Three Ghostly Roses

It's been over a month since I released this. The reception has been pretty good so far and it's being featured as a Hidden Gem on the front page of RMN this month. I passed the 100 download milestone and the number of subscriptions and page views are still rising. I say things are going pretty well.

Originally called Four Ghostly Roses, I want to talk about this project's history a bit. (there might be a mild spoiler or two ahead eventually for those who haven't played yet)



Back very early in 2013, I was gifted RPG Maker VX Ace after using RPG Maker 2000/2003 for many years before. It was the first time I had a legal copy of RPG Maker and I was hyped.

In a brainstorming session for a platform game with a group of friends, I had a concept idea rejected once. I drew a terrible picture of a man dressed in rags holding a flower. I decided he was dead and going to try and contact his daughters via their dreams. They said it wouldn't work for a platform game. I don't know why, but I quite believed in the idea. (I wish I still had that picture!)

Months later, I had just recently received RPG Maker VX Ace and I decided that was the idea I would first try the engine with. I did not like the default chipsets. I had some previous experience with pixel art at that point, so I decided I would give that a try. Making my own chipsets was a total disaster for Four Ghostly Roses. Pixel art back then was a total nightmare. (Thankfully I grew to enjoy it!)

So I decided to make the best with default chipsets of RPG Maker VX Ace. Looking back, I totally did NOT get how to use them properly. I always had such precise visions for my game worlds. It made using default chipsets for anything extremely frustrating to me. So much so that it inspired me to git gud at my own art eventually.

I shall show off my first time using VX Ace RTP and the disasters that came with it.











The concept of the game remained relatively the same. The drastic changes were all in the level design, writing, graphics, and music. I also cut down the playtime by a LOT. The original one took me about 8 hours. I thought that was short back then.

There were a lot more battles and they were lengthier. I also had an additional dungeon area (The Castle) that I included as just the boss stage instead in Three Ghostly Roses. A daughter altogether was scrapped.

In battles, Edmund would eventually gain FOUR turns. He had healing skills and his blast skills had three elements instead of one.

Four Ghostly Roses was full of inexperience. When I finished it, I was quite proud. I thought I had done something good. I quickly realized the severity of its flaws and it kind of bummed me out. The game was scrapped for many years.

Yet, it kind of stuck with me. Every time I started the brainstorming a new game project idea I would go back to that and try to figure out how to pull off. Hell, I almost redid it for IGMC 2014 before I realized 30 minutes - 60 minutes was way too small for my idea.

I eventually cracked this year and finally went ahead and started making it again. I think the reason why it stuck with me so hard was because of how fond the memories were when I was made it. It was the first time I ever made music that I considered good. The world was really fun to be in, despite not coming out the way I envisioned.

As one can tell from playing Three Ghostly Roses or even looking at the screenshots tab, I had made MAJOR progress over the years. Hell, I learned a lot from Three Ghostly Roses itself and realized some important lessons.

I'd totally do things differently if I had the chance to make the game again. Yet, I am happy with it. I feel no need for it. I realize that I will always be in a cycle of improvement as long as I try my best while making games.

In Three Ghostly Roses I included a select amount of songs from the original project as bonus content. I thought the choices were appropriate. 95% of the new songs were pretty much me recreating an older song. Sort of like siblings. They weren't the same songs, but they were for a very similar purpose... If that makes any sense.

There was one song I wanted to include but I felt like it didn't fit in the actual game. The song itself is kind of spoilerish, seeing how it's the last boss song of the original. Yet, the game is different now, so no harm. I hope those who have beat Three Ghostly Roses enjoy it!



For everyone who downloaded and played Three Ghostly Roses, thank you! Every time someone posted feedback it made my day. I hope this post of my remembering was interesting.