Would you buy a game like this? If so, what do you think it should be priced at?

What bridges am I burning exactly? Other Rm devs usually aren't anyone's target demographic. Particularly for the commercial efforts you keep insisting I might want to do, 5-10 years from now; presumably using the copy of VX Ace I have owned and done nothing with for 3 years?

You mind sending further replies to my inbox?

 

Will likely have a demo closer to the game's actual release, right now I'm in the early stages. Only really done the intro and I'm doing some maps.

 

@Bumblefish97 : Good. I'd say it might be a good idea to post an early version under Ideas and Prototypes so that you can get feedback on it. If' you've never made a game before the feedback alone can be invaluable and it is good to get that early instead of too late to change anything in the game.

 

Like a tech demo sort of thing?

 

It sounds conceptually interesting.

However for me personally, default combat engine and RTP graphics combined together are a big turn off for any RPG maker commercial project.
It would make a great IGMC game contestant or prototype worth playing but I doubt it would have enough appeal for me to look at on steam, let alone buy it. Sadly you can blame the oversaturation of poor RPG Maker commercial games for that and the dev bias.

Although, on a budget you could buy packs of resources to overcome that. They're not expensive and go a long way distinguishing yourself from the rest of the chaff. Alternatively, there's some interesting tools tailored to RPG Maker like Game Character Hub which can help a lot to bring your RTP characters to a different level without requiring any artistic skills. Get some sounds from sound libraries and you can keep the development cost pretty cheap.

In my opinion if you aren't willing to spend money on your own game to develop it, you shouldn't expect people to be willing to pay for it either.

But then again, if it's really well executed, who knows.

 

There's one purchased pack I use for it so far which is the wizard castle inner tiles. By RTP I mainly just meant tiles that match the RTP, not just the stuff that comes free with the engine. There's others I think I'll be getting as development goes on but all in that sort of style. Sound effects and music I think I'll definitely be using ones that didn't come with the engine but haven't bought/downloaded any yet because I think sound I'll be adding after I've done the game itself.

 

The concept doesn't sound uncommon for me, so you would have to "compete" in other categories if you are going to charge me money for it.

 

I'm going to give you some actual advice, since this thread has diddly squat to do with demos. Common sense dictates if ya had one, you'd have posted it.

Your idea sounds good. Solid, really. The world can't get enough of magic and magic institutions of just about any kind since Harry Potter hit the big screen. If one pays close enough attention, they will find that magic is testing well in Hollywood right now, for what that's worth to you.

My advice is focus on the long-term playability (not a real word but I use it anyway). It's not enough for me to capture a monster and put him on display, making my visitors happier. No no, that's going to loose novelty with time. I want that creature to be feral. Maybe he scares the kids at first. So I want to be able to breed them, making each new generation more domesticated. I want to upgrade its habitat to ensure it is happier at all times, so my visitors are happy.

I want my creatures to provide benefits, unlocking new abilities and resources to improve my overall R&D quality, and the quality of my museum.

A game like this requires distractions and longevity in my opinion.


You're probably wanting to sell hard copies, but this seems to me like something you could run a more mobile format with. Something like this would receive a ton of downloads if it was Free to Play. From there you could charge players for virtual product. You don't even have to be a dick about it, like most mobile games. It's possible to be fair, especially if you have little overhead (compared to companies who pay entire teams by the hour).

The long and short of it? Yes. If I was still a big active gamer investing in new titles, I would give this a shot. I love tycoon and sim games, and your spin on it sounds like it has a wealth of potential to provide a great pay experience. But make sure your game has enough depth that it can maintain a progress curve, and even provide meaningful play after everything has been acquired and mastered.

 

To add to that post, I find you need to give the players a purpose too. I myself don't buy many management/sim games as there is no overall goal to them, so I grow bored of it. For example, I had the original SimCity, and I'd have to say the most entertainment I ever got out of that game was loading up an existing city that the developers made, and hitting it with all the disasters at once. But, that was because there was no endgame goal short of make a city, which that I grew tired of fast.

Probably the only sim game I found really fun was Railroad Tycoon. The original. There you had a goal of making a railroad which went from coast to coast, while fighting off the competition. That I found interesting enough that I played that game constantly when I was younger. Though, since I was in elementary school then it also probably helped I could turn off things I didn't yet understand like how the economy worked and such too.

So the takeaway from this is I think the game will need two things to be successful:
-A clear endgame goal.
-Ability to turn off some features, especially if you want to appeal to a younger crowd that might not be old enough to grasp some of the harder aspects of the game.

 

Sim City had a Scenario mode to combat this. Games like Theme Park let you reach monetary benchmarks which allowed you to buy new land, opening new types of rides, traveling around the world. A lot of those harder aspects gave the game difficulty, so you couldn't just build stuff til you got bored. It's also educational for the younger gamer.

A big part of the purpose in tycoon and sim games of any kind is setting the goals, perfecting your builds and performance. You have to enjoy a certain aspect of gaming outside of the usual action/story oriented content. The games I personally enjoy the most are those that have heavy customization. Banjo-Kazooie: Nutz N Boltz probably gave me more raw entertainment than any other game when it came down to just play. I didn't even play Banjo games prior to it. But I spent hours building vehicles, land, sea, and air. Pushing that physics engine to the limits.

That sort of gamer is attracted to anything sim/tycoon in nature. The goal is within the concept itself. Scenarios are just fun.

 

I think with RPGMaker it'd be tricky to pull off some of the customization other games have in any real detail