[IDEA] yume city (tentative title)

[megaMasquerain]

So a while ago MRSKELETON recommended I tackle a smaller project before I do any more for Hieros Gamos, and recently this idea popped into my head, so I figure I'll post a topic and see where it goes.

Story
You are a child born to the leader of one of Olympus City's twelve tribes. When a boy in your tribe turns 13, they are expected to go out and make their own destiny, only returning to the tribe after a year of surviving alone in the post-apocalyptic city.

On your 13th birthday, your father gives you a sword and a suit of armor and kicks you out into the city, as per tradition. Though the city is filled with monsters, the fighting skills your father taught you allow you to defeat them and survive another day.

Life in the city is rough, however. Though your people know there was once a catastrophe of some sort, they know little of what caused it, for none of the 12 Tribes can communicate through spoken or written language, which was lost long ago. You must make your way through the city for a year, uncovering the secrets of its past, and use your status as the future leader of the Zeun Tribe to cultivate alliances, friendships, and maybe make a few enemies along the way...

Gameplay and shit
The game itself is heavily inspired by Yume Nikki and spinoffs (obviously). The graphics, audio, and atmosphere will be similar to Yume 2kki, though a little more subdued.

As said in the story, verbal and written communication were lost long ago. The only text would be status messages, etc.

Your character walks around a city with large, open spaces, deserted buildings, old mechanical contraptions, tribal villages and the like. The city has obviously been through a lot - some parts of it are even flooded!

Some stuff you might see while walking around:

Monsters: This is an RPG, so there are enemies. The encounter system is similar to Earthbound, you see a monster on the overworld and can choose to try and escape it or beat the crap out of it. Battles will probably be realtime turnbased, though I'm not quite sure yet.

Items: You can collect healing/buffing consumables, weapons and armor to help you kill monsters. They're usually scattered around but you can buy/make your own (more on that later). In particular, there are many "special swords" with overworld abilities that help you advance (think the Effects in YN).

Neutral NPCs: Members of the other Tribes, usually, though there might also be unaligned NPCs. Though neutral NPCs won't attack you normally, you can press a certain key to draw your sword and go into "aggressive" mode. Aggressive mode isn't required to fight monsters and Enemy NPCs, but you can use it to attack Neutral (or even Allied, maybe) NPCs.
The other tribes each have different things they like and dislike, and by doing things that match up with these likes/dislikes you can make a tribe your Ally or Enemy. Allies will open their shops, craftsman, and "Inns" to you, while Enemies will not, and some may even attack you on sight (though there will be ways to repair your "reputation).

Material: Items you can use to make other items or sell to vendors. Some of the tribes have craftsman who can create items from materials, but if you don't have access to a certain type of craftsman, you can just sell materials to a store.

Tablets: Tablets are the key to "beating" the game. There are a finite number of tablets scattered around the city in hard to get to (possibly random) places. They contain pictures, hieroglyph-type script, and words in English. These serve as a sort of Rosetta stone to teach your character the lost language of his people (though they're readable by the player of course). When put together, they tell the story of how the apocalypse happened and the Tribes came to be. Collecting all of them and returning home will trigger the ending (signaling that a year has passed in Olympus City).


Alignment and Tribal Reputation

There are two facets to alignment - the usual "law/neutral/chaos" Alignment, and Tribal Reputation, which is your allies/enemies among the different tribes. Both affect each other - for example, certain tribes might be less willing to ally with you if you have a Chaotic alignment, and allying with a certain tribe might give a boost to your Lawful alignment. Your basic Alignment (but not your tribal reputation) determines the ending of the game.

The Twelve Tribes

The 12 tribes are based on the Greek Pantheon. Each tribe has a specialization or two - some are focused on combat and will give you warriors to aid you in battle (IE new party members), whereas some are focused on crafting or transportation and will aid you in noncombat ways. Some do both!

Combat Tribes:
Zeus (Tank, player's tribe)
Artemis (Beastmaster/Archer)
Athena (Mage)
Aphrodite (Healer)

Noncombat Tribes:
Hera (Weapon/Armor upgrades. You're automatically allied with them in the beginning so you have a healing/shopping spot, though you can become Neutral or Enemies as the game goes on).
Poseidon (Water transportation)
Dionysus (Skill Upgrades)
Demeter (Buff-giving food)

Tribes that provide both:
Hermes (Rogue class, land transportation)
Hephaestus (Mechanic, armor forging)
Ares (Melee Fighter, weapon forging)
Apollo (Bard, healing potions)


Feedback Wanted

This is still in the planning stages, so if you have anything that might help the design of this, please tell me

Probably going to make this in RPG Maker VX.

[Gors]

this sounds promising, but I have not played any Yme Nikki game, so I don't know how most things should work. The story looks solid though.

[Vipershark]

This sounds really cool to me, but like gorsal, I haven't played Yume Nikki either.

I'd definitely like to see progress on it, though!

[Gors]

not to say (I was kinda afraid of saying it) but I don't know how you're going to pull it off. Are your techniques good enough to do that in RPG MAker VX? Not doubting you or anything, but it still sounds pretty complex for a small project. Again, it might be me and my lack of programming knowledge, but I'd think on a minigame or something if I was going to do a smaller project.

just my two cents, disregard them if you know how to do this c:

[megaMasquerain]

not to say (I was kinda afraid of saying it) but I don't know how you're going to pull it off. Are your techniques good enough to do that in RPG MAker VX? Not doubting you or anything, but it still sounds pretty complex for a small project. Again, it might be me and my lack of programming knowledge, but I'd think on a minigame or something if I was going to do a smaller project.

just my two cents, disregard them if you know how to do this c:

Yeah, I'm a pretty damn good eventer if I do say so myself. When it comes to scripts I'm just going to use the kind that people offer for free use. There are alignment scripts and real time turn based combat scripts for certain and there's probably an Earthbound-style encounter script hiding somewhere too! If I end up finishing this it'll be freeware in the spirit of the other YN games.

As far as this being a "smaller" project, it's still ambitious, but it's something I can do all by myself, in comparison to Hieros Gamos, where I had to get other people to do things like the programming, music and tiles. I think a project like this allows me to get a headstart on music (the music in Yume Nikki, Yume 2kki and .flow are almost all 2-3 second loops) and tiling (YN games have really simple backgrounds for the most part).

[megaMasquerain]

Did some tiles (and the main character) for fun.



Probably going to totally redo the ground tiles. I got sort of carried away there.

This is an area near the Hephaestus tribe's village, where the dilapidated buildings and inanimate objects have come to life.

[Gors]

I am confused with the perspective. Is this supposed to be a top-down view RPG like Pokémon, isometric or oblique like Earthbound? Right now the dirt pattern tells me it's top-down but the building is in profile. Please check a reference of what perspective you want. Not to say that the dirt is much more detailed than the sprites, which breaks the visual (but you already pointed it).

[megaMasquerain]

Better at all? Perspective's not my strong point.

[Proton]

Better at all? Perspective's not my strong point.

They're more like this when using a top down perspective.

You've got an oplique image


on a tileset that looks top-down, like Pokemon.

[Altrez]

[megaMasquerain]

Better at all? Perspective's not my strong point.

They're more like this when using a top down perspective.

You've got an oplique image


on a tileset that looks top-down, like Pokemon.

Would changing the tileset to oblique be an option?

[Gors]

yes, but prepare to be frustrated a lot

[megaMasquerain]

yes, but prepare to be frustrated a lot

From Proton's examples I don't think a top-down perspective would really do the idea justice. I'm prepared to deal with the frustration and this could actually be a learning tool for me.

[Gors]

okay, then! I'm looking forward to your works!

just to complete it, oblique projection is really complicated t opull off, especially on rough solids such as that building. Just be sure to keep every building/props into the same oblique angle, or else they'll look weird and distorted.