• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS




RMN FEATURED GAME FOR MARCH 2011!

~ PLOT ~

Rather simple. Leo and Leah have been close since they were newborn cubs. But now they've been separated and, with the guidance of you and the mystical help called Charlie Darwin and his "pet" Daisy, Leo must use all his survival skills to get her back!

A tale of love, loyalty and lionhood!

~ WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT ~

- Approximately 5 - 7 hours of gameplay.
- Entertaining characters and colourful graphics, mostly edits of Secret of Mana and Seiken Densetsu 3.
- An awesome soundtrack!
- An array of special items, special moves and special collectibles!
- Lots of humour reminiscent of Earthbound and Super Mario RPG!
- A very tweaked default battle system and skill system!
- A handful of mini-games!
- A damn good time!

~ TRAILER ~



~ AND ALSO CHECK OUT ~

Why don't you check out my complete adventure RPG, A Home Far Away? About ten hours of fun there!




And hey, don't be afraid to leave a comment! We could all do with any sort of encouragement these days! :D


Latest Blog

Top RPG Maker Games

Hey guys, minor news here but recently stumbled across this video of a guy's list of the top RPG Maker games and Leo & Leah is listed as #4! Check it out!

Posts

Craze
why would i heal when i could equip a morningstar
15150
Yeah, seriously. This needs to beat Vacant Sky.
TFT
WHOA wow wow. two tails? that is a sexy idea...
445
the movement is finally upon us.
Without a doubt, Featured Game of the Month. Congrats! ^_^
If it's as good as A home Far away I am going to like this a lot. downloading...
As much blood and sweat I put into A Home Far Away, I put a lot more effort into this game. Hopefully you will enjoy it even more than AHFA!
dragonheartman
Developer, Starless Umbra / Heroes of Umbra
2966
Killer app of the year!!
Congratulations on the Feature, strangeluv. You totally deserve it!
LEECH
who am i and how did i get in here
2599
Loving it so far, congrats on making such a great game strangeluv.
...Wow. I just finished this today and...well, I do have to admit I did not see the
extreme Mood Whiplash in chapter 4

coming. Good job, the climax was interesting. Pity Leo can't talk, I think it would be nice to see his thoughts at some points...

I know you said Mother 3 was an inspiration for some of the themes and events in the game, but in my opinion the storytelling in this is much better. The characters don't feel like cardboard cutouts and the spoilered thing above was much more noticeable and well-done than in Mother 3 in my opinion.

(Am I the only one who felt bad about eating yummyhops, even in the beginning, by the way? D:)

Anyway, I was wondering: who thinks this deserves a TV Tropes page? A Home Far Away already has one, and there's definitely a lot of material in this game as well.
author=dragonheartman
Killer app of the year!!


sluv saves rm2k!!

author=argh
Anyway, I was wondering: who thinks this deserves a TV Tropes page? A Home Far Away already has one, and there's definitely a lot of material in this game as well.


you should make one c:
Normally I would, but I'm terrible at writing descriptions, and I'm worried what I'd write wouldn't do the game justice, especially due to its atypical narrative structure. ^_^; I can definitely help with adding tropes, though.

Edit: Oh, and also; I found the game to be rather easy. Maybe I'm just used to hardcore RPGs or I level ground more than the average player, but I was absolutely swimming in items and seashells from chapter 3 onwards, and usually dispatched bosses easily with liberal use of War Cry, Heart, and Enguarde. Is it supposed to be fairly easy?
Ocean
Resident foodmonster
11991
author=argh
Normally I would, but I'm terrible at writing descriptions, and I'm worried what I'd write wouldn't do the game justice, especially due to its atypical narrative structure. ^_^; I can definitely help with adding tropes, though.

Edit: Oh, and also; I found the game to be rather easy. Maybe I'm just used to hardcore RPGs or I level ground more than the average player, but I was absolutely swimming in items and seashells from chapter 3 onwards, and usually dispatched bosses easily with liberal use of War Cry, Heart, and Enguarde. Is it supposed to be fairly easy?

Yeah probably not meant to be grind heavy. In fact if you're generally slaying everything you see, you're probably going to be overpowered by the end.
author=argh
I know you said Mother 3 was an inspiration for some of the themes and events in the game, but in my opinion the storytelling in this is much better. The characters don't feel like cardboard cutouts and the spoilered thing above was much more noticeable and well-done than in Mother 3 in my opinion.


This is a very big compliment as I regard Mother 3 as "great game literature". I, myself, don't think Leo & Leah can hold a candle to it but I'm glad you finished it and enjoyed it!

author=argh
Normally I would, but I'm terrible at writing descriptions, and I'm worried what I'd write wouldn't do the game justice, especially due to its atypical narrative structure. ^_^; I can definitely help with adding tropes, though.

Edit: Oh, and also; I found the game to be rather easy. Maybe I'm just used to hardcore RPGs or I level ground more than the average player, but I was absolutely swimming in items and seashells from chapter 3 onwards, and usually dispatched bosses easily with liberal use of War Cry, Heart, and Enguarde. Is it supposed to be fairly easy?


I don't know if the game will ever be popular enough to warrant a TVTropes page. A Home Far Away is fairly popular, but is an easier sell than this game, imo. People might be skeptical to play a cutesy amateur game about lions and animals.

And yes, it's supposed to be fairly easy. To me, I like to make stuff that is more easy than tough. If you know what to exploit and find your skill trio (for me, it's War Cry, Heart, Enguarde and Snarl, Lick, Tantrum), the bosses are a breeze (except the final one, imo). For the "hardcore" players, they could've always switched back to Active or tried to work with skill combos they are unfamiliar with, I guess... but it was meant to be easy from its inception.

Anyway yeah, dude, thanks for playing!
I honestly didn't like Mother 3 very much. I didn't cry in the ending (I know, I'm a monster! D:), even though I was very shocked. It's just...I don't know, it feels like the author was going through the motions and events that would normally be heartrending and whatnot, but I felt they lacked substance and punch because the characters were too one-dimensional. It's hard to care about characters who have maybe 15-20 lines in the whole game and little to no characterization. I can see why other people like it, but I guess I just don't like that kind of storytelling or something -- I tend to like stories that take the effort to map out every little detail, to make the world and characters feel real and tangible, so I can better immerse myself. That's why I hate the "silent protagonist" archetype, and why I was curious to know Leo's thoughts on some of the events in this game, for example.

(I also didn't even register Tanetane Island as a mood whiplash / nightmare fuel scene, to be honest. I was just like "meh, new area, now with extra mushroom trippiness" throughout the whole thing. Maybe because I've played other games with horrific nightmare sequences, I'm kind of dulled to more mild ones now.)

But eh, this isn't really the place for this kind of discussion.

I don't know if the game will ever be popular enough to warrant a TVTropes page. A Home Far Away is fairly popular, but is an easier sell than this game, imo. People might be skeptical to play a cutesy amateur game about lions and animals.

Believe me, there are far weirder and more obscure games than this that have pages. The main question is whether or not the subject has a lot of trope material, I believe, and in this case I think the answer is "yes".

(And yeah, I fought almost everything in the beginning, which probably made me overlevelled a bit. I tend to do that naturally with games that use touch encounters)
Yeah I get what you mean about Mother 3. It's not really for everyone. I, too, thought Tanetane Island in Mother 3 could've been creepier also.

I guess I picked Leo to be a silent protagonist because all he really does have on his one-track mind is Leah. There isn't anything for him to say that isn't already being said by the plot itself. There are a few small things, though, like how after a certain point, Leo doesn't eat Yummyhops automatically anymore. Maybe he feels guilty after a certain chapter??????? lol

And yeah, I see some weird things from TVTropes. It still kind of befuddles that someone made such a detailed one for A Home Far Away. I still would like to know who that person is...! Seeing one for Leo & Leah would be pretty interesting, I admit, as I even have a TVTropes page reference in it. If you choose no to anything, the character says, "But Thou Must". Ha. You're always welcome to write a review if you wish to express what you really thought of the game!
I personally love the silent protagonist more than I like a main character who talks. When the main character doesn't talk, it becomes an experience that immerses you, and forces the game to try and elicit those emotions through the turn of events that transpire before you as the player.

Not to say that is always the case; sometimes the silent protagonist falls flat on it's face, or really just isn't trying to tell a fascinating story. And often a talking main character can help tell the story better, too. I just prefer the silent kind.
Well, I finished this game and...I found the end of chapter 4 and the whole of chapter 5 pretty weird o_~.

I think firstly, the part about the introduction of the clowns was lacking and seem rushed because they just seem introduced out of nowhere. Basically, I get the general idea that they are the clowns of the void (I think?), but I belive more development could have been put into these clowns so that Charlie Quinn could have been felt as a real final villain. I did remember reading somewhere in the game that they are rulers of some sort, but nothing of characteristics is fleshed out of the clowns. I personally liked the gungirl and wolf better because they had more character.
Secondly, Leo showing no mercy for the gungirl and Charlie Quinn...I mean, is Leo really so unforgiving even of his villains? I guess I don't really understand Leo enough. Maybe that's a lion's trait?


The overall quality is excellent though, I would say, so I enjoyed it as a whole, even though there seem some parts out of place ;)
@ sluv:
I guess I picked Leo to be a silent protagonist because all he really does have on his one-track mind is Leah. There isn't anything for him to say that isn't already being said by the plot itself.
Actually, while it's true he has a one-track mind, there are a few things that are rather ambiguous that I would have liked to see -- he's bombarded with questions late in the game, and I would have liked to see his reaction to them, at least, instead of just standing around impassively. There's also the fact that he does the same whenever Brandy shows up and blows someone to bits suddenly, when he should probably have more of a reaction to this heartless killer, especially in chapter 2... (I personally was extremely shocked at Brandy's first appearance where she just brutally and bloodily murders someone -- sure, they were a bland one-dimensional villain, but I was like "woah I thought this was supposed to be a happy cheery game and suddenly BLOODY MURDER?! D: D: D:")

Speaking of that, I would have liked more characterization for Daisy as well. She only appears in literally two scenes, and her only purpose seems to be to make the game easier by having a second party member. Even if she didn't do much, at least having her appear in cutscenes instead of seeming like she's in Leo's pocket the entire game would have been nice.

(There's also the question of the yummyhops, like you said. I felt guilty about eating them from the start, but I felt extra guilty after that certain scene, and I wonder if Leo thought the same.)

Perhaps one of the creepiest parts of the game for me are the interface screw-y sections. Things like fourth wall breaks and game mechanics that were taken for granted suddenly changing or glitching out are far more creepy than anything in the actual game in my opinion. As long as everything else is consistent, you can subconsciously reassure yourself that everything's constricted to the story -- but when the medium that you're viewing the story through starts breaking down and trying to scare you too, that's when it starts getting really disturbing. Like that yummyhop that says "Go on, eat! You'll only be eating your own soul!" and then attacks you...


@ eplipswich:
Yeah, I agree that Charlie's introduction was rather sudden. He barely has any lines -- we don't really know anything about his motivations. Harlie at least says that he wants to devour people's dreams -- possibly he's an Emotion Eater -- but all he says about Charlie is that he's "worse" than he is, which is rather vague. But yeah, Brandy and Whiskey are the main villains for the main game; chapter 6 and Charlie are just wrap-up and epilogue stuff. Still, I would have liked more characterization for Charlie.
For your second point, I think it may be because he's not human, so obviously you can't expect him to act the same way. He's a lion, a predator, who is less intelligent than humans...and honestly, if some berserk psychopath who kidnapped your love interest and tried to kill you just had a breakdown and told you to kill them, I think you would too if you were a lion. Same thing for Charlie.


@ narcotis: Yes, that's the main argument I've heard for silent protagonists. For me personally, though, I don't like to insert myself into the story and pretend I'm one of the characters; I don't really like going on dangerous, "exciting" adventures myself, I'm more interested in reading about other people doing that. So the silent protagonist argument really breaks down for me because of that, and since silent protagonists rarely get any characterization, I get somewhat disappointed. Leo, at least, does get a bit of characterization since he speaks through his actions a lot.

Edit: I think I might go ahead and make a TV Tropes article, but simply say "DESCRIPTION NEEDED" instead of writing a description. I'm not sure if that's allowed, though.

Edit 2: And what do you know, I made one anyway. I know the description isn't very good; feel free to edit it into something better. Summaries and descriptions aren't my strong suit... (By the way, check out the subjective tropes page, since it's not showing up on the main page for some reason)
I went trough the balloon minigame a second time and Leo again got stuck facing upwards. The strange thing is, there's a cutscene right before during which he does turn to different directions. It's not until I get the control that he loses the ability to turn around. Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe the result will be otherwise if I give it a third try.