MAY REQUIRE THE RPG MAKER 2003 RTP TO PLAY.

Behold, a game that took 15 hours to make. It probably shows its short timeframe, but that's the fun!

This was my second completed project (and fourth project overall), released in 2010. After amassing about 1000 downloads, I took the game down for years and recently re-uploaded it.

The concept of this game was inspired heavily by Xenosaga's very own Encephalon. There are, of course, quite a few differences, as I'm not the type who develops a complete fangame.

-=REAL-TIME CLASS CHANGE=-
There are three classes in this short story of an RPG: Fighter, Mage, Medic. They do what you think they do, with a few exceptions: Fighter is your buffer, Mage is your status effect specialist, and Medic is your debuffer.

The centerpiece to the Encephalon's battle system is real-time class change, similar to FFXIII's "Paradigm Shift" except more flexible. Each character has a "Job Change" command that lets you change the classes of the entire party, then and there. Their classes will revert to normal at the end of the battle, and it -does- cost that one character their turn, but changing classes could lead to major advantage in bosses. It's not as necessary in random battles. I made it as flavorful as I could, given my time constraint.

Some minor glitches have been reported with this system (I.E. the occasional looping of the command), and I can't for the life of me figure out the source! It shouldn't be a gamebreaking issue, though.

-=STORY=-

Where do people go when they die?

This question has plagued humankind since the dawn of civilization. Humans have attempted to answer this question via religion and philosophy. For thousands of years, nobody was able to reach consensus.

Until the year 2112, when the Encephalon was created. The Encephalon is a massive virtual reality stored in powerful mainframe computers deep within the headquarters of Vector Industries. When people die, Vector scientists can preserve that person's soul inside of the virtual reality -- for a hefty price. In short, Vector scientists have created a virtual "Heaven" -- pure, wonderful lives full of any adventure imaginable.

Likewise, Vector scientists have also managed to create a less-than-desirable place within the Encephalon for criminals and traitors -- a virtual "Hell". The implementation of "Hell" is still being debated in political circuits worldwide.

Lately, though, the Encephalon has been acting strange. Strands of malicious code -- a series of powerful viruses -- have been infecting servers at an alarming rate. Vector scientists must dive into the Encephalon to fix the problem before the virus destroys the entire program and erases thousands of souls.

Can you save Heaven?

-=A few notes about the contest itself=-

This game "physically" takes place in the Encephalon mainframe, similar to the "One Room" requirement outlined by Shinan. However, the main goal of this project is not to fit a theme, but to create an RPG of reasonable quality in 72 hours. I took the idea of the theme, but this certainly has no place in a contest full of literal one room games. As such, I won't be officially submitting this baby.