[JRPG] Edge Of Eternity an old school JRPG

{WIP}

Hi everyone,

I work as a programmer at Midgar Studio,

We are actually 2 3d artists, 1 programmer and 1 musician working on Edge Of Eternity,

Edge Of Eternity is an old school JRPG in the gameplay with classic ATB system, we also included a deep choice system where every actions and choices in the game will have an impact on the universe and the quests.

Maps will be cut into medium sized openworlds with a lot of quests on each map separated by the world map, there will be also many dungeons.

We've done a little pre-alpha video of the gameplay in dungeon, it's far from perfect and we are still in pre-alpha (we plan the release for december 2015) many things will change like animations and gui but it's important for us to have feedbacks about our work.

Thanks everyone !

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/EoeGame
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Wow, some really good stuff around today. ..

Massive fan of FF series, so of course I'm going to like this.. Make sure there is a damn good plot on it, can't have a JRPG without a good plot and hey you never know you might be able to pick up where Square Enix failed.

 

Thanks a lot.

I totally agree with you, plot, characters and sidequest is on the top list for me . it's gonna be epic .

For SE it's the very reason of this project, i've been really disappointed by latest Final Fantasy and i didn't liked Bravely Default, i want to bring back old gameplay (FF7 / FF9) with quest / choice system "Mass Effect" like and mature universe with deep story for me it's the key to bring back the golden age of the JRPG hope so ^^.

 

I'm surprised you would say FF7 and FF9, considering the battle theme is but a blatant copy of that from FF10. Whoever did this music doesn't even deserve the least of respect. The most important thing about a musician/composer is originality and creativity. What does he do? Copy FF10's battle theme and change around a few notes. I honestly hope that the music is place holder...

That said, the game actually looks quite nice. I personally am always looking for good RPGs to play, especially ones with good story. I wish you the best of luck.

 

The music IS a placeholder, our composer start by learning the style of his influences by first trying to do a music in the same style and then create something original after.

Have a look at the opening theme (orchestral part)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2igxxFRacA

 

Some ppoints about your game :
-When battle starts , camera is doing some travelling, could you put some skip button to start battle immediatly instead of loosing time viewing the combat scene ?
That's a comon problem with turn based games, lot of players would need to start combat directly , same for ending combat , lot of players would want results screen directly and not viewing pose victory animation again and again.
- Hero basic combo attacks is long , can be borring each time watcing lon combo. why not making it shorter with one or two attacks only or make animation lot more quicker. Such long animations should be only for strong powers needing lot of MP or energy, others should be quick moves.
This way you would watch long combos or powers less time because they wold require too much MP/power, and combat would stay more dynamic with fast attacks/powers, and sometimes more longer for stronger ones.


I find FF games problem is you loose lot of time looking at menus instead of real time playing , but that's how works FF style turn based games.
You have Eternal Odissey one of best J-RPG on 360 unfortunatelly, battles and character moves was so slow paced, a pain, you loosed more time watching characters actions then playing, i think i was spending 70% time waiting character/ennemies finish their movements and 30% time playing.
So you lossed ten minutes to make only some two combats, that' why the game is so so long ...

Some games like Tales of Xilia allows full time battle in combat scene, last FF13 lightening returnd has a lot more dynamic combat where you don't loose your time in menus.

Some RPG trued to mix real time and turn based like Eternal Sonata that was turn based with distance walk and combat time management, all that with simplified menu combat.

Last JRP Barverly Default on 3DS has bring great system.
You say you don't like Braverly default but your game core system is exactly the same : menus commands and turn based.
The grest features you could inspire from Barverly are :
- Auto Battle : it records last actions of characters from previous battle and play them automatically if you are in that mode , usefull against easy foes or same level as you, at any turn you can stop auto battle and switch to normal battle where you choose the moves again.
- Battle move speed * 5 * 10 : During batlle the heroes and ennemies actions animations will be speed up to *10 by pressing a button, at any time you can press it again to switch to normal speed. Very usefull when you want batlles to not be long to some minutes.

What i could say, traditionnal turn based is slow paced combat, watching again and again same animations can sometimes be very very borring.
So you could go like FF13-2 and assign main action to some keys and have some semi real time timeline turn based game.
If you don't opt for some arena combat real time like "tales of" series games , i would recommend that you implement some braverly default great options like Auto batlle and animations speed up to avoid loosing lot of time in level up or borring battles.

The best game i played was Xenoblade with simple menu power and shortucts, integrated in real combat, and one the best last years JRPG story so much involving it pushed you to progresss to see what was going on.

It's just my taste about turn based games , i played FF10 re master, but was after some 20 hours super borred of mainly watching characters moves then playing.
Now it's your game do it like you dream of it indeed, and it will always be fans for turn based games.

Will it be cinematics ? lypsynch and voice dialogs ?

 

Thanks for the feedbacks,

We don't wanted a skip button since the camera and fx are a very important part of the magic but you make me realize that much people like this possibility like in pokemon so i think i'll add one ^^.

For the combo i know it's long but one of our main ref is Lost Odyssey and even with combo we are still faster also we'll add a QTE system in combination with your equipement to add additional effects to your attack and to bring more dynamic to actions.

For the battle system i know many people prefer realtime fast battle but we play the nostalgia, it won't fit to everyone but that's the way we love jrpgs ^^.

The main reason i didn't liked Bravely Default is the characters, really soulless characters for me but i liked the battle system, we'll add auto battle in the same way ^^.

Cinematics in VFX are completely impossible for our budget but there will be many cutscenes, for the voice acting we will and for lipsync it's not 100% real lipsync but we use FacePlus (Mixamo) with Blendshapes for that and it work quite well.

Thanks

 

Yes i understand , there is lot of fans of that system also.

Strange i played Braverly some time, and i found it had good panel of characters with their own story and intrigue that you discover throught the game.
But well it wasn't a gigantic budget game also.
That's cool for Auto Battle, this could help , and perhaps battle speed * 10 could also help to skip borring battles or simple ennemies faster.

That's great.


Another point on the video :
Your menu is very very at left of the screen , so playing you look at center and have to move your attention ot left.
Why not putting the menu less on the left, more near your character ?

Some example :
Here is what i call dynamic effects and characters, dynamic battle, and the menu is also lot better caus based on symbols instead of have to read text, that's lot more faster to interpret for the mind. The only text is a small number on the icon saying the PM needed for the special moves.
This is a big plus that lot of turn based games should inspire.
And it is centered rotation menu , you keep your attention centered on the screen.

As you can see attack/magic moves are not long at all, only big special moves are during more time, this keeps battle very dynamic.

 

You are totally right, the actual GUI is awful, we are waiting for the 4.6 release to recreate it with uGUI (even the design) instead of NGUI .

Any feedbacks about the graphics ? character ? environment ? monsters ?

Thanks

 

For level : It is really good with good effects , good design.
Make it more friendly if it was friendly cave : special grass patches ehere and here, non agressive animals or birds stuff to make it even more alive, some undercave special luminescent trees etc .... glowing insects .
If it is abandonned hostile cave, not need ot add stuff.
But you can go crazy more : more magic stones , big chains , big meachanisms

The ground seems to have same texture as the walls : very rocky, too much ?
the floor should have a texture less rocky more like something we could walk on it, ith some texture variations to make some paths where people or monsters would have walked a lot.

The combat arena, is pretty simple and empty, same problem : one material only on floor very monotonous.
And same material as walls it seems ..would need some more texture or variations.
Would need more rocks , magic stones around , more diversification, more appeal
Why not some cubic stones pavement for the floor arena like it was some real fighting arena.
Make arena perhaps more unique.

One thing the crystals are too big and too visible in the combat arena, as big as the golem and just behind him : too bad it draws all your attention to it . Make smaller crystals, or less glow power or put that crystal on arena sides, not just behind character in battle field alsmot.

For the ground it's one material like walls, very monotonous.
Break them perhaps some rocks ,other textures variations , some decals , some large holes with water on the ground where you could walk on , make it less "one etxture" style.

I would have made it mroe like a mine with wood structures to support the roof.
abandonned digging mechanisms, camp fires for workers that had worked in it.

For game play i hope you will have boxes or something to destroy to win some loot or something to gather like mining rocks ? Well bring materials collect or money collect gameplay breaking some stuff, people really like that to break stuff

For the monster as it is rock monster , it is ok to have one material instead of custom texture.
There is multiple ways of designing a golem.


For caves, you can just google to find interesting ideas of design ; like some cubic rocks on some walls :


For character it will be your own style.
What i would have done is put some elements on the character that really distinguish it and avoid uniform monotonous clothes (as they are heroes).
And for some characters make them personnal : some decoration jewels, some tatoos etc ...

You can see the lion object on the character that is some particular appealing sign


Or in that attached girl character image, you can see this is very particular design.
The leg specific clothes or some clothes specific objects, it's not unifrom
It's some work, photo internet research , inspiration, to avoid generic looking clothes and add some clever and good appealing details.

 

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Thanks you for all these good advices

Any other feedbacks ? To improve the game i need all the possible feedbacks <3.

 

Make it more more complete and advanced in terms of battle system , then send me a small demo than i will give you some tips.


About actual gameplay : Like said
- more dynamic battles make them more interactive than only choosing some menu.
- speed up actions otpion
- auto batlle options.
- I would see ennemies more in right position of screen like fighting games, better.
- Like lost odissey RPG, make camera with several options.
Somedynamic camera that moves close to the player character that is in the turn phase, more dynamic, keep far camera as some option. People like long view, others more closer and dynamic view.
- Show some TimeBar or turn bar with characters portraits icons and letters or numbers for ennemies, this way we can see what are the next turns who will attack , then we can prepare better strategy.

Personnaly if turn based i would prefer Turn based with a time line like FF7.
Or like Grandia 3 on PS2 , this is lot more dynamic, and strategic as you can attack with more strategy when ennemy is going to attack for example

Now from gameplay , it's all up to you
It's turn based classic gameplay, around that you'll have to bring your own touch, gameplay.
I would say make turn based as smooth as possible.

 

This is looking really great, Kaldorei. There are a few improvements I would suggest, but they are all in grammar and spelling. For instance, the English plural of equipment is still equipment (no "s" needed at the end).

These are relatively minor things, but will certainly add polish the the product when you are ready to sell it.

I'll be watching the development of this project. Good luck!

 

Thanks . The game is set to release for late 2015 and the UI is a really rough work in progress (we are going to recreate it with ugui)

 

Personally, I was kind of disappointed at the UI... but then I've noticed camera animations.
Honestly.. I'm charmed.
The amount of detail that you've put in seems amazing considering there's only 4 of you.
I've only recently started with unity (been doing c# for quite a while though) but it still seems impressive.

@Offtopic : Took me a while to find "subscribe" button since I'm new to this forum... but I've managed to subscribe nonetheless!

 

Thanks <3.

For camera system we created a complex node system that allow us to create quickly cinematographic cams and effects .



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