HB, that's an intriguing character. I'll have to find a spot for him.

The entire conversation system is based off what you ask or decide to talk to the NPC about. Unless it is a plot-line conversation in which case it would work like how you described.

I haven't played Suikoden, haha. I know what you mean with recruiting. I'm trying to get away from the typical rpg or jrpg in that this is a single hero campaign. Except with some realism. People will join you from time to time, but only for the specific time needed. For instance, if you take on a quest to escort someone from place a to place b, they will then be in your party. It would not be wise to let them die however, since there are no revival spells in this game. A death of a quest character would mean that quest could not be complete.

In RoL you choose what the player says. The conversations will be somewhat in the style of Elderscrolls games.

This game can't be compared to HR all that much now. The systems are completely different, the story is different, the characters are different (first of all, you are a party of one). The only comparisons would be in the type of game it is, the world exploration (slightly), and the number of collectibles vs the size of the game.

"2. A hero traversing a mountainous forest in search of an herb needed for someone's gift, to me, screams "A Home Far Away"."

Actually, this sounds like a typical generic herb gather quest used in many, many games. I can promise you that A Home Far Away was not the first to use it.

Some great screens here guys. I'm really digging that battle system!

Currently, Realm of Luna. However, this name was inspired during the original plan for this game. It was going to be an expansion pack for Hero's Realm, so this was going to be the "moon," thus the name Luna. However, this game has developed into something far displaced from Hero's Realm, so the name -might- be changed to Realms before release. As I plan to release expansion packs later in the future which will partake in other realms.

I'll need many, many NPC's. Most of them I'll design to fit their place in the world, but it's nice to get some fresh ideas for characters. Sometimes they even inspire additional side quests to go along with the character.

Still going strong. It's not a small project ya know! Plus, I'm trying to publish a book at the same time. And I just got a promotion at work which comes with as many more hours as it does pay. Aaaaaand, dating a new girl. All this takes away from my project time (not that I'm complaining). =)

(It would certainly make the game diverse if you not only got different dungeons each time, but different quests too.)

I can't remember the name of it, but I played on online text-based game that had this feature. When traveling you would stumble across people or objects randomly that would give quests. It was quite entertaining.

i think you should steal what they call 'inspiration' from resources made by other people.

I sense sarcasm. I believe the entire RPG Maker series inspires game creativity even with the intended free graphics that come with the program (made by other people). Is that wrong? Or is it wrong when we rip graphics from commercial games like FF to use in "our" games? If it is, please let the rest of the community know so we can be sure to delete all the graphics we have off our systems, less the few of us who make some of our own.

People take this stuff way too seriously. Most of us aren't making games for commercial use. Most of us aren't even finishing projects we start. I hardly think forming a quest off of a randomly generated plot like, "A group of guards enters and sit at a table" would be considered stealing.

Besides, the links I gave were to the free stuff section of the website, which is intended for just such endeavors. Da Vinci invented scissors for cutting paper, but I doubt he would get upset if someone used them to cut cloth.

If my sarcasm detector misfired, my apologies.

I'm glad someone found it useful. =)

"It makes sure that you've always got something that needs to be done,"

Yeah, that's what I said.

"It piles you up with so many quests, and quests off quests, that you never run out of something that needs doing."

I just elaborated on more points. I know for a fact that the human interaction has something to do with it because A) I have friends that are addicted to playing the game together, and B) people use it as a social networking tool. So yes, there is more than one tool used for making it addictive.

"I said this on IRC but it's more of a task than a game."

When you break it down every game is a series of tasks. The only difference in regards to WoW from other games is that you can never complete them all. I wasn't in any way debating to say WoW is fun. In fact, I think its a great concept done wrong and completely ruined. I was just pointing out some of the tools they use to make it addictive.

Well I did say it's useful as a basis for quests. It certainly doesn't give enough detail that people wouldn't have to expand on it. I'm thought I'd point this out because I've seen many posts in the past where someone is trying to get this community to come up with quest ideas for them. Personally, I very much enjoy coming up with some very unique quests, but I'm not about to give up all the ideas when I can put them in a game instead.

Here is another site that lists a large number of basic plots with basic twists.
http://www.io.com/~sjohn/plots.htm

Yet another site. This one is very useful for item ideas with a price and weight list too (for those using encumbrance in their games.) I'm still having trouble finding what I'm actually looking for.

[To ][/To] Can I request this get moved to Resources, I think it applies there better.

Do you have trouble coming up with ideas for quests? Well, maybe this site can help you out.

http://dreamweavedworlds.com

Specifically these generators:

Event generator that gives ideas of events that could happen in an rpg world. Great basis for quests.
http://dreamweavedworlds.com/Generator_Events.html

Same thing, they direct it as for cavern settings but a lot of this is open-ended.
http://dreamweavedworlds.com/Generator_Caves.html

Ideas for what you might encounter in an inn or tavern:
http://dreamweavedworlds.com/Generator_TavernsandInnsEncounters.html

Generate names for organizations like "The Bone Kinship"
http://dreamweavedworlds.com/Generator_OrganisationsNames.html

This website also offers maps and images for free use, story-line bases for the writer impaired, and even dungeon tiles if your maker can handle them. The images wouldn't work easily if at all with RPGMaker engines, but I know many people here use different devices.

I find it difficult to come across actually useful sites in regards to general RPG resources. Anyone else have any interesting ones they'd like to share?

World of Warcraft has 14 million players paying $15/mo to play. What makes it so addictive?

- Always choices of what to do next. It piles you up with so many quests, and quests off quests, that you never run out of something that needs doing.
- Competition: you want the better skills, the higher level, the better equipment, better mount and better pet than the next guy. And since there is always someone that is a bigger nerd than you, there is always a challenge of trying to get better.
- Human interaction: player vs player, groups, a variety of quests that require multiple people to play.
- Options: The sheer size of the game gives you a near unlimited ability to explore. You get to pick your race, and each race starts out in a different place.
- Free-roaming and non-linear with direction.

Hey, 14 million people can't all be wrong. I on the other hand, think that the quests are repetitive and unoriginal. And since I don't p lay well with others, I have no interest in anything but the exploration, which is stunted with hordes of shitty, never-ending, repetitive collection quests.

Here I've been cutting and pasting to get rid of the coast. Why did no one tell me about using shift before now? Thanks Corfaisus, that's actually very useful. I wondered how one might get around that.

Ragnar: I completely agree with you. I play RPG's more for the sense of exploration and discovery, than for any other reason. I will be including a (final) version of the map with the game, which will be updated as expansions are added. I HAVE to have a map with this game, since its non-linear.

Sounds like my game, "Stuck in a Dream."

If you want some ideas PM me. Hell, I can probably give you the game itself and let you know what I was going to do with it. Never finished the game, but the CBS is fully functional, as well as a map system, and a few different levels. If you're really serious about finishing a game, this would be right up your alley.

Batistaberg, when do you expect to release? That looks pretty sweet.

Nessiah, I'm always a fan.

Craze, thanks. The second one I just did quickly to show you players here how the world is divided. In game, you discover this as you go.

Terrorantula, this is done in 2k3. In game you aren't given a world map, but this map (the first one) will be included with the game for reference. The names I added in photoshop and some of the structures are from charsets (not that you can really see them on this map). The only graphic edited on the world map by me is the entrance to the caves. The graphics for Secron are heavily edited, and the ship I converted from VX graphics.

As for the needing to settle down on a project idea and sticking with it, I know what you mean. I've started about a dozen games now, most of which I have abandoned. Primarily for three reasons: 1. The idea was too big and I kept wanting to add more and more as I went, making it too confusing to program and too daunting of a task. 2. I've tried to stretch the 2k3 limits to other game types and even though they are good ideas in theory, I run into some problem or another that the program can't handle and I give up. 3. I didn't plan out enough before actually starting the project.

So, with this project I decided a few things early on.
1. I would keep it limited in size so that completion was feasible and it didn't get too daunting. Thus the world map is only 100x100.
2. I would use a platform to begin with, in this case "Hero's Realm" to save myself programming. However, I eventually decided to start almost fresh in that regards too. Why? Planning.
3. I planned what I wanted to do with this game from the start. The concept was to have a small but highly engaging world with dozens of fun quests that you can kinda just fall into. The battle system would not be a focal point of the game: battles would be short and require knowledge on the enemy. Programming would be simple and done from the start of the game to work effortlessly with the whole game.
4. I would not spend weeks and weeks developing graphics. I would use RTP and edited variations of RTP. This would allow me to have matching graphics (for the most part), a quick editing technique, and some variations in the game so everything doesn't look the same.
5. I would create this game in stages, not all at once. When I get new ideas for quests, items, etc, I write them out in a devlog for reference later when I get to those stages.
Stages of development:
- The above planning.
- Basic common events programmed, such as day-night system.
- World map and basic history on locations and empires.
- Town maps and basic history on those locations.
- Interior maps for towns, kept simple, but with maps would be attached as I went.
- Other major site maps (forested areas, caves, etc) : Dungeon areas would wait until I have a quest that requires them.
- Basic character stats developed along with party concepts planned (single character game, but occasionally you may have someone tagging along for a quest)
- Items planned and programmed.
- Enemies programmed.
- Any advanced programming for common events.
etc etc

I think you get the idea. The part I really can't wait for is implementing quests but I know they will be lacking if I don't have the foundation to make them great, thus they are one of the last things that will be put in. The original game will be relatively small but will allow for expansions to cities, forests, caves, other realms, etc. When I expand the original release, there will be just as much to explore in the existing world as there will be to explore in any added world. The largest stage is obviously the original game, but after that it is a piece of cake.

geodude, you tell me. I had to piece this together without a picture to go off of.

Corfaisus, are you referring to the cacti? They looked a lot better before I accidentally saved them in the wrong format. As for going purely with RTP graphics, it gets rather boring in a large scale game and makes every place look the same. I'm sorry that my graphics make you squirm, but this game is quest driven. If I was really worried about the graphics I wouldn't have went with RPGMaker at all. That being said, if you would like to volunteer your expertise, I'd be more than grateful for the help.

Corfaisus, I'm going to be making I've made an alternative graphic for the caves. I see no reason why the entrance to a cave needs to be the size of a town.



The Funhouse is one of the things coming from Hero's Realm (this was originally going to be an expansion pack). FYI, it's not going to be what you expect, at least on your first visit.

A couple screen-shots of a western/port town called Secron: