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Weekly Update - Losing Resonars? Replies re last post
4 years ago4,592 words
A long one this week! I've been thinking I should trim out some vestigial features to focus more on the monster-skills mechanic, plus some replies to things people said in comments on last week's post (since I can't reply to them all individually!).

For weeks now, I've been feeling like I'm juuuust on the edge of having the game ready for the next phase of testing. I did a lot this week - which boosted my mood, which then boosted my productivity even more - and I felt confident throughout the week that I'd be able to upload an update by the weekend... Then Friday arrived, I played what I had with the intention of just checking it's all okay... only to find a bunch of issues that made the run far from smooth and which I'd best address before getting more feedback (otherwise people would just be telling me about stuff I already know, which feels a bit pointless).

I'm frustrated by it, but I suppose we all have to understand that games development is an endeavour that happens over many months, and it requires an exhaustive amount of both effort and patience.

Here are some of the things I did this week:


Turn order change


This only took at hour or two so it doesn't really feel like a big deal, but maybe as a gameplay tweak it might be? I've revised the turn system to be the same as in Taming Dreams: that is, at the start of each 'turn' (should probably be 'round'?), all the living combatants are added to a stack, which is then sorted through based on arousal, then the stack is worked through in that order. The turn order bar shows only the remaining entries in this list. When it's empty, the list is filled and sorted again.

I like this because it feels neater, plus it means that arousal speed determination is far simpler; no wondering whether it being higher leads to additional turns or anything. Plus the turn order bar is super easy to read if you know it's only showing the current pending list.

It also allows for some interesting turn-shifting mechanics. I've altered the Slap skill so that it knocks the target one place later in the stack, for example, and other skills could either move a target's turn sooner or later.


New battle music


This ate up most of the week! ∞ I posted it on Patreon a few days ago ∞; I'm only including a static image here since the rest is long enough as it is. I also devised and coded a system for handling seamless dynamic music... which required going into Audacity and cutting the wavs into chunks with millisecond precise divisions, for stupid reasons... One of the annoying things I have to do that takes ages but which I can't be bothered talking about in detail!


Lore section


Another quick thing I'd been meaning to do, but which is more interesting to talk about than the bunch of minor bugs I fixed. I wasn't sure how to succinctly summarise characters for their lore entries, especially if stuff changes over the course of the plot (feels weird if the text is the same at the beginning and end), so I had the idea of giving each one several separate entries - basically just a title and a short bit of accompanying text - which could be unlocked over the course of the story. Kind of like unlocking a mini story for each character. Many of them could be unlocked through the optional 'P chat' bits, so it feels like you're getting something somewhat substantial for them.

I also decided to use the same system for monsters. When you first tame or kill one, it has a basic About entry unlocked, but clearing the species from an area would unlock an additional section, maybe something like 'inspiration' about the design thoughts behind it? Unsure; I didn't have the time to devote to it.

The next thing's more important:



Losing the resonars?


The game's gone through a lot of changes over the course of its development. The version I've been working on for the past few weeks stresses acquiring monster 'essences' and equipping them as skills, which I feel is a big improvement over what it was like during the last testing phase, but it also feels like there are some vestigial remnants of the old system getting in the way.

I love the concept of the resonars: lightsabre-like crystal swords which can be used as instruments of both music and destruction. But using them to cast music spells means playing a brief sound clip that clashes with the background music, which is something I've been aware of for ages and which several testers commented on unfavourably (at least one said they'd avoid using such skills so as not to interfere with the music). It'd be great to be able to sync it with the background track, and I've thought about that a few times, but the effort needed to get it working would be huge, and it'd essentially turn it into a different game. Absolutely not worth it for a couple of skills.



I also recently (either last week or this, I forget) revised Collie's previous musical 'Let's Go!' skill - it's now a howl, for plot reasons - which means even fewer skills use the music thing.

Both Savitr and Collie can physically attack with their resonars too, but each only has a single skill to do this, which I feel would go largely neglected, especially if they wouldn't grant the same bonuses from training that essence skills do so there's little incentive to ever use them.

So I'm wondering whether to just scrap the idea of resonars entirely and focus exclusively on the monster summoning aspect.



To remind you of how it works - since I haven't updated the alpha with this yet and it's changed a lot since then - each character has six skill slots. When you first tame a monster, you acquire its 'essence', meaning any character can then equip a skill associated with that monster in that slot. When you use that skill, the character puts their hand to their forehead as if concentrating, the monster forms with a fancy effect in front of them, then it uses that skill, and disappears afterwards.

Any damage the skill inflicted is added as XP to that skill. The skill's level is added to the damage it deals, and when it reaches level 10 - the initial cap - a 'permanent boon' is unlocked that grants a permanent upgrade to one of the character's stats. Clearing a monster species from an area raises the level cap for its associated essence skill to 20, and when that new cap is reached, an additional boon is added to the character and the skill is fully mastered and can't grow any more.

I'd say this skill growth is similar to MARDEK's, in many ways, except you gain permanent character growth from it rather than just a skill you might never use.

Currently, some 'innate' (non-monster-essence) skills - such as the resonar slashes and music - can still gain XP, but I've been unsure what to do with them regarding bonuses. Should they have level caps and associated boons like the essence skills? Feels wrong for some reason. I also feel like they get in the way, filling slots that'd be better filled with monsters, so most players probably would change them to monster skills quickly anyway. While playtesting, I noticed that whenever I used these skills, it felt like a waste, like I should have been training a monster skill during that turn instead.

So maybe I could just remove those skills. This isn't the same as removing physical attacks. Many summoned monsters use physical attacks; the Pawnites do, for example. Perhaps in place of the resonar slashes, both Savitr and Collie could start equipped with some Seraphim-issued summoned monster that wields - or is? - a resonar, or something similar?

Some quick concept art:



Maybe all Seraphim (and Cherubim) come equipped with a basic monster just called 'Resonar', which is a winged sword thing that attacks using a basic slash? Or maybe Savitr could have a more powerful variant or something. That'd be a fairly simple model to make.


Savitr should still have a heal. Currently it's called Solemn Light, which shifts runes towards Grave, and I wondered whether he could summon up some sorrowful angel or something. Some visual brainstorming led to this - which borrows a name from an old monster design of mine - which would probably have a Bliss-Abstract heal instead, if I went with it. Or maybe I'll see if I can come up with something Grave since I'd rather stress that aspect of Savitr's character than the abstract angle (his runes are axG, after all).

Collie can also use a Tame skill, which would also need to be associated with a monster she starts with... Maybe I could use Pawnite for that? It is very in line with her traits, and it's a manifestation of loyalty, being both a knight and a pet, so it'd maybe feel more right to give it a major role like this than to just make Pawnites standard fodder monsters in an area called the Sprouting Isle...



There's this monster design - Rabbish (a radish rabbit) - which I used in a few different things around the time I worked on Taming Dreams, which I've been wanting to replace one of the current six monster species with, for this area at least. Maybe Somunculimp could be moved to the next area and replaced with Rabbish; I suspect the latter would be more appealing. I could also replace another monster species with the Fungoblin which I already have the model for, since MARDEK's first (real) dungeon had those in it so it'd be a kind of callback to that.

Back to skills, Savitr has a taunt called Guardian, and Collie has the aforementioned howl, neither of which I want to lose. But maybe instead I could change these to be 'Special' abilities, used separately from the equipped skills (and as such they're always available), with no cost but no growth potential either? I added Collie's howl because a later plot scene should have her use it, and I wasn't certain how to ensure she'd have it equipped at that point. This would address that, plus it'd give characters abilities that weren't interchangeable. Pierce's would be the Manifest Mind he already uses in the intro.

Speaking of the intro, I'd have to rewrite a few lines if I did do away with resonars and replace them with all monster skills, but it wouldn't be a huge deal.

But would characters be unarmed, then? In Taming Dreams, characters were unarmed; their weapons and shields were monsters dreamed up in the moment. I don't want to use monsters as a shield in this, so it'd make sense for the characters to wield shields since I want to retain blocking. Crystal shields, or something; I'll need to do some concept art.

I also like the thought of characters having a gemstone on their forehead - which Savitr already essentially has - which they use to channel their thoughts into monsters. I thought of also adding a wand or staff or something with a crystal at the end which they touch to this to create the effect, but maybe that's just overdoing things, and pressing their fingers to it would be enough.

I feel like I should just stick with what I've got instead of making constant changes... but I also feel like what I have currently is an improvement over how it was before, but it's kind of half complete, like a Frankenstein's monster merging two concepts, or something.

I also feel like stressing the monster-summoning concept might be a better selling point since I can compare it - however vaguely - to other monster taming games like Pokemon... even though it's not really like that. I suppose a closer comparison might be Ni No Kuni, in which you had monster allies that joined your characters in battles (though the battle mechanics were very different). Or maybe FFXIII-2 (I say after finding a screenshot of that for later in this post), though I barely remember that so I don't know.

The changes I need to make are relatively minor for the most part - not a huge overhaul or anything - though if Collie and Savitr do come with at least a couple of monsters equipped - which they'd have to otherwise they couldn't do anything (I don't want to include a basic Attack command) - I'd need to design those monsters. That'd be the biggest time-consuming thing, though I was able to design, make, and animate the Ignorat recently in about a day so it shouldn't take too long.


Tulpas?

Are you familiar with the term 'tulpa'? I think it came up in certain online communities a while back; I found out about it from someone mentioning it on this blog. Wikipedia says:

Tulpa is a concept in mysticism and the paranormal of a being or object which is created through spiritual or mental powers. It was adapted by 20th-century theosophists from Tibetan sprul-pa ... which means "emanation" or "manifestation". Modern practitioners use the term to refer to a type of willed imaginary friend which practitioners consider to be sentient and relatively autonomous.


The monsters in this are essentially 'solid hallucinations'; they're literally dreamed up, manifestations of mind. So the term seems fitting considering that. But they're not exactly sentient or autonomous, plus the word might just be unnecessarily esoteric when the basic 'monsters' would do. Plus 'tulpa' might be loaded with connotations, like when I wanted to use 'owo' for female sindrels. Hmm.

I've also been wondering for a while whether to rename the miasma to mindasma. I'm not sure. I personally love novel terms, but I've been noticing more and more that a lot of people are just put off by the unfamiliar.



Re the previous post

Thanks to those of you who left long comments on the previous post! I wanted to reply to them in this one rather than individually since I don't have much time and I'd be repeating myself a lot, but this has turned out much longer than I thought it would already... I'd be saying similar things to many of the comments anyway, so what I'll do is go over them again and make a dot point list here of things I feel are worth mentioning:


- To clarify, I'm not planning to continue MARDEK any time soon, and I wasn't asking for ideas about how to do that. I'm spending a full-time-job's worth of hours on Atonal Dreams (and it's still taking forever!), and I'm not going to work two full time jobs at once because that's impossible. Divine Dreams was meant as a reimagining, however, and Atonal Dreams is a standalone prequel to that to determine whether it's worth working on.


- Many characters in the planned Divine Dreams are derived from MARDEK characters, but have been renamed to avoid implying that they are those characters, because they're not. Savitr is vaguely based on Enki, for example.


- It's also interesting hearing what people consider to be my 'new' stuff. Some people seemed to categorise things like Alora Fane Creation and Taming Dreams as 'new stuff', but those to me feel like distant memories from another era. I suppose it's not been that many years though, objectively. It's not been that long since MARDEK either, though, and that feels like a lifetime ago!

When I talk about my 'new' stuff, I mean post-Flash, post-brain-surgery, post-university. So Sindrel Song, Divine/Atonal Dreams. 3D Unity stuff. More of an intended direction than a body of released works at this point. It's the path I'm currently walking rather than the stops I've previously made, or something. I'm aware that makes it difficult for other people to have much of an opinion about any of it though!


- MARDEK was free, and it was a huge RPG with little to no direct competition. There's absolutely no way to replicate that with a Steam release, and my release process is going to have to be more like I see other indie devs on Twitter talking about. The games scene now is vastly different to the Flash scene a decade ago. Thankfully even mediocre-looking games seem able to do decently well on Kickstarter, with a sufficient enough push. I'm in the (long) process of learning how to do that.


- MARDEK wasn't a financial hit, partly due to meekness on my part (I accepted the first offer and felt bad about taking anything), but largely because essentially no Flash games made serious money. The whole sponsorship model - where essentially the entirety of a game's income came from a sponsor paying you to put their branding in the game - was ridiculous. I often wished I'd got just $1 for everyone who'd played MARDEK. I'd be a multimillionaire.


- I'm hoping that the revised monster essence training/collection aspect from Atonal Dreams will scratch many of the same itches that MARDEK's skill learning system did.


- Atonal Dreams is still quite silly; I wouldn't find something entirely serious interesting.


- Atonal Dreams no longer requires a controller to play! That was the first thing I addressed post-alpha-test.


- Obviously no sensible comparison can be made between something intimately familiar, steeped in years of memories, and something new. All I hope is that people approach the new with an open mind.


- I can understand the draw of familiarity, though it seems so strange to me how... rigid this seems to be for some people. Personally I get irritated by generic Fantasy or Sci-Fi settings that have been done many times before. When I see something that puts a new spin on things, I'm way more likely to be gripped. I found world in the Elder Scrolls games generally dull, for example, forgettable despite delving deeply into their tiresome lore, whereas the novel spectacle of "THE WORLD IS A BIG GIANT" from Xenoblade Chronicles quickly made that one of my favourite games. I can't stand the look of games like Genshin Impact because they're so generic (in an anime way).

Seems some people particularly like the generic settings because they're generic - or rather they're 'relatable' - though? It's so at odds with how I think and feel about created worlds...

I groan when I see the generic elements (fire, water, air, earth) used over and over, and it irritates me when their relationships aren't even consistent (does earth beat air or is it weak to it? Depends on the game). I love what I've done with the psychological elements in my Alora Fane world because they really make sense with the fundamental lore; they're not just something tacked on just because. But I suppose it's difficult for me to understand how someone could react to that with anything other than fascination, like how you might not truly ∞ grok ∞ - even if you could 'understand' - how someone could dislike your favourite piece of music.

I'm aware that it's important to strike a balance between familiarity and novelty though; I've written about that a bit in several posts so I won't go over it again in this already long one. One thing I've mentioned is that a lot of indie devs advertise their games purely as a list of games you might remember that they're ostensibly similar to. See ∞ this successful Kickstarter, for a particularly stark example ∞ ("A Metroidvania inspired by new & old classics like Hollow Knight, Super Metroid, Super Castlevania IV & Megaman X"... yes, but what sets it apart??).

I consider the Alora Fane setting to be Fantasy, just not generic fantasy, and I wonder what about it would make it register otherwise to people.



- I've always just taken it for granted that every new RPG I play will have its own convoluted battle system to learn, like the paradigm shift mechanic from Final Fantasy XIII and its sequel. I couldn't begin to explain to you how this worked, years after playing it, and I'd say I barely understood it while playing it, but I was just used to gritting my teeth and pushing through the mechanics in any game I played, so I put up with it, even found interest in it.

People expecting to be masters from the get-go - or for everything to be known to them before they begin - seems so strange to me, and I wonder if it's a recent development. I saw a post somewhere recently (Reddit maybe; can't find it) where someone said they handed an old game they loved to a younger sibling to try, and they hated it because it didn't hold their hand with explicit tutorials and omnipresent button prompts right from the start. But aren't a lot of people who'd like a MARDEK continuation of an older generation than that?

(I remember FFXIII and -2 looking so sleek and modern and impressive when I first played them, but this screenshot just looks offensively busy and hard to parse to me now!)


- You may or may not have seen this comic/meme around:




I've made stuff, loved it, released it into the world, and seen it stamped on. Since I invest myself in what I make, that wounds me. Anyone would share less if they had past experience of sharing things that went badly for them. I suppose - frustratingly - it's just part of growing up. What a world. I keep a lot of stuff I make to myself because I enjoy it deeply, but can't if someone else tells me they hate it, or even that they don't love it like I do (and how could they?). All I can focus on after that is what they found fault with.


- I miss the days when I'd just make stuff without worrying too much about whether it was 'correct' in some technical sense. I've been honing all my creative skills a lot over the past decade though, and I'd like to think I can produce 'better' stuff now. Though I suppose there's always the risk of it seeming like a slick product. I am at least still trying to be driven by my heart, to do what feels best to me, but what, then, am I supposed to do when people comment that Collie's depiction is offensive in some way, or whatever? Do I stick with what felt right to me? Or change course, bending to the crowd? I'm still trying to figure this out.


- I also don't really get how some people apparently prefer pixel art over 3D. I remember playing the old Pokemon games and longing for the day when they'd make the jump to full 3D. It's all progress as far as I'm concerned, opportunities for greater expression and vitality. I didn't use 3D originally because Flash had no support for it. I see a ton of other indie games that use pixel art, and always wonder whether it's due to perceived accessibility (it's easier to draw a sprite than to make a model), or some kind of nostalgic or nouveau-retro aesthetic choice. Makes me wonder how people perceive visuals when they see Atonal Dreams' 3D as inferior to MARDEK's pixels, for example.


- Something some people dislike about my new direction is the focus on 'emotions', presumably - though I can only guess - because it registers as, I don't know, 'sissy' or off-putting to minds more attuned to mechanical things than to airy-fairy feelings, which most 'gamers' would fit into. Maybe I need to start describing it the skills as being 'psychic' in origin, which is no less accurate but has very different connotations.


- snipo101 asked me "What do you think your fans think the core identity of the original MARDEK games is? And do you agree with that?". Seems it's extremely subjective what any game means to anyone! My own focus is primarily in immersion, lore, aesthetics; a lot of people cared about the gameplay aspects of MARDEK way more than I ever did. I love Pokemon, but I have zero interest in competitive play. I'm just hoping to make something that'd appeal to many different facets of interest in the way MARDEK apparently did.


- I have a Discord! Technically, though it's private currently because I don't want to have to deal with the stress of potential drama on top of everything. I absolutely don't miss waking up every morning about what terrible state my community is in. I'll sort out a solution some day.


- Memody: Sindrel Song is not a rhythm game. It's a memory game that uses melody as a stimulus (rather than, say, pictures or words). But the fact that so many people continued thinking of it as a rhythm game despite my many attempts to explain that was an important lesson to learn. Games need to fit their perceived categories. I just hope Atonal Dreams registers as an RPG!


- It also had essentially no marketing because I didn't know anything about how selling indie games worked back then; I was working under the same mentality I had when I released Flash games. Over the last year, I've learned an enormous amount about how I should be approaching games now.


- I made MSS because I'd literally just had brain surgery, and believed a memory game would help with my recovery. That's not really comparable to a game created under any other circumstances. I'm making Atonal Dreams with similar motivations that drove the creation of MARDEK.


- I'm hoping the "you can tame your enemies for the duration of the battle, and can equip tamed monsters as trainable skills" would help Atonal Dreams feel familiarish but also interestingly new. I've stressed this more in the changed version, which I feel is dramatically different to the alpha some people have already played.


- I really hope that Atonal Dreams will find an audience who can appreciate the depth and cleverness I've tried to inject into everything. I'm glad that at least some people already do.


- It's a shame that I didn't finish Taming Dreams, but life got in the way. I released it stupidly anyway though (developed in the dying Flash, released on mobiles exclusively... silly).


- I frequently think of replaying the Final Fantasies that inspired MARDEK, but I haven't found the time yet!




Also, I wrote ∞ a post about Bob Lazar ∞ the other day, which I assumed only a couple of people might read. Currently it's got way more views than most posts get? Someone must have linked to it from somewhere, or something. I write about stuff like that because I find it enjoyable to wallow in wondering "what if??", and dismissals from the clearly-less-gullible-than-me doesn't exactly fill me with joy... is all I'll say about that for now.

10 COMMENTS

Maniafig222~4Y
Game design is a very iterative process based on what I've heard from other game designers. It's good to iterate, though, since a good foundation is so crucial to making a good game!

I welcome the return of the Taming Dreams turn order system! You're right that this new system is easier to comprehend, the old ATB system did feel somewhat tacked on to me.

I'll save my comments on the music until it's finalized and I can experience it first-hand in the game. I do like that the vortex battles have their own theme now!

Personally, I wasn't that hot on resonars, I thought the other ideas you had for the instruments for the Divine Dreams cast to use more interesting, but I did like the general concept of musical instruments serving as weapons.

I'm actually surprised that someone took issue with the implementation of the music. It really doesn't interfere more with the music than most skills in JRPGs, it's just a quick melody instead of thunder or bubble sound effects. I honestly question whether the person making that complaint is basing it on some old tweets of yours where you still had the musical QTEs and they interrupted the music.

I'm pretty mixed on making it so most skills are based on your collected Miasma. I don't really like it when characters in JRPGs are interchangeable (outside of job-system games), and it sounds like they would be interchangeable if most skills are tied to Miasma.

I really liked how in Taming Dreams the skills were tied to mementos, so they served both a gameplay purpose and a narrative purpose. But with Miasma, well, anyone can equip any Miasma, right? And if not, why not? I'd rather the game struck a balance between 3 skills derived innately/narratively that form the core of what a character can do and 3 skills derived from equipped Miasma that shore up blind spots and create synergies. Basically the system from Taming Dreams, but with 3 offensive Miasmon skills instead of 1.

It sounds to me like the bigger issue here is the way leveling works. Personally I don't really see why you can't just make the innate skills level up like Miasma skills do.

I think it'd look strange if characters had a shield but no weapons. The no-weapons angle worked in Taming Dreams because nothing in the game relied on direct violence, but going into battle where enemies will run up to you and bite you with only a shield but no weapons just seems strange. Why wouldn't characters keep weapons on them, and rely only on Miasma?

The gemstone idea could work, I think, but it seems like something a specific group of characters should have, rather than all playable characters.

I'd say the Miasma summoning mechanics mostly function as a Blue Magic system, but greatly expanded upon and more of a focus. The real 'summoning' mechanic is converting enemies to your side, letting you directly control the enemies.

I actually wonder whether the whole conversion system loses some of its uniqueness when you can also equip the Miasma you're converting. What's the difference between a converted Pawnite and a Collie who's equipped a Pawnite? I personally think the in-battle conversion system is the cooler mechanic of the two.

I've heard of tulpas, though the spell checker has not and wants to correct it to 'spatula'! I don't think the term has that many connotations, tulpas are way more niche and unknown than memetic furry slang. Personally I'd be fine with either Tulpas or Miasma, but I prefer Miasma since it's more familiar and has been a recurring thing in your projects since MARDEK. Mindasma sounds weird and doesn't roll off the tongue!

Personally I'd categorize your stuff in 4 eras:
-MARDEK and its progenitors: The old stuff and the culmination of the old stuff
-Miasmon, CBC: Post-MARDEK experimentation
-From Timid Cervid up to DreamQuest: Aftermath of the burnout from FH, projects with Caoimhe-like protagonists
-Taming Dreams and beyond: Alora Fane on the foreground, with inspiration from MARDEK, the 'new era'

The more I play MARDEK, the more I find that the skill system gets in the way! A lot of it just felt grindy, though I think that's largely because the process doesn't reward effective skill use, but just gives a flat +1 per action/reaction/battle.

The silliness/seriousness is something I mentioned, but I still think it's just different, somehow? Not necessarily worse, even. I thought the comedic writing in Taming Dreams was overall better and more consistently funny than the comedic writing in MARDEK, but it's still tonally different.

Taming Dreams had a pretty clear 'voice' because of the strong dynamic between the goofy, idealistic Mardek and the straight-man worrywart Deugan. In a way, I'm now wondering whether Savitr should be a more outspoken character or have more of a voice, in the alpha I played he seemed very reticent, so the dynamic between him and Collie often feels like a one-way street rather than a back-and-forth like with Mardek and Deugan.

I can't say that I associate JRPGs with having to learn complex new systems, that mostly seems like a thing Final Fantasy does, perhaps just because it's big enough to get away with it. It seems to me like most other RPGs have pretty conventional core battle systems, and it's just what they do with the system that sets it apart, like a heavy focus on status effects like in Sonny, or all kinds of synergies and combos like in EBF5.

Honestly I think Pokémon been on a downhill decline ever since it went to 3D! I really prefer the way gens 4 and 5 look over the recent stuff. Gens 6 and 7 look really rough on their native hardware, while gen 8 looks really unimpressive to me compared to most other JRPGs.

Personally I really adored the aesthetic of Taming Dreams. I'd certainly say Atonal Dreams looks better than MARDEK, but I also think Taming Dreams looks way better than MARDEK.

I actually liked the emotions angle. A psychic angle to me doesn't exactly feel right, it has very different connotations to me, more of people with ESP, spoon bending, telekinesis, mind reading and sixth senses.

Wow, you have a discord?! You should send me an invite!!
5
Zoffman1~4Y
Hello! Long time fan, first time commenter.

In response to, "People expecting to be masters from the get-go - or for everything to be known to them before they begin - seems so strange to me, and I wonder if it's a recent development."

I think it is partially a recent development. In part due to an explosion of options gaming wise, hundreds of console games, thousands of computer games, millions of mobile games. And in part due to there being more variety in gameplay now. As much as I loved rpgs on the super Nintendo, they were all very similar mechanically. I don't mind figuring things out personally, but I think it can go a long way to at least clue a person in on how they'll learn. Whether it be gradually through story diaglouge, optional help boxes (like dark souls 1), or just telling the player there's a help menu for a reason and saying good luck.

"I consider the Alora Fane setting to be Fantasy, just not generic fantasy, and I wonder what about it would make it register otherwise to people"

This one is tough. Correct me if I'm wrong. But I'm assuming you mean Tolkien inspired fantasy with knights, dragons, and magic western Europe when you say "generic."

For me, what does it the most are interesting worlds (like the ones in stormlight archive, Malazan) and magic systems (stormlight, Lighbringer, Broken Earth). I had to mention stormlight twice since its world is also heavily music influenced.

I think showing what is unique is important, and that's something that's tough to convey in words which is why you get descriptions like that kickstarter. In other words, demonstrate why this story needs this world and this magic, why CAN'T this story told in Middle Earth, or the Forgotten Realms. I'm behind on updates and videos so maybe you've already taken care of that, sorry if so.

Keep up the good work, I look forward to what you show next!




2
purplerabbits148~4Y
For me, I didn't notice that the music with skills inturupted the music during the battles.

For why I like 2d over 3d, one part comes from my love of anime, (Just look at the images for Redline, and tell me that it is not beautiful) and that I am waiting for 3d to grow past the mimicry of real life and 2d into the more fun stuff you can do with the medium.

For example if you take Pokemon going into 3d, Kabuto became more boring in the 3d space than in the 2d space. Kabuto now has the realistic anatomy, of pokemon applying to the real world at least, but it comes at the cost that the red eyes and feet are now barely visible. Unlike in 2d Where the eyes and feet are visible and give an impression of the character behind the Pokemon.

A similar vibe can be said for Kabuto's evolution, Kabutops. Looking at the bulbapedia pages, I really love the action that the 2d sprites have even when not moving, while the 3d sprites are just there, kinda meh without action in my opinion.

For any type of art, whether it be paintings, photography, or 3d animation, there will always be a period of time where new art mimics the old style of art/real life until there comes a time when the limits of the medium can push itself beyond the old borders. For example lets take paintings, Im pretty sure that youve seen the old paintings of the Renaissance with the amazing paintings that reflect life. As the ages progress artist move on from just real life into stuff that can only be seen with paintings, like Picaso's abstract works, Frida Kahlo's self portraits, and Polluck's drip paintings. I really love that type of art because it pushes the medium.

So with paintings it is a short leap to 2d art. 2d art benefits from the history of the old painting days, but still has its own unique look that it can push. "Akira," "No Game, No Life," and most movies from Studio Ghibli that are produced by Miyazaki have an amazing visual look that take full advantage of the 2d visual.

On the other hand, 3d is still a new way of art. The lessons from paintings in 2d don't exactly translate 100% to 3d due to the differences in medium. So there is a case of uncanny valley for me and thag I'm waiting for the "boring" phase of 3d to grow into something that really pushes the medium. For example if you take the new Sponebob spinoff Camp Koral, there is a huge improvement on how this 3d work moves the medium foreward, but it still is trying to be like its 2d counterpart. One thing thats done better with 2d is the exagerations for comedy. In the 3d Kamp Koral, the exagerations are better than the older 3d cartoons, but still feels off.

Now a work that seems to hit the mark for 3d stuff is Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild and Age of Calamity. The stylization for it really makes ot look beautiful and is taking advatage of the nature of a 3d world and not by trying to be like the 2d world.

Pokemon in the newest iterations have improved on the 3d nature of the new Pokemon and makes more use of the 3d space when compared to some of the 2d to 3d translation of the old Pokemon.

So for me, I still enjoy 2d because it has the legacy nd history from waaay back and that people have learned how to do truely unique things with the 2d medium. 3d on the other hand is still new, so the "good stuff" still hasn't become the norm. I can see that some stuff has passed the threshold, but not at a frequency that makes me excited for 3d. One game that I know that pushes the boundary for 3d space is "Manifold Garden." That game have you stare into infinity, which is impossible in the 2d space

The difference between 2d and 3d is about the same difference between a book and the movie. The book House of Leaves truly can only work as a book, because you cannot recreate all the different physical sublevels of the pages of that book with the hidden messages, meanings, and interpretations. On the otherhand, you can't do justice to the movie, Inception, in book form, it has to be in a movie to truely experience what the movie has to offer.

Sorry for being a skeptic and brining down your mood x~x

For me, I spent quite a lot of time in an engineering Uni so I default to thorough questioning when things are questionable. Though, it is fun when trying to use science to prove the absurd. For example, one class we were learning about electric fields, and for one question someone got the crazy result that a dragonfly would exert an electric field the size of a school bus. Well turns out he messed up a constant in the equation, but that's a pretty cool result. Another would be the time some people were trying to figure out how we could still experience the world as is , but if it was flat. Well, they got the shape of the Earth to be the inverse of a solenoid on a flat plane. However, they could not figure out how to add the sun and moon into the inverse solenoid to make everything work. So yeah science can go in absurd directions.
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purplerabbits148~4Y
I should add that for pixel art, a large part for the love comes from nostalgia. Back then the artists would take 3d if they could, but they were limited to pixel art so they had to be extra creative with how they did things.

I love creativity from limiting circumstances.

Pixels also have the benefit of being very efficient with portraying information and space. For example the wild anime hair in old games like Chrono Trigger, help identify what which character is important. And then you have the crazy level of rendering for Cloud Strife in the Final Fantasy 7 remake. They rendered his freaking pores if you zoom in close enough. That level of detail is extraneous to the story and most people would not notice, but it does have the benefit of looking amazing.
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AdmiralLara49~4Y
Oh come on it doesn't take much to be less gullible than you :P

also, like "arousal"? For real? This seems to be a very horny game, I hope people appreciate that about it
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Astreon152~4Y
I think dropping the resonars all together would be a waste.

Maybe the use of a resonar skill could be like a super-duper magical music attack, a bit like the "special" attack from the bravelys saga ?

Remember how you can tweak those beforehand so they add an elemental + status effect, both to you and the opponents ?

Maybe you could do something similar here, where the player would choose between 4 progressively unlockable skills (Savitr's would be locked/greyed since he is supposed to be too OP at full strength), and launch the "special" attack once a certain condition is met (like 100% arousal, or 70% bliss, N monsters tamed, etc.).
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Tobias 1115~4Y
I wondered about whether to have some kind of 'limit break' thing - since that's really the only thing that differed between characters in FFVII and VIII, I think? - though I wasn't a fan at all of the specials in Bravely Default (2), especially since they took over the background music. I just avoided using them mostly!

It also seems weird to me that they'd wield weapons that'd only be used in some rare special attack but which would otherwise go unused, plus I don't like the idea of battles being determined by big specials. I'd rather they were focused on individual skills instead.

It'd also be way more work!
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Astreon152~4Y
Interesting, you dislike the specials in BD for the exact same reason i like them: the cutscene breaks the rythm of the battle, has its own music and voice acting, etc. I used specials very often, just for the pleasure of the animation part :) Also, the special"s theme replaces the background music for as long as its effect lasts, and suddenly switching back to the battle theme was a great indicator that your buffs disappeared, so interrupting BGM actually served a purpose.

I was thinking you could add a box to check somewhere, which would allow/disallow for a "resonar skill" cutscene to take place but that'd probably be to much hassle.

To not drop the concept entirely, here is another suggestion: maybe they could use the resonars while striking, with a reaction button, and each would produce a different noise on impact that would trigger some kind of effect (stun, reduce whatever stat, boost whatever stat, etc.). I'm thinking something along the lines of the gunblade in FF8.
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Kalin24~4Y
For turn order, I'd want each char to be added back to the list as soon as they act, so everyone appears exactly once. (The way you describe your change, it sounds like the last char to act in the round will not be able to see who acts next.) Also, I've never been happy with the standard mechanic of "faster chars just act sooner in the round" since most of the time it isn't an advantage, and occasionally it's a disadvantage. I really like the idea of "faster chars get turns more often", something I first saw in Ultima 5. Of course, you have to balance that carefully, because you don't want anyone to act more than twice as often as an average char.

I find it funny people are talking about the standard four elements of JRPGs, since those are the Greek elements. The Japanese (according to Wikipedia) had five, adding "void". The Chinese also had five, but instead of "air" and "void" they had "wood" and "metal", which could be very interesting in a game. And lately I've noticed a trend of just three elements: water > fire > wood > water.

For essences, what if you split them into two types? When you tame a monster, the tamer (and only the tamer) gains that monster's skill, and can level it up by taming more of that monster. When you kill a monster, you get an equipable stat boost that can be leveled up by merging others from that monster. This makes the player choose between improving skills and improving stats, which can make replays more interesting. And you can give both skills and stat boosts to all members of the party, but only if they're left at low levels.
1
Wolf21~4Y
Why not attach a similar 'levelling up' function to the resonars as well? Perhaps the more you use a resonar's skill, you develop more affinity with the resonar? If you then add additional functionality to the resonar (presumably resonating with a character's inherent element) maybe once you reach a certain affinity level it can add a passive skill // active skill (maybe both, with each at different thresholds of affinity). Assuming you only have the one resonar for each character, the skills can slowly increase as affinity builds - or you could cap the affinity at a point. Affinity could build even without using the basic resonar attack skill, but just by having it equipped (and maybe it builds more if it is used).

There are a few things you could do with them. I like the concept, as it evokes that 'resonating' feel and that is an emotionally charged term. Enhancing a character's innate ability, covering a weakness, or enhancing a strength might lend itself well to the lore and the in-battle development of characters. I like the idea of them and wouldn't want to lose them, but also if they are just tools for resonating with your own core emotions // element / etc. then it would represent that the characters are already armed, but with their own traits rather than with a weapon (or representing the inherent traits of a character AS a weapons).

That aside, I was having a chat with my partner about your games (she's heard a lot about you over the years - and even played some Sindrel Song with me a while back). I brought up the initiative // speed system and she was a bit put off by the term 'arousal'. I brought it up in the discord and someone said I should mention it on the blog. While discussions about mechanics and such are at the fore it's easier to pick up on such terms but maybe the connotation of the word might put others off as well (and I wouldn't want that to be the case).

In terms of the actual turn based system - would it be possible for a very attentive hasty reactive character to have multiple turns in a round? It is more relevant for RPGs where you distribute stats (and can pour stats into speed, or dex), so it might not really be relevant here, but it always irritated me in some games where I was 10x the level of an enemy but we were still basically just as fast as each other. Depending on the length of the game and how many areas, maybe something like Earthbound could be used instead, where you instantly win battles against enemies that are far weaker than you (e.g. when backtracking through really low level areas to get chests // do something).

Edit: What syntax does your comment section use for inline formatting? I just found out that I can italicise things with slashes and I'm unfamiliar with what that would be. Though I am pretty much only familiar with some flavours of MarkDown or ReStructured Text.
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