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Context
After having created a game where a lover commits suicide to rejoin his dead girlfriend. (In memory of Selina Fritz ; Valentiny)
After having created a strange RPG where a jazz band seeks for a goose's golden poops for money. (Black Lemons ; Theme Roulette 3)
Now it's time to get back to business with another serious project, this time for 50 Days of Representation.

Underrepresented group
The starting idea was quite hard to find. With a little help from Discord, I've decided to deal with the Wiccans.
To be concise, the Wiccans are somewhat the sorcerers of present. They live in harmony with the nature.

Synopsis
Florian, character inspired by myself, is currently writing an essay about the wiccan culture. He learns there's a wiccan village located in Wales, inside a deep forest.
Florian sends a letter to the village's chief, who accepts to receive him and host him for a few days.
Florian's eyes will watch a underrepresented group living on their own. Children, adults, elders ; every type of person is good to help Florian write his essay.

Technical
The game is defined as a kinetic novel. Mostly composed of dialogues, there are a few choices to be made ; even if those won't have any consequence to the progress.
Example: the teacher will give you a history quiz to test your knowledge. Getting 0 or 3 correct answers to his 3 questions doesn't change the story at all.
It's also the first time I create a bilingual English/French game. You'll choose the language you want at the start.
If you take your time to read, the adventure would be around 25-30 minutes long.

A second episode?
If the wiccan episode is satisfying enough, I'll continue with more episodes of Florian's Eyes. I don't really know if I plan to feature a real underrepresented group or a fantasy one next time.

Credits
- Forest & Interior tilesets by Benben
- Characters generated on http://www.stkp.com/rmxp/charagen/xp_generator.html
- Florian's Eyes logo generated on Cooltext.com
- Forest picture for title screen taken by Martin Vorel @ Libreshot.com/the-way-in-the-foggy-forest

- Cricket background sound for title screen by Relaxing Soundzzz @ Youtube
- Musics for the maps by various persons @ FreeMusicArchive (all Creative Commons License, details on the game credits)
- Little sounds (move, select) for title screen by yours truly

- RPG Maker XP game engine and default assets by Enterbrain

Latest Blog

My first custom CSS for a gamepage

The overall style may look a little strange when it's about disposition (e.g: the screenshot thumbnails far from the game actions).

I've just changed the menu for now.
(As a web developer, I'm shocked there aren't any flex containers in the gamepages! Flex is way easier to dispose content blocks rather than using float and clear!)
  • Production
  • Fflo
  • RPG Maker XP
  • Visual Novel
  • 08/09/2020 08:09 AM
  • 08/27/2020 09:36 PM
  • 08/30/2020
  • 4853
  • 0
  • 79

Posts

Pages: 1
Gretgor
Having gotten my first 4/5, I must now work hard to obtain... my second 4/5.
3420
Hi! So, I had to erase the word "standard" from the Game.ini file to run the game. Just wanted to let you know, in case you want to fix this.

EDIT: Apparently some character sets are missing too, because the game just crashed on me when I tried to start.
Fflo
Be careful ! I'm French
3650
Oh my god.

Relieved to see the game doesn't work for those who don't have RTP!
I'm fixing it now (it's just missing the charset file for the envelope).
Wait for a while before I edit this message to tell the game's working again.

Edit: it should work now.
Gretgor
Having gotten my first 4/5, I must now work hard to obtain... my second 4/5.
3420
Thank you :)
Gretgor
Having gotten my first 4/5, I must now work hard to obtain... my second 4/5.
3420
Double post, I apologize.

I had to manually download the RGSS104E.dll library to run the game. Maybe include it in the package?

EDIT: Hey there! So, I played the game, and here are my impressions on it.

I like the premise of spending some time with an "alternative" culture isolated from globalized society, and learning about their customs and their rituals. It's clear that a lot of research went into understanding wiccan culture here, which I appreciate a lot.

I must say, however, that other than that, the game is kind of underwhelming. Nothing goes on in the story, you know? Florian stays for a day, and then leaves. Not only does he not get to experience a decent chunk of wiccan culture, no hardship or anything like that is faced. You know how Abigail just textually explains a ton wiccan rituals and holidays just before Florian leaves? It would be much cooler if Florian actually experienced those things instead of leaving the day after. He doesn't have to experience all of them, but at least a significant portion of them. That by itself would have made the game much better.

The bit with the teacher has very little to do with wiccan culture, to be honest. The random history quiz on the industrial revolution feels extremely out of place. If the teacher went off on a tangent about how the industrialized world is different from the world of wicca, it would make sense, but that doesn't happen. Also, is it really necessary to spend, like, five whole minutes discussing fractions? It feels out of place too, and it doesn't feed into the main theme at all.

The gameplay is really scant, this being a kinetic novel and all. Kinetic novels live and die on their story, so when your story revolves around showcasing the traditions of a culture rather than an interpersonal drama, some gameplay would be better. Why not a graphic adventure section where you help the villagers pick fruit and herbs for a meal? Or maybe a section where you have to collect resources to help the villagers prepare for a thunderstorm? I dunno, something of the like would be cool.

Overall, though, the fact that you took your time to research wiccan culture shows to me that your intentions were good, so do not give up. Keep trying, learn from your mistakes, so your next game can be better than the last. I'm not really one to talk, as my games so far have been pretty meh, but I'm in that process right now as well.

So, good luck to both of us, I guess!
Fflo
Be careful ! I'm French
3650
Thanks for the quick review!

- It's the first time I export something made with RMXP. I thought the RGSS104 file was automatically added.

- I didn't do a lot of research actually but my sources were complete. The French Wikipédia page about wicca, the English one ; and a 16-minute French video about wicca. Using FreeMind (a software for creating mind-maps) should be a must-have for the RM community.

- I'm not surprised to see you've found the game a little underwhelming. It's not easy to make a captivating game with just dialogues and knowledge about wicca. I wish I had done something more complex with a little exploration. (To be honest, I planned to give the player a mission to get some fruit but my map size is 120x120 and there's just a third of it which was completed. Mapping some
woods is long, especially with my tileset.)

- I decided to make my character stay less longer. It would have been rather repetitive and bland to watch the same things over and over. The Sabbats and Esbats happen every 40 days and my character is unable to stay for so long only to attend them.

- I know that the teacher's class is rather boring but it's justified. There are some children in the village (7 / 30) and those don't go to school.

- Some mini-games would have been interesting. Didn't think about them.

Honestly, even if you had mixed feelings about my game ; I think it's the best event game I've made on RMN.
Gretgor
Having gotten my first 4/5, I must now work hard to obtain... my second 4/5.
3420
Well, you don't have to make the player go through every single day. You can skip a few days at a time in the narration just fine, but I see your point. It's hard to justify the character staying that long without it becoming rather strange.

And yeah, I hate mapping as much as you do, I can totally understand that. I forgot to mention that I find the forest tileset really pretty. I also found it fascinating to learn that many wiccans actually have jobs outside their wiccan camps.
Pages: 1