THENECROMANCER'S PROFILE

6. I'll explain as best I can.

The cinematics are top notch. I've actually never seen anything like it and it's exactly the kind of stuff I've always to play around with. You did a really good job on that. A few times it seemed off, like the way a picture moved or transitioned to the next one, but I couldn't give specific examples. Overall, it was great. I find myself wondering how exactly you did it and if those capabilities are in VX Ace. Is it just built in picture commands? There was that scene where he walks out on the balcony, I know that's not default picture commands heh If you don't mind, would you explain it all to me? Just basics. Here or PM. Would appreciate it.

One thing I do remember is the way you have characters move and be highlighted during talking scenes. In particular when the 2 main characters are talking in their apartment. It seems awkward the way her graphic ends up hiding behind his when he talks. They are right next to each other and there is only 2 of them. It seems unnecessary to do that in the first place, but maybe put more distance between them so she doesn't become so obscured. That idea worked well in the doctor scene, but here...ehhh...

The graphics are ok. I don't love the art style(the hand drawn stuff), but it's fresh and custom so kudos on that. The tiles and sprites, not my favorite. But I'm stuck in the past on that old NES/SNES style so I won't say much else. It's personal preference. One thing that that bothers me is the scale of everything. The hero sprites are tiny. That kitten he was rescuing was twice his size. In the apartment they could put some blankets and pillows down and have plenty of room to sleep on the TV, once tilted down from the viewing position. Why are they so small?

The Windows style menu stuff is great. Is that all show pictures? It seemed so smooth. That hustler poster haha Hilarious. Those kinds of things made me enjoy the game so far, but I'm afraid there isn't much else.

Granted, I only played a VERY short time, but there were plenty of things that I disliked.

The writing is kind of...clunky and blunt. Some of these people say weird things and they all seem to have the same personality. Smart alec-y and upbeat. The cat is a fat piece of shit thing fell flat for me. The only specific example of the writing I can think of is when he has the accident. The whole scene dialogue was a little too much caps and punctuation to be taken seriously, but when the guy first realizes that someone was in there he tells his friend to 'take a look for yourself'. The other guy doesn't say anything after that, instead that same guy says 'what are you standing around for, get help'. He told the guy to stand there and look first, not get help, now he's yelling at him to hurry up and get help. Stuff like that makes it hard for me to believe these are real people saying real things, so I take the game less serious and even if it's meant to be lighthearted and jokey, I dunno it just fails to resonate with me on that level either. So it ends up being that I don't like the dialogue from any angle.

The pace of the storytelling seems a bit odd, too. I don't know if I can really explain that. It jumped from the accident scene, to him waking up and explaining his history, to life with his gf, a little too quick? Maybe. Without enough finesse? I don't know why but I'm not getting sucked into the story. It's just random things happening.

When the character talks about serious things, I can't take him seriously, and I'm not really laughing/enjoying the dialogue that seems to want to be clever and funny. That's what I mean when I say it's blunt. It gets the story across and moves things along, but it's not elegant or emotion-evoking. IMO. I don't have any advice on improving it, as I'm not a great writer myself. I guess..try and make it more believable? Even if the goal is to be funny? Whatever that means hah

Also, some of these names and words you're coming up with are atrocious haha RNjesus? Am I pronouncing that right? RNG plus higher power, I assume? That's quite a stretch. The BIOSpital was good haha but Dr...I don't even know, is such a silly name. The main character is Lady something, I simply dislike some of your choices(but they are yours to make). Some of the computer related words and puns are too labored.

I got up to the battle tutorial. It's a lot of information to dump on the player at once. Most of it is common RPG stuff, but it's a bit of an overload. I would always suggest the kind of tutorial that is interactive and slowly introduces the player to the mechanics by doing. Not all reading up front, then you're on your own. Hopefully this isn't the only time it's mentioned. Some kind of reference to it would be helpful, something in the apartment maybe. You could trim it down to the immediate basics, like rows, without spending so much time on the costs involved with changing rows. Leave out the elemental stuff, since of it actually applies yet. When it finally is part of the game, then give an explanation on it. Like the player learns an ability that inflicts status effect, that would be the time to explain that. But that's not too important either way.

The battles themselves, standard stuff I suppose. Which is a downer for me. The camera work is interesting. Is that a MV feature? Or some script? On the world map some objects jitter a bit as the camera slowly moves around. And in battle at one point it went to zoom in, and got stuck zoomed in. It wouldn't zoom back out even after several turns. Not sure if that's a bug or a feature. Are the battle sprites goofy on purpose? They have googly eyes and seem to be joke sprites, no offense.

The mapping was ok, but a little bland in most places. The apartment looked good though. The tiles are huuuuuge and the tiny little characters look silly wandering around in them.

I stopped after that battle tutorial. I could see myself trying the new download, and going a little further, and I have to admit that the only reason is the cinematics. If they weren't there, I probably would have quit before getting this far. I'm more...picky about the games I play mostly because I've been around for like 10 years. My interest in games in general is down, but when it comes to amateur games I need something really high quality to keep my interest. Which your game has in the cinematics(without them I might give the game a 3 or 4), plus I'm enjoying the computer themed stuff, overall haha It's hit and miss, but it's a refreshing setting. Not the typical crystal, dragons and demons stuff most games have.