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Tactics Decayed

  • Dyhalto
  • 08/03/2014 01:37 PM
  • 1599 views
Preamble
Only a week ago I did a review of Tactics Blade : Episode 1. The logical thing to do, after having had my TRPG appetite sated, was to move on to Episode 2.
There were a number of flaws in the first game, but it's natural for a creator to look upon previous mistakes and rectify them in future projects. I anticipated this kind of effort, at least in the slightest, but it turns out the creator, LizardBite, learned nothing.

Visual: 0/5
There's been no change to the graphic resources. Multiple enemies still share the same sprites with no effort to even swap palettes, let alone frankensprite. Melanie is still a male soldier. Imps still have a dragon portrait and gorilla battle anim.
Ordinarily this would constitute a step sideways, making a score of 1 remain 1, but there was some effort to change the battle animations... gone seriously awry. I was pleasantly surprised when Rose's attack was stepped up, and she even had a unique cast animation for her newfound magic spells. It gave me hope to be dashed.
Melanie and the new ally, Leo, have no cast animation for their spells. Enemy attacks have been garbled; some of them I can't make any sense of. The Imp who used to pounce on you now jumps erratically around the screen. I wish I could make a gif of the Mage boss casting because he's..... everywhere. It's a disaster.
And mapping, previously considered passable... well... see for yourself.


We regret to inform you that Mapping School has rejected your application


Audio: 0/5
No change from Episode 1 here.
At all.
The internet is full of midis; originals and remixes of VG staples alike. I can put "wet T-shirts" into Google and one of the search results will be a midi. Hell, we're in the age of high speed internet. Use 20MB WAV files instead. There is no excuse for not expanding the weak music selection between episodes 1 and 2.

Storyline: 1/5
Looking back at my review of the first episode, you may have detected a glimmer of hope in my moderate commentary. Well, that's gone now. It wasn't more than a few battles in before the plot was shaking, then completely flying off the hinges at the halfway mark.

Rose and Melanie, captured and imprisoned, are being used as science experiments. Okay, that's dastardly. I can live with that. The bad guys are infusing them with magic, making them more powerful. What the hell for? They're busted out of the laboratory by Leo, who was a boss in Episode 1. Making him the de facto protagonist in Episode 2 was about the only clever twist it had to offer.
The story loses focus then. You just kind of go on a disorganized crusade of killing bad guys with the occasional interlude by the demon king talking to his minions.
Whatever.

Gameplay: 0/5
Like the storyline, tactical gameplay elements fell right off the cliff into oblivion.
First off, our heroes were given magic. LizardBite obviously wasn't able to grasp balancing their newfound powers with appropriate challenges, because their magic totally breaks the game. Not only is it ridiculously powerful in terms of damage dealing, but MP is in abundance so you'll have wiped out the entire enemy army before running out. Leo's lightning magic, in particular, can kill up to 13 foes at once.
Worse yet, about 1/3 through the game, you can buy "Armor" for your three heroes. It skyrockets their defense by an astronomical 7 points, compared to enemy types getting an extra 2 or 3 strength per upgrade.
And then. And then!!


What? We only fill a quarter of the screen? Couldn't we have been given a few more guys?


Overall: 0.5/5
I rounded up to 0.5.
There's the off chance that Episode 3, if ever made, could be the culmination of tactical RPG design lessons, but since 2 went so far in the wrong direction, I won't be holding my breath for the series finale.

Posts

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Wow... this game (if you can call it that) is just, wow. I tried it myself and let me tell you Dyhalto could have been more stern. I'm never one to be mean at someones game, but there was absolutely no effort put into this this. It would be nice if the creator could at least reply. I know I personally would like to hear some reasons for his design choices.
author=Jparker1984
It would be nice if the creator could at least reply. I know I personally would like to hear some reasons for his design choices.


I would like to start by apologizing for, well, everything. I would have replied sooner, but today is the first time I've logged on in months, and imagine my shock and horror when I saw that someone had reviewed a pair of games I'd made when I was... *checks date the games went online* 16? Oh dear, 16-year-old me was an idiot. To be honest, I'd forgotten that these games were still up here. Not sure why I never deleted them along with the other embarrassments of my teenage years. Perhaps as a warning to myself?

Anyway, I made these games one after another six years ago when I had no idea what I was doing. My memory of what, exactly, I was thinking is hazy, so I'll try my best to explain what the hell was going through my head.

I do know that I decided to split it into a trilogy after because I had no idea how to get around the level cap, and I started making Episode Two as soon as I was done with Episode One, which is why there are zero gameplay changes. I made the games using only default resources that came with SRPG Maker... or at least whatever version of the tool I downloaded from wherever I got it from. I attempted to create a few maps where reality was breaking down and different places were bleeding into one another but, well, the review provides a screenshot of how well that went. XD

Obviously, I never made an Episode 3. I'm trying to remember what I had planned for it. If I recall correctly, Episode 2 ends with Melanie identifying herself as the Goddess of Day, I think? Something like that? I think that the Goddess and Noctus were celestial locked in an everlasting duel, and Ep3 would start with Goddess!Melanie, Leo, and Rose storming Noctus' place and killing him. And the Goddess!Melanie would start taking over the realms with Rose's help and the player would control Leo fighting them or something. So, yeah, the story had that little twist going for it, but I doubt 16-year-old me would have executed it very well, so it's probably a mercy that I never made the third one.

Anyway, I would like to thank Dyhalto for taking me on a trip down memory lane. We all make idiotic mistakes when we start creating, and I'm just glad some of my dumber RPG Maker mistakes are no longer on the internet (yes, these things were not the dumbest. I know, terrifying, isn't it?)
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