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Miscellaneous

Game Design

Let's talk about...Development HELL



P.s. Nightwish is awesome.


I asked a few friends what to blog about, hey I told you I'm going to rectify myself, and so a development blog it is. While I didn't want to reveal anything about the development until the end, I guess Development Hell is not bad to talk about :D

I learned a few things during the 'hidden' development of PorcuP and trying to work behind the scenes. Here are some interesting things I actually -knew- but I didn't follow.

PLAN PLAN PLAN. But make it flexible
- Ah yes, planning. When we first started out, I asked rhyme to create a world map and we can plan the scenarios based on them. Except...The map was huge...I had a crazy schedule set up for it alongside with self inflicted hard mode work for my university projects. The game was planned with each other holding hands. Except...



- So when one of us had to go due to...life, I was quickly trying to gather my bearings and thinking what to do. A few more and then we found that the game is too big after all (specially with the constant deadline changing). And the only reason I did so well on quickly shifting the game to Porcupine is because I decided to make it part of my main lore (Division Heaven). Which can -also- mean as a dead sentence for any game I dubbed thee as part of it. Because I'm someone who wants the best when it comes from that lore too. orz

- And because of it too, skillsets and items must change, even the UI (thankfully just a quick color change). And what's the best way to finish database works as fast as possible? Get your closest friends and go to Google Docs. Expect craziness though:


Good times.


Freedom is evil, stop adding features!
- What made Rm2k3 awesome back then? Limitations and working around those limitations.

- Freedom is great, but it's also very evil in terms of development that -should- have a deadline. I found myself being able to do most of the things I want. What I found is that because I was new to VXAce and how easily some things are replicated (from VX -> VXAce) and BETTER, I got off the rails and overdid it, sort of, with the feature spamming. And friends giving suggestions didn't help with that. Or when the story starts writing itself...

- Point is, I have to be held back because it was too much and/or will take a while. And partly for other reasons... As much as features are great and how you can go all out, working under a deadline isn't good. Finish the game first, make the next one better. Is what they would say.

- Connected to the first point and what I found about planning is that, it is really important for the scripts to be as finalized as possible. If you think it's going to make the game easier to make and is more time efficient. Do it. Just look for people and beg to your knees if you have to, do it. Or else you'll end up with something like this:

From this:


To this:


- Doesn't look like it should matter right? Except imagine redoing 2 hours worth of dialogues and it's going to make you cry. All for the sake of proper line spacing... orz

- While I actually failed on this regard, I'm happy with all the features the game has now. Even when I'm way overdue. Haha.

ORGANIZE YOURSELF
- I CAN'T STRESS THIS ENOUGH. REALLY. Just, just look at this:



Let's just say inside those folders there's more New Folders. I curse my laziness u.u);
At least the inside of the game isn't that bad.



But this is also connected to the NUMBER 1 POINT. I should've added more spaces between the characters in case of emergency activation skills. ;_;)

Anyway, it's 2 am and I have work to do.
That's it for now =w=)b

Miscellaneous

And an action was taken...

Let's just say it began with this:
3 <Nessiah> but I did porcup work :D
07 * Decky pats :D
<Decky> nessy
<Decky> http://rpgmaker.net/games/3827/blog/8323/
3 <Nessiah> hahah
03 <Nessiah> ;3;
<Decky> two-line blog
<Decky> naughty lady :P


I have an argument as to why I posted only a two-line blog post, but I disgress. I will now rectify myself with an elaborate blog post. While I was going to let the game explain all of this, I figured I might as well write it here for people who likes world building posts and things like that.

Porcupine Princess is a prequel to Princess Princess. It will also explain the connection between Princess Princess: Another Story to these two chapters as well. The goal of the heroes in this game is to end the 30 year drought and make it rain.

Set into the fictional world of Galatea, the residents are divided into two main factions. Which is crappily illustrated below:



The Aviarian Domain is lead by the Aviarian Queen, Isabella. Aviarians can be summed up as people who have the "ability to fly" and would often be referred as Aesir and Vanir. Aviarians are also said to be the ones responsible for rain. They also have a tradition of giving flowers to beloved people. The more flower motifs you have, the well-liked you are. Let's see how many flowers our beloved Queen has...


She seems very well loved, yup.


The Arcanian Domain on the other hand is actually a divided nation. There are what they call the 7 Overlords, which are considered to be the leaders of each continent. They do however have a superior, and that is Ardius, the Overlord of the Mainlands.


This wonderful person right here~


The Arcanians are divided into different races as well. The Humans and The Demons, also known as Earthblood residents. These two races are in conflict due to their primal needs. So what do I mean by this? Well, there have been rumors (if you played Princess Princess 1.5, this should be obvious by now!), that Earthblood residents are cannibals. They eat humans and their own race alike. So a "witch hunt" was conducted and now Earthblood residents are believed to be a few and almost non-existent.

Due to unknown circumstances, Aviarians have stopped letting rain fall down to the earth. While the Arcanians, confused and angry, stopped delivering earthly goods to the Aviarians in retaliation. It lasted for 30 years and both sides are on the brink of starting a war against each other.

But of course, this is all backstory. Some people, like our heroes, are more concerned of solving the matter at hand. And that is to make it rain. And thus we enter the story of Porcupine Princess. Where our main goal is to enter the Tower of Creation.



The Tower of Creation is also known as the Home of the Fairies. They are known as the kindest and Goddess's second creation, aside from Angels (which are the first). In there lies hidden a mighty artifact called the "Aiglos." It an artifact that is known tohave been used by the Goddess to cause an Ice Age. It's also been divided into two parts. One is sealed on the Aviarian Domain and one here in the Arcanian domain.

The next-in-line Overlord of Shalza, Syrn Gehalde, abandoned his duties as a prince for this quest and to do something worthwhile for his people before he becomes an overlord.



If you remember this guy, he's also the very same, optional boss that kicked the asses of many over here:


We meet again.


So yes NicoB, that answers your question why they're not saving the princess despite the fact she's just next door.

While there is tension between the two nations, thanks to Isabelle and Ardius's interference, the Aviarians and Arcanians can still interact with each other. But a lot of people are saying it's not going to last long. That is why Syrn is doing his best, along with his mentors, Alphonse and Emily and his slave, sidekick friend Citrus, they're almost near their goal to the Aiglos.

However, whispers of an entity called, The Overlord Slayer, have been spread around and the Ames family has caught up to it. Said to have murdered the Overlord of Astroia, there had been concerns about the safety of Syrn and the rest of the overlords. Which is constantly getting in the way of Syrn's goals much to his irritation.


What became of this person is unknown...


And that's where the story of Porcupine Princess starts~

Announcement

About the dropbox

I am currently trying to clean out so many things back and forth so I kicked people out of it for the meantime!
I hope it didn't cause any weird feelings! D:

Progress Report

Icons :D

I was making some icons for...reasons and a friend asked me for a tutorial because of reasons. I thought I'll post it here as a blog post instead of an article because it's well, not that helpful haha.

Progress Report

Never ending arts

Still have a lot to do. Stupid Cutscenes :I


Music:
Ragnarok Online Remix – Mintjam
Persona fan remixes
Ar Tonelico Loki
Atelier Ayesha Battle

Length: 2 hours and 11 minutes (33 minutes ish for video)
Still incomplete since I have to draw some effects, etc. But it shows how I color, hopefully.
Done in a livestream session.

Tools used: Paint Tool Sai, Brush and Pen Tool. Nothing else.

Total Amount of Layers: 69

Progress Report

Choo Choo

Progress is getting there...slowly...but surely.


It's always been a dream of mine to have a DVD+booklet copy for a game I'm involved with. I wanted to give hard copies to everyone involved in the game's development as a souvenir too. We'll see how it goes ;w;c)

Thank you to rhyme (ILU, let's walk under a field of stars my twin sister <3) and Penta for the wonderful job they did for this game!

Progress Report

Some changes here and there

Mostly some game design changes, some nice people gave me their input on PrinPrin 1.5 and what they liked and what I should change.

One of them is the Press A to active conversation and the gab windows. After talking to them and the reasons why they prefer it, I have made all the gabs to Press A's for focus-sake and completely skippable without taking away your attention. It also made me a bit more creative to how the portraits are moving and so on. (I scripted guys, omg!) :)

Number Two, I decided to make a lot of tutorials that you can access optionally or discover them on your own. I really like the idea of Old school RPGs where you discover new things and exploit them. And I really, really, REAAALLLY hate spoonfeeding. But not everyone is like that so I added it!



Number Three, we finally finished designing the final boss...100% including hard mode. Good luck guys!

And that's it for now. Chiao :)

Announcement

Testers Recap?

I am not sure if my brain is shocked or destroyed right now but I was checking over the testers list. I think I added some people accidentally to the testers but I didn't actually see them in the dropbox members list, one of them was emmych since I didn't see her name in it? I might be crazy.

And I know one person informed me that she has to get removed from dropbox right now for bandwith.

So uh if I missed anyone even in 1.5 can people check it out here? Here's what I had so far, tell me if I missed anyone!

> Beta Testers
Jalen
Hirei
Indrah
Marimo
Toomas
Ronove
Liberty
Kread-Ex
Newblack
Nightmare
Deckiller
Radscythe
PentagonBuddy
Skie Fortress
Sorceress Kyrsty

Game Design

Finally! Some Freedom~

I finally finished most of the work that I should be doing now! And to show off that I wasn't really slacking off and that even though I won't finish it tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, there was some progress made.

I thought that the battle system was too slow, maybe because I'm a fast reader, I am not sure! So here's a video with the changes made!



1.) Added a faster battle log. I got it as a birthday present! Thank you TDS!
2.) Added battle shaking!
3.) Added tips for the poor souls. I feel like I'm spoon feeding people, but hey!
4.) Fixed the Battle Damage Pop-up!
5.) Devil Survivor 2 is addicting, I didn't take any inspirations from it, at all. Nope.
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