The Reconstruction - A Full 20+ Hour Adventure, Version 1.05 - Released October 18th, 2009 Options

[Deltree]

Would you stake your life on a world that cannot be saved?

Featured project on RPGMaker.net!




Link goes to RPGMaker.net page. It's 140 MB, so start the download now and then read on!

UPDATED 10/18/2009 - Version 1.05 download available.
MegaUpload mirror is here: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=SCP67YGY

"So there's this guy I know, right? Kinda quiet, unassuming... a little odd, maybe, but who isn't? Anyway, the other day he comes to me with this idea about starting an adventuring guild! Completely out of the blue! Now, I know things ain't been so great lately for the world - the government's still hangin' together by a thread, the crops are dyin' left and right, and it's the time of year when those giant bugs start tear-assin' across the fields again. And that weird old woman who's been following us around...I don't trust her. Still, he's right; we oughta do something, so I played along and agreed to help out. We're a small guild - there's only six of us right now, including him - but I got a feeling he's got big things in store for us. Big things!"

- Sicious Qualstio, "Assuming the Position", Day Three

[Show/Hide] Gameplay Features

• Strategic turn-based battles reward careful positioning and smart actions over brute force.
• No typical HP/MP drudgery - Instead, battlers have Body, Mind, and Soul ratings that serve as both health and fuel for special abilities. Knocking any of them to zero means defeat, so heroes beware!
• No level grinding or money hoarding!
• Diverse elemental and weapon-versus-armor system for all sorts of exploitative goodness.
• Structured mission-based gameplay means you'll never have to wander around figuring out where to go next.
• Oh, and no random encounters either, because, seriously.
• Over a dozen colorful characters to recruit and train.
• 20+ hours of adventure - multiple secrets, sidequests, and endings!

[Show/Hide] Starting Characters

This is the starting cast. No spoilers here. Mind you, there are still many more allies to find!


Name: Dehl Sikohlon
Race: Shra
Class: Whiteblade - A well-balanced fighter specializing in Soul and Body attacks and a bit of healing.
Background: A gentle young guardsman who quietly appeared in Wadassia one day ten years ago. He tries to act like a human.


Name: Zargos D'Rath
Race: Human
Class: Trudge Knight - Well-armored fighter proficient in Body attacks and boosting ally morale.
Background: Once an ambassador for the old Wadassian monarchy, he's been dragged out of retirement by the calling of the guilds.


Name: Santes D'Rath
Race: Human
Class: Blessed Corps - Divine casters who heal the weak and weary on the battlefield.
Background: Loyal wife and watchdog to Zargos, she's brave and blunt almost to a fault.


Name: Tehgonan Clapian
Race: Human
Class: Spectrumancer - Caster who deals in Mind damage and the manipulation of elemental enchantments on the ground.
Background: Already a slacker by age 11, he decides to skip out on his frilly schooling in favor of his new guild's real-world education.


Name: Fero Flael
Race: Fih`Jik
Class: Huntsman - Fighter who deals in Body and Mind damage, usually from a distance, and can affect the movements of others.
Background: After escaping his ravaged homeland, he has chosen to stalk thes new rabid wilds known as civilization.


Name: Sicious Qualstio
Race: Fortian Pure
Class: Caster who deals in multiple elements with Body and Mind damage, as well as some healing.
Background: Ousted from his hometown ten years ago, his cynical and overconfident outlook may yet get the better of him.

[Show/Hide] Screenshots

[Show/Hide] Hints and Tips!

How do I save my progress?

Point to your guild manager in Quest Mode (he'll have a yellow "!" overhead), choose Records / Save Progress, and then Save.

So how do I level up?

There aren't levels, per se. Allies who participate in battle gain essence (sort of like experience) which can be used to train up stats. To train, point to your guild manager in Quest Mode and select Manager Roster, and then Train Characters. Training a stat consumes essence, and makes the next improvement in the same category cost more. You'll also get skill and mana points which can be used to upgrade your ablities. There are given by performing actions in battle, and also as bonuses for improving the guild rank, among other things.

What about equipment? Items?

You characters' equipment is fixed, for the most part. There are also no healing items, resurrection elixirs, magical gewgaws, or other nonsense to worry about. That is not to say your weapons and armor are completely static, however...

Should I be fighting with a full party of 6 all the time?

Running through areas with a full group of six at once may sound tempting, and will work for most quests - however, splitting up means you can cover more ground without backtracking, and because essence is divided among participating allies, smaller groups = more essence. Most enemies are vulnerable to one specific kind of damage, so small, efficient groups that can effortlessly take them out is preferable.

What happens when I die horribly?

Losing a fight does not mean game over! Usually. For most fights, you'll be sent back to the safe point and your group will be broken up. For boss fights, you'll be given the option to retry immediately - the only penalty is that you'll lose out on all that sweet sweet essence the boss would be worth.

About square enchantments

Don't neglect enchanting squares with elements! Using a Heat-element attack on an enemy standing on a Heat-enchanted square will multiply the damage dealt. Similarly, if your enemy uses strong Cold attacks, throw some Heat-element squares out to shield your allies. It's not cheating; it's effective!

About the Rush bar

Rushing may look like a waste of a turn, but it can mean the difference between chipping away at a foe and crushing him outright. Filling the Rush bar will move your allies forward and push the enemy back, while boosting your damage and lowering theirs. Beware, however - the enemy can do the same to you!

About the Chain

Love the Chain, and the Chain will love you back. By matching colors (use an ability with the same "color" as the current link), you'll build up the Chain, which makes all of your attacks more effective. Just remember that one mismatched color will send it toppling back to zero.

[Show/Hide] Known issues and bugs

-There is an issue with some bad pointer math that I can't find a way to duplicate; sometimes the training improvement costs for some characters (specifically Tehgonan and Fero that I have seen) will be increased by a small amount (like 25); they should always be divisible by 100, however. It's annoying, but minor, and if you do manage to figure out what's causing this then I will totally love you forever because I have no idea where it's happening.

[Show/Hide] Credits and Special Thanks

Concept, design, and implementation by yours truly.
Some character designs provided by Geoff and Jackie, those crazy kids.
Some music composed in Sonicfire Pro. Images enhanced with Adobe Photoshop Elements.
Very special thanks to Fool for lots of testing and input.

Supporting Scripts:

-Advanced Message Script created by Dubealex
-Anti-Lag Script created by Near Fantastica

Filesize: 140 MB, links offsite to rpgmaker.net page

This post has been edited by Deltree: Oct 18 2009, 03:13 PM

[obsorber]

Did you like deeply sharpen the edges of some of the images?
In a way I kind of like your strange style or graphics and it
looks like a lot of effort has been put in to develop this game.


Nice screenshots.
I'll give this game a try soon and give you some sensible feedback.

[Deltree]

Thanks for giving it a look! I wanted everything to have a sort of abstract rough contrast look to go with the bright colors, which is the reason for the outlines.

[Craze]

This looks incredible. Downloading now, and if you make a gamepage on rpgmaker.net I'll be able to submit a review.

This post has been edited by Craze: Sep 3 2009, 05:05 AM

[Deltree]

This looks incredible. Downloading now, and if you make a gamepage on rpgmaker.net I'll be able to submit a review.

Funny you should mention that! I discovered that site by accident last night, so here it is: http://rpgmaker.net/games/1426/

EDIT:

Holy CRAP, you people have absolutely annihilated my web host bandwidth. I'm changing the download link to use the RPGMaker.net site for now; you guys rock in a terrible terrible way.

This post has been edited by Deltree: Sep 3 2009, 07:34 AM

[Despite]

wow very nicely presented & looks to boot.

I'll be sure to check this game out asap, maybe I can learn a thing or two.

[Craze]

I am loving this game. The battles are amazingly like a full-on TBS... but take three minutes to play out and are able to take all kinds of nifty things into account (RUSH! is my favorite thing ever in a battle system).

Easily one of the coolest RM* games I've seen with some of most the most tactical boss fights ever.

[Deltree]

Oh boy! Glowing praise is my favorite praise of all!

I've uploaded a new version with some minor changes (fixes some sprite artifact issues and a couple of bugs). I'm seeing a little apprehension about the difficulty, so my next update - probably Sunday night or Monday - will include some rebalancing issues, such as with the potency of healing spells. (The bosses are still meant to be Persona 3-caliber hard though, so I'll leave them alone). Should anyone have suggestions, please speak up!

[Craze]

I have a question, citizens of RRR:

Where are the comments for this fantastic game?

[Deltree]

Perhaps I shall consider renaming it to "Final Phantasy Trigger X-3: Moons Over My Hammy" in the near future!

In unrelated news, I'm working on an update to up the convenience factor in playing a bit. I'll add a feature to Quest Mode where you can press a Cycle Key to snap the cursor right to the guild manager, and I'll be changing how Skill/Mana Points are earned in battle. Right now, you get a few for using a skill, plus a small bonus depending on the skill's rank (how far it had been leveled). I'll probably increase this "bonus" substantially, so that powering up skills - especially the passive ones - will be less tedious (right now, the only substantial sources of skill/mana points are the bonuses you get after every 4 or 5 guild rank increases.)

It might take me until the weekend because 99% of the game is event-based, while the scripted stuff is mostly hellacious pointer math that I'll have to be careful not to break, which is exactly what I'll be prodding at.

[stoodyhoo]

Wow, I'm surprised I never heard about this. I'm gonna give it a go, it looks fantastic.

[Dark Gaia]

Hi!

I must say, it seems like a lot of effort has gone into this game. I'm surprised I haven't checked it out sooner. A full 20 hour game is more than one can expect from most RM games, so that's a good point. I'm not too enthused about your battle system as I generally dislike Final Fantasy Tactics and games like that, but I'll still give this a shot when I can.

[Deltree]

Egads! New posts!

The 20 hour estimate is based on my test play. My (third) endurance-run-playthrough save file ended up being about 18 hours, but since I know exactly how to beat every enemy and solve every puzzle, it could actually be a lot longer!

Like Craze mentioned, the battles are much faster paced than in FFT, and movement is in one dimension so it's much simpler. There is also no accuracy factor (I find missing to be infuriating) so if you pick the right skill against the right target, you can often one-shot enemies.

[Deltree]

Version 1.05 is now available, and fixes several issues here and there. Big thanks to Fool for helping out.

-Fixed several issues with the quests "Cries of the Land" and "To Ascend".
-There was a bug that skewed passive skill upgrades to requiring more Skill Points than Mana Points. This will be corrected if you begin a new game (the values are now equal for each upgrade), but due to the nnature of the data involved, current saves can't be amended. Not a big deal.
-Fixed an issue where certain passive skill names weren't consistent.
-A decent number of dialog additions and typo fixes.

[Storm237]

I love this game.
/me shakes head at my pathetic game.

This post has been edited by Storm237: Sep 4 2011, 09:01 AM