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Tramian, the capital of the kingdom of Dermod, is in an uproar.
Darian Ragnall, the royal prince of Dermod, is to be engaged to one of the princesses of the nation of Galiena, and the city is busy celebrating.

While on the streets the mood is cheery, in the castle it's another matter entirely. Tension and irritation float in the air and everyone is on guard. Dark rumours are flying around that there is treachery afoot and the royal family is in danger.

Meanwhile, the bride-to-be is on her way to Dermod from her home in countryside. Lorelai Jarvis, princess of the mountain nation of Galiena, has been living in a small house far from the capital for a long time. She seems neither happy nor sad over her fate; she merely gathers what few belongings she has and leaves with her only maid, Marian, to her new home.

The Royal Knights of Dermod escort them to the capital, but trouble starts soon for Lorelai, right there on the road, and never stops. Lorelai is forced to keep a keen eye on her surroundings to survive the intrigue going on at the castle and try and solve the growing mystery surrounding prince Darian and the royal family.

Characters

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Demo download ready! Also status report.

Demo has been approved, so play and review! (Pleeease!)

Some notes on it:
-You can skip text with the Shift key, so be careful when running around (you may accidentally skip incoming text).
-The demo is intentiaonally easy combat-wise, as the gameplay features were not fully implemented by the time we made it, so you may feel combat is a bit wobbly. I apologize.
-If you're not too sure of how strategy combat works, read the combat manual when prompted.
-The demo only holds the prologue, which should take you about 30 minutes/an hour depending on reading speed.


The idea is to release the full game next. Event-wise there will be about 4 chapters (excluding the prologue). First chapter is mostly done (event wise) and the second chapter (which came out quite a bit longer than chapter 1) is midway through. I'm trying to swim my way out from a bog of writer's block (more like writer's confusion and sheer BLAH) but I'm winning inch by inch, so I expect considerable progress when I clear the scene I am currently working on.

Not much else to report. Hope you guys enjoy the demo!
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  • 01/19/2012 03:30 PM
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Hi, I downloaded your game, but I can't see the fonts being displayed. Link the font file and let me know so I can play the game.

*nvm, had them misplaced* it works now.
This is a nice demo ! I really like the fact that the story is seen through a quite original viewpoint. As for the dialogue, it is quite good and I appreciate the fact that you put effort in it, although I may have some suggestions if you're interested in them (not that I claim any degree of expertise, but these things are always easier to see from outside, speaking as an occasional wannabe writer who has a very hard time constructing natural dialogues).

Some exchanges do suffer from characters being seemingly defined by a single personality trait - of course, I realize that there isn't much time in this short prologue for character development, but there's a narrow path of excellence between bland characters and cartoonish/anime-ish exaggerations ; right now, Lorelei feels like a truly interesting character, while the other ones are a bit sketchy, even Marian who comes close second in terms of screen time.

Maybe insisting a bit less on a single aspect of the characters in the dialogues (such as "sheep prince" or Liam being uneasy around women), and especially refraining from using the exact same phrase too often, such as "girly face", would help in this respect. These things certainly help defining a character when you first meet them (they were totally fine in the first dialogue outside Lorelei's house), but I get the feeling that they should quickly be supplemented by at least another trait : being two-dimensional is already a huge improvement over 1D, and still very manageable in a few exchanges.

Also, you could perhaps tone down a teeny bit the "exposition dialogue" : in particular Marian sometimes utters information-laden sentences that are obviously intended for the player rather than for the other characters, and it feels a bit antiquated as a way to convey backstory. The narrative screens that you inserted between some scenes are a much better device for achieving this IMHO.

Of course, these are just suggestions, but I feel like you're not far from having something that sounds right, given a few slight adjustments. I will certainly play the rest of this game when it comes out. Keep up the good work !
I thought this was a lot of fun. A very cavalier kind of game feel, good sets, and I like that you give the player reason to kind of investigate every nook and cranny (I ended up with a nice little stash of money...I only wish to spend it like a true shopoholic, hehe)

And I like the characters. I mean...I love court intrigue...anything. I just love courtly dramas so the two knights, Liam and Sir-MasculinityCrisis, didn't interest me as much as the ice bitch queen and warm husband (day and night motif?)

I am noticing a fairy tale kind of gender bias though - good mother dies, evil stepmother, older cold female, 2 idealistic and yet grounded females (Marian and Lorelai) and men who are almost resoundingly pliable in the face a world populated by powerful living in a patriarchal society. That all said, I'm not judging this as for or against women or a type of woman or men- but I do want to say that I'm interested to see what you DO with that theme because it appears as if that's a subject you want to tackle almost DIRECTLY.

Beyond courtly dramas I am also a fan of subversive cultural critiques ^.^
Indra
YOU ARE BEING TOO AGGRO
11514
Glad you liked it Jubell <3
Don't worry, things change a whole lot through the game, and not everyone is what they seem initially (heck, mostly all characters change in some way). And you've yet to meet a few more people, so no worries there XD.

@Hasvers: Derp, totally missed answering you. Read your post one mornign while too groggy to rememeber answering and it kinda slipped my mind, sorry XD
Again, the prologue gives little time for the characters to show themselves much, but give them time. Marian and Lorelai are the ones who get the most screen time, but the rest get development later. Even what may seem like a bland character now will probably have something to say in the future, and saying more would be huge spoilers XD
In fact, there is so much stuff I want the characters to say that it will probably require some sort of Extras feature with skits upon clearing the game, since many don't really belong on DURING the game proper (would break tension and all).

I've asked other testers as to the informative dialogue for Marian: the short answer to that is that I can't think of a better way to give it out. There's so much stuff I have to somehow fit in there and while I try to make it as dynamic as possible during dialogue...well, I'm not perfect XD I will try to polish whatever I can, in any case. Personally I don't like abusing narration, as it makes me feel like a cheat somehow, taking things out of scene to dump info :
The story seemed quite interesting and for the most part, the demo was pretty good. But the mapping was off; and by off I mean that you need to work on depths.
For example, the bottom side of your walls don't have walls, so when observed, it makes the room look titled, you know, squashed from a side.

And your mapping needs detail or I might be being unreasonable with this one, since standard blocky VX graphics makes me always feel that mapping is amiss. :-p

And your battle system seems to have a bug, when I prompted to end my turn, if I hit Esc, I'm stuck. Lorelia sprite is greyed-out, which I suppose means that her turn had ended, but the enemies don't attack me.

Aside from that, I enjoyed the game and I was pretty happy to see that exploring gave me good stuff, but you might want to make it a little hard to find stuff.
Indra
YOU ARE BEING TOO AGGRO
11514
DragoonHP: You're the first ever to comment on the mapping style (and that's the the lower wall thing is, a mapping style, as I despise seeing the outer wall). As a style, It's something I am not about to change, but I'll consider if it's really a problem.
As for the bug: sometimes you "lose track" of turns (not the script's problem, as far as I know) and instead of finishing a turn from the character's menu, you may have accidentally told it NOT to finish. When that happens all players are grayed out: simply press on an empty tile and choose to End Turn from the menu there.

Glad you enjoyed the demo overall. :D
Okay... looks as I'm the only one who found the mapping style a bit out-of-style...
I should stop playing all those old-schooled RPGs... :sigh:

And I successfully reproduced that combat "error" three times... but I'm off to test your little advice...

EDIT: It works (the solution you gave me) and for the walls, maybe you should try using shadows to give the effect of depth... just my two cents...
I tried the demo and it was fun~
I also liked the characters ^_^
edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
Indra, your game reminded me of a couple of Sega Genesis Tactical RPGs way back when, Shining Force I and II:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Force

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Force_II

(Yes, I´m that old!)

Compared to the battle system (BS) used in those (at least SF I, for sure), your game's much more sophisticated, since you have the effect of what direction the target is facing during an attack (and the need for an additional move at the end of the turn to position the direction the character you move is facing) and a possible counterattack. On the other hand, those games had a nifty animation of the target whatever the item was being used on it or being attacked. There, if you got lucky (or unlucky if receiving the attack) you could get a double or critical hit. Also, you don´t seem to give more XP unlike those games for killing an enemy, so that I would expect a party that stood together for a while to level up relatively evenly in your game, which isn´t the case in SF I.

The other difference I note is that in those games the turns of the enemies and allies alternate based on a random seed for each member of the battlefield, you get different order of turns for each go around (kind of modified active BS), while LQ´s is more of a passive, alternate turn BS, where sides alternate turns and the other of the side is set, except when the side choose to move another member earlier..

Overall, I found my parties in your demo, overpowered, especially since some of the counterattacks did more damage than the enemy's attacks, so that using items wasn´t needed and my party's member were never in trouble. In the case of SF I, I had to use some healing items, especially early on, since some of the stronger enemy´s attacks put some of my members in jeopardy.

BTW, having played your demo, prompted me to find the ROMs and an emulator to start replaying SF I, which lead me to share the comments above. I don´t mean to give suggestions regarding what you should do about your battle system, but rather contrast it to something relatively similar (at least, both tactical in nature). Memories ...

Anyway, other than the battle system, I found the whole premise of the game intriguing so far (far better than any of those two SF will be able to provide!). I look forward to seeing what else in store your game for the characters you have introduced in your next demo.
Indra
YOU ARE BEING TOO AGGRO
11514
@Asterisk: Glad you enjoyed it!

@edchuy: I will be completely frank and say that A- The battle system is rather rough and unpolished in the demo as of yet, and B- I did not press the difficulty in the demo on purpose, since I didn't want to turn people off the game due to difficulty.
In the full release, the idea (unless that changes for whatever reason) is that the actual combats will be HARD, but also few and far between. Fights are non-repeatable and few in number (there is one dungeon each chapter, with maybe 10 fights total if you count sidequests).
Levels have next to no influence in the game otuside some stat boosts, and you will change the party setup often in any case. Equipment and skill usage (and tactics) will be much more important.
But as it is now, it's a very watered down system. I was far more focused in getting the story and plot across, I admit it. I'm simply biased to those aspects of game making XD
I will also go ahead and say that I did not create the script used for the tactics system myself, so I'm not to claim credit for its niceness.
In any case, I'm glad you enjoyed the demo, hoping you will like the full release next >3
i really look forward to this game it looks like its going to be good
Brilliant use of facial expressions. Despite your awkward choice of words at times, your characters' layered personalities shown through pretty quickly, especially Lorelai.

The first 5 minutes of Lorelai, she's cynical. Knows her nanny is lying. Jokingly calls herself old. Then she hears the bandits and starts smiling. Instant characterization. Hell, if that line was said without the smile, the gamer would get a totally different perception of her. I love it, and I don't think there's enough of it in RPGs, indie or professional.

The rest of your game is class above surely, but I personally most appreciated how you portrayed Lorelai. Nicely done. Can't wait for more.
Indra
YOU ARE BEING TOO AGGRO
11514
@Sauce: Glad you liked it! I'm personally a HUUUUUUGE maniac of facial expressions, and I get so cranky when I can't get my hands on the ones I want >I
There's nothing wron with favoring Lorelai, you haven't had time to meet the rest yet, and even then Lorelai is by far the character who appears the most(and the only one who's ALWAYS there, as the rest come and go).

The awkard choice of words is probably due to me being spanish. I love dialogue above all else and try to polish it till it shines, but my lack of actual english common usage (outside the internet, and that doesn't count) or actually hearing people SPEAK in english may cause some trouble.

In any case, glad you liked it!
I just tried to do the demo and it just closes i have the rtp files but it just loads up then closes making a windows error sound but nothing pops up no map files came with the download either
The end of this Demo was great. A neck breaking princess, awesome!
I'm looking forward to more and I hope the fights will be more challenging after the prologue.
-_-
...Are you going to finish this game anytime soon...?
You're seriously killing me with suspense.
I agree with tarus Silver is this game going to be finished :( if not you might want to switch hiatus to canceled but still this game does look already awesome without even touching the demo
tactics demo rpg. Pretty funny. Battles were casual walks in a park, just like how the protag thought it would be. And yes the protag is very funny, quite a character she is. This game is gonna be quite the party. If it ever get finished that is.
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