home of the persecuted races, who have long harbored a hatred for humans. They are known as the Formarians. It is a little known fact that many of them were sold into slavery centuries ago, and are still working under brutal conditions in the Empire's heart. The Kingdom of Genoa however, enjoys a warm relationship with the King as King Auster himself wished to abolish the slave trade in Valthorme.
 
Capital:  Enoun

More to be added.
 

 
CHARACTERS:
 
 

Spoiler

 
Protagonists:

 
Tristian - The Proud Patriot
 
Age: 26
Hair colour: Brown
Eye colour:  Blue
Height: 177 cm
Weight: 65 kg
 
Weapon usage: Bows, Swords and Lances
Class: Master Knight
Promotes into: Holy Knight
 
A powerful knight-general in service to Genoa's Royal Family and Ianna's sworn protector. Tristian has a fantastic amount of pride for her country and will do anything to protect its last heir. Because of the blood ties that binds her to the Dubhan bloodline, her survival literally means Ianna's safety, and even after she is affected with a curse that will no doubt end her life, she swears to return Ianna to the throne. However, Tristian's resilience does give way to her stubbornness and her pride may cause her to underestimate her quarry, the Ebony Hand, on whom she swears vengeance after they decimated the Silver Order.
 
Role in battle: Buffer/Damage dealer/Uses weapon-specific skills.
 

 
Ianna - The Gentle Heir
 
Age: 22
Hair colour: Blue
Eye colour:  Green
Height: 159 cm
Weight: ?? kg
 
Weapon usage: Tomes and Crossbows
Class: Princess
Promotes into: N/A
 
A gentle soul whose kind demeanour belies her powerful heritage, Ianna is the last of the Genoan Royal Family's bloodline and despite the Dark Crusader's blood running through her veins, she is a practioner of Light magic. The resurfaced Ebony Hand no doubt has dark plans for her, but to do so, they need to eliminate her bodyguard, Lady Liangale, which terrifies her to no end. Although traumatised by the events at Castle Genoa, she vows to fight on and topple the powerful Empire in one stroke.
 
Role in battle: Healer/Nuker
 

 
Dante - The Dashing Sage
 
Age: 27
Hair colour: Blonde
Eye colour:  Blue
Height: 176 cm
Weight: 75 kg
 
Weapon usage: Tomes and Lances
Class: Mage Lord
Promotes into: Mage General
 
The charasmatic and dashingly handsome Lord of Connaught, also known as the Mage General, Dante is a master of black magic and his knowledge over all things esoteric is extensive. He seems worried over the recent practioners of Elder magic, a practice banned more than three centuries ago and it causes him deep concern for Tristian, for whom he has always nursed a soft spot. He is determined to get to the root cause of why the sect has surfaced in the first place.
 
Role in battle: BAMF Nuker
 
 
 
 

 
Trabant - The Sea King
 
Age: 35
Hair colour: Black
Eye colour:  Hazel
Height:      203 cm
Weight:      105 kg
 
Weapon usage: Axes
Class: Berserker
Promotes into: Already promoted
 
Known as the lord of the seas of the southern Isles of Concordia, Trabant rules his territory with an iron fist and prizes physical brawn above all else. He is a fearsome specimen and his strength and temper knows no bounds. His plans to claim a small port town a cut short when he comes across a certain individual, and seeing as how they share a similar hate for the Empire, he decides to lend his strength.
 
Role in battle: BAMF damage dealer with low defenses.
 
More to come.
 
Antagonists:
 

 
 

 
More to come.
 

 
FEATURES
 
-  An epic 10 episode tale spanning 4 countries over a huge world.
- A deep, mature storyline focusing on love, honour and pride. The themes however, may not be suitable for the average 15 year old.
-  A cast of dynamic characters each with their own agendas, hidden feelings and motives.
-  Rich, vibrant maps give life to the continent of Eridanus.
- Party synergy in battle is crucial to success. Find a weak spot and exploit it!
- An Augment system ( previously known as the Crysalis System ) allows you to either fuse together different crystals to form powerful orbs which grant new abilities in battle, or use them to buff character stats.
 Thread to be updated in the near future. ( 27/02/2015)

 

[Filius Rex]

This is looking pretty good so far. The screenshots look nice  The premise of the story reminds me a bit of Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones...

 

[RPG_MJG]

Maps look great, what lighting script do you use?

 

[Julien Brightside]

Seems like a good project. I am curious on what this will look like further down the road.

 

[PixelLuchi]

@Filius: Maybe in the beginning, but it is a lot deeper than that. =)

@RPG_MG: I don't use a lighting script. I use overlays to give light and shadow,

@JB: Hopefully, I can develop it a lot further as it stands right now. =)

 

[Dalph]

Looks great, but why is this for VX? That tool is limited as hell...anyway the portraits looks awesome and your mapping is very nice.

Good luck for your project.

 

[PixelLuchi]

@LCM: I haven't got the money for Ace now. There is a lot of features of that engine that I like. But I'm going to work with what I have for now. It's also one of the reasons I don't parallax map. I like to see how much I can do with limited resources.

Regarding this game, I'll try to make at least one hour of gameplay before releasing to the public.

Testing out menu interfaces.

I'll be adding bit by bit to the game's world and its history as well. Here's one of the many factions that can be found on Heim:

Spoiler

Guild of Elder Magic ( working title )

 

Founded by Notsu, one of the many founders of Heim ( there are 8 in total ), this sect's initial aim was to recruit those interested in learning the art of Elder magic. However, over time, their aims became corrupted after Notsu's passing, and gradually, the once noble practice of this powerful form of magic was perverted into something dark and sinister. Eventually, the practioners were banished and sent into exile. It is said that some rogue shamans have conspired with the Empire to bring down Genoa's most powerful ruling family after the Royal family themselves: House Liangale; as all of the descendants have the blood of the Light Crusader Palla and hence, are notoriously vulnerable to dark magic.

 

Several of the characters in this game are descended from one of Heim's 8 founders. It forms an important mechanic for both for gameplay and storyline reasons.

 

Urgh, I need to work on Enelysion now. 0_o Once I get that game out, I can work happily on this.

 

[PixelLuchi]

Updated OP with a planned features list.

 

[SnowOwl]

Spoiler

 

[blueperiod]

Doesn't "Heim" translate to "home" in several European languages?

 

[C-C-C-Cashmere]

This looks really good, Luchino. I like that you've decided to reduce the scope to a visual novel, to avoid the trappings of including features for the sake of them. Honestly, I think a lot of games made in RPG Maker could benefit from less focus on battles and more focus on story, where it shines. Keep up the good work!

 

[PixelLuchi]

Apologise for the lack of updates, but Enelysion is keeping me pretty busy. =)

Anyway, I've done the basic outline for the main plot now, and finished up the planned portraits for my characters.

Spoiler

I'd take editing the Fire Emblem portraits any day over RTP. I just love the art-style. <3 It goes well with the serious atmosphere that the game sets.

I plan to have at least half an hour to an hour's worth of gameplay by the end of October. Right now, I only have like 10 minutes, but I'll try to make that into a video, so you can get a general feel for the game and its direction. Its so much more effective that a couple of screen shots.

Testing out lighting effects with no lighting script ( I should do a tutorial on it. Maybe ). That masked RTP character is a placeholder, obviously. Because the game is more of a VN than an RPG, I will tend to place heavy emphasis on atmosphere ( which I don't have a problem with ). But my dialogue and writing is still a bit rusty ( as indicated by the test runs for Enelysion XD ) so I will pay more attention to it this time around.

The game's world will also have a rather heavy emphasis on magic and ancestry ( nearly all the main characters are descended from heroes simply known as Crusaders ( got this idea and some plot points from Fire Emblem 4 ) and the names of those crusaders normally reference the what elemental affinity they are tied to, Like Argi, the Light Crusader and Dubhan the Dark Crusader. Those names mean light and dark.

That's all for now. Don't want to give an info dump, now do I? =)

 

 

[PixelLuchi]

I've got about 20 minutes of the game done now, so here are a couple of screens to show some progress. Believe me, it is ALOT better in-game, since you have music ( which is of the same superb quality as Enelysion's soundtrack, just without the whole Celtic vibe XD ) and the ambient sounds as well. ).

I'll probably release the 20 minute teaser on Sunday, a month before Enelysion's release. =)

 

[gvduck10]

your screenshots are beautiful! your characters look great. I will definitely want to play this when it's completed. as long as the battle system and story are pretty decent, this will be very popular indeed!!

*feel free to check out my stuff below*

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[PixelLuchi]

The 30 minute teaser is now available for download in the OP. =) Feel free to C&C.

 

[Dalph]

What to say...It's awesome, I particularly love the atmosphere of your maps, it seriously bring them to life, gonna check your lighting tutorial and maybe support this (along with Enelysion), but I have to say that ""personally"" this one impressed me a bit more.

The main character here is a tall and strong warrior woman (like in Enelysion), it's a concept of a character that almost no one uses, but I like it. Again good luck for your project, I'm keeping an eye on this one.

 

[PixelLuchi]

@LCM: Yeah, I do feel this project will end up better than Enelysion, since its my 2nd one, so I can put all the experience I've garnered over the last 2.5 years into it. =) I'll make a support bar for both games soon.

EDIT: Here's a support bar for anyone who'd like to support the project. =)

 

[Choco-Elliot Wyvern]

Ooh just saw this, downloading the teaser now Looks good so far!

EDIT: The link seems to be down... is it just me... ?

 

[cabfe]

It's a great prologue and the musics are well chosen.
The relationship between the characters is well written. Nothing said too bluntly, but nicely hinted. Good job !

Regarding my playtest I noted these small issues :

- The forest in the beginning is getting me very slow framerate (like 10) on my old PC (AMD X2 4200 MHz, yeah, I know). The next forest screen is fine though.
- The log to the south of the "main" road is passable. I think it should be best to set it impassable to better understand we have to go to the east path.
- In the cave to the north-east, the stalagmites seem to be set "Above player". It looks strange standing on this tile and stanger when you then go down.
- A typo  : "formiddable" (a sage in the palace - west wing)
- Same place : the wall tile to the right of the door leading to the princess is passable. Well, the problem happens with the wall tiles under the flags actually.
- The same bug with the wall tiles behind the trees.
- On the map to the south of the castle, with the 2 fountains, I can walk through the trees that are at the bottom of the screen.

(and no, I didn't try to walk against all the walls )

 

[PixelLuchi]

@Choco: I'll try to get a Mediafire mirror up by the end of the month ( my 2GB data cap limit a month is nearly up >< ). I swear, if my internet was not so atrociously bad, I would have done a lot more with my games... Like upload videos onto Youtube and whatnot. *sigh*

Now you guys know why I am so touchy about large game sizes... or why I care about keeping the size small, in any case. Or why I refuse to parallax map...

@cabfe: Bugs noted. =) I'm glad you enjoyed the prologue. I do enjoy writing this more than Enelysion, tbh.