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Epiquest 2: the Sequil

I have had time recently to get back to RPGing. I've probably got an hour of game content. I painted myself into a corner with Epiquest 1 and continuing it was a chore when it should have been fun to make. Epiquest 2 starts from scratch (except the scripts) and incorporates all of what made the last game fun and a lot of new things that will make the game more accessible. So far this is what I have.

1 town
1 village
12 classes
1 swamp
1 pond
1 desert
30 weapons
45 armors

The NPCs have personalities and react to you accordingly. Shop keepers will sell for higher and lower based on your party and how the NPCs react to that party. In other words, people that like cute and fuzzy things will not like hunters. People that study lore will react better to pilgrims, greys and mages. Men that love lusty women will react better to mistresses.

It is very similar to Epiquest. However, it will be more accessible. You will pick your party before the first mission. So if you fail, its your own fault, not the challenge of the game. However, you will need to find people to join your party. So far there are 11 additional people to add to your party with 11 classes. Some are easily found in towns, while others are out on their own. You will still have 4 active members in your party with reserve members. The leveling up for both party members and enemies has been tweaked and it is more enjoyable and more understandable, because there are no decimals this time around.

Epiquest 2 will still use the chase enemies way of fighting battles where you can see them on the overhead map. They will react differently to you. Some enemies will run away from you on the map while others will charge toward you, but most will just randomly move. At night, the enemies are more challenging. Not like Castlevania 2, but more like gushers, snappers and cardinals will be wolves and squeakers at night.

The areas are less compact so you will be able to sneak past enemies. That was a big complaint about the last game, because players just plowed into the enemies without thinking to avoid them. Now you can literally sneak by them all. I might add some mini boss characters in there to make things interesting. The enemies also drop specific items that can either be sold or used to shake things up.

Enemy battles have strategies. Avian enemies are in the air, so it requires either a weapon that can shoot them down or a jump attack. Like the last game, certain enemies are immune to weapons and need magic to defeat them. The enemy troops have been randomized and diversified with an improved system. As an example, with most usual RPG games, you would get 3 spiders always. With this game, it will always have 2 spiders + a randomly generated enemy that fits those 2 spiders.

Another interesting enemy feature is the mage enemies have specific elements assigned to them. So even though you see a mage, that mage will have a specialty that is not stated in the name. Enemies will level up as you do like the last game. Enemies are still as smart as they were in the last game with attack patterns, although I have kept in mind all of the comments that people said about the last game to ease up on the sleep spells.

There is now a crime system. Break into or steal from houses and guards will notice. They will chase you down when they spot you just like the last game. When you are captured, you will either have to pay a fine or be arrested, which punishes your stats.

Weather patterns and time are both back. Actually everything is back. Orbs are back. Learning skills from equipment is back. Learning skills from using skills is back, even if there are not that many skills yet. There will be bows & arrows, slings & rocks, throwing daggers & stars.

Right now it has been a slog for the past 2 weeks to get the class, enemy, skill, weapon and armor balancing implemented. It was my choice to start from scratch (except the scripts) and I think it was the right choice. Once that is done, more maps will come quickly.

To top that off, there are already 2 guest mappers for the 2nd area of the game.

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This will be released in a minimum of 2 weeks. When it is posted, it should have 5-7 hours of gameplay with:

7 populated areas (towns / villages)
20 enemy areas (caves / glens / woods / towers)
90 weapons
150 armors

Best of all, its enjoyable to me to make, because I'm not having to do crazy plots or alien worlds.
More maps today. A lot more maps. Five more towns are done, including their interiors. Well the interiors do need some work. I made a lot more exterior enemy areas. The usual exterior enemy area is 3-5 maps all 40x40. The glen is unique and I doubt has been done. The exterior of a ruined stronghold has been done, but not the interior. There is a lot of variety, such as instead of only having only woods, there are jungles too. Instead of having only ponds, there are swamps. It keeps people looking at some great maps.

The jungles, forests and woods were the most painstaking to make. All of the tree tops and bottoms and center pieces were a hinderance.

Better yet, there are different entry points. There were in the last game, but now if you enter through the east, you start on a different map than if you would in the west. Sure they still connect, but sometimes there is a river that prevents you from getting to the east from the west.

I haven't made any caves yet, but I will soon. There will be 1 cave and 2 tunnels planned for the game.

Once I get all of the maps done, I will begin play testing and balancing.

The only problem is I don't have a story at all. Not one bit. I just have area after area, town after town.
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