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LMPGames
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Software engineer by day, game developer by night. Yo! Welcome to my profile. While you are here, check out the games I have added to RMN or hope over to my website to find everything I am working on at the moment.
Major Active Projects:
Legend of Emilar (RPG Maker MV)
Odyssian Void (Unreal Engine)
On Hold:
Combine Insurrection (Source)
Major Active Projects:
Legend of Emilar (RPG Maker MV)
Odyssian Void (Unreal Engine)
On Hold:
Combine Insurrection (Source)
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Game Mechanics Part 5
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
More on the Day/Night system. How is that actually going to work with enemy spawns? You said you wanted to make more instances of where enemies spawn based on the time of day, but there isn't an actual day/night cycle.
So how can you add in enemies that spawn based on the time of day outside of quests when there is no cycle and time of day is story dependent?
Yeah, those are great points. I am going to think about this and get back to you. Maybe we need a wait system so that you can put the time of day into the state you want it to be in? I would need to see if that clashes with anything, I can only think of one instance but the system could be disabled during that part of the game.
Game Mechanics Part 1
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Wait, are you going back through and updating these? The formatting looks different and I noticed some of the typos and yeesh typos/wording has been corrected.
Secondly, it looks like you updated some of the info too. If you are going back and updating the blogs, sweet! The later ones are way easier to read than these first ones.
Yep and that is the exact reason why, aside from fixing the horrible typos and adding in some additional or update information.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Lantern
How often is this going to be utilized? I'm just thinking about the extensiveness of the design you have laid out compared to how much it's used. Does it make sense to have all of these different fuel types that can be crafted if we're only using it like maybe 5 times in the whole game?
Also the times seems a bit long. How long would you realistically be in an area? I know that the Usgol Mines are freaking huge and that what you have right now is based on testing in there. But not all of the maps are going to be that massive.
Would it make sense to have the time scaled a bit? Like 1 minute in real-time = 5 minutes in-game as far as the lantern timers go? That way in smaller maps, there is a real possibility of not having enough oil.
These are all good points. Right now there are about 10 locations I have planned where you will need the lantern, but I also get your point on that too. The main idea was that the lantern could be used in locations where it is also night so that adds in more utility over the course of the game.
As for time, another great point I had not considered since I have only really used the lantern in the Usgol Mines. I will look into that.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Bridges
I like this mechanic when you showed it off the first time. As with the Lantern, how often is this going to be used? I would assume more since it's a exploration gate. Is it possible to add in more than one type of bridge material?
Like should the same materials be used to work on wood and stone bridges? Also should there be additional quality levels of bridge materials? Some that can be used to repair more than one section? I don't know how you would track that though, that might need something in the plugin just for that.
Damn, you're getting at some really good oversights with these mechanics tonight. Good call out; yes there will probably have to be multiple types of bridge materials for bridges made out of different stuff. As for the bridge materials that can be used more than once; it could be done, but I don't know if I want to implement that type of feature.
It is meant to be a bit grindy since bridges usually are either preventing you from reaching some part of a map or giving you a fast travel path through one. I will think about it, but right now I am leaning towards no.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Secret Finder
Nothing much to add here, this is a kick ass feature and I wish more games with hidden areas used something like it. Will there be any visual components? How will we be told how much the amulet is vibrating?
Yes, there will be a visual component to this mechanic. I will be animating a image representing the amulet to vibrate at different rates corresponding to your proximity to a secret.
Game Mechanics Part 16/17
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I would suggest getting some kind of stylized icons tough instead of using a generic ?/! type icon. Something with a bit of flash can go along way here.
Agreed, I would like to do this if practical.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I kind of like this idea of preventing auto-saves at certain points. Overall, I think auto-saving can be good but also can be bad. It depends on how it is implemented.
Yeah, this was one of the reasons I held back from comitting to auto-saving initially.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Right on. I also like that you are considering instances of regular weapons that have special properties. Was that because of how you are going to change the AWP to use YanFly's instance system?
Exactly.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I also like that you fully embraced the weapon break idea, even if it is an option we can turn off. I like that it has positive benefits too, so we have a reason why we would use it as opposed to just increasing the difficulty. That is premium game design.
Yeah, I starting thinking about the breaking system and asked myself if I was playing this game, why would I choose to make weapon durability work that way. My answer was "I wouldn't use it unless I wanted more challenge". So I added in some benefits to incentivize use of the system; the carrot and the stick metaphor comes to mind.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I knew some of this, but it seems you are thinking about changes too. For what it is worth, I am 10000% behind "implementation 2"; that sounds like an amazing game system that will make battles feel more unique even against enemies you have fought a lot of times because how that specific battle can unfold can be drastically different.
Encapsulates my thoughts on why I would also pick implementation 2 really well. RPGs need to have emergent gameplay. It is not enough that there are battles, battles need to be spontaneous and provide challenge occasionally. This type of system allows for some of that.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
You have mentioned these on stream before. I like the idea, gives more customization and choice for how your characters are equipped and I like that you called out the fallacies about how equipment is used in RPGs. I don't think people think enough about that kind of stuff, so cool to see here in an RPG Maker game.
I think it's the opposite actually; I find that many RPG Maker devs have really good ideas that it seems that AAA devs no longer are capable of making; mostly because publishers won't let them. There was a time when AAA game dev was more creative though.
So I don't find it odd that you would find things like this in an RPG Maker game, I feel it is pretty common with well-designed RPG Maker games.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
This was also a cool idea. More options are always a good thing, as long as they are implemented correctly and the whole game doesn't collapse into a buggy mess. I got some faith though.
My worst nightmare is that this game ends up being a Bethesda-level game for bugs. It is going to require a lot of playtesting, but I am committed to trying to get the game as stable as possible. If I feel it is too buggy, I will absolutely delay the release as long as it takes.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Another one I was there to see the creation of; I thought you were a bit cracked for putting an ammo system into an RPG Maker game, but the details here and stuff you have said since you created the initial version are bringing me around to it. I want to see more though, before I pass my final judgement on if I like this or not.
That is a reasonable statement. To be honest, I am not sure I even like the idea, but it makes more sense than ranged weapons having infinite ammo that doesn't have technologies that allow that ammo to add extra effects. I feel that in this world, gun ammo at least would have the ability to store magic if items can.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I will need to see it in action to give proper feedback about allowing additional grouping within groups though. Like, how many skills will actually fall under the Class Skill category for Compound classes? I think those are going to be the biggest offenders here.
Yep, that is what I foresee being the most iffy right now; Compound classes. They will have a selection of skills from the lower trees including their own, so it's almost like 3-4 classes in one.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Overall though man, this has been cool to read through. All of these blogs have given me a lot of hype for the game because you are making some great decisions and the thought and consideration those decisions imply means that other parts of your game are being given that same level of thought.
I can't wait to start learning more about the lore for the game and see how you've built all of that. It will give us an idea of what to expect of your writing style and how thorough you are in terms of world-building.
Thanks for all of the suggestions so far. Some of what you have said has made me thinking a bit more critically on some systems as I have been working on these blogs. So you have already had an impact on the game.
Game Mechanics Part 15
author=LMPGamesauthor=TrashCanEnthusiast
I also like that there will be a limit to the number of times you can upgrade a spell and that the number is based on class type. Does that mean that spells already upgraded to their highest level on, say, a compound class can be further upgraded when that character becomes a grand class?
Exactly, and the number of upgrades only increases. If you have three open upgrade slots and then move back down to a lower class, those slots are still there for you to use. They don't get removed.
I read this question entirely wrong. Let me clean up this response.
So, the listed upgrade limits apply to spells you learn as those classes. So a Wizard learning one of its strongest spells is going to have 10 upgrades to that spell. When that Wizard character changes to a Compound class, the number of upgrades doesn't increase. It stays at 10.
Any new skills learned as the Compound class get either 10, 8, or 6 upgrades. Spells learned by previous classes do not have more upgrades added to them unless you use one of the special items.
If you go back down to a previous class, the upgrades left don't change and you can upgrade any spells you know, even if they were learned as a more advanced class.
If you class change to a non-magic using class, then you won't be able to upgrade your known spells; it can only be done from a magic-using class.
Hope that clears up my answer a bit.
Game Mechanics Part 15
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Skills/World Systems:
Most of this sounds interesting, but how will the timed-reset for gathering work? Will there be things to forage that are not part of farms? If so, how often will shows respawn and how often will we find them?
I am thinking that the time it will take will be a configuration option on each foragiable (is that even a word) good. So while Helmsleaf might take 10 to 20 minutes to respawn, a much higher class good might take an hour.
Just examples, timing will have to be balanced.
Yes, there will be things to forage that are not grown on a farm tile. Part of my problem is going to be giving collectable materials a unique sprite tile to work with so you don't see something like a common RTP plant used for Helmsleaf in one place and not in another.
Respawn was covered above, as for occurrence in the wild, that will be largely a balancing question. I would say for the common base materials, those would be plentiful, tier 1's you would see often, tier 2 you might find occasionally, tier 3 would be more uncommon, tier 4 would be rare, and tier 5 would be very rare.
What that translates to inside of a map, I don't have any answer for you yet on that.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Something feels off with mining, not sure what. Maybe the different tools are needed for different levels of materials or that certain spots produce certain materials and you can't harvest without the higher quality tool?
I really dunno, something just smells funny there.
Hmm, I will think on this for a bit as well, but let me know if you think of anything specific.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Fishing sounds kind of cool; almost FF15-esqe. And a cooking system could be cool, but I don't think it is really needed. I hated cooking in Breath of the Wild, such a random and dumb mechanic to stop you from exploring the open world; what is the point of an open world if you're going to be stopped from going where you want? Usually against cooking systems due to the way they are normally implemented though your idea sounds more reasonable than most.
I am considering it, but I probably won't. We already have a ton of mechanics; at some point you have to balance them against each other and determine if you really need them. I don't think I really need a cooking mechanic for the game, even though there a many systems associated with cooking already in the game.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Would be interested to learn more about how you are actually tracking the upgrades per character. You said the data would be stored on the character, but what does that actually mean? Does that mean you're storing specific values or like the entire skill data with the updates from the upgrades?
To be honest, I don't really know at present. I have two plans for the restructuring of the plugin and you brought them both up. I can store the updated skill data on the character, or just the specific values.
I don't know which would be easier to work with yet; I will have to do some proof of concept testing.
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
I also like that there will be a limit to the number of times you can upgrade a spell and that the number is based on class type. Does that mean that spells already upgraded to their highest level on, say, a compound class can be further upgraded when that character becomes a grand class?
Exactly, and the number of upgrades only increases. If you have three open upgrade slots and then move back down to a lower class, those slots are still there for you to use. They don't get removed.
Demo Progress and Plans
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Interesting information. Questions, have them do I.
Mainly about this "tech demo". How exactly would that work? Would all game mechanics be present, how lore-friendly would it be? Will there be any chance of spoilers?
Well, TrashcanYoda, let me see if I can answer.
I dunno if you remember the stream(s) where I was showing my RMXP tech demo, but it would be kind of like that.
No story relevance what-so-ever. It would essentially be a new RM project with example items, skills, enemies, and so on. Nothing, or at least not much, would be directly taken from the game.
Each mechanic will be broken down into a small section of a map and each map will house certain types of mechanics. For example, anything pertaining to weapons would all be in a single map.
There will be a hub map that leads to all of these area maps and you can freely travel between them.
There will also be several combat areas with progressively harder enemies for you to fight to get a feel for how combat will work. There will even be some optional and super bosses to fight.
Probably won't be anything too fancy, map design wise. No lore or anything story-wise for sure.
Final Fantasy Provenance
Game Mechanics Part 14
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
Yo man! Been reading through these blogs. So many new details that I didn't know about from watching streams and such in these.
This is some really cool shit. I have some questions though, I will post em on the blogs they relate to.
Item Crafting:
So if I understand correctly, crafting items is a multi-step process like in other games. Each item you can craft can have items that need to be crafted themselves or be a mix of those and what you called "base materials" that aren't crafted.
The amount of items needed to craft are dependent on a character or NPC's crafting level, but for character's if their crafting level is lower than the crafting level of the item you will need to use more items.
After a certain level, natural bonuses can be added to items based on the type of that item being crafted. This happens with both characters and NPCs. But in addition you can manually add these bonuses using catalyst items once your skill level is high enough to use them.
The cost for NPC crafting is based on several formulas; first the cost is calculated based on the total cost of all of the base materials used to make the crafted item. Second is the 10% of the market value of the crafted item. Third is the service fee each NPC charges based on the total crafting cost.
All of these added together is the final cost to craft an item. NPC rates can vary based on their skill and the total crafting cost can change based on the number of crafted components you already have.
Did I get all of that right? It was a massive wall of text for that system and a lot of this is new information you haven't mentioned before.
The Magic School system is pretty much how you described it on stream, but the more detail on this Priaris Tree thing is interesting. So the "Primaris" tree is the base elemental tree for a school it sounds like?
I like that, for classes that mix a magic and non-magic class together, you are only allowing the use of the learned primary schools. That makes a lot of sense since a primary school is one that you can become a master in while the secondaries are ones you just know a bit about.
It makes your choices on the schools you learn much more impactful because you can choose something that may end up being worse off for certain objectives. I like that level of thoughtfulness in game play design.
One thing I noted that you said that is wayyy different than what you have said before now is the magic "upgrade" system? Wasn't this going to be a crafting system before? What happened there?
Yep, you got the gist of most of it. It is a very complex system so I tried to break it down small enough to make sense in this blog post format without having anything visual from the game to accompany it.
As for the Primaris tress, exactly correct. Those are the base elemental trees.
Ah, the magic crafting plugin. So, yep that has been axed for my game; I am still releasing it as a plugin though. Instead what I will be implementing is the magic upgrade system to allow you to improve the magic you know.
With all of the other stuff going on with the magic system and how classes and such are shaking out, the crafting system just didn't make sense any longer for my game. It's too big, the magic crafting plugin could potentially handle it, but game mechanics wise it would just be too sloppy to maintain over 28 characters and dozens of classes that would be able to use magic.
Game Mechanics Part 10
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
How will element synergies work in totality? Like, if there are multiple conflicting elements, how is the system going to handle that? Are there strict rules on how this system will be used?
That is something I am working on figuring out. I need to find a way to make it not convoluted and right now it kind of is. Out of all of the systems we have talked about so far; this one is the most likely to get axed or reinvented to be honest. I have no issues doing so with problematic systems like magic crafting as you asked about on the latest blog.
Game Mechanics Part 8/9
author=TrashCanEnthusiast
How are all of these stat upgrade systems going to be balanced? With so many ways for players to build their characters it seems like balancing enemies will be very hard to do.
For temporary party members, will there be any interaction with them like in FF3 or are they just there to supplement story and quest beats during cutscenes?
For the special weapons you talked about, are these abilities unlocked through the AWP or is this part of a new system? If part of the AWP, is there a new feature that will also add in the ability to add skills to level unlocks? Any thoughts on adding in a refinement level as a requirement for things?
Ha, I was wondering if someone would ask this question. My honest answer is, I don't ****ing know either lmao. The way I build my enemies is that regular enemies are 25% stronger than what I think the average player will be level/stat wise at that point.
Variants will be 30%. Bosses will be 50%. Optional Bosses, 55%. Super Bosses 75% to 150%. Then from there the level system should increase it further. Since the stat system that will have the most impact early through mid-game is tied to levels, I think the boost and level boosting will be enough.
Late game that is why super bosses have such a large buff, to make up for whatever the player might have built and still offer a decent challenge. All of this is theoretical though; I won't actually know until the game is playable from start to finish and I have a bunch of play tests to pour over.
I expect to be tweaking these systems up until and even after launch.
Mainly temp party members are just there for story beats and such. There won't be much, if any, interaction outside of cutscenes. that is the plan at least, I might change my mind if I think of something that would add to the game. Right now though, I don't see any advantages; the FF3 mechanic is cool, but ultimately fluff that didn't need to be added imo (the talking to them part, not the battle part. The battle stuff is cool as hell).
Yes and no. It is part of the AWP and is part of a new system within the AWP; an extension feature actually. We'll have an AWP-centric couple of weeks for game mechanics blogs eventually.
Yes, the weapon skills for special weapons are tied to weapon levels however I like your idea of using refinement as a requirement as well. I will look into if I want to add that in for the ultimate weapon skills on special weapons. I can make the attacks stronger as a result if I do.
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