Page 3 of 3 FirstFirst 123
Results 31 to 40 of 40

Thread: ::What makes the best RPG Adventure?::

  1. #31
    Breast Member McLovin''s Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2006
    Location
    can you be more specific?
    Posts
    4,501

    Default

    Some stuff I did when I made a game using GameMaker last year:

    Epic scenes will make it good. (think The Landing from FF8)

    Good music that doesn't get people turning down the volume every time its up. (like the main FF theme, yuck)

    Also a great atmosphere/setting to play in.

    Enigmatic or characters with heavy backgrounds are cliche though they always bring talk about a game (Magus from Chrono Trigger, Zack from Crisis Core, etc)

  2. #32

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Ledious
    Vaun(hearo): sword, long-sword, heavenly weapons, duel sword, staff, spear, short bow, snake, hand soulfire, advanced combat soulfire.

    Sarf(archer, healer, nomad) knife duel-knife/short sword, short bow/long bow, crossbow, advanced compact bow, combat soulfire, hand soulfire.

    Roland(knight, heavyweight) long-sword, duel long-sword, Claymore, ax, duel snakes, combat soulfire.

    Felia(Soulfire artist, the female) duel knife, short sword, short bow, cross bow, soulfire weapons, advanced hand soulfire.

    sword master(swift fighter, light weight)short sword duel short sword, sword,duel-spin knifes, staff, combat soulfire.
    I don't think anyone has commented on the characters yet so I will. No. Just no. Here's why.

    Vaun: Vaun? Vaan? Very similar. Might want to change that. He also has too many weapons. I recommend having him as a Light Warrior of sorts. 1H swords and Shields, Knives, Daggers etc. Only give him basic Soulfire.

    Sarf: Too many things again. Make him the healer with Staves and Rods. Also give him a few basic attacking Soulfires.

    Roland: He's the Heavy Warrior characters. He shouldn't need Soulfire. He should be the one plowing through, with the others for support and Soulfire. I suggest giving his own kind of skill.

    Felia: The Female? I recommend scrapping one of the males and creating a female in their place. Make her the Mage and give her nearly all of the Soulfires. Let her use Bows so she has some damage behind her for when she doesn't use Soulfire.

    Sword Master: Unnecessary. You already have two characters with swords (Well more if you use the characters that you created.) Make him something else. A thief maybe? Daggers and Knives and Crossbows. Maybe some kind of Stealth Soulfire?

    Yeah, at the moment the Characters are way too similar. You need to change them or else some characters will end up useless. (I'm looking at the Sword Master.)

    I also noticed a Weapon called Snake or something. I'm assuming you mean like an animal? No. Instead create a Beast Tamer character that uses Whips and Knives and can summon Monsters.

    Just some friendly advice. I'm not going to comment on the rest, because for me, Characters are what help define the Story. Oh, actually one thing, don't include a Romance, unless you can do it perfectly and have it as a side story so it doesn't distract from the actual plot.

  3. #33
    absolutely haram Recognized Member Madame Adequate's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2005
    Location
    Kirkwall
    Posts
    23,357

    FFXIV Character

    Hiero Dule (Brynhildr)
    Contributions
    • Former Cid's Knight

    Default

    Make it so several major characters are not attractive. Especially some females. I don't mean make them hideously deformed, just... normal people. Some normal people are not too hot. Some girls who are not innocent princess types have breasts smaller than a DD-cup.

    Heck, just try to ditch the cliches altogether. Don't go for cliches OR anti-cliches. (That is to say, don't give the lithe little girl a giant hammer for a weapon. That's exactly the same as giving her two daggers.) Just develop nuanced, believable characters.

    And be brave with the plot. For instance, kill major characters. Not out of spite, but if they need to die. One thing I've always wanted to see in a game is where one or two or your party members stay behind to buy time. And they die. You control them until they perish (They don't die after 5 fights when some cheap invulnerable boss shows up, either), and that's the last you ever see of them. They're dead. Gone. Once they die, you take control of the other characters, and the time your sacrificed people remain alive for is exactly the length of time you have as a headstart. That sort of thing. Or, give the players difficult choices to make. This doesn't mean a choice between two different rewards, or a simple binary good/evil choice, but a difficult choice. A choice with no easy or obvious answers. A choice which the player is faced with, which is difficult for them, and which is not contrived. And which has a real impact on the story.

    A tall order, I know. But getting the plot right would mean even if other aspects of the game are average, you'd have a real gem on your hands.

  4. #34
    President of SoulfireSoft Ledious's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2008
    Location
    Dublin(Columbus) Ohio
    Posts
    131

    Default

    (I'm looking at the Sword Master.)
    He dies in the middle of the game but is a vital part of the story. He taught vaun on how to manipulate his own soul fire which only a few people in history could do.
    Both vaun and the sword master die at the same time and the "sordmaster" sacrifices himself to bring vaun back alive. The concept works perfectly but I cant tell you guys how it works yet, I want to keep it a surprise. Well in the process of vaun's death he learns how to manipulate his internal soulfire. Sarf then later replaces the sordmaster's position in the party. He is like the crossbow-using, stealthy guy you were talking about.

    Now as for vaun's name, this is what is soooo disappointing. The name Vaun was chosen for this character 6 years ago, before ff 12 was even mentioned to the public. The name USED to be original and it was perfect. Now ever since ff12 came out, everyone has been thinking vaun was influenced from the Vaan in ff12 and it wasn't.
    Well, I talked about this with my team and we think it is necessary to keep the name since it will be a while until we start production on this game. Plus we think that the Vaan from ff12 was just an off character and didn't really have any significance to the plot. Our Vaun is the most important character in the story and his character he is much different than FF12's Vaan. But if we find another name that suites him we will change it. It would just be a shame, Vaun was the very first name we ever wrote down for medallion and he was the projects inspiration.

    These Ideas about the other characters are good and Ill have to show these to my team and see what we can do. However it is completely different than some opinions on the characters I have had in the past. Some people want to be able to chose a weapon they would like for each character and gain experience for that weapon. As the character gains more experience with a certain weapon they become more skilled with it. This will enable the player to customize their party more, like if they wanted to have 2 relatively heavy characters on their team, they could. Or if they wanted 2 people who can use a bow on their team, they could. The certain weapons a character can use is limited according to their body mass, knowledge, what they specialize in and what they would prefer to use. They wouldn't use one type of weapon, instead they would use more than one type that way the player can have access to more strategic options. Because of the commands you can use in this game you can have 2 people who use a bow and you can tell them to shoot from a distance while the other team members distract the foe. Felia can shoot from a distance but what if the monster is impervious to HS based attacks? She would need to fight with CS which requires a weapon. Also 2 different characters can combine two "like" attacks with each other to create a more affective version of that attack. You can switch between weapons during battle and each weapons have different strategic uses.

    Heres a list of some weapons. A Snake is an axe with an extend/retractable chain operated with a trigger. Another name for the weapon is an Augdril (there is a picture of one in the list below)


    And be brave with the plot. For instance, kill major characters. Not out of spite, but if they need to die. One thing I've always wanted to see in a game is where one or two or your party members stay behind to buy time. And they die. You control them until they perish (They don't die after 5 fights when some cheap invulnerable boss shows up, either), and that's the last you ever see of them. They're dead. Gone. Once they die, you take control of the other characters, and the time your sacrificed people remain alive for is exactly the length of time you have as a headstart. That sort of thing. Or, give the players difficult choices to make. This doesn't mean a choice between two different rewards, or a simple binary good/evil choice, but a difficult choice. A choice with no easy or obvious answers. A choice which the player is faced with, which is difficult for them, and which is not contrived. And which has a real impact on the story.
    yes Exactly! we don't want this to be the average generic RPG so we have huge twists surprises suspense and some horror, death isn't always a pretty thing. 2 main characters die the sword master and Felia. vaun dies too but you can control his spirit in the afterword and eventually you find a way to get out and revive your self. when you come back you find the "swordmaster" is dead and that he sacrificed himself to bring you back to life. Which is Ironic because that's about the time when you found out he was a spy and had orders to imprison you. Vaun learns that the "swordmaster" believed that there was still hope for ordinary people and that Vaun could show the world that.
    Last edited by Ledious; 08-12-2008 at 10:56 PM.
    creative director of Soulfire Soft, public site coming soon!!! -_^


  5. #35
    Brennan's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
    Location
    South U.S.
    Posts
    1,333
    Blog Entries
    2

    Default

    All I can say is great idea with killing off a few characters. Vaun's seems a little cliche, though. Don't try to make it like Vaun just dies, the the swordmaster sacrifices himself all at the same time, make it draw out more than a few minuets to add to the epicness of the story. Another approach is to go crazy with ideas, and to scrap the bad ones, and put the good ones together in a preferable way. (But try not to confuse the game players and the staff in the process, or it will not work like you want it to.)

    Long story short: Don't confuse people, don't confuse the programmers and such, and try your ideas.

    I sound like I'm being bossy, don't I

  6. #36
    President of SoulfireSoft Ledious's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2008
    Location
    Dublin(Columbus) Ohio
    Posts
    131

    Default

    Ok, so the sword master should die at the same time as Vaun? is that what you mean. I'm a little confused on what you mean by "all at the same time". and yes what ever will add to the epicness. So far people have been very pleased with the overall story, everything happens on a very large scale I just hope it will be epic enough.
    Oh no, your fine everyones comments here are really helping me out, bossy or not

    Well, allot of you have been talking about the music so I think Ill show you some of our concepts as for music goes. Let me know if it fits what your looking for

    Here's some music samples of some of the background music that will be played in Medallion. They're not finished pieces so they are only snippets of the songs and you will hear mistakes.

    medallion town music samples - Putfile.com

    And heres an example of the music once its finished:
    medallion music sample final - Putfile.com it may take a while to load.
    enjoy!


    hmmm....is this loading for you guys?
    Last edited by Ledious; 08-12-2008 at 10:51 PM.
    creative director of Soulfire Soft, public site coming soon!!! -_^


  7. #37
    Breast Member McLovin''s Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2006
    Location
    can you be more specific?
    Posts
    4,501

    Default

    Not for me.

  8. #38
    President of SoulfireSoft Ledious's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2008
    Location
    Dublin(Columbus) Ohio
    Posts
    131

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by McLovin' View Post
    Not for me.
    hmm, yea its not working for me either. Weird
    it was working yesterday...
    creative director of Soulfire Soft, public site coming soon!!! -_^


  9. #39

    Default

    - Good story (a given)
    - But don't forget to include fun gaming
    Neither one is good by itself in an RPG, you can have much fun with hunts in FFXII, but where's the story?, you can get immersed in Suikoden III's story, but the gameplay makes you cringe, as a result, neither one is as good as they could have been.

    - Variety in the character department
    Sound like obvious but, honestly: how many more games that are all about a bunch of teens with a token little kid/adult do we need?
    Games like FFVI and even Rogue Galaxy are good examples of variety

    - Variety in the gameplay
    To go from point A to point B with lots of random fights in between, only to go from there to point C to the end of the game with a sprinkle of bosses here and there does not a fun game make.
    Again FFVI shines here and so does FFIX, from little things like feeding fish to a dying man to rock a huge cage you are trapped in are things that break the monotony, they don't need to be ground-breaking, as long as they are part of the story.

    - Attention to music and design
    No one likes forgettable/annoying music and boring/ugly designs, take in consideration that I'm not talking about the latest graphics here, FFXII Revenant Wings graphics don't compare to Crisis Core graphics, but in their own right they are gorgeous, because attention was taken in order to make it look the best possible.
    Similarly, in FFXII Revenant Wings, the music was simply taken from FFXII, but it was better placed, more attention to where in the game each track would sound it's best was taken, thus the music is much better enjoyed.

  10. #40
    praise the sun Nifleheim7's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    Samurai School
    Posts
    1,119

    Default

    I can't get into too many details right now,but i would like a story that doesn't explain evrything.Something that makes the player think and wonder about certain elements of the story.Shadow of the Colossus is a good example although it's not an RPG.Less is more.
    Characterization is also very important.A good story definitely needs characters that the player cares about.The hard part is how to avoid cliches.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •