I'm glad Lee's reaction, and how everyone reacted to his reaction, rung true with you
I know that young boy going through heartbreak and being angry about it isn't something most of us who have had experience sympathize with. I just remembered how that felt from when I was seventeen (how everyone is just like "just freaking get over her!" on day two , but then pretending to feel sorry for you in the same breath
), so I drew on that when writing Lee's reactions.
(BTW, toted is actually a word. It means to carry around, it's generally used to talk about something you're carrying around to show off as a prize.)
I agree that Fayte feels underdeveloped. I didn't have as much time to throw in non-optional cutscenes with her to give her depth, or put in any flashbacks. I'm glad I was able to keep her from being two dimensional though.
I feel I succeeded with Ember a bit more, at least if you go through her route anyways. Though again, she falls victim to me having to do all her cutscenes in one sitting.
I'm glad you liked Aiden though! I had a ton of fun writing him, and he became my favorite character after I decided that he is really serious about being a Reaper and why. (I think he had two more cutscenes after the one you saw. Though it might just be one.) So I'm glad you clicked with him
All my friends ignore his route and focus on ember
As for the endings, I'm glad that you spent so long thinking about it
It makes me feel really cool knowing you were invested enough in the game to care so much. And it wasn't originally going to just be like "NUUU, U GOTTA DO THE RIGHT ENDING!" Lee was just going to whip out the pistol and shoot the heart. Then you'd get an ending showing you the aftermath. It would just pan over whole cities with everyone laying on the ground, drooling. There was also going to be an ending you got if you didn't level up enough (Edmund would just kill you straight out, and you'd see the world with everyone running around like beasts.) The game would tell you on day four if you were on track for this ending, so you'd have time to level up.
I didn't think about the disconnect with Lee killing himself though o.o Maybe I should make that a choice too. It'd give me an extra ending lol.
As for the seven days starting then, it was more because I needed to remind people that serious business is gonna happen
Some people might not find the situation as interesting, so since you can't make any choices to NOT become a Reaper, I figured might as well start the countdown at that point. But if it gives the impression that it wasn't actually Lee becoming a Reaper that triggered the events, I should prolly take that bit out lol.
And you didn't get any extra skills? o.o did you beat the boss as a level 1 then? XD I didn't have time to get any sort of "YOU GOT A SKILL" notification. By the time you're max level (10), Lee has about...9 or so skills to choose from. But I guess I need to make it clearer when you get skills.
Also, the status menu didn't list all the RMXP stats >.> It showed you your relationship level with whatever character you selected, in addition to your HP and progress towards your next level. No one opened it though, so I guess I better put in a better tutorial about the menu somewhere >.> Maybe after whichever social link cutscene you do second.
And as for not having more manditory battles that don't eat time, I'm planning on adding a bit more content to the game. So I'll keep that in mind when crafting the extra bits of narrative. Maybe I'll make use of blizzABS's alignment group feature and have an optional character you only get if you save him during another Reaper attack.
There's also a lot about the Tromuli that I want to get in there. But I didn't have the time to put in their cutscenes XD
The weapon system was basically to allow you to have two versions of whichever fighter you found most useful. But I've sen that most people just swap to that fighter instead :/ I'm debating changing it so that either: upgrading one instance of a weapon upgrades every other instance, or that you can only control Lee. Which do you think would be best?
As for the HUD, gameus is working on a version of the zHUD that shows party members off
I'm glad you liked the N button too. One of my friends spent about an hour looking for the office, so I figured I should add something. Seems that he wasn't the only one XD Also, I'm not sure what kinda secrets I should put in the mansion :/ I could put juice and dew in random spots, or maybe a painting of Aiden and Edmund together you can find. As for that guy looking like Edmund, that was a total accident o.o I forgot I had a sprite with that same head already >.>
And I wholeheartedly agree with you about being able to skip Lee's non-reaper section! That should be pretty easy to do with a script. I oftentimes have wanted to replay Knights of the Old Republic 2, but the introductory section is just...waaaay too
long.So I only played it once. Thanks for the suggestion
I hadn't thought of it.
And to respond to your last edit question, your reaction to Lee was what I was hoping for
I'm also glad you saw Aiden as more than just an annoying dork character and delved into him. Your reaction to the ending choice was great! Though I wish I'd had time to implement the other endings so you could have not felt as cheated upon a reload
P.S. I came up with the idea for what Edmund was going to be after I wrote that long scene with Lee's father. Edmund was just sorta a way to inform the player of why William was such an angry man and obsessed with his house. But I seized upon the idea of Aiden wanting Lee to become a reaper because Edmund was special somehow. Originally, it was just going to be a giant Nightmare. It was just going to eat the Link. That was the ending
P.P.S. A big portion of Lee's resolve to become a Reaper, even though he didn't know it, was as a final "screw you" to his father. His father had just been going on about how much shame Edmund becoming a Reaper brought their family. So When the option presented itself, it was more than a little tempting even though he didn't quite get why. I'm glad the sense that Lee had a strong resolve for some reason he wasn't aware of came through
That was the whole original point of the talk with William