The World Tower

Intro

"The World Tower" was a turn-based RPG that was being developed by Yoshio back in early 2009 and whose last major update was back in May of that year. Since then the game has basically drifted to the back of the games list where all projects go to be forgotten about. And in the case of this game maybe it deserved to be back there.

Story

Probably the biggest selling point for this project is the story which is about a family trying to come back together after being torn apart by the rules of the tyrant that controls the World Tower. Though the game never really explains why Bass separates children from their families or arrests people for no reason. My best educated guess is that he's some kind of fascists trying to indoctrinate children at a young age so they'll possess a religious in their devotion to him.
Though, I suppose I'll never truly know the answers to those questions since the game was never finished.

Gameplay

Unfortunately this is where the game starts to utterly fall apart in my opinion. A lot of the battles in this game are extremely grindy. Your going to need a lot of items in order to advance, but encounters are touch based in this game as well as one time deals. So if you spend your money poorly your basically screwed. Thankfully there is a fix to this problem if you find the monster in the storage room which can be fought an infinite number of times, but he/she/it only rewards the player with money so they can buy MP restoring potions, HP healing foodstuffs, status curing herbs, and a few minor pieces of equipment. And you'll basically want to grind against this enemy since your going to want a lot of HP healing foodstuffs as well as buy items that can inflict status effects or deal damage within a specified range since your own attacks are utterly useless in some fights. And if you aren't properly stocked in advance you can find yourself in situations where your utterly screwed.

This is because boos fights in this game are based on the idea that you'll be fully stocked with all of the tools you'll potentially need. Which means if you save in an area where it's impossible to go back and buy those tools you'll need to basically get down on your knees and start praying to the goddess of random number generation to lend you a helping hand or two.

Another problem I have with the game is that this is a game with touch encounters where your obligated to fight every enemy in the game. One of the main appeals of touch encounters is that it makes it possible for the player to advance while avoiding at least some fights. This game on the other hand basically forces you to take down every enemy since your going to need every last penny as well as experience point you can get in order to win.

Seriously, it took me almost a dozen tries to get past the second to last boss in the demo since he activates a skill in response to how much damage he's taken and this skill is so powerful he can almost kill one of your party members and can instantly drop the other if he isn't in defense mode. And said boss activates this skill four times during the fight. I almost gave up when I got to that fight since I couldn't grind out any more levels to make myself more able to survive those hits nor could I buy a couple of vials of poison in order to status him to death. I was basically forced to chuck firecrackers at him and hope I could survive the storm long enough to win. And eventually I got lucky enough to do it, but the fact I needed to count on luck because I didn't have the tools I need to make fighting him easier on me is a testament to how much Yoshio expected the player to stock up on certain items when they had the chance.

Thankfully the final boss is a lot easier, but that's probably because he spams status moves that only connect about 50 percent of the time. And I was thankful for that since Jayson wasn't revived after the battle with Levitz so I couldn't grind on any of the monsters before the final boss battle. Since those fights were balanced around the idea you'd have access to two characters for those battles. And thankfully again the party is fully healed before the final boss battle in the demo. So I did get him back when I needed him the most.

Mapping

I normally wouldn't give this topic it's own section, but the mapping in this game is awful. For starters the game includes multiple doors in the residential district that don't serve any purpose beyond making the world look bigger. A motivation that really should be nipped in the bug since traversing long maps is extremely tedious and will quickly grate on the nerves of most players. To make matters worse some of the maps are a byproduct of including excessive amounts of shops in the market center. A good example of this is that the game has an item shop for MP Potions, another for ailment cures, another for healing supplies, and a fourth for one time use weapons like explosives. Seriously, these should all just be combined into a single shop or at most two clerks within the same shop with all of the healing supplies being sold by one NPC and the one-time use weapons being sold by another. By having so many shops spread out over a large area it just makes finding what your looking for more difficult and serves to piss the player off. At least that was my experience with the game since I was constantly finding myself asking where the bleep am I going.

Thankfully the dungeons are a bit more focused, but the developer also intended for people to back track to their house for free healing to save on supplies when possible. So the windy nature of the tower's residential and commercial districts still manage to haunt the player even when your out in the field.

Graphics

I suppose we can start on a more positive beat when it comes to this topic since the enemy sprites and character face sets aren't part of the RTP for RPG Maker VX and are also easy on the eyes. On the other hand, the use of crystals to represent monsters is a bit weird. Admittedly the crystals don't move which makes it easier for the player to backtrack to shops for supplies or to their apartment in order to sleep, but it doesn't change my opinion that it's a bit off putting visually.

Sound

On the music side of things the game mostly goes for upbeat and cartoony sounding music that will slowly grate on the player's nerves in my opinion. At least it started to grate on my nerves after hearing it endlessly loop as I tried to figure out where I was going in the market/residential district. As for the music that goes against that grain I would point to the music that plays in Levitz's house that has a more sinister feel to it.

Conclusion

"The World Tower" is plagued by bad mapping and boss battles that expect the player to be able to predict in advance what supplies they'll need in order to defeat them. As a result it basically sets the player up to be frustrated since they'll probably spend sometime wandering around the market area trying to find the right item shop to get the stuff they want as well as thrust them into boss battles where if they don't have the right tools they'll be utterly $%#@$%. As such I really don't recommend looking at the demo for this project.