What could have been?

[TerminusEst13]

So, a month isn't exactly a lot of time, and Lord knows everyone probably had to snip stuff as time went by. Some people had to snip out entire chunks, while others had to barely cut out anything--either way, that looming deadline probably pushed down on people's ideas, and sacrifices were mandatory.

What are some ideas you had to cut out that you were really, really fond of? Any plotlines, extra endings, other characters, anything?

 

[Cinnamon]

I always already planned to make an extended version of my game after the contest, but I did have to cut one thing out to stay around the 1-hour mark: A thunderstorm level. After the graveyard scene you climb up on the inner side of the ship and outside you see a thunderstorm raging, along the lines of the moon level in Cave Story.

Everything else I'm completely satisfied with except the forest level which is a bit too big and laggy for some computers.

Some stuff we're adding for zeh perfect extended version:

- More scenes with Cinnamon's brother and father (the contest version puts a lot of focus on the mother).

- Establishing more clearly that Marbles = Cinnamon's brother in terms of personality and character dynamic.

- An 80s doll house mini-game to give the player some customization. (Finished this one today!)

- And more gameplay, areas, a couple of random encounters, blabla... :9

How about you? Your game's already really good, but I heard you want to change the map-battle system?

 

[Merlandese]

The Key Topic system I used in Last Word is highly functional, but it's a big simplification. I originally intended some system of intelligently gossiping with people, but I couldn't weave the narrative around it in a way that was efficient and allowed the judges to progress the plot in a timely manner. And there were also some Key Topics I didn't even get to finish.

Another one is that the ending sequence is a bit more flat than I'd like. And there's a loose string that doesn't make a whole lot of sense because I didn't have the time to incorporate any clues around it. I've been working on updating Last Word for a post-contest release as well.

Is Peace of Mind going to get a post-release? I think it should. I'd like a graphics update, at least (no offense).

 

[GIRakaCHEEZER]

I was originally planning for a 3rd ending in Tess if you made a choice at a specific spot in the game, but it was cut out due to time constraints. Also I wanted to plan the story out a bit better than I had, but focus shifted to finishing the game rather than the writing, sadly. Also maybe some more flavor text would be in the game as well if I had been given some more time.

 

[TungerMan]

I spent the first 10 days pondering whether I should enter the contest or not, the next 10 - writing an epic storyline for a 1-hour adventure game. Needless to say, the remaining 10 days were not enough for me to complete anything.

Ended up making some sort of a 10-minute abridged version of the initially planned title. I wonder if it even made the final cut.

 

[outcry312]

I planned a full story with 3 levels. I had a scope change though, and brought that number down to one. I realized then that with more time, I would want an extended edition if I could get one made. One adding quadruple the acts, each adding something new. In the end, I had to cut out the story so that the parts that were left made sense with the only level there, and there was a conclusion. But I left it at a TBC, so that I didn't half-ass an ending with what story was there.

Now I can work on my extended version to keep me occupied until I go back to college. And have the true experience out there

 

[Silvestre]

I was actually planning to make another game I started working in, around the beginning of June about dark elves. It would never be finished in time because of the size of the world and everything I have in mind.

The idea for my entry game occurred suddenly, and making something shorter was definitely the best choice.

As for things I had to give up on doing, or wanted to see implemented, I would love to have used Schala battle system instead of something so close to the default battles.

The lack of resources and time to make everything myself made me toss away the idea and stick to something simpler.

I was happy to make two endings, though, and work on the little details with patience, rather than rushing everything out.

 

[EternalShadow]

I planned two additional characters, but panned them for obvious reasons. I also originally wanted a bit more interactivity in the pre-time travel section of the game, but that would've taken too long to implement. 

 

[TerminusEst13]

How about you? Your game's already really good, but I heard you want to change the map-battle system?

Is Peace of Mind going to get a post-release? I think it should. I'd like a graphics update, at least (no offense).

Ah, yes. Once the results are out, I'd really like to head back and give it some much-needed love. I'd originally planned for less RTP graphics, but idiot that I am I had no idea about the existence of expansion packs, and all of my artist friends were busy with other things at the time.

(There's also how the battle system turned out to be a complete wash, so I'll need to redo that)

Something I'd originally considered was that instead of one hero with three stages, there would be a whole party of heroes that had gotten back from their latest adventure, all with a trouble each. I thought in the end the story would be much more compact if you only had to deal with one person instead of multiple people--but with more time, I may revisit this idea again so that you can fix up/heal a few other people in between sessions with the main patient.

Minor tidbits:

- The game was originally supposed to be set in the future (hence the birth date on Aeger's report), but there wasn't really anything sci-fi in the RTP. So I shifted it to sort-of-kind-of-medieval and...never changed the date. Thankfully nobody has ever asked me how medieval characters know what "Korsakoff's Syndrome" or "chronic hallucinatory psychosis" is.

- All of the characters have names that occur in real life (Jadranka is Croatian, Mareike is German, Halcyone is Greek, etc)...except Aeger. Aeger is just a latin word meaning "sick". There was going to be a reason for this (his character sheet even has "Aeger is a fake name, an assumed alias taken from" written next to it), but I forgot why. Whoops.

- The beginning was originally going to be playing as Aeger and his party. Instead of a massive wall of text, you would be him going through the cultist hideout in typical RPG style, fighting off enemies to get to the book--where the other party members would be killed off and Aeger would be afflicted. I changed it because starting off with a generic RPG was a huge turn-off and would give players a bad first impression.

- Jadranka was originally able to heal herself on the go. This crashed the game. Whoops.

 

[Tiarali]

I originally planned to make it so that the zombie curse was catchable by the main character, and if you caught it from battling zombies you then had a certain period of time in which to acquire the antidote or it would be game over.

But... that's a lot of work for a beginner to rpgmaker to sort out.  I still had an alchemy system in the final game, although it was simplified.  I was happy to be able to do that because I hadn't seen a specific tutorial on how to do that, I had to work it out for myself.  Not hard at all, of course, but still.  The little things matter

 

[Cinnamon]

- The beginning was originally going to be playing as Aeger and his party. Instead of a massive wall of text, you would be him going through the cultist hideout in typical RPG style, fighting off enemies to get to the book--where the other party members would be killed off and Aeger would be afflicted. I changed it because starting off with a generic RPG was a huge turn-off and would give players a bad first impression.

I love that idea! Would've been a great twist. But you'd have to make sure the player knows that the beginning isn't part of the "main" content, so it'd be a bad idea for a contest I guess.