RPG Tips List Version 3.0

Started by Starrodkirby86, March 05, 2008, 05:50:20 pm

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Starrodkirby86

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This is my oldest of my classic writings, and I redone this so much times (Three!). Ironically, this has less tips than the other ones, but that is because I organized it, so there are many tips in one. Now, please do not state anything completely stupid, such as, "That's obvious" or, "We know how to do that!", or "That's too much words! D:", any of that idiotic crap. Feedback is appreciated, but if the writing style has changed completely (You know what I mean? Like it doesn't sound like me), take note that this was written last November. Enjoy. Also, if you disagree on a viewpoint here, consider the date one more time, this is way before my registration here and my learning other items. Thanks once more.



RPG Tips List Version 3.0


I have taken a reading of my previous possibly atrocious "RPG Tips" lists, and I have drawn to the conclusion a new one should emerge like how a phoenix dies and begins a new life with itself (Though that does get a little boring and tiresome, no?). Take these into consideration, but you shouldn't force yourself to follow them like a bible. Rules have exceptions, like the English language, so it's okay to bend a few of them. A good example would be an RPG that actually acts out the flaws of RPGs on purpose of humour.

I attempt to make this "RPG Tips" list extendable to not only people who are just simply the kind who create RPGs off RPG Maker, but also anyone that is making one overall. It'll be much more versatile that way.

1.   The Battle System. A Battle System for an RPG is very important to the overall RPG itself, considering an RPG apparently should have a lot of playtime devoted to the Battle System. However, the type of Battle System is almost similar to what a game difficulty set-up system is. In some games, take the Puyo Puyo Endless Rounds, when you play on a harder difficulty, you get some more bonus points. This sort of thing applies for creating an RPG; of course, bonus points are substituted for added points from the critics.
A usual RPG would have a Turn-Based Battle System with little to no tweaks or of that sort. That is definitely being faithful, but if there is no extra add-on or special execution of the system, the RPG overall would be rated down. However, change the system and make it an Action Battle System, or one where the battle scenes happen during field maps, points can rise.
Another one, Tactical RPGs, are very advanced to create, and are assumingly difficult. Though, as the example promises, if the system is executed well enough, which should be minimal because of the sheer difficulty of inserting it, the points given would be great.
However, you cannot depend on these methods solely.
2.   Think of the storyline. In the RPG realm, the storyline itself can play as a Fantasy novel, or any sort of novel at that point. It must contain a reliable and noticeable Beginning, Middle, and End along with the template of a "Story Hill". Now, if one is not familiar with the Story Hill, fear not, the involvement of our Hill is now going to come forth.
Basically, a Story Hill starts off with the setting of our plot and the hero, which is the bottom. But it rises, such as the slope of a Roller Coaster, and this itself is the Rising Action. The Rising Action is the moment where things start to get dirty and the problem is yet unveiled. When the "slope" reaches to the highest point, it is known as the Climax. The Climax is the highest point of the event, and is usually where the problem is at its worst, or on the brink of being solved. The Falling Action is the descending of the figurative slope, and is usually where the problem is about to be solved. Finally, where our slope goes to a horizontal line, or in Algebra terms a slope of "0", we have our Resolution. A resolution is the problem solved, everything great (But not necessarily, because someone's death can really not be happy), and it's rightful to call it a "The End".
Though following the Story Hill is highly recommended, you don't need to follow the typical format of it. You can do multiple hills, where are in the form of chapters or side-quests. This is a good excuse of keeping the story alive or going, as long as the suspense is sprinkled on, overdoses highly praised and maybe expected.
Lastly, if the developed RPG were to have any plot-holes, or unanswered questions, the chances of getting booed upon on those areas are not slim. This is where the effect of multiple story hills can take place, as these can answer many questions that pose up to the game. There is an exception toward this however and that is only when a sequel of a game is to be created that answers these questions, which then you should really tell people a sequel would be coming so they are aware.
3.   Avoid clichés. What are clichés exactly? Well, to put it in some easy terms, it is something that apparently is overused that it's old, predictable, and overall boring. Clichés in a way can determine which RPG's storyline proves out to be the top compared to another. Such examples of clichés are of the fact that the main hero has wild or spiky hair. The main hero is male, and he usually is a swordsman. As you can see, stereotyping or showings of the typical game are signs of clichés. One more thing that is also cliché possible is to avoid using plot events that virtually act like a major RPG or game before it. This would mean you should avoid copying any Final Fantasy, especially VII (Which is one with Midgard and Cloud).
4.   Dungeons can be fun. Dungeons, or the deeper, darker, tougher areas of the RPG are not required to be a maze which one has to explore in some agony, only to reach a stuck way with the potential of running out of potions. No, it does not need to be like that. Dungeons can, and should have some puzzle flare to go with it, to keep the player from sleeping, and to have surefire fun while engaging it. Add in traps when you can, since dungeons do contain that sort of thing. Follow a dungeon-such environment to what you are aiming to pinpoint, so the goal can be straight on great. Lastly, if a dungeon were to break down or collapse, a natural occurrence is more believable and less of a cliché than when the boss is killed the dungeon strangely goes to its impending doom.
5.   Battling isn't the only way to escape fieldwork. Many games are not simply confined to only contain battling as its way of game-play and fun. Another execution of it are to be mini-games to leave players entertained, amused, or occupied when they do not want to train at the moment or are tired from it. Mini-games are to have some non-frustrating formula towards it, since it is a way to relieve stress (Or to reduce any anger management towards the process getting to the next level) and have fun while doing it. It can be a test of reflexes, a puzzle game, logic brain bending, or even a whole new game in it as a mini-game!
6.   Learning Curve. You should recall that in games, especially great classics, the later you get into it the more skill it requires to pass it, correct? This same plaster applies in RPGs as well. During the beginning of the game, getting the player to be familiar and maybe cordial with the controls and style of the game should be pretty obvious. Monsters at that moment are not to be tremendously strong as some people can speculate, considering the player are mostly bare bones and no strength. To make the previous statement more lukewarm and believable, the typical monster in the current area of the game should reflect on the level the average hero would reach. This is where test playing the game comes in, so you can see if there is one common monster defeating all the heroes up or there is an atrociously hard boss that can only be defeated by rigorous hours of training (Which is what you want to avoid unless this boss is the finale).
7.   Bugs. A "bug" is simply a vocabulary computer term meaning a flaw in programming. This easily concludes to the fact that bugs are very bad, and you should try your best to part with them. The more complex and longer the game is, the more of a chance that a bug will appear. Destroying minor bugs such as spelling errors or character mismatch can be a very simple task, but ones that go straight into the battle system or into a mini-game can be extremely arduous to correct. When a bug is too much for your skills, assistance can be needed. This is in the form of posting in message boards, or e-mailing some fellows. In the case of message boards, make sure that the good forum has accepted you, coming in and posting as some newbie that simply registered overnight will not be taken lightly (There are exceptions if the community is not a group of trolls). If all is doomed, consider revising to avoid the bug or destroying the infected part altogether.
8.   Let music ring! A more essential part towards the minor other half of a game is its audio. When you aren't a composer yourself and there are no friends that have music creation knowledge, obtaining music from the Internet can be easy and hard. It is best to use as much custom and original pieces as you can. Of course, that doesn't mean the use of compositions from a video game or a TV viewing is to be reduced. It is welcomed to use that as long as the music is not from a well-known source. If the latter happens to be the case, point deduction is the inevitable. You should also refrain from using exact licensed songs unless you are creating an RPG that is to go for a private community and not create any public shockwave.
9.   Visual masterpieces are divine. Aesthetics is almost as important as the game-play because it is related, if not the core of the execution of the game. Having understandable graphics are a must, unless the area involved is like a hypnotic daze or a drugged-out land and many stuff are bluntly strange. Using graphics that the bandwagons were to use is a definite negative, as uniqueness is a positive thing as long as you get the correct audience. The way to stand out from everyone, the easiest really, is to create your own or request a seriously good friend to assist you. They can be simple etchings on paper scanned or Photoshopped masterpieces, as long as the extra mile seems to have been given, indeed your RPG can be a visual masterpiece.
10.    To release out to everyone! A game's completion is always a joyous occasion and shouldn't be missed. However, there is much confusion that occurs in the way of how to give it to the public. In very simple ways, packaging is essential to the final part of the game creation. It is highly recommended to download or install an Installation Creator (A good one would be Clickteam Install Creator, which emulates the install process very skillfully. Another excellent one is Ghost Install Creator). After the packaging is complete, uploading it to a reliable source is also required. Usually, the best uploading FTP hosters are ones that don't expire the downloaded file within inactivity. Ones like this are FileFront and most obviously free Website hosts.
Once the following has been accomplished, the last thing to initiate is to spread it out to the public. An easy way is to tell your friends. If, by any chance that happens to fail or you are eager to find other methods, attaching a link to the download of your pride and joy to a signature in a message board would be also be a proficient method. However, make sure you are active enough to the right audience and the message board itself isn't a "ghost town". Finally, if you're that daring, tell everyone through classic advertising. Lastly, make sure to get the critics to review it, especially if you are highly confident that the game is to be a surefire hit (You can prove it from friends and strangers' reactions to playing it). Getting the critics to review and have a positive score on it will attract players immediately.

Well, that easily sums up Version 3 of the RPG Tips. The exclusion of RPG Maker was very difficult, but it was passable and hopefully achieved. However, somehow I am to believe that there is a blatant message that still orientates this to the RPG Maker community...We'll just leave that to you.

This list is composed of 2082 words and 11476 characters.

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Valcos

March 05, 2008, 09:08:23 pm #1 Last Edit: March 07, 2008, 02:21:26 am by Valcos
 :o Thats a crap load of writing!!! Ill read it later and edit this post ;D!

Edit: Alright, I just finished reading it and...like I said... :o! Thats a crap load of writing!!! But it was good and informative. Lots of information for some small subjects. I completely forgot about mini-games :P. Gotta start thinking of some for later ;D. Cliches arent all that bad :P Just dont use the extremely overused ones :P...plus the male as the main character is pretty hard to avoid for some reason :-\! I hate dungeons!!! Not completely but if they dont have save points I tend to hate going through them :P.

Nice work! Expected a lot of typing from you :P. Probably took me longer to read it than it did for you to type it :D
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya

Reygekan

You did have some good peices of advice- although they were very basic tips and nothing in depth, however one is hugely flawed.

Quote3.   Avoid clichés. What are clichés exactly? Well, to put it in some easy terms, it is something that apparently is overused that it's old, predictable, and overall boring. Clichés in a way can determine which RPG's storyline proves out to be the top compared to another. Such examples of clichés are of the fact that the main hero has wild or spiky hair. The main hero is male, and he usually is a swordsman. As you can see, stereotyping or showings of the typical game are signs of clichés. One more thing that is also cliché possible is to avoid using plot events that virtually act like a major RPG or game before it. This would mean you should avoid copying any Final Fantasy, especially VII (Which is one with Midgard and Cloud).


No. Avoiding cliche's is the worst advice you can give anyone. You shouldn't ever be boxed into what you can or can't right. Any cliche' can be great if pulled off creatively and originally. It's a cliche' because people loved the idea- so much too many people tried it. Using cliche's means absolutely nothing if you can throw in something exciting to spice it up and it shouldn't mean anything either. Tales of Symphonia is criticized for it's use of cliche' but is considered the greatest RPG on the cube, not to mention one of the best RPG's of all time.

Starrodkirby86

Quote from: Reygekan on March 05, 2008, 09:21:15 pm
You did have some good peices of advice- although they were very basic tips and nothing in depth, however one is hugely flawed.

Quote3.   Avoid clichés. What are clichés exactly? Well, to put it in some easy terms, it is something that apparently is overused that it's old, predictable, and overall boring. Clichés in a way can determine which RPG's storyline proves out to be the top compared to another. Such examples of clichés are of the fact that the main hero has wild or spiky hair. The main hero is male, and he usually is a swordsman. As you can see, stereotyping or showings of the typical game are signs of clichés. One more thing that is also cliché possible is to avoid using plot events that virtually act like a major RPG or game before it. This would mean you should avoid copying any Final Fantasy, especially VII (Which is one with Midgard and Cloud).


No. Avoiding cliche's is the worst advice you can give anyone. You shouldn't ever be boxed into what you can or can't right. Any cliche' can be great if pulled off creatively and originally. It's a cliche' because people loved the idea- so much too many people tried it. Using cliche's means absolutely nothing if you can throw in something exciting to spice it up and it shouldn't mean anything either. Tales of Symphonia is criticized for it's use of cliche' but is considered the greatest RPG on the cube, not to mention one of the best RPG's of all time.
I know. I really know. Legacy and I had a huge debate about this. As mentioned before (And this was my main concern), I wrote this before I had different opinions, and that includes cliches. This was written months ago (November), so I definitely had different opinions.

Thanks for pointing that out, I knew someone did. And I liked how you used Symphonia, I used it for examples at Legacy as well.

By the way, here's the thread. http://forum.chaos-project.com/index.php?topic=568.0

My mainstay for cliches at this point is that cliches are only all right when they're executed correctly. Being completely cheesy or ripped off is a big no no. The correct execution will have the reader/viewer still have feeling for the characters, and maybe feel a little moved. They'll still be within the game, and not disgusted by the fact it is.

Just that Tales of Symphonia had funny cliches....Very funny. XD I laugh at it now.

What's osu!? It's a rhythm game. Thought I should have a signature with a working rank. ;P It's now clickable!
Still Aqua's biggest fan (Or am I?).




Reygekan

People are really split about Symphonia for it's cliche use. I write a lot, so I know that cliche's don't matter too much, and I'm glad that you'd previously changed your opinion on the matter because a very annoying thing that most writers do is tell people not to use them- it's stupid and boxes in free thought.

While your other tips were very basic I do have to agree with them, you did nail several good points.

Starrodkirby86

Thanks once more. While Symphonia has a very unintentional humorous storyline, the character interaction and personality use is great, along with the gameplay and etcetera. That's what really makes up the horrendous storyline events (Heh, Lloyd's hometown gets burned down...).

What's osu!? It's a rhythm game. Thought I should have a signature with a working rank. ;P It's now clickable!
Still Aqua's biggest fan (Or am I?).




legacyblade

Those are some good suggestions. And I now agree that cliches (particularly main character having a sword...it's clasic) are usable, as long as done well. Book editors are tougher than gamers on cliches, but they're still acceptable if successfully pulled off.

darklight

March 07, 2008, 02:50:58 am #7 Last Edit: March 07, 2008, 01:34:38 pm by darklight
I have never played FF8. *ducks*

That said, my original plot involved a power-hungry queen who plans to control time in order to rule for eternity. While not intentionally ripping off the game, it's still pretty similar, and people who have played FF8 would probably find my original story more like a deja vu trip than something original.

Clichés are common because they are powerful ideas that really speak to the player on a deeper level. Of course, the more games you play, the more you see the same ideas resurface, and it loses the impact it had initially. But to someone who approaches the game with either no previous experience or just an open mind, those clichés pack a punch.

I mean, don't you remember the first time the hero's village burned down? :P Sad, wasn't it?

The demo release has been pushed back. In the meantime, you can check out my resources thread.
I'm also working on the project site - stay tuned for a launch very soon!

Fallen Angel X

Yeah... I cried when that happened  :'( And I've always stuck with saying cliches are aight if you spice it up :D

Valcos

Yo F.A.X. read it and leave a review or comment about it  8)... :P
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya

Starrodkirby86

Yeah, thanks Valcos for getting your chum to straighten up, after all, he is the King of Spamming. Erm, spamming constructively I must say...Anyway, yeah, a cliche's main problem is that if they're so overused or common that the idea is too ironic or humorous to actually create some impact. If you played a lot of RPGs with the hometown being burned into pieces, you would begin to laugh at them more and more, like eventually for Symphonia I treat the burning as some comedy.

There are cliches that you don't need to avoid. There are some however, that should be avoided because of their coherence with other RPGs and the fact that the player can predict what'll happen makes everything dark and evil.

What's osu!? It's a rhythm game. Thought I should have a signature with a working rank. ;P It's now clickable!
Still Aqua's biggest fan (Or am I?).




Blizzard

I find it interesting how the main hero using a sword is a cliché, but still acceptable. After all in the middle ages the sword was the most used weapon.
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Vell

yeah, Swords just always seem to make sense, over the years theyve been come to be seen as a symbol of courage or somethin like that...

Valcos

Yeh thats true :P. But what about the main character being a male? It isnt a bad thing :P But its about 99% of all games have the main character male ???
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya

Starrodkirby86

Quote from: Valcos on March 09, 2008, 06:56:20 pm
Yeh thats true :P. But what about the main character being a male? It isnt a bad thing :P But its about 99% of all games have the main character male ???
That's more of an accepted fact. Gender doesn't really count for nit picking at unless you're one of those protesters that state video game has sexism in it. If your game has the main character as a heroine (Not like a side main character, but your main main, if you know what I mean), then some attention would be brought into it. It's just that most games have a Male character as the main, so it's expected and it's not exactly boring. Besides, it's their personality and actions that counts, not gender. ;)

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Valcos

Yeh, I know ;D. I dont care for what the gender is. Except that the female characters are a bit more fun to look at :P.(lol, SC2...hehe, heavenly sword :O)...but anyways. Wonder what games would be like if the maincharacters were switch so all the guys were girl and the girls were guys! :o That would be messed. Like Cloud as a girl! What the F!  ;D
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya

Nortos

Love Heavenly sword it's awesome look at my avie Kai is way cooler than Nariko

Blizzard

Games with female main heroes tend to be emotionally overused and with way less plot, but much thinking. That's at least what I found in games with heroines.

Don't get me wrong, a depth insight of the psyche is very good in games, but it's being overused in such games. It goes on and on and on and then you get bored of 10 minutes cutscenes just to play only 5 minutes. Also they leave nothing to speculate. It's all revealed, nothing is uncertain, there is nothing interesting in the known.
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Quote from: winkioI do not speak to bricks, either as individuals or in wall form.

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Valcos

Oh, that game with Vincent had a hella alot of cutscenes :o. Thats another thing, I hate long cutscenes that are either, well obviously to long :-\, but if they are boring! AVOID THAT!! :P
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya

Fallen Angel X

Well if the problem is having a male character just have 2 main characters: 1 boy and 1 girl. Like umm DC2? Then you could go as far as to add love into the game but that's usually expected. Like a cliche I suppose  :-\ Maybe probably add a twist then

Starrodkirby86

Usually, when you have something that people know it typically happens, and it does happen, the event will just be boring, predictable, and it won't spark anything. For example, like what FAX said (But with a modification), if there is a main male character and a main female character that are deeply involved, they'll most likely have some romanticism along the way. It's natural...but, at the same time predictable. It's not as accepted as well as someone using a sword or a male hero per se.

What's osu!? It's a rhythm game. Thought I should have a signature with a working rank. ;P It's now clickable!
Still Aqua's biggest fan (Or am I?).




Valcos

Quote from: Fallen Angel X on March 12, 2008, 09:55:14 am
Well if the problem is having a male character just have 2 main characters: 1 boy and 1 girl. Like umm DC2? Then you could go as far as to add love into the game but that's usually expected. Like a cliche I suppose  :-\ Maybe probably add a twist then


DC2 good time... good times 8). Lmao remember what you did to that picture? :P

But, when you have 2 main characters are you supose to balance it? So that you get practicaly equal playing time or? :-\
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar De La Hoya