SaturN

Introduction

"SaturN" was developed by lowua using RPG Maker 2003 and stands out as one of the few games made with that engine to feature a real time combat system. On the plus side, this does mean this game has a bit of a unique flavor to it in terms of combat right from the get go. On the downside, the combat is extremely repetitive and leaves a lot to be desired. So, it's easy to understand why very few developers make games with real time combat systems with this engine.

Story

our the trial!

"SaturN" features a nameless and silent protagonist on a quest for revenge and in order to achieve this revenge he'll need to complete the trials. A series of boss battles that take place in various locales that have recently appeared on a nameless world. Yeah, apparently lowua doesn't like giving his main character or the world he lives on a name. Which is rather odd in my opinion. Though, I suppose we could consider this Earth number 1,037,512 or something to that effect. Of course, the appearance of this new areas has also led to a warping of the local weather conditions as well. So, you'll get to enjoy wandering through a frozen wasteland as well as hot desert. Truly, this game is just chock full of interesting areas to explore. But what really spoils the story for me is the ending. Though, I suppose that's because I'm a sucker for a happy ending. So a game that ends on the kind of bittersweet note that this one does isn't really to my liking.

Gameplay

Yeah! The final boss can get stuck on his minions!

On the gameplay side of things "SaturN" features a real time combat system which leads to a lot of issues due to the limitations of RPG Maker 2003. For starters the game is highly repetitive with the player spending the bulk of their time doing simple hit and run attacks on the enemies. Basically you move in close enough to draw the enemy in. You'll then hit them and fall back in order to create enough room for you to attack again. And you'll rinse and repeat this tactic until you've defeated the enemy. To make matters worse, you basically use the same tactic with the bosses as well. The only difference being you'll spend the bulk of the time with them running around like a chicken with it's head cut off in order to dodge randomly summoned spells.


To add to the list of problems, the enemies in this game are prone to getting stuck on walls. Something the player can readily take advantage off by abusing their special attack which has a much longer range then their regular attack as well as possess the ability to pierce through impassable objects on the map like they aren't there. And to add to this pain, it's possible for enemies to get stuck on each other. Albeit this issue doesn't pop up anywhere near as often because of how spread out the enemies usually are, but it is possible to take advantage of this issue every now and again as well.


On the plus side the game does feature a few mini games as well, but I'll admit that I'm not a big fan of the bulk of the mini games that can be found in this game, but I did get a little joy out of pelting little kids with snowballs.

Bugs/Glitches

• Sometimes enemies in this game are faster then normal for no apparent reason

• The final hunt target in this game causes the player to lose control of their weapons

• Older versions of this game were missing a pair of sprite sheets that were used in Acts 3 and 5

Conclusion

I'll give lowua credit for taking a chance on implementing a real time combat system with RPG Maker 2003. After all, I consider this decision to be a truly bold one considering how much it goes against the grain. Even so, this game is bogged down by highly repetitive combat and a slew of bugs that range from annoying to game breaking. As such, I really can't recommend this game. Albeit, a few people might wanna give this game a whirl just to get a feel for how a real time combat system works in RPG Maker 2003.