CRYSTALGATE'S PROFILE

Even with "seasoned" RPG players, you still have to ease them into your world and your rules and your game mechanics. Perhaps less so than the average Joe. Throwing the book at them is as sure a way to turn them off your game, imo. And saying somethng like "It's just like Suikoden Mapersona Tensei (SMT) battle system, with octohedron grids!" doesn't help.

I like to think that seasoned RPG players aren't overwhelmed by 3-4 skills, especially not if it's skills you've already seen a dozen of times. You should have a good idea what skills like "Fire", "Heal", "Sleep" and "Attack Up" does in advance. Granted, the question remains how effective they are, but that shouldn't overwhelm you. Of course, if you throw 3-4 alien game mechanics on the player at once I can see the problem, but 3-4 well known skills?

On the thing of healing spells being cheap, I'm going to guess that it's because people don't want players to complain that the game is too difficult because they don't have the MP to heal, or that healing is not cost efficient in regards to it's MP.

When it comes to healing, the player doesn't have a choice, he has to recover lost HP. If the heal spell is less MP efficient than an offensive spell, the player will still heal (he could use an item instead, but games with strict MP limit usually has strict item limits as well). However, if the offensive spell is less MP efficient, chance is the player will simple not use it which is exactly what I see happening in many RPGs. In fact, the only RPGs I've seen getting away from that problem is those who simple does away the MP efficiency issue, either by throwing in enough MP replenishing items to make MP cost barely matter or by giving the offensive and healing skills to different characters. I have not ever seen any RPG where I've thought that the MP is better spent on an offensive skill than on healing.

If you're afraid of the player running out of MP, you can keep the healing cost as it is and lower the cost of everything else instead. I have never heard of the problem that "players are casting the sleep spell to much and hitting attack to little" anyway.

I completed the switches puzzle, but had no idea what to do after that. I was running low on resources and decided to exit. One exit toke me out of the tower. Then I used an exit scroll to get out of the forest as well, but ended up stuck in a wall with all the progress since entering the tower lost.

Yes, except for DQ VIII where they renamed the spells.

When it comes to characters, I just choose something that I think sounds right for that particular character. For some characters this can take quite a while.

I name spells mainly after what they do or their animation. In one project I names the fire spells "Heat Wave", "Fireball" and "Inferno" while the ice spells where named "Ice Blast", "Blizzard" and "Frozen Orb".

I can think of two things that attracts me more than others, appealing characters and fun.

Appealing characters seems straightforward, but it really isn't. You can have characters with complicated and tragic back-stories and character development where they grow as they encounter both hardships and joy, but it does not guarantee appealing characters. In fact, promises of either means very little to me when evaluating your characters. What I really look at is characterization.

Good characters aren't dependent on their back-story or current goal to convey anything meaningful (although those things can definitely help), they can show their personalities and feeling (unless they are supposed to not show their feeling of course) well even if the plot currently isn't facing what specifically concerns them. Show is also the key-word, you shouldn't have to be blatant about it unless it's appropriate for the situation. For example, a kind character should behave in a kind way, not just go and suggest the kind course of action every time the party has a choice to make.

While this can be hard to show in a project without spoiling anything, I can often get a good impression by reading a 3-5 line summary of the character.

Next is fun. For RPGs, a great way to make it fun is a good phasing between story and gameplay. Don't have too long sections of cutscenes, but don't have to long dungeons either. I will understand that the story cannot always be conveniently spaced out, but poor balance between story and gameplay should be an exception rather than a rule.

Then there's always paying attention to detail and making sure it's fun. If the player is expected to talk with townspeople and explore the town, it has to be fun. The townspeople should have something interesting to say and there should be interesting things to see and find. Do the same reasoning for every other lengthy aspect of the game. Battles is usually one of them so I go a bit more in-dept with them.

A very simple rule for fun battles is; they should demand or at least encourage different strategies. All the character customization, limit breaks and any other features are useless if the same strategy is used for the majority of the battles. Other than that, anything you implement should be implemented with great care. If you want a limit break system, carefully consider how the limit breaks affects battles and make sure the player can utilize them in a meaningful way.

The best way to show that the game will be fun is to explain what you're adding and not just give me a list of features. One well thought trough idea is better than dozens of haphazardly thrown together ones.