SEACLIFF217'S PROFILE

So general thoughts of the engine after a half-week.

-Is it good?
Yes.

-Is it better than MV?
Absolutely. Once I finish my current MV project, I see no reason to return to MV.

-Is it $60-$80 better than MV?
Ehhhhhhh...

I got the -20% discount for owning MV on Steam, lowering the price to $60-ish and for my needs I'd say it's just barely worth it. I don't blame people for waiting a year where it would likely be $50 or less during the Steam Summer Sale.

The return of XP Layers is the biggest draw for me. It's been one of the most requested features since it was removed in VX over a decade ago, and while it was a sin for it to be removed to begin with (and for so long), I'm glad it's back. Creating complex map designs and making significant edits to maps is now a smoother process.

It actually made me realize how... astonishingly tedious MV's mapping was. I'd say in hindsight it's the worst mapping system of any RPG Maker. Sure, it had more layers than VX Ace, but at least in Ace you can overwrite the tile and call it a day. In MV, you have to replace the tile with the ground layer tile under it, than replace it with the tile you want. Really bad UI, IMO, glad they fixed it.

MZ's ATB is a nice touch. Yes, you can plugin ATB in MV, but I never really found one I liked. I believe Yanfly's ATB plugin for MV didn't even have an active option. Regardless, having it integrated makes it easier to work with in the database, adding skill delay to skills allows an execution delay in combat, so it's easy to emulate Final Fantasy's IV-VI attack delay by adding a -5 delay to the attack command or something.

But that's the thing, anything outside of XP's manual layer control can be summed up as 'a nice touch'. You can preview move routes now, it's a nice touch but doesn't significantly change how I create move routes. Better performance is a nice touch. Effekseer support is a nice touch. Having weapons replace the attack command without a plugin is a nice touch.

That said, these 'nice touches' do add up. The only thing I think MZ has that is inferior the MV is the RTP, but if you own both you can easily just copy/paste everything over.

So given that out of the box MZ is already compatible with the majority of assets created for MV (even some of the plugins still work), even the the smaller community support of RM today is more than enough for MZ to easily surpass Vx Ace as the best RPG Maker.

However, until that happens and the price lowers, you could also chose to stick with Ace or MV for now.

author=Liberty
^
yeah, the core pack (of about 10 plugins) is stupidly versatile and it looks like they'll end up building a library of paid plugins, but the free stuff is pretty amazing without anything else added on top.

Yeah, the Battle Core Plugin alone contains the features of four or five Yanfly plugins. Skills&Buff Core too.

There's easily closer to 15-20 Yanfly MV Plugins within the ten Visustella Plugins.

Edit: Double post

Favorites from each:

2k-
Battle 3
Village 3
Field 4

2k3-
Empire
Far Eastern Land
Ice Labyrinth
Repeated Wars

XP-
Battle 1
Battle 2
Boss 1
Field 1
Dungeon 1

VX-
This one was the weakest imo... the Ship theme maybe?

Ace-
Battle 2
Battle 3
Dungeon 2
Dungeon 7
Field 2
Scene 2
Town 3

MV-
Basically any of the 2k3 remixes I listed above that also appeared here.

Battle 4
Battle 6
Battle 7
Dungeon 7
Theme 2
Town 3

MZ-
Once again, basically any of the MV remixes I listed above that also appeared here. I also like the MV remix of Town 2 a lot.

Battle 2

Though to be honest, the MZ remixes that came in the DLC folder greatly overshadow the default versions, IMO. In which case the remixes for Dungeon 6 and Battle 8 are amazing.

Expect a spike when MZ releases. A lot of those people will stay for like, a week, then decide even with all the simplicity of RPG Maker they still have to do a good bit of work to make a good game.

Others might like the engine and stay with it. And a few might learn about an older engine and decide to stick with that.

Then by this time next year we'll be back in the same place as when this post was first created, and likely in a worst place when it's around time for RPG Maker MXL or whatever unless a few games happen to go viral again.

Personally, I see myself fiddling around with the engines for the rest of my life, and the a lot of the community that happens to stick around are great people.

Picture looks grainy because the filesize was way to big at the original resolution.

Don't know why the thumbnail looks the way it does though.