I have started working on a game and have any ideas about modifications I would like to do to the default system. By poking around in the scripts I have so far taught my self how to change the battle system to side view and got the windows and menus all in the right places. I know there are plenty of ready made battle system scripts out there but it feels like cheating to me if i don't try to do it my self.

It feels like much more of an accomplishment when I figure these things out for my self but it did take me quite a while just to make that small modification. So I was wondering if any others have this do it your self attitude. Or am I just being stubborn and should use what is already out there so I can get to more important things. Like finally getting to the game play and story part lol.

The way I see it, there are two reasons to make a game. They're not mutually exclusive reasons, but typically one is of a higher priority than the other.

The first reason is as a learning experience. You want to make a game to learn how games are made and to push your personal skills to the next level (whether those skills be in spriting, writing, composing, or programming).

The other reason is to create a finished product. You want to make a good game and put it out there for people to enjoy. Finishing a game and making it good are your primary motivations.

If the first is your goal, then I definitely suggest scripting things yourself since you'll learn a lot in the process. If the second is your goal, then why reinvent the wheel? If a script you need already exists, why bother going through the time and effort to make it yourself when it's already available for you to use?

It all depends on what your goals are.

Some things, such as antilag scripts and other utilities are better done by other people purely because they probably know what they're talking about, especially if they're collaborative efforts from a whole community.

Battle systems and other scripts that introduce big features? No. Don't do it. You're just creating a cookie cutter game if you do that.

I like systems to be tailored to their individual projects. If somebody is using a script made by someone else, they probably don't know all the workings of it, and won't have put as much thought into getting everything set up right and individual to their project. They won't see what works and what doesn't and tweak it to fit, because the script is already made and finished. If they encounter bugs there's little they can do but ask for support, whereas if they made the system themselves they might have more insight...

It's your game - make it your own. You'll feel better for it and you'll end up with a fantastic end product.

Scripting things yourself gives such a sense of accomplishment, and typically you can get them to do exactly what you wanted to do, rather than mostly. Using other peoples scripts is mainly for things you know (or have decided) you can't do. Even when you use someone else's script, you could tweak it to do what you want. That way you learn a little more and also give it your own spin.

For a lot of people, understanding the scripting language takes time and patience, and even then some people don't know what they are doing. They're in fear of touching anything in the main script database for fear of messing something up.

I'm one of those people, only because it's hard for me to understand the language. In all my years of experience, I've always found I learn better with visuals and follow along examples than just reading and applying.

Minor examples applied to VX scripting. Recently I figured out how to change the font, adjust and change the title menu, remove the blur effect from battles, and a few other things. Yes, these all seem simple, but because these required changes to the database, and there were specific tutorials to show what to touch and why, I was comfortable going in and doing these things. And I appreciated it a lot more than some cut and paste script, because this way I was able to see how I was effecting the game in case I wanted to try it a different way.

But when we get into complexed scripts that are not so cut-and-paste (Tenkentai and HK's animated title screen, for example), I'm completely lost because I don't know what to do. Instead of tutorials to use them, we are usually given a demo to build our game around. In my opinion, that teaches nothing to the user other than making the scripter a crutch for them to rely on, when it would be more effective for them to learn and design it themselves, or at the very least understand how to make it work in the game they are using without any problems.

There's already plenty of tutorials on how to design games from the ground up. Benko has an online guide that walks you through the entire process of creating a mini rpg by having you follow along with your own maker. so maybe there could be a few tutorials on how to build a script from the ground up, explaining the language along the way and why we use certain coding over others. A student could read and follow along on their own computer and practice themselves. And the tutorial could be a small series, beginning with very minute changes to the default system, to designing a simple script, to something more complicated.

I have not seen anything like this on any of the sites I've visited, so this could definitely fly and draw in a lot more people.

I try to script everything myself. Now, I'm not as advanced as I like to be so I need to use other peoples scripts as a guide. Sometimes there are simple scripts that I will use just because there isn't a better way to accomplish the task.

My rule on using someone else's script is that, at the very least, I need to understand exactly what is going on in the script and too be able to produce a similar script from scratch. There are some beautiful scripts out there, but If my game was all someone else's scripts and nothing from myself, I fell like I would not only be cheating myself, but the people who made those scripts.

And of course, give credit! Even if you didn't use someone's script, If it was the bases for your script, at the very least give them a special thanks.

Adding to tripp's post, if you don't understand what's going on enough to make it yourself, then you also don't know how what you're adding is going to affect your game, for better or for worse. Adding something that could do anything is a great way to eventually break your game. Incompatabilities, glitches, or just generally bloated poorly configured systems down to poor understanding, etc.