AMERK'S PROFILE

It's a beautiful game with no sense of direction. I definitely see the potential here, but I fear that with a lack of direction, a confusing story, and balance issues may hurt the game more. I played more than an hour into it, and I do have to say it's an intriguing game, it just needs some definite polish to give it the edge that it needs.

We had a review staff for RPG Revolution for the forums. After some time, we decided to make it more in the form of feedback (still going through the details) and leaving out the scores, since it's about commenting on what works and what doesn't work, and scoring adds an unneeded amount of competition. Perhaps that is something that can be utilized here. While I've used a scoring based method in the past, in recent times I find it sometimes inaccurate, and that I allow a biased opinion to affect the score. I'd rather read the review based upon its own merits and not be turned on or off because of a score that may not be reflected accurately.

It's hard to determine what a fair price is for an indie game, but keep in mind the following:

Most console games go for about $30+ (some newer consoles start off higher but then quickly drop), and within a few months they are about $20+, where they tend to even out. You get a hard copy of the game and game case and manual, and if your console breaks down and you get another, you're assured the game will work on the new one as well.

With indie games, you get a download that you install on your computer. That's it. Most often, there's no guide, and certainly not a hard copy. If your computer crashes, you must weed through customer service antics to get another download for the next computer, assuming you can prove you purchased the orginal dl to begin with.

For that reason, an indie game priced at $19+ seems a bit unfair. You can find a crapload of games on the VC for about $5 to $8, so my opinion is an indie game should be around $10 to $15 tops, no more.

Edit: One last thought, but it's probably best to stay out of the freeware communities when you have a commercial title, unless you frequent the site and know most of the people. This mainly applies to sites like this, VX.net, RRR, and other such sites. If you are planning to sell, look for a commercial site that primarily handles commercial titles, such as Amaranthia.

I like this concept. Gave the demo a quick test drive and I think it will offer the RM community something refreshing. I'll be looking for the completed version.

Well, initially I thought it was going to be a badly written cliche of a Dark Elf taking over the world, and I nearly cringed. But it was all a joke, and then it got pretty funny. I've probably put in about 1 and 1/2 to about 2 hours of this, so I'm sure I'll like the final product. It's been awhile since I've seen a fairly decent RM2K game.