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Ah yes. The optional tasks.

  • Marrend
  • 06/17/2011 06:15 PM
  • 333 views
Now that has been the game's main plot of Chapter 3 is in and tested 'n stuff, the time has come for me to think about my lame excuses for optional tasks. While it's certainly possible to beat the game without doing any of them, albeit with a bit of grinding on the player's part, what the optional tasks aim to do is give the player a little extra help, be it in bonus items, experience, or money.

Chapter 2 tasks won't be as advantageous as Chapter 3 tasks, obviously, but they should still provide some benefit that would otherwise not be available until Chapter 3. At least give an experience/money boost to help with the grind factor a bit.

Chapter 2 tasks are available right at the start of Chapter 2. Note that ones the player chooses to leave the campus of the "real" Matsumori High, any tasks left undone basically become unavailable until Chapter 3 begins. Then again, since I'm only really planning two tasks for Chapter 2, I guess it's a moot point.

Chapter 3's tasks are centered around the party-able characters. Which ones are available depends on who's leading the party at the time. The initial bonus for completing these tasks wouldn't be much, but, if the player visits a certain NPC in the "dream" world, and the character is in the party, the player will receive the character's best weapon. As an added bonus, reporting all six character-related quests in this fashion will unlock the game's item database in Ichiro's shop.

Half the time, the game takes control away, and you're stuck in the event until the task resolves in some way. The other half of the time, that game allows the player to resume the game as he or she sees fit. While some people would prefer more free-roaming based tasks, I personally prefer to have this split.

As another notable change, two students at the front of the school have become something of rumormaesters. They have something different to say each chapter. For Chapter 2, they give hints to players looking for optional tasks available in that Chapter. For Chapter 3, they mention the various optional tasks that are available in that Chapter. The female student gives hints as to what Masako can do, while the male student offers hints on what Goho can do.

Once these things get implemented, I've got the bad feeling that I'll pick up from an old end-of-Chapter 2 save, check to see how the Chapter 2 stuff works (since those should be available at the star of Chapter 3 anyway), move on to Chapter 3 stuff, check to see if that works, then call this done. Not exactly the professional approach, but I'm starting to feel stretched by this game. I'm totally open for volunteers to playtest this monstrosity, though. It'll still be a while from now, but any takers?