KILLER WOLF'S PROFILE

And here I was just thinking, gee if I could lower my standards (likely involving a shovel at this point) and switch to VX, I could crowdfund my way into ultimate slackerdom...

ugh.

I like the idea that people out there are willing to support small projects, but that comes with the risk that the wrong kind of projects are going to gobble up the funds.

I would love to see the demographics on the donors.

I enjoyed this, but the jackass aspect of my personality wants to ask where the "Tried to write a novel from the perspective of a black woman..." slide was.

FF8 - FF7 - Tactics - FF6 - FF10 - FFIX - FFXII - FFV

Final Fantasy 7 was the game that got me into console rpgs and the whole Playstation era. I remember using my first paycheck to buy the system and the game, and not being able to afford a memory card for a week (and the hilarity that ensued from not being able to save, although I did get pretty damn good at the game up to the Midgar Zolem part...). I've played it three and a third times through, not counting the innumerable early restarts.

But I always liked FF8 a little bit more. It might just be that I was in highschool and found the initial cast very easy to identify with, or it could be that I had time to build up anticipation for the game due to following press coverage. You could say FF7 hooked me, but FF8 was that firm tug that actually SET the hook. The only "problem" was that it was so easy to abuse the mechanics. I didn't get a character killed until some time on the third disc. It was also one of the first games that gave me guru status with my gamer friends. They'd get stuck on something, and call and I'd walk them through it - or I'd show off how easy boss murder was when you kept Squall, Zell, and Irvine in critical health and rolled through Limit Breaks every turn.

Tactics gave an entirely different experience, but still ended up being a favorite. I had all these weird superstitions pop up, because I was almost always under leveled, and had my victories rely on skill and luck in equal measure. There was one fight I could only win with my foot in the box for a twelve pack of sunkist.

FF6 is a 16bit classic, so it pretty much speaks for itself. It was the first FF I dove into after beating 7. I recalled articles about it in game magazines, and how a friend raved about it and decided to dive in.

Final Fantasy 10 was fun, and the whole Tidus / Yuna / Seymour triangle happened to strike a chord with me due personal issues at the time. It was nice to vicariously bust up your sorta/but not quite girlfriend's arranged marriage.

Final Fantasy IX had some good parts, but the character design and naming of certain elements just put me off. Adelbert Steiner? I get his pomposity and the whole supreme fealty thing was part of the joke, but he just looked ridiculous and I never really used him in combat that much. I couldn't really identify with monkey boy Zidane either. It had some fun game play, but I guess I was too spoiled by the "modern" approach of 7 and 8 to really appreciate the comical fantasy schtick at the time.

Final Fantasy XII started strong with me. I enjoyed the change up in setting, and while the costume department seemed to think it was appropriate to make everyone's outfits out of less fabric than you find in a pair of paper towels, seeing my equipped weapons and shields when I walked around was cool. I got used to the semi-mmorpg feel, but never quite liked it. Then my estimation of the game plummeted when it turned into "climb this boring tower forever." That was where I stopped playing (of course, Xenosaga 3 had some say in the matter).

Tried 4 and 5, but was too spoiled by the next gen iterations to get into them. Never tried the online ones, and have yet to wade into XIII.

Fair warning: I'm trotting out Deus Ex as an example again.

Coming from the console rpg mindset, when I first got Deus Ex, I killed a ton of people. I knew the game had exp and "levels", so I wanted to level up. By the end of the first mission, I realized that the game only gave you exp for exploration and plot progression.

Paradigm shift. I started over and played the game as a total stealth build. I conserved bullets, lams, bioelectric for when I REALLY needed it to explore or advance the plot. That mindset stuck with me through all four games in the Deus Ex expanded grab bag, and carried over every other game where that approach was applicable.

That said, I'm currently working on a game in the basic Shin Megami Tensei template. Having the right party and being able to exploit a number of enemy weaknesses at a time is key. In order to recruit, you require Sek (energy/money), your main source of Sek is combat.

Fighting is required, and the encounter rate is high (currently painfully so, planning to adjust), but the "grind" is still optional. Just getting from point A to point B pumps the players level up enough that, if they've been paying attention and forming smart team ups, they should find the boss fairly challenging, but entirely beatable.

They can grind to pump up their demons' stats and powers, but every fight comes with a risk. If any summon other then whichever one is currently Imprinted as the PC's Guardian falls in battle, it is removed from your stock and you'll have to catch it again, at whatever level it occurs in the game. If you leveled your flame spewing Jackolantern up six levels to get the area of effect fire spell and you carelessly let him die in battle, you'll have to capture another and start over.

Also, the player can only Rest in safe areas, and it costs Sek to recharge your Demon's MP. The player also gets the opportunity to select either an Health restore, a Mana Restore, or an EXP bonus if they manage to kill a group of monsters before they can take a turn. They also get the option to bank the bonus, letting it stack if they are able to do this multiple times in a row, for greater gains.

My goal was to reward players who put the basics of the combat system together well a little better than people who will just march up and down that stretch of hallway where the higher level encounters spawn until they get that next level/skill.

I'm going on a big bug hunt in Breach:Awakening. I'm also tuning my custom encounter rate a bit. If it gets annoying to have to fight every other step during testing, it probably will be just as annoying to other people when I release it!

I'm still trying to hit the difficulty sweet spot. The game is basically an homage to SMT, so erring on the difficult side seems the way to go, but maybe not quite as brutally difficult as the game is right now.

Of course, I could leave the challenge as is. That would teach players to pay attention when their hud changes color. Grey means you're okay. Yellow means you might be in trouble if your party is put together poorly. Red means you're shooting for a pyrrhic victory, at best.