Well, it has been quite awhile since the last development blog. I thought I might as well share what I can tell you right now. Coming up to the first date of the release of this game’s page (a.k.a, the 1st anniversary of Concordant, which is on November 27th.)

Note: Sorry, I was pretty exhausted, so I didn't have the time to put this out for a long while. My stomach's been having a bit of a "bad rush job" at the moment.

There are noticeable issues from when I played some of the route since there are a few snags in the eventing order during the Council Room event. So I will have that changed at some point in the game. In addition, there are several balancing issues in the game from some sections being too easy and some lighting issues that I need to fix. Once that’s resolved, I’ll add that alongside with the patch on v.0.6. (Yes, I decided to have the version 0.6 instead of 0.8 released since one of the routes has a “different” take on the game as a whole) It takes some time to have it to work, but once it does it should hopefully have less event issues in the game.

In terms of plot, one mistake I did with this game is that I noticed the plot early on is too slow to progress and some events with some of the characters makes some of the later plot points a little bit of a disjointed mess, which is something that I tried not to put in the game, but not realizing it until it’s too late.

In addition, I noticed that I added way too many plot points and themes in the game which ends up being rather inconsistent with the overall game’s intention. So after some consideration, I decided to plot out the whole script by writing all the different routes in the game to check how much I can get this game to work itself in its own way and… oh brother… I almost wrote up to 30-45 pages of script interactions alone. And this doesn’t count the free time interactions in the pacifist route and looking at plot holes that I’ve written in the script. I was supposed to have someone check that for me, but he’s preoccupied so I have no one to help me on this, which is a little bit frustrating.

Regardless, I need to press on and try my best to make this game the way it is and just try to rectify some of the flaws I had in the game. Not to say that I’m taking the defeatist attitude, but I’ll try not to make sure the game works in a way that would follow what I kind of envisioned.

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In addition, the amount of interactions during specific routes are only limited to only a few battles. During the more pacifist sections, I might change that a bit here and there, but those options are only meant for limited situations only, so I'll have to make due for now.

In addition, I made a second pass of one of the routes’ script so that when I put it in the game, the story won’t be too “exposition” heavy and remove several points where I felt like it’s redundant or it doesn’t make any sense.


Now, as for art wise, I’ve made some sprites in the game from the big ones to several edits and a few other changes I need to make in the game as I’m playing it over again and watch for different plot inconsistencies and check for different issues I’ve seen so far.


In addition, I’ve been revamping some of the battlers in the game which I intend on making a polish for the different COMBAT situations, since I noticed some of the older ones aren’t up to par. So I made some modifications to it as I tried to change the pose and position of the characters in the game. I haven’t been really good with dynamics, but I suppose I would try my best to attempt practicing through different ways I can find the different enemies satisfying.



I’ve also made some battleback edits for the game. Some haven’t been to fit the style of the defaults so these are considered as “greybox-level” changes at the moment. Once I’ve made a lot more modifications in the game, I might consider polishing them and adding them to make it the way I wanted to.




Also there are now multiple facesets over than two different ones for the following characters:

Ahsak
Schetcher
Filia

In addition, I’ve also made different elements to skills in the game to make sure different skills affects differently in the game as well as adding one of the most dangerous status effects in the game. "Silence"

When you are silenced, your entire skillset is blocked in the game. This is because most of the skills you have are under the act function. Silence binds the act function. But it does not bind the resolve function. And resolve have very small pool set of skills in the game, so your actions in the game is limited. Few skills can remove it (using another action called Resolve) or using a dispel herb. (But most of the time, you'll use dispel herb essentially)

Why am I telling all this? Well, it’s because in one specific route, your character will be “swapped” with another character. That other character is essentially a reverse of your current character. It isn’t weak and it has a variety of broken movepool sets in the game. And this character will essentially be featured in what you may call as “Gladiator Mode”. The gladiator mode will be switched over to the name of the character playing the game once 0.6 version is released, fixing some of the patches and adding a new route to the game.

- Here's a sneak peek on what's to come in the 0.6 version in one of the routes.









Although, Gladiator Mode, currently, will have a separate release. It will not be a part of the Concordant release at the moment. But it still has the same skills and essentially follows the same COMBAT scenarios as in the game.

Now this might be confusing as to what Gladiator Mode is, so I will answer some of the questions in a q and a style format to make sure I can explain some details regarding it.

What is Gladiator Mode?

It’s essentially a battle against nearly ALL of the cast of the Concordant series in the game “unchained” and in their full potential. Essentially one of the more “harder” battles in the game to those who wanted to do turn counting and planning for specific battles because the enemies hit relatively brutal.




You will essentially be healed and are allowed to save between every battle. Though you only have a limited amount of items in the game and you cannot restock during the battles, so make sure to use your items sparingly.

Will this be a part of the Story?

Debatably, yes. Though it might not be released until the full 1.0 version. Essentially, this counts as a “post-content” game. Though if I say anymore, it would be spoilers.

Is there any other fights other than the Concordant Cast?

Actually, yes. And this is something that I’d like to ask all of you who developed RPG Maker games here on RMN or otherwise. I would like to consider having outside “crossovers” with different RPG Maker enemies in different series. I can make the enemies in the game as battlers in my own style provided I agree with it. If there isn’t any or enough for the game, this idea may be cancelled/scrapped.

There are specific ones I considered as well, which I may need permission or else I probably won’t get the ok to put it in the game. But just to get an idea of what I already considered as a possible character “battle” cameo in the game.

Puppetmaster from Brave Hero Yuusha is considered as one.



Series I have considered, but decided not to put any in the game (unless I changed my mind) mostly because of permissions and personal reasons:

Reconstruction
April was a Fool (Though this is not an RPG Maker engine game)
After A.I.L.A Genesis
Master of the Wind

Also, this isn’t canon to any of the between storyline at the moment, if you wanted to ask anything about plot relevancy.

If you have any other suggestions, I’m all ears on what I want to add in the game. Doesn’t mean that I’ll add them in the game, but I’ll consider it for now.

How many characters do you play as?

Only one. And I won’t say who and why because that’s also spoilers until 0.6 is released.

When will this be released?

On the same time v.0.6 is released.

Is this released from the same patch or on a different one?

Different one.

Will you have an early beta version playtest for this, so I can know who I’m playing as earlier?

If you wanted to, you can send me a message or comment and I can send the early file for you to test. I can’t stop you from not spoiling who you’re playing as but I highly advise not to spoil who it is you’re playing as.

If there are any other questions for Gladiator Mode other than the ones mentioned above, I will add them to the Q and A as soon as anyone asks.

And that’s it for this progress report. Next time I’ll cover a progress report, I’ll be covering on some of the more “plot-twisty” and “spoiler” elements of the game. Since that’s the one where I’ll be talking about the most in regards to the “pen-ultimate” ending.