• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS
"What if you knew you were going to die?
If you knew that thousands would die in your wake?
What if you could stop it from happening?
What would you do?
What wouldn't you do?"


Bloodstained Hands is a 20 hours plus (approximately) RPG following the story of Rain, a young man forced into living his life cloaked in blood and shadows. As he fights to overcome the oppression of a tyrannical Emperor, he will come to realize that evil is not so black-and-white as it may seem, and none can say who the true villains are.

Features
  • A beautiful world artistically crafted using Parallax Mapping techniques
  • A breathtaking soundtrack from Fesliyan Studios (https://www.fesliyanstudios.com/)
  • An immersive story with a fresh take on your typical RPG clichés
  • An ATB battle system with various customizations
  • An intense, dynamic Overdrive system
  • A New Game Plus mode - play through the game with all your party members and skills intact!
  • No RTP. Just extract and play!
  • Various types of crafting
  • Optional mini-games in certain towns and pubs
  • A host of side quests to keep you entertained
  • Repeatable missions for endless adventures


Download Instructions
If you are downloading this game for the first time, just extract and play! No further instructions required. There is a read-me file in the root folder that explains controls and how to modify them.

If you are updating the game from a previous version, simply move your save files from the root folder of the old game into the new one. To ensure the game updates properly, activate the list at the entrance to the Sanctuary at any time after completing the training sequence at the start of the game, then unequip and re-equip your characters.



Thanks to orochii for the game page CSS. Support orochii here.

Latest Blog

Bloodstained Hands v5.9.8!

This update has been ready for a while now, but I just never got around to releasing it. Regardless, here it is! Bloodstained Hands v5.9.8!

What's new?
- Added a new encounter mode, and ability to switch between modes
- Added two new Overdrive skills
- Intimidate now affects enemies with queued actions
- Updated some of the more challenging puzzles
- Modified the secret final boss

Here's a full breakdown of the update list, with the reasons behind each update. Spoilers ahead.

So, first and foremost, the encounter mode. A lot of the feedback I've gotten relates to the random encounters, which is a pretty dated system that doesn't hold up as well in the present day, but does have some nostalgic charm. It seems as though avoidable touch encounters are a preferred method for turn based battle systems, and I agree. So, to that end, I've implemented touch encounters similar to a style seen in Villnoire. However, since I personally like the random encounter system, and I'm sure there are lots of other players that do too, I've kept both styles, and added an option in the System menu to toggle which encounter type you currently have active. Now you get to choose! Bait has also been modified to work with either encounter type, and certain dungeons that don't support touch encounters will still have random encounters.

Next, the two new Overdrives. Major spoilers here. So once you get the two ultimate staves, you get access to the skills Fiend and Celestial. While these skills are certainly powerful and useful, they lose their significance once they've been triggered once. They're basically just a stat buff. What happens when you get another Overdrive ready, but you've already used those skills? You're left with the default character signature Overdrives. Well, not anymore. Now, if a character has either Fiend or Celestial already active, their next Overdrive will unlock Abyssus or Aether, respectively. This is a massive Dark or Light spell that targets all enemies and hits three times, all at no MP cost! Definitely powerful, but takes some preparation to truly pull off!

On to the next update, Intimidate. This skill was pretty useless unless your wait mode was set to Full, since it wouldn't affect enemies with queued actions. Now, it does. It will always drain enemy wait gauges if they're not completely full, but now it will also have a chance to cancel a queued enemy action as well. This could be pretty overpowered, but certain enemies will have a better chance at resisting this skill, although no enemy is completely immune.

And finally, the secret final boss! I've made some adjustments to this boss that make it more than just a simple damage sponge. It still has the same hooks it had before, but it also has a new conversion skill that swaps immunities and resistances to Light and Dark magic - for the player. In other words, while this skill is active, healing magic will damage you, but if you're hit with a Light or Dark spell from the boss, you'll be healed. You can cancel this status at any time, but... well, there is an incentive to keep it active on at least one of your party members. I won't say more than that.


Anyway, that's it for this update! I won't be adding any more content to this game, it's officially done now. I will update it if anyone finds a bug or glitch that needs to be fixed, but this is the final update for Bloodstained Hands. I've had this ready for a while now, but I didn't want to release it until I was sure that I was done with the game and that everything worked smoothly. Thank you to everyone who played this game and gave feedback, you've really helped me to become a better developer!

Posts

Nice! Great job, it looks like you put in a lot of work! I'm thinking of reworking the last optional boss, reducing the overall HP, but adding some unique hooks that really cause you to rethink combat for that fight. I'll let you know if that comes out in an update. Even I struggle with finishing that fight on time, so I really shouldn't expect too many others to have mastered it.

Awesome work, I'm glad you enjoyed the game. And thanks again for the review!
Woops I forgot to post this! It's about my personal stats for the game. I haven't actually defeated the final optional boss because I can't put enough attention to do it. XD

Anyway, this post contains total MAJOR spoilers. (For other players: don't open if you haven't finished the game yet!)

I first finished the game with my active party at average Level 50-ish; the one where I finished all the hidden/optional bosses I could find in the first playthrough was at Level 55/56.

My winning active party consists of: Rain/Fang, Grey, Matthew, and Shadow.

In order, my favorite sidequests are:

Exports - Love that around the world trip I made, and I also adore your brilliant usage of the NPCs who just seemed they were just complaining about their day-to-day lives.

The Academy - The focus on Grey was an amazing change of perspective. Also, it was my chance to level up Grey's spells without the other guys in the way.

Treasure Hunt - For the unbreakable lockpick. I love the lockpick mechanics; I just hated breaking my lockpicks and having to buy them all the time! I carry like 20-30 lockpicks everytime I go out of the Sanctuary. XD The Alchemist might have paid me lots for doing missions for him, but I also paid him lots for the lockpicks.

Boss fights:

The boss fights against the generals and Kain annoyed me (in a good way) when I discovered they would heal themselves. Well, of course, why didn't I think of that? XD

Kouryuu was the hardest boss fight for me. I had to level grind in Abyssus to do this fight without having everyone die on my every 2-3 rounds of Kouryuu's attacks.

My favorite boss fight is Crevasse. I probably just didn't level up enough for her, but she was tough in a good way.
Awesome! Can't wait to see it! Thanks AnneLaurant!
Thank you for your patience; I just submitted a review!

It's way more difficult to get the right kinds of screenshots VS playing the parts of the game I need to get to to grab screenshots. XD I almost got pulled into playing into the Amethyne arc, hahaha!
Wow, great to hear from you again! I was getting worried, it looked like you just vanished for a while. Glad to see you're still around! And I'm really glad to hear that this game was an inspiration to you, that's more than I could have hoped for. Let me know when you put up a game page and I'll definitely subscribe!

Also, yes, old saves are still compatible. There may be one or two bugs initially, but certainly nothing game breaking, and after exploring the new mechanics everything should work as normal. Looking forward to your review!
Hi, Strak!

I'm so sorry I haven't spoken in so long. Truth is that I've had difficulty with the last optional boss due to my short attention span and I've been procrastinating with getting non-spoiler screenshots (boo hoo all of my saves are in the later parts of the game), but I want to assure you I've had my review saved in my files for so so long!! XD Also, I totally waited for the Misao nominations and voted it, and wow congrats!!!

Anyway, the other reason I've been busy is that I started work on an original series and a game. Yipee! BSH did influence me to start on it, especially with how long you mentioned you worked on it. I'm looking to release a formal demo before the end of this year. (The informal one was distributed to trusted friends.)

Enough of me. If the game's been updated since I last popped in here, then I'll be glad to pick up the latest version, grab some screenshots from it, and submit that review. You deserve that additional review. I have no idea why there's only one until now. So sorry I dropped off the earth for a bit, but I'm still here! And congrats on the newer release(s)!

Oh and are the old saves compatible with this latest release? I think the version I have is 5.9. Even so, I don't know, the game wasn't that hard to master compared to how your blog update made it sound like. Or at least for me. I enjoyed the grind. XD

Anyway, thanks man! (I sound so hyper. I'm just excited for this new version release!)
I hid the post because, first, spoilers, and second, that's a really long post for a comment section. You could have put some of that into hide tags for consideration of others reading these comments.

As for the content, I'm sorry if you didn't enjoy the game, but this game isn't meant to be like other fantasy RPGs. If you were expecting another Final Fantasy, there are plenty of other games like that. This game is meant to be a challenge, and deliberately breaks the norms of most classic RPGs. If it's not your cup of tea, great, there are games I can recommend that you might like better. I would, however, appreciate it if you would differentiate between a game being "bad" and simply being one you didn't like.

That said, I always appreciate it when someone plays my game, so thank you for giving it a try. I hope you find something more to your taste around RMN.
This post has been hidden by the game developer. Click here to show the post anyway.
Ah gotcha, that makes sense. Don't worry, the last hidden boss can't be triggered accidentally, and only on new game plus. It appears in a hidden map that's only accessible from the overworld at that level.
author=Strak
Wow, I'm impressed you were able to take on those bosses without the ultimate weapons! That's impressive! Even I have difficulty with them without a good loadout.

I think you got them all! There is one more secret final boss, but it doesn't become available until you reach level 99, so it's more of a second playthrough (or third or fourth) boss. Nice work!

There actually is a reason behind why the bosses are where they are. I'll explain below.
So basically, I wanted to create a boss for each region and dungeon, even if there wasn't a boss included in the story. To that end, if a region already has a boss, they didn't get a super boss. In the Belua Prison, you've got the Black Knight, in Emerdala there's Atlach Nacha, Mount Fulmen had Kouryuu, the Towers had Tarasque and Bahamut, Glacio's Throat had the Leviathan, the Mines have Crevasse, and the Veins have Lindwurm.


Anyway, that's why some regions have optional bosses and others don't!

I guess I was sleep deprived when I wrote my previous post coz I only encountered these but did not defeat all of them.(Don't know why I typed defeated SMH) The only ones I managed to defeat was the Fish and the orbs on Mt Fulmen(I tried the dragon but he was extremely strong so I left him for now).
I also tried the Black Knight 2-3 times but he was quite strong but I think I can defeat him if I upgrade my weapons.
I guess I'll have to start the weapons for now n then get the remaining bosses...
Also out of curiosity, where is that lvl 99 secret boss? Is it only available in NG+ coz I have the regular version only.. I'm only asking so that I can avoid it because I'm nowhere near the required level n don't want to unintentionally trigger the fight lol..

Thanks for the info!
Wow, I'm impressed you were able to take on those bosses without the ultimate weapons! That's impressive! Even I have difficulty with them without a good loadout.

I think you got them all! There is one more secret final boss, but it doesn't become available until you reach level 99, so it's more of a second playthrough (or third or fourth) boss. Nice work!

There actually is a reason behind why the bosses are where they are. I'll explain below.
So basically, I wanted to create a boss for each region and dungeon, even if there wasn't a boss included in the story. To that end, if a region already has a boss, they didn't get a super boss. In the Belua Prison, you've got the Black Knight, in Emerdala there's Atlach Nacha, Mount Fulmen had Kouryuu, the Towers had Tarasque and Bahamut, Glacio's Throat had the Leviathan, the Mines have Crevasse, and the Veins have Lindwurm.


Anyway, that's why some regions have optional bosses and others don't!
Ok so I completed all the side quests(acc to the ones mentioned in the Side Mission Tab) and I'm about to start the mission for acquiring the weapons.

I also finished some optional bosses. Want to make sure I got all the bosses before I start the weapons mission. I checked the bosses from the Story Mission Guide but just in case can you let me know if I missed any boss from the list?
I have defeated these so far...Added under spoiler tags

Black Knight
The Fish monster in the 5 Islands
The worm thing in the Veins
The creepy dark monster in the Mines
The dragonballs(hehe) in Mount Fulmen


I think I may still be missing some optional boss. Maybe there's something in Diamo or the Nothern snowy region? I feel like there's not much that happened in that area simce I was there last maybe?
Thanks in advance!

P.S: Don't ask how I got to this point so quick, apparantly I have wayyy too much time on my hands than I'd like to admit...
Hey, thanks for the questions. For the escape meter, it may be affected by your wait mode. If you have full wait on, escaping battles isn't very feasible, and you'll take a lot of hits. More active wait modes are much more effective for escapes.

As for the villagers with red text, that's actually for an optional side mission that becomes available later in the game. It's a good idea to take note of those villagers, but you won't get the first item in the cycle until much later.

And as for that boss, that's actually an optional super boss. You can face it at any time or ignore it completely. It gives good experience and some rare and valuable drops, but is otherwise completely optional.

Thanks for playing! Hope this helps.
author=Strak
Hey, thanks for playing! Unfortunately, controls in RMVX are a ridiculous nightmare to deal with. There is a read be file in the root folder of the game that explains controls better, as well as a section in the Guide, which is accessed from the menu.

However, assuming you haven't changed any controls for any previous games made with RMVX, you should be able to escape from battle by holding the Q key. Or possibly A. It's one of those two, can't remember off the top of my head right now.

Thanks for playing!

Hello! I got the escape key. It's the Q key to escape from battles. One point I want to note(it's just mildly annoying tbh) is that the escape bar fills extremely slowly especially when there's 3 or more enemies(sometimes even with 2 enemies) and this causes the party to take lots of damage during that wait time.. IDK Maybe it's meant to be like that or I'm just low-leveled to endure the hits(I'm currently in the desert area around Astrid's Castle rn), but just wanted to point this out...

Also, I have one question. How do you start on the tasks that some random village people talk about? There are many people in different towns that make a comment that they require something and these items are highlighted in RED.. I'm sure all these tasks are somehow connected and will be completed one by one as I travel to different towns. I also recall the first request(not 100% sure) was in Emeralda where one person asks for something SHINY. I had no idea what to get for this task & so I never started it...
Could you please help with this? I was thinking I would backtrack and try to complete this before moving too far ahead. I think I already am very far ahead n now most likely have to go back to every possible town before the Desert Area :/
Thanks in Advance!

Also another question in spoiler:
Is there any specific quest for that Monster Fish boss in the whirlpool near the 5 Islands? I accidently started a battle with it while I was sailing there and my party got their butts whooped. Do you reccomend a specific level the characters need to be to attempt this boss or do I need to do something else first or can I ignore it for the time being?
Hey, thanks for playing! Unfortunately, controls in RMVX are a ridiculous nightmare to deal with. There is a read be file in the root folder of the game that explains controls better, as well as a section in the Guide, which is accessed from the menu.

However, assuming you haven't changed any controls for any previous games made with RMVX, you should be able to escape from battle by holding the Q key. Or possibly A. It's one of those two, can't remember off the top of my head right now.

Thanks for playing!
Hi, I just started playing the game! It's interesting so far but I had a question.
How exactly am I supposed to escape from battles?? I looked at the guide in game and it says to hold down L during the battle when no actions are being performed.
I tried holding the L key and literally nothing happens... I don't know if I'm doing something wrong? Can someone help?
I have had to fight every random monster encounter I came across so far.. Yes it's good XP to battle but it starts to get annoying after a while... Plz help!!
The set with the red butterfly is the last set. It wouldn't make sense for the alternate path the appear after it. I'm certain the alternate path appears if you simply fail the last set 6 times. As for asking for a save file, that isn't really something I would do for anyone, regardless of their circumstances, but even if I did, I would need to have their save file in order to do it. Try the solution I've already given you first, and if you're still having trouble, then I may consider adding an update that reduces the number of failed attempts, or maybe provides an alternate path for each set, instead of just the last one. That's all I'd be willing to do at this point. Regardless, thanks for playing, and I hope you get past the puzzle.
SORRY. If my memory doesn't play tricks on me, when I played the first time the alternate path appeared on the right AFTER the set with the red butterfly. That's the reason for asking for a save file after that point.
Tanks.
fifacv@hotmail.com
If you keep trying, eventually an alternate path will appear on the left side past the second set of butterflies. I think you need 6 failed attempts in the last set for it to appear.
help pls. I'm playing for a 2nd time but my arthritis doesnt let me finish the mission at the academy .(41 hours in the game). Can only cross 1st and 2nd set of butterflies. Can you Help me?.I don't know how to send you the file. I just save the students an must cross the colums with the butterflies. my level is 38

thanks a lot