Click to view attachmentHi, my name is Hiraku. I'm currently in development of a game called Esper Skies and I need a bit of help with the plot. I have quite a bit done but it seems a little slow and dragged out. I'm looking for assistance on how to make it seem less dragged out and more like a professional JRPG. Although, any suggestions you have (story changes, character introductions, etc.) are welcome as well. I want to warn you though that there is a LOT of detail to handle, as the story in the attached txt file is quite detailed already and important things to take hold of below have some detail. I thank all of those who help in advance.

Before I begin I'll give you a basic of the plot line (further explained in the attached txt file):
The story opens with Vihana Borealis, a young girl from the slums of Nazara, attempting to retrieve her mother's necklace from a local gang. During her assault, a childhood friends appears and helps her, but requests she helps him in return. This request drags the two into a fight on the verge of becoming a war, and as the discover the hidden cause behind the fight things become a global affair and the entire world becomes at stake.

In summary, it sounds somewhat like a typical JRPG, and it is but the game is intended to draw influence from a variety of other genres while keeping the Turn-Based JRPG feel. But this thread isn't about gameplay, so let's move onto the real subject. And here is your warming:

SPOILERS FOR AN UPCOMING GAME AHEAD

I have been working on the plot for the past month and have gotten maybe about 75% finished. There are several problems in terms of plot though:

• The story seems dragged out and many important plot points seem to be introduced later that they should be.
  
• There are large gap between playable character introductions, so much so that you don't encounter the last playable character until right before the last two dungeons in the game.
  
• The largest twist in the game, which I feel should be introduced maybe halfway through the game and make the story a global affair, does not occur until what feels like the very end of the game. While this can be acceptable, it feels like it should be done before the final dungeons.

There will be about 7 playable characters with others that will be optional, but each of these 7 characters play an important role in the story, so much that they are what the game's 7 themes draw from.

1. Vihana - Love: Throughout the game she has a developing relationship with Desolo, eventually resulting in true love. Also, she finds that the love for her friends, as well as their love for her, gives her the strength to overcome any obstacle.
   
2. Desolo - Hate: Before the game, when Desolo was a child, he hated adults for not believing him because he was young and naive. While he grew out of this hate after meeting Vihana's mother, it lingered with him and a similar hatred is brought out throughout the game and eventually leads to a life changing decision.
   
3. Sven - Family: A sheltered child when younger, Sven's family was more a profession than anything since his dad is the General of the Nazara guard. As he progresses through the game, he finds that his new friends have become his family and he looks after them as so, going so far as to consider Sakia a little sister or daughter.
   
4. Sakia - Loss: Sakia is caught in the attack on Nazara toward the beginning of the game. The attack killed her aunt and uncle, and unbeknownst to her, she would lose her family and friends later in the game. Unlike a typical child, or even adult for that matter, she does not wish to take revenge, but rather continue traveling with Vihana and the party to make sure no one else feels the pain that she has.
   
5. Lloyd - Revenge: Lloyd's whole purpose for joining the group is to exact his revenge on the Archadian Empire. But over time, especially with Sakia's revelation, he gives up on a violent revenge and resolves to make the world a better place.
   
6. Kurren - Truth: When the acts of a cult begin to threaten the world, Kurren wants the world to know, even if they don't believe him at first. He feels that being left in the dark is not something that should be done, even if the truth can hurt someone. This includes Sakia being kept in the dark about her aunt and uncle.
   
7. Kaelin - Betrayal: After seeing the actions of the rest of the party, and how his country is doing more harm than good, he quits being an Archadian soldier to join the main cast in stopping the dark threat ahead of them.

The biggest plot points that I'd like to keep are as follows:

• The opening scene is Vihana attacking the local gang to retrieve her mother's necklace. The gang stole it after raiding her house and killing her mother. Despite the anger she feels, she does not kill any of them, which is part of the reason she runs into trouble and Desolo has to step in and help her. While the gang was defeated and Vihana finds the necklace, the gang had been hiding a weapon, or a monster to be precise, and it has escaped its cage. Vihana and Desolo defeat this creature before it can even reach the streets of Nazara.
• Toward the beginning of the game, the Archadian Empire attacks Nazara and Lydia, a childhood friend of Vihana and Desolo, is kidnapped because she can naturally use magic, unlike the rest of the world which has to draw power from Espastone. This starts one of two main quests the player must go on, but must request leave of the city and Sven must prove his strength to his father before officially being allowed to leave the city.
  
• Kurren is introduced in his hometown of Apol, where the party believes him to be the great Sage of Apol even though it is never stated either way until Kurren mentions it himself. From here the party must meet with the true Sage of Apol for guidance when dealing with the cult of Erebus.
  
• Erebus, a dark cult worshiping a forgotten dark deity, is planning to use Lydia to draw the power of Mallus, an imprisoned god, so they can rule the world, but little do they know their plans would be foiled in more ways than one.
  
• The biggest twist in the game. Throughout the game, Desolo and Vihana develop a close relationship, virtually being true love. But the hatred building up inside Desolo causes him to take hold of the dark power himself, corrupting him to the point where he builds his power to a point where he can destroy the world. After he basically turns the world into ruin, he comes to his senses and realizes the only way to stop this dark power is to hold it back. He tells the party to kill him before he loses control and completely destroys everything, as his death would also mean the death of the dark god, Mallus.

I have to say that there are many good ideas in what you wrote, but even something to care about.
I've downloaded the .txt just now, I'll read it carefully next week, after having solvied my University issues.

Anyway, let me ask some questions / make some comment:

1. the stolen necklace idea is just good, in my opinion. It's a convincing beginning which throw the player in the middle of the action;
2. I'm really sorry, but the idea of the girl using magic without Espastones kidnapped by an empire reminded me Final Fantasy 6 in primis; you should really work hard on that point to detach your project from the Squaresoft game. Study well Terra's features in FF6 - FF Dissidia - FF Dissidia 012 (final fantasy wikia) and use them in order to differentiate Lydia as much as possible from her. I suppose you where tributing FF6 (your title is clear enough on this purpose) but if I'm not correct, just reply; I know the premises are different, but those two characters could be seen as similar...
3. Archadian Empire... where have I heard it before? Has it something to do with FF XII? If this isn't a willing tribute, I really suggest you modify that name;
4. Espastones reminded me Magicite from FF6... but the origin is completely different, as well as mithology. In your project these are stones full of the magic which was sealed by Nagigaka and not the remaining power of dead Espers;
5. I really like the settings. Honestly, when I read your topic, I imagined the world as a classic FF world... but now, everything is different! It looks like a more interesting Gundam / Armored Core / Front Mission world with magic carved in Sniper rifles, aerial weapons, mutant creatures! This is exciting! Are you going to use medieval-punk environment or use a more Midgarish (FF 7) setting?

I'll add more when I'll finish reading your file.

Jens

Thank you for the feedback. And yes, as you've noticed there are some hints and allusions to various Final Fantasy games, although you pointed out some ones that I honestly hadn't noticed. But I guess I can go into a little detail.

1. I'm glad you like the opening. I wanted to throw the player into the action right off the bat to keep them interested in what's going to happen next.
2. I had begun to notice that a little. It wasn't exactly intended to reference Terra, but in retrospect, it screams ripoff a lot. I am trying to give her more of a naive child-like personality since she is actually pretty young still, but I guess it's not coming off as well as I hoped. I still would like the main characters to be forced to rescue her for some reason though. To me it seems like a logical reason for the characters, at least Vihana and Desolo, to start their journey across the world.
3. To be honest, I had not noticed that at all. The Empire's name was just something that came to mind at first and I thought would be cool to have some faction within the empire called ARC (Advanced Relief Corps) to play on the name. I haven't been able to do anything with this idea though, so changing the Empire's name wouldn't be such a bad idea.
4. Espastone was my way of mixing Magicite and Materia. It is going to be the basic premise of the ability system, allowing characters to be customized like in FF7, although the world as a whole tends to use it for more technological purposes, like electricity or powering aircrafts, etc. Is it alright if you elaborate on your opinion of Espastone? You seem to at first dislike it, then you seem to enjoy the idea, which leaves me a little confused.
5. Setting is actually one of my issues at the moment. I have two in mind, so I'm trying to design a story that can fit into either. The first setting idea I have is one that has a level of technology almost equivalent to the industrial era (much like FF6), but the architecture and flora would be more along the lines of South East Asia. Basically an attempt to mix Western culture with Eastern culture, something I think would be great in a Fantasy game. My other idea is to have it set in a more modern world. You know, skyscrapers, airplanes, trains, computers, cell-phones, etc. Around the world there would be gas stations, amusement parks, etc. for the player to explore and find more about the world and even have some fun along the way. At the same time, there would be areas that stick to more traditional means of living, meaning that they might have temples, farm by hand, and not use technology as advanced as the rest of the world. I'm leaning toward the second one, since I want to somehow incorporate elements of FPS games and even some things like God of War into gameplay, but I'm still debating at this point.

Thanks again for the feedback! I can't wait to hear more once you've delved further into the draft of my story.

Okay, I'll add some brief explanation of some points I haven't expressed well before:

1. about Espastones:

To be honest, in the beginning my mind screamed "OMG! This is FF6!" but later, when I read the .txt introduction, I've understood they were a more complex and elaborate idea. So I began respecting it, since you have found a really good background to explain their origins.
Materia + Magicite, you said... so are we going to see a materia-like system with some feature from FF6? I mean, items that allows player to learn magic but when removed leave them without any magic power? It could be a great system if well developed.

2. about the settings:

The best setting I've ever seen was FF7's in my opinion. Midgar remained fixed in my mind and in my heart as a sort of symbol. This is my personal opinion, though.
I think RPG with FF6 technology level are too much diffused. I'd prefer a FF7 - FF8 like technology level. FF8 had a decent mix of nowadays technology (cars, gas stations, trains) and sci-fi effects (Esthar, the flying coliseum, Lunar Gate, Ragnarok).
If I have to be honest, I'd be for this kind of environment, though, it's only a personal preference.

3. about Lydia:

Alas! Terra is too much a term of paragon when coming to this character! You really have to do something special to develop her personality. Anyway, you could do something like this:
Archadian Empire is too strong fo Nazara's army, so a direct military action to take Lydia back would be a suicide. Anyway, Lydia is unique, so they need to save her and take her back to Nazara.
It will be better to send a small group of people (two or three) who have nothing to lose (Vihana is orphan and has no family, so she's a good candidate. In addition, she knows Lydia; same for Sakia; Sven is a soldier who knows how to fight; as regards Desolo could simply decide to follow them, ATM I haven't a better idea, sorry).
This could sound logic: a sort of hidden team who set for a ghost mission

Other questions & comments:

> I was curious about the Banshee, the aerial weapon Archadians uses to get rid of Nazara's defenses...
It's a sort of unmanned helicopter or it's more similar to an orbiting cannon? Let's say I'm an Armored Core fan... so I imagined it as a sort of unmanned aerial vehicle supplied with multiple gatling guns and rocket launchers...
> The story flow is good in my opinion. I've read it till Kaelin enters the party and I actually thought "that is a really good plot".
I'd leave Kaelin introduction there. There are no general rules about a playable character entering a party. See FuSoYa in FF4: he appears only in the lunar dungeon, near the very end of the game.
Just let the player use them a little (two dungeons are a fair amount of playable time) - so don't bother introducing him so far.
It's a pretty good idea.
> You want to make Desolo's changes more easy to see from half-game, right? If I were you, I'd begin changing Desolo's personality from that point you wrote about in your .txt on. You can gradually change his dialogues to make them darker throughout the two final dungeons; this way, the player would think that he's becoming more violent only because Kaelin's presence is annoying him... and then... SURPRISE!
I suggest you put some hint here and there to make a smart player understand what is really happening. You know, some NPC dialogue, some sentence with a hidden meaning...
> The City of Fun (Karakest) reminded me good ol' Gold Saucer... in a different way. Setting that city as a place where hooded men secretly revere Mallus was a surprising idea. It seems the last city a group of fanatics would use as a place to gather together, so it's perfectly okay

More will come soon

I hope this could help,

Jens

Espastone
There will be a Materia-like system when it comes to abilities. I want to have something like FF6 where certain items and equipment can offer abilities to learn, or produce Espastone after a certain amount of AP or something is obtained. I was also thinking of reversing it, where you can equip an Espastone to a piece of equipment and if it is mastered the equipment will gain a passive ability based on what Espastone was mastered. I'm still working out what I'm going to do, but I would love to combine a little bit of everything.

Setting
To be honest, I agree. FF7 had a great setting. I think that FF7 and FF6 both had a more "world is already almost in ruin" feel to it, and I'm looking for a world that is very healthy and beautiful. Whether players want to or not, I'd like them to be able to travel to other parts of the world and explore it's beautiful nature. FF7 had a great world but it seemed a bit dark a dull, most likely to fit the darker feel of the story, and FF6 had a similar feel as it is a world caught in the middle of a war.

Lydia
I like that idea, and depending on how it's executed, you can find out later in the game that Lydia has either a special connection to the cult and their goals or something along that line. I could also do something along the lines of Lydia is just a bystander who was also kidnapped (for reasons still connected to the cult) and, along with other civilians, has to be saved. I'll see where i want to go after i get a little more feedback.

The Banshee
It's more of a manned, flying platform with various forms of weaponry (melee, chain guns, rockets, etc.). It'll have some joysticks/buttons for the pilot to fire with.It's hard to explain right at the moment, so I'll try and draw something to give you an idea I warn you though, I suck at drawing so if the sketch looks bad I apologize.

Kaelin and Plot Flow
True, but I still feel like Kaelin should join a bit earlier. I was hoping to have the party question him joining since not only did he betray his own country, but he also killed innocent people and destroyed villages. Even if he wanted to right his wrongs, most people would normally question him. I might introduce him a bit earlier, maybe back at Nebelhof or something, to allow this sequence to play out.

Desolo's Change
I actually wanted Desolo to become the bad guy half way through the game. Saving Lydia would start their journey, but saving/stopping Desolo would be the larger portion of it. With the way things are playing out, I might make his change toward toward the end, maybe where I left off but the game would continue for a couple more dungeons.

Karakest
I never made that connection before, but yeah I thought the City of Fun would be an interesting place to introduce the cult. It would also be a way to introduce mini games and allow players to replay scenarios similar to what they did earlier in the game (not replay the dungeons, but like Sven taking out the Empire's soldiers would become a mini game, etc.).

Thanks again for the feedback. If you have anything else you'd like to say, feel free to do so.

The Banshee
No problem, I was just wondering I can roughly imagine it, so this is enough

Kaelin and Plot Flow
You could also make him trying joining the group earlier in the game (after his second defeat, for example), but let the player choose wheter they want him or not in the party. Then, when assaulting Archadian headquarter, his entry becomes mandatory. That shouldn't be too much difficult to do, since he should have some lesser role before that event... you could just add some cutscene here adn thereexploring his personality if you choose to accept his request.

Desolo's Change
Desolo could become the bad guy just after Nebelhof's destruction. This could be the beginning of a hatred-lead avalanche effect. The sight of g Sakia's despair for having lost everything could lead him to boost his hatred at the point he's no more able to control it. However, you can make him slowly change just after Karakest's events.

Karakest / Gold Saucer
That minigames idea reminds good ol' Saucer again It's actually pretty good, but if I were a party member, I'd never come back to Karakest, after what happened... I'd probably refuse even entering it.

These are only suggestions,
I hope this could help,

Jens

Kaelin
I could do something along those lines, the only problem is figuring out how the story would change up til his permanent joining. I might change the event when he joins so the result will be similar, battle him before he is officially a party member, but his dialogue and how he interacts with the other party members would be a bit different. I'll mess around with this.

Desolo's Change
I was actually thinking that. After the events at Nebelholf, he would either leave in the middle of the night or tell the party that he needs some time to think, removing him from the group either temporarily or permanently. Changing after Karakest would be a good thing to help progress it too.

Karakest
True, I don't think the party would want to return after what happens to Vihana and Desolo. I might change it so that introducing the cult is nearby, but not in Karakest, allowing them to return without fear. What I could also do is have them return, finding that the cult has been disbanded and that there is no threat there anymore. I'll have to think about this one too.

Thanks for all your help so far. I plan to work on this plot a little more and maybe return with a more developed and finalized plot.