DARKEN'S PROFILE

*blows dust off ancient readme.txt*



Currently working on: The Machine that Breathes https://store.steampowered.com/app/1126210/the_machine_that_BREATHES/ (Please wishlist!)
the machine that BREATHE...
A tunneling machine finds itself injected into a body resembling a human.

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Old/Lost RpgMaker Games - SegNin's Rare/Obscure RM Games Request Topic

author=Gourd_Clae
https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/libraries/article/91862-in-a-swift-decision-judge-eviscerates-internet-archive-s-scanning-and-lending-program.htmlIs this something to be worried about down the line? I wouldn't want to lose anything because the internet archive is gutted further.

IA is pretty invaluable but we haven't been relying on it too much for archival. I'll be pissed if the whole thing is taken down due to court costs and by proxy the waybackmachine. I know there's a lot of RPG Maker game dumps on there so it is worth having multiple baskets but this does set an awful precedent.

I remember LBR got a torrent for the game archive. I don't know if its updated but I think p2p is our best bet for unregulated hosting.

What are you thinking about? (game development edition)

yeah i never get the adoration of maps like this because you never really get to see the scope of it ingame and could be a performance hog if there's just enough process heavy events. there are far more impressive games that can stream an endless open world without loading screens and at least 3D has the advantage of angles and vistas. whereas I feel like area to area transitions in an rpgmaker game are more expected with the focus on individual areas being as relatively pretty (and less work for the dev).

Guess the RPG from Only 3 Tiles

the quiz is pretty deep in the iceberg than it would be for the common rpgmaker user who only knows the 3 holy tiles of rudra

Guess the RPG from Only 3 Tiles

he can't even recognize 3 tiles from an obscure gba game known as Magical Vacation!

Guess the RPG from Only 3 Tiles

25/30 though 3 of them were just me not thinking of the full title for some of them

2023 Gaming Diary

Dragon Age: Origins

So I've been game hopping super hard lately but for some reason settled on Dragon Age. I could never figure out why I bounced off of it as it strikes a neat balance between modern Bioware and classic CRPGs though really I have no idea wtf Bioware has been up to since uhh Anthem? Like ME3 feels like the last solid game from them in a weird way.

Anyway I went with an elf rogue dual dagger build, he's a crit monster when the threats from alistair are applied correctly though with coup de grace I didn't even need to back stab anymore. I took morrigan along of course but I forgot how much she disapproves just any sidequest you go on if it's the least bit out of charity. She's by far the most interesting character but with the most problematic and imo inconsistent philosphy. I feel like she should have been pissed at mages and the chantry and thats it, but I think a character that makes fun of you for doing every little sidequest is pretty funny.

I went and did the mage quest which is one of the 3-4 pillars of the main questline. I got through the fade and remembered now why I bounced off of this game actually. The game ignores the central mechanics and just becomes a really bad metroidvania but I get what they were going for. After completing the mage tower I then found out I missed out on Leilenna and Sten like forever because apparently the first town gets ransacked by the blight. I didn't spend too much time in the first town because it didn't really seem that interesting? But it seems like a massive oversight to miss out on crucial party members for the rest of the game. I got so mad I just modded the game to teleport to the town and pick them up and it makes me just want to look up a guide whenever I go anywhere just in case there's some bullshit softlocked content. Idk man WRPGs sure like to boast about choices but being open also leads to some serious design flaws. Like it'd be interesting if missing Leilenna actually led to something but no there's zero upside to letting her get killed in the town unless the thought of deleting a party member spurs your imagination of CHOICES!

Oh yeah and when I was picking up party members the game just decided to not autosave even when warping or triggering crucial plot points so I had to do it all over again. Normally I'd quit at the whole locked out of important PCs thing but then I think my ADHD flairs up when it comes to figuring out how to cheat my way through the bullshit. This kind of happened with System Shock 2 where I wasn't cheating but rather exploiting and abusing my way throug the end because I was so sick of it. Idk maybe it's reverse psychology, where a frictionless game just doesn't inspire any kind of tenacity, thus not worth my attention. Or like how I probably had more fun getting the busted Sega Saturn to work than playing its games.

Video Game Critic Wager 2023

J*PG

Eurojank comes to mind as a regional term for not even a genre but a particular subset of games on a budget via circumstances from eastern europe and could be seen as quite negative. This guy sums it better than I can. But from what I can tell it's taken in stride.

J*PG

I can see why the term comes off as derogatory after all games like dragon quest and final fantasy cited ultima and wizardry as their biggest inspiration or even DnD. The NES market demanded a streamlined experience especially with the two face button layout. Even the RPGmaker games made today only need confirm and cancel for most interactions. Which guide a lot of the UX principles such as not needing to know stats or fuck up making a bad custom character. But from a certain perspective streamlining wouldnt be enough to box an entire lineage of games just like that.

Console RPGS would be apt until Bioware enacted a very simular trend but even started taking out a lot of the strategic aspects of RPGs. Which... is the same for the latest FFs not even bothering with turn based. So idk I think JRPG is still as useful as "anime" even if the animation industry is becoming more and more international. Genres are really just marketing terms. Some millennial weeb might not appreciate Warhammer 40k looking stuff but if you say JRPG its like oh okay I know exactly what youre talking about. I can see just Anime RPG since that includes in the Tales of franchise of games easily but term proliferation is everything.

Canonical Respawns

Dark Souls is a pretty big one. You're undead so you cannot die and appear back at the bonfire when you "lose". You keep all your stuff aside from souls. Though I've never been clear on what exactly takes you to the bonfire, I guess you just turn into a zombie and slowly walk back to regain a bit of humanity. If you give up on the game you could argue that's what turns you hollowed losing all trace of humanity.

I've always liked Prince of Persia (2003) where the idea is that the protagonist is merely narrating and you hear the prince go "wait, that's not how that happened" whenever you die. It doesn't have the keep your stuff thing but I could imagine some interesting bits to insert like "oh yeah well it turns out I got this weapon earlier than I remembered" to emulate foggy memory.

My own game I had an idea to have you assume a nearby robot body, since you were a robot that could possess/hack drones and such I figured it would be cool to have a comeback mechanic. It's kind of hard to implement not for coding reasons exactly but just that the game isn't built around having robot corpses everywhere with different graphics. Generally I think the costs of immersion can be rather high unless it's built into the game from the start.