Alora Fane

I set up my new PC at long last, I'm still working on story decisions - including some fast/dream travel 'flowerbeds' - and it's a shame people aren't more receptive to - or even aware of - my post-MARDEK work!

I FINALLY set up the new computer I got like a billion years ago!! Transferring everything over - and creating a couple of backups because I was concerned about buggering something up and losing everything somehow - and then setting everything up and mentally adjusting to what feels like moving into a new house all took time, so I lost a couple of work days due to that (knowing that'd happen was why it took me so long to get around to it in the first place).

Wow, though, what an improvement! I used to have to wait like 20 minutes for my old PC just to start up or shut down, and almost as long for some things like Atonal Dreams to export. Now, startup takes 20 seconds, if that, and exporting AD is even quicker. Everything opens almost instantly; no horrible lags that used to eat up so much of my time. So that's great!

One thing I was really hoping for though was that Sibelius - my music composition program - would no longer randomly crash on export, as it had frequently been doing on my old PC over the past few months (though it never did before that). But it's still doing that, so that's annoying. I wonder whether the files are just corrupted or something; I haven't made anything new to test yet. Makes me want to just switch to something else - as I've written about before - but there are a bunch of issues with that.

Other than that, I've been continuing to work on Atonal Dreams' story, like ∞ I talked about last week ∞; everything in that post is still relevant.

I can't really go into detail without spoiling everything, unfortunately, but I might post on Patreon soon about some more not-hugely-spoilery details I'm still trying to work through. Here, I'll share something more conceptual, lore-related, rather than story-related per se:

The world map's currently broken!

I've been wondering for a while exactly how Savitr and Collie arrived at Crescent Rift, and how the nightmare prologue would transition to the 'tutorial island' section in the 'real world'. For a while, I had it so that Collie's nightmare ended with her being told to 'wake up', then she wakes up floating above the world map astride a figmon - Mysteed - with the real Savitr telling her to wake up and saying that they'd arrived at the island; she'd somehow drifted off to sleep on a flying horse thing on her first mission with her hero, which seems a bit silly really.

I also had elemental 'mausolea', in which pairs of characters would sleep on a bed together to enter into one person's psychepelago (dream world). It seemed a good opportunity for silly character scenes, but using a bed like that limited it to just two people.

I came up with this concept which combines those two things, kind of. They're large aster-shaped flowers, with the petals kind of like beds, on which up to six people can rest at once. The term flowerbed seems like an easy and satisfying pun. I imagined a couple of uses for them:

One was replacing the mausolea with these flowerbeds, so up to six characters could sleep at once, with one guiding the whole party to their personal psychepelago (which would correspond to the element of the flowerbed).

The other was using these as a kind of fast travel system. Essentially the lore would be that they were devices created by the Aolmna - the gods who made the world - where you could use your memory to navigate through the drealm to somewhere you'd previously visited. You'd use one by sitting and meditating, focusing your memories, and the crystal in the middle of the flower would turn you - and anyone on the other petals - into energy and transfer you through its roots - the 'memoroot network', or maybe 'deja root' or something - to another flowerbed.

It seemed very fitting with a lot of the themes and motifs, and like a nice play on how fast travel does work in games in general, plus it's a kind of commentary on how the waking world and drealm are essentially one and the same, the nature of reality and consciousness, things like that.

The game could begin with Collie waking up on one of these flowerbeds with the real Savitr, and he could explain that the reason she had such a vivid dream is because they did just travel through the drealm. It'd mean I wouldn't have to include the world map between the prologue and tutorial island sections. Plus Savitr being able to travel to this particular flowerbed would mean he has a memory of it, which has some story relevance.

So that all seems very elegant... but it presents problems where characters who are on your party would technically have memories of certain locations you haven't reached yet, so why don't they just use their memory to get you there via the memoroot network? Using the physical travel network to travel into dreams presents some possible issues too.

So that's something I'm having to come to decisions about!

Another thing: I irregularly get emails from fans of my old work, either expressing appreciation or asking me for something like whether they can have access to old files (to which I generally say no). Recently, some of them have said things suggesting they're not aware of this website, or any of my most recent work, which makes me wonder how to even reach fans of my old stuff.

I know I've written about this a bunch of times in this blog, but it's also always kind of disappointing how openly uninterested people seem to be in my new work. One person said that while he loved MARDEK, he didn't care for the new stuff, and likened it to how he had a dream when he was young involving decorating his living space to his liking, which he acted out when he moved into his own place, and then it was out of his system. In my reply, I wrote this:

You're not the first to say they don't like my new stuff and prefer the old, and I've thought a lot about that in recent years. I wouldn't say your comparison to a childhood dream you just have to get out of your system is accurate exactly.

It's more like... creators begin their journeys making stuff that's basically just a conglomeration of their influences; MARDEK's fairly blatantly based on games like Final Fantasy, for example. But as they learn more about their craft, they start to develop their own voice, their own ideas, and get more interested in experimentation... but that leads them in a more personal direction, and people who haven't walked that same journey with them - but who did appreciate their early work because they discovered it at a more receptive time in their life, and it resonated with their familiarity with the works it was inspired by - tend to be put off.

It seems to be a common thing with bands, I think.

It's a shame, though, because I feel like I've come so far as a creator since I made MARDEK, and I feel the stuff I'm working on now has the potential to be meaningful in a way that a silly derivative semi-parody that I made in my teens/early twenties was, but I'm very aware that a lot of people will just miss out on it, and I have no idea how to get around that, or if I even ever could.

It's a recurring theme, and it makes me think about how differently creators and non-creators see those creators' creations. How different the roles they play in their respective lives are. For me, MARDEK was a stepping stone; for players, it was an experience, tightly tied to fond memories. For me to return to old work would be unwalking a journey, for them it'd be a warm bath of nostalgia, a return to a pleasant part of their past.

I've been frustrated by this in the past, but I suppose I'm more accepting now, and just appreciative that people still care about stuff I made so long ago. I just wish I were better at putting out new stuff so then I didn't feel so embarrassed about being praised only for stuff I've long since grown beyond!

6 COMMENTS

kidupiscean37~3Y

Glad that your new PC works mostly well!

Maybe you can include a demo of Atonal Dreams as part of the MARDEK package on Steam when the demo is ready (and update the last paragraph in ABOUT THIS GAME too)?

phsc57~3Y

Good thing you set your PC up, about Sibelius, what version do you use? is it the latest one? it is very likely not about hardware but software, what your computer is running might not be that compatible with the specific version, if you give me some information like the OS you are using and the specific version of Sibelius I can look into it and maybe help, maybe you're missing some necessary packages and files for it to run well or it is just not made for it, but there are (sort of probably?) a few ways around it.

Anyway, about the fan emails and such, I think it is sort of too late to tell them about your modern stuff, maybe some Steam posts (like, updates and such?) on MARDEK, as in you make like a situation update post on the MARDEK game linking to here and explaining what you are doing, but I think now is too late.

While I think most people prefer MARDEK to your newer stuff, what exactly is your newer stuff? Taming Dreams well it did not get finished and differs quite a bit and is rather niche compared to MARDEK I would say (as in, the amount of people who - playing the game - would enjoy it). Other than that, Sindrel Song is very different and probably the most niche thing you've made?

I think the nostalgia is really strong, if you ask most MARDEK fans what their favorite chapter is, most will say chapter 2, while in my opinion 3 is actually REALLY superior if you think about the game alone, much more content, more hours, way more interesting gameplay and such, things get much deeper and such, while chapter 2 is very good I think chapter 3 is what made me realize "ok, MARDEK is really good!", but I only found out about it because I played the old versions of chapter 2 years earlier and checked on it to see if there was a continuation.

I do think MARDEK is fairly unique, some mechanics are based on games but the specific touch you added to the game is what in my opinion makes it better than the original "source material", the reaction system, the possibilities when building your character and team, the plot itself is rather simple but I think the characters have more personality than the generic old mainstream JRPGs, also the dialogue and like general... memes? not so much memes in the modern sense but in the formal one, like how Aalia is a reference to how young girls used to write in the internet, or some really small stuff like some Aeropolis people being racist, the adventurer feminist, all of Warport, the Aeropolis shaman, the guy who says girls dig his uniform talking to the girl, and all of that, small dialogue, even some kinda dumb stuff but I find it funny (probably because of that?) like the bearded guys in Canonia.

Also the music is something I really dig, the only issues I have with MARDEK is inbattle artstyle which is very simplistic and such, also maybe how boring chapter 1 is? but I think the game is fairly unique and I think you underrate it maybe because of the "lack of a deeper meaning or message", and to that I say, not everything has to have that! but I understand why you as a content creator would prefer something deeper.

I think that also over you know, 10 years? people really change and so do their tastes, your stuff is much more niche now, and it requires some open-mindness to check different things out, I don't know if I would check Atonal Dreams on Steam if I saw it, but knowing it is made by you I think it is already a bit better since you did not only make MARDEK that I like. But mostly the very old games from the flash era, even when they differ quite a bit from MARDEK (like Raider or Clarence).

I myself wrote an email like that quite some time ago to you about how I liked MARDEK and it was very nostalgia based, but after showing your games to my friends MARDEK seems to be what they find most interesting, even tho I realized there are a few things I'd prefer were different for it to perfectly fit my tastes, and the same goes to your current view on the game now as well I would imagine?

It is a common thing with everything, music even more since one's musical taste is much less... rational? than other things (read On Repeat: How Music Plays the Mind by Elizabeth Margulis, a book on the neuroscience of music that in my opinion answers pretty clearly what sets one's musical tastes and such and has a lot of solid research, tho some of the conclusions you seem to sort of know already?).

I think what I like the most about MARDEK over everything else is the gameplay, and this is the biggest reason I would like to play Atonal Dreams, even if it is very different, the mechanics and battle dynamics of MARDEK are very cool and better than most RPGs of similar style and end up being what I truly enjoy and even if I had never heard of the game and played it today for the first time I think I'd enjoy it, so I hope Atonal Dreams also checks that box for me.

(also maybe the plot and general message truly is deeper and such but i am trying not to read a lot of your later posts when it comes to some game stuff because i just want to experience it kinda blindly tho i do know some stuff so i can judge it in a less biased way considering i might disagree with your design choices and thus later on get maybe a bit annoyed with the direction you went while maybe in the bigger sense of things your choice was better?)

Lots of text, huh. Completely unrelated but, I myself am making a game, so maybe I will relate to this when (if) I finish it and then make like 5 more games like 12 years in the future or so or something?

Anyway, about the fan emails and such, I think it is sort of too late to tell them about your modern stuff, maybe some Steam posts (like, updates and such?) on MARDEK, as in you make like a situation update post on the MARDEK game linking to here and explaining what you are doing, but I think now is too late.

While I think most people prefer MARDEK to your newer stuff, what exactly is your newer stuff? Taming Dreams well it did not get finished and differs quite a bit and is rather niche compared to MARDEK I would say (as in, the amount of people who - playing the game -  would enjoy it). Other than that, Sindrel Song is very different and probably the most niche thing you've made?

I think the nostalgia is really strong, if you ask most MARDEK fans what their favorite chapter is, most will say chapter 2, while in my opinion 3 is actually REALLY superior if you think about the game alone, much more content, more hours, way more interesting gameplay and such, things get much deeper and such, while chapter 2 is very good I think chapter 3 is what made me realize "ok, MARDEK is really good!", but I only found out about it because I played the old versions of chapter 2 years earlier and checked on it to see if there was a continuation.

I do think MARDEK is fairly unique, some mechanics are based on games but the specific touch you added to the game is what in my opinion makes it better than the original "source material", the reaction system, the possibilities when building your character and team, the plot itself is rather simple but I think the characters have more personality than the generic old mainstream JRPGs, also the dialogue and like general... memes? not so much memes in the modern sense but in the formal one, like how Aalia is a reference to how young girls used to write in the internet, or some really small stuff like some Aeropolis people being racist, the adventurer feminist, all of Warport, the Aeropolis shaman, the guy who says girls dig his uniform talking to the girl, and all of that, small dialogue, even some kinda dumb stuff but I find it funny (probably because of that?) like the bearded guys in Canonia.

Also the music is something I really dig, the only issues I have with MARDEK is inbattle artstyle which is very simplistic and such, also maybe how boring chapter 1 is? but I think the game is fairly unique and I think you underrate it maybe because of the "lack of a deeper meaning or message", and to that I say, not everything has to have that! but I understand why you as a content creator would prefer something deeper.

I think that also over you know, 10 years? people really change and so do their tastes, your stuff is much more niche now, and it requires some open-mindness to check different things out, I don't know if I would check Atonal Dreams on Steam if I saw it, but knowing it is made by you I think it is already a bit better since you did not only make MARDEK that I like. But mostly the very old games from the flash era, even when they differ quite a bit from MARDEK (like Raider or Clarence).

I myself wrote an email like that quite some time ago to you about how I liked MARDEK and it was very nostalgia based, but after showing your games to my friends MARDEK seems to be what they find most interesting, even tho I realized there are a few things I'd prefer were different for it to perfectly fit my tastes, and the same goes to your current view on the game now as well I would imagine?

It is a common thing with everything, music even more since one's musical taste is much less... rational? than other things (read On Repeat: How Music Plays the Mind by Elizabeth Margulis, a book on the neuroscience of music that in my opinion answers pretty clearly what sets one's musical tastes and such and has a lot of solid research, tho some of the conclusions you seem to sort of know already?).

I think what I like the most about MARDEK over everything else is the gameplay, and this is the biggest reason I would like to play Atonal Dreams, even if it is very different, the mechanics and battle dynamics of MARDEK are very cool and better than most RPGs of similar style and end up being what I truly enjoy and even if I had never heard of the game and played it today for the first time I think I'd enjoy it, so I hope Atonal Dreams also checks that box for me.

(also maybe the plot and general message truly is deeper and such but i am trying not to read a lot of your later posts when it comes to some game stuff because i just want to experience it kinda blindly tho i do know some stuff so i can judge it in a less biased way considering i might disagree with your design choices and thus later on get maybe a bit annoyed with the direction you went while maybe in the bigger sense of things your choice was better?)

Lots of text, huh. Completely unrelated but, I myself am making a game, so maybe I will relate to this when (if) I finish it and then make like 5 more games like 12 years in the future or so or something?

donutsizzle2~3Y

I have been a member of alorafane since it was fighunter, and I have always been interested in your work. I have not played any of your more recent projects because they have not been available to me.

I really wanted to play the most recent MARDEK reboot, other unfinished projects, and AF:C was especially enticing to me (as I really enjoyed trying to create my own scenarios in Blades of Exile, among other games). I never got the chance to play them. I don't play mobile games, so I never played Memody, which seemed tailored entirely to mobile. I am likely not representative of other gamers or groups.

I'm not complaining, I'm not upset, nor am I trying to blame you. The reason I'm bringing this up is simply to note that even those who have been following your work and anticipating new releases have not necessarily played more recent projects because of surrounding circumstances.

The only projects that are currently available to the public, unless I'm mistaken, are MARDEK and Memody. If other projects were made available, at least one person (me) would purchase/play them. I wish you the best on your continued work. Divine Dreams looks excellent.

Take it easy.
~sizz

I really wanted to play the most recent MARDEK reboot, other unfinished projects, and AF:C was especially enticing to me (as I really enjoyed trying to create my own scenarios in Blades of Exile, among other games). I never got the chance to play them. I don't play mobile games, so I never played Memody, which seemed tailored entirely to mobile. I am likely not representative of other gamers or groups.

I'm not complaining, I'm not upset, nor am I trying to blame you. The reason I'm bringing this up is simply to note that even those who have been following your work and anticipating new releases have not necessarily played more recent projects because of surrounding circumstances.

The only projects that are currently available to the public, unless I'm mistaken, are MARDEK and Memody. If other projects were made available, at least one person (me) would purchase/play them. I wish you the best on your continued work. Divine Dreams looks excellent.

Take it easy.
~sizz

Tobias 1115~3Y

This is true and I'm aware of it, and it's why it's so frustrating that Atonal Dreams is taking so damn long (after a predicted 6 month development time); I feel I can make interesting stuff these days, but I just haven't really had much opportunity to show it off yet!

(Maybe I should look again into publishing my unfinished stuff in some kind of compilation or something...)

But I'm surprised you've been under the impression that Memody is for mobiles! I think I talked about that early on, but I eventually ended up going with a Steam/PC release instead and there's no mobile version at all. But I never know where exactly to mention the relevant information where people will see it.

kasheeste2133~3Y

Perhaps I'm just a simpleton but why is characters having memories of places you haven't been/can't go yet a problem? I mean...Savitr probably has memories of when he was Ferdinand I&V's personal sommelier but people don't expect to be able to fast travel to a Bavarian wine cellar. Its a dream, you're certainly more educated on the topic than myself, but last I knew they and their contents are involuntary. Why can't we go to the wine cellar or Collie's treehouse of marshmallows? Because your inner Freud doesn't want you to.

Similarly for the whole past thing... I think it's pretty normal for folks our age to look back fondly on what we were and what we could have been but ultimately those days are gone and aren't coming back. We've traveled too far, learned so much and picked up too many demons such that even if we did have a time machine and could plop ourselves back in good old '05 it certainly wouldn't be the 'glory days' (moronic term yes; but you get what I'm going for) and I would be very much surprised if the whole theoretical experience weren't woefully depressing. Simply put, there is a quote (attributed to Pericles but I find that dubious) "Time is the king of all men, it is their parent and their grave, and gives them what it wills and not that which they crave."

Similarly for the whole past thing... I think it's pretty normal for folks our age to look back fondly on what we were and what we could have been but ultimately those days are gone and aren't coming back. We've traveled too far, learned so much and picked up too many demons such that even if we did have a time machine and could plop ourselves back in good old '05  it certainly wouldn't be the 'glory days' (moronic term yes; but you get what I'm going for) and I would be very much surprised if the whole theoretical experience weren't woefully depressing. Simply put, there is a quote (attributed to Pericles but I find that dubious) "Time is the king of all men, it is their parent and their grave, and gives them what it wills and not that which they crave."

Tobias 1115~3Y

I probably didn't explain this very well!

The setting of Alora Fane is based around the idea that consciousness is the substrate of the universe, and all forces and matter emerge from that. The Aolmna learned how to manipulate consciousness, which is how they created Alora Fane. The flowerbeds/memoroot network were artefacts they left behind that operate using similar 'technology': people can physically travel through the waking world by basically being transformed into pure consciousness, transferred through roots, then reincorporated at the other end; memory is basically the equivalent of some starship transporter chief entering coordinates into a computer.

They Beyond Ponderer monks also use the flowerbeds to travel into the drealm directly to access psychepelagos.

So they have a dual purpose: for warping around the 'real world', like a typical fast travel system, and for exploring dreamscapes which are less fixed, more driven by characters' memories and feelings and such.

My main concern about their role as physical teleporters is that you get some allies who'd have memories of locations that would basically make going through certain dungeons pointless; why trek through this cave when so-and-so can just warp us all there? Reaching a particular elemental flowerbed would be the goal of some dungeons, which might feel like a waste of time if you have someone who you know has been there before.

I probably didn't explain this very well!

The setting of Alora Fane is based around the idea that consciousness is the substrate of the universe, and all forces and matter emerge from that. The Aolmna learned how to manipulate consciousness, which is how they created Alora Fane. The flowerbeds/memoroot network were artefacts they left behind that operate using similar 'technology': people can physically travel through the waking world by basically being transformed into pure consciousness, transferred through roots, then reincorporated at the other end; memory is basically the equivalent of some starship transporter chief entering coordinates into a computer.

They Beyond Ponderer monks /also/ use the flowerbeds to travel into the drealm directly to access psychepelagos.

So they have a dual purpose: for warping around the 'real world', like a typical fast travel system, and for exploring dreamscapes which are less fixed, more driven by characters' memories and feelings and such.

My main concern about their role as physical teleporters is that you get some allies who'd have memories of locations that would basically make going through certain dungeons pointless; why trek through this cave when so-and-so can just warp us all there? Reaching a particular elemental flowerbed would be the goal of some dungeons, which might feel like a waste of time if you have someone who you know has been there before.