CASHMERECAT'S PROFILE

This mini tutorial, which I did not deem substantial enough for a full article, is aimed at intermediate to expert developers. It is particularly aimed at gameplay-intensive games such as puzzle games, but can be extended to any genre of game made within the RPG Maker engine and perhaps beyond, if you replace the word "common event" with "function".

You can use common events to make game development more quick, efficient and easy when you want to be able to alter the shared functionality of a set of events. Here are some ideas for using common events.


1. Player transfers, or teleports. By storing these in common events you can alter default Fade type, SE and other specifics of transfers for all move-related events. Just use the "Designation with variables" option in the "Transfer Player" command and call this common event after assigning Map ID, Map X and Map Y variables. If "Direct designation" is preferred, just standardize the Move SE using a common event, as well as before/after transitions, stated in point 2.
2. Before/after transitions. Use these to standardize fade outs/fade ins before/after the teleport events. What I recommend is a "Tint Screen" to black, and use "Transfer Player" with "None" Fade, followed by a "Tint Screen" to normal colour.
3. Puzzle items such as crates or boulders. This is more the case with puzzle games, but I believe it makes life easier for any game. To standardize the behaviour of objects in your universe, assign a common event that defines that behaviour. For example, if a boulder will roll until it hits a wall, and then makes a sound at the end, create this functionality in a Common Event and duplicate it for all boulders, so that if a new puzzle mechanic comes up that requires you to modify the boulders' behaviour, you don't have to go through every single boulder and copy-paste the relevant code. This improves modularity and the ability to modify all boulder code using one event. This hopefully will speed up game development, and make it more robust and understandable.
4. Save points, victory/flee/defeat conditions in scripted battles. You can standardize save points, and what happens if you win/flee/lose scripted battles.
5. Reset map. Again, mostly useful for puzzle games. Create a common event that teleports you to another map and brings you back to the origin spot, possibly resetting self switches in the process, if required. The script I use to reset all self switches in a map is as follows:



This allows you to call "reset_self()" in a "Script" event command to reset all self switches on a map.

And now I'm going to give you another weird tip.


Use an "@" sign before a variable name to declare it private to an event. For example, in an event you may assign name, age and gender to an NPC, as follows:



In the first Conditional Branch, the script check "@init.nil?" checks if the private variable "@init" exists. If it does, it initializes "@name" as "John", "@age" as 16, "@gender" as "M", and "@init" as true, which is to indicate that initialization has occurred. This is so that the next time you interact with this event, it won't reset the age back to 16.

The next Conditional Branch checks if you are 18 or older. It uses the script "@age >= 18", which means "is the private variable "age" greater than or equal to 18?". If that is true, it displays a message saying you're an adult. Else, it displays a message saying you are not an adult yet.

Next, it asks if you would like to age one year, and then if you say yes, it will increment the "@age" variable by 1.

If you interact with the event 3 times and say "yes" the first 2 times, it will tell you that you're an adult. This is because the "@age" variable would have been incremented by 1 twice, leading it to equal 18, which satisfies the conditional branch "@age >= 18".

The advantage of using private variables over public variables is that you can literally copy-paste this event multiple times, and not have to change a thing. If you used public variables and tried to copy-paste this event severally, these events would share the same public variable, and you'd have to change every single one of them. But when you use private variables, there is no need to modify each event.

You can combine this with the advice I gave above by storing the event code for a "Teenage Boy" type of event in a Common Event. This standardizes the behaviour for "Teenage Boy" and makes it easily modifiable. Thus you can copy "Teenage Boy" wherever you like and he'll work.

Note that this is more useful for objects that do not exhibit unique behaviour, like crates or boulders or save points.

I feel like playing some RPG Maker games with really good comedy in them. Like, laugh-per-minute funny, whether it be witty, or with lovable characters, just funny all-round. I really liked Razed are the Powerful, with all its tongue-in-cheek references and witty wordplay. Quest Twilight Prince Prophecy Chronicles had hilarious voice-over, but it was so short! I wish it was longer. I found Cap_H's A Man Called Dungeon hilarious, I assume it was intentional. (I hope Cap makes more comedy games).

So yeah, I'm looking for funny games, and I'm wondering if you guys have any.

Hey everyone. I'm making a puzzle game called Account Mu, and it's a really minimalist piece with a lot of deterministic puzzles contained in a non-linear format. However, I'm really looking to push the idea that these puzzles can be attempted in any order. Do you guys have any past experience with puzzle games that have done this well? I have played lots of non-linear RPGs (roguelikes mostly) but I want to know if there are good puzzle games that have done the whole non-linear thing well and how they did it, and how I can apply that to my game possibly.

One of my inspirations is Wine & Roses, not because of the combat, but because you could attempt the battles in relatively any order, improve your skills, and finish the final boss by the end. But the thing that stopped you from just going straight to the final boss in Wine & Roses is that she was way too strong for you to finish off right away, and you had to train on the little guys first before you could beat her.

I'm wondering if I could teach a little puzzle mechanic one at a time, so that the person can come back to the final puzzle and defeat it, only after having learned certain skills. I want your ideas though.

Thanks!

I just feel like asking questions coz I want to hear people's opinions about everything and anything. They'll be random questions, with no order to them. They'll also probably be horribly written or asked. But the main thing is I want to know more about YOUUUUUUUUUU from the deep down insidey place. Let's go!

Do you finish most games you start? Or do you get bored quickly?

Describe your wallet to me. What material is it made out of? How long have you had it for? Does it hold significance to you?

What is your stance towards fizzy drinks? Do you think they are sugary diabetes?

What is your idea of the perfect RPG Maker game? One that will utterly demolish all the other RPG Maker games and be heralded as the best of all time? How will you make it?

What is your goal in life?

Where do you see yourself in 5 years? Job-wise, health-wise, family-wise?

What would you do with $1 million?

Do you sometimes recognize the taste of your own mouth? Literally, can you taste the taste of your mouth right now?

Do you hate how often time goes past? Or do you like it?

Do you like pretending to be someone else online? Or do you just try to be yourself?

Do you want to spill one of your deepest, darkest IRL secrets? I'll try not to judge you. But others will. Just kidding, I'll judge you.

Do you sometimes feel like you're special, and then you realize that you're not? How does this make you feel?

That's all I got for now. I might ask more soon. VERY interested to hear what you guys have to say. I want to hear more about YOUUUUUU