yikes, i can certainly see that happening easily. my own game i thought about that scenario and decided to eliminate backtracking. its a good thing you will be able to stick with your original plan. keep us posted on the progress.

You know what? We wish.

meanwhile at sks house...

wow that 10th playthrough was even better then last 9 plays! those suckers at the mag dont know what their missing! lets force them to wait another few months!

Yeah, we would never be so ignorantly proud of our game to act like that. I mean I'm still not sure that upon release, it doesn't meet anyone's expectations and ends up flopping. I mean, I THINK what we got is good... but what I think and what you guys think may be totally different.

Just don't go in expecting it to usher in the second coming of Christ. I just hope that you find it to be an interesting story with fun gameplay... and maybe a bit a replay value. I know expecting someone to replay a RPG Maker 1 game is a tall order, you know, due to the nature of them and all. But SK and I are going to try and make it worth your while. One of the rewards is getting the password to all the cards.

Everything he just said.

We're not about to go spouting off that we definitely think this game will be fantastic.

Three months later:

Guys, a LOT of work has been done over this time. We are at the beginning of the end. SK gave me all the dialog for everything up to the end of the game a week ago, and I've been pounding away at it. And I have to say I'm really enjoying how it is turning out. Out of 18 scenarios, we have all the dialog for 17. So we need to tie up the loose ends in 17, and then finish the game. We still have a long ways to go as far as playtesting, debugging, and battle balancing, but I consider that pretty much the downhill side of this. That and SK's workload drops by about 90%. Which is good for him as I know his work has been very taxing considering the input method.

If things continue at this rate, we should be done with what would be the alpha version by early next year.

great news. i wana play this so bad. ive kinda stalled on my game lately.

Yeah, I'd say the last few boss battles and the ending just about does it for dialogue. Now, granted, this is still a lot of dialogue left to go, because it's the ending sequences of the game, and there needs to be a lot of story there, and I might need to concentrate particularly on writing this one well, otherwise we'll just be giving you guys another Nocturne. ... But then, I don't suppose we can make the fighting as intense in an RPGMaker 1 title as had been in that game, either.

So I was updating the walkthough for the game. I decided to scrap practically all of the original text. I updated the ascii art a bit and added a few more sections to it. When I re-typed everything, I did it in MS Word so I could have the benefit of a spelling and grammar check (I'm sure you guys know why).

One of the things I'm adding is a frequently asked questions section. I went back over this thread and pulled out most of the questions that would be appropriate for the FAQ, but I would like a few more. If there's anything you would like to know about the game that doesn't directly tie into the story, feel free to post them and I'll be glad to add it to the guide. I know we haven't really mentioned much about the actual game, so I don't expect a lot. But anything will help.

So it's been a while since SK or I really told you what was going on. SK is working on the text for the last leg of the game. Everything including the optional stuff is finished up to the final dungeon. It's just the final dungeon and end of the game. So we are getting excitingly close to being finished with the main game... and soon will be on to test playing and battle balancing.

In other news, I've been thinking heavily about making some changes to the game as a whole. Two things specifically:

I was thinking about killing off SoE from the title entirely. The reason being that, I mean, not only does SOE refer to another game entirely, it's just not that funny. A Secret of Evermore / Zelda pun that's not even all that funny representing the whole decade of work SK and I put into our game just doesn't seem to do it justice. So I'm messing around with the idea of strictly calling the game just Arc Arath.

The other thing I've been thinking about is getting rid of the title screen. NOT the main menu. But the actual title screen that you can use in RPG Maker. Firstly, I honestly just can't decide on what to use. I've made several versions of it and I just can't really settle on one (yet they all look incredibly similar). Not only that, but it wasn't something I made myself. I lifted it from Radical Dreamers. You can see what I'm talking about in my Radical Dreamers Let's Play. So actually, here, I'll give you a link to all the images I've put together so far:
http://www.mediafire.com/?p80lij1fwj95r5w

The two with the elemental diagram I made a ways back is an idea I have for if SK and I decide to scrap the original title screen. Instead of using an in-game title screen, we'll just stick with the main menu as the 'real' title screen. And then use the RPG Maker title screen when it comes time in the game to explain magic and elemental weaknesses (of course also giving the player access to said screen whenever they might have trouble remembering said diagram).

But yeah, that's just what's been on my mind lately. I'm just thinking out loud.

I thought we were doing that, already.

So far... the main menu, the title screen, the walkthrough and the little web site still all refer to the game as Secret of Everyone: Arc Arath.

Well, at the very least, you need to keep that intro where a bunch of characters pop up one by one. I thought that was nifty. I guess instead of SOE appearing there, you could have AA.

I dunno, I like the title Secret of Everyone. Silly yes, but original. Arc Arath itself just sounds boring to me.

Lantis and I really only have one more dungeon to go in the optional area of the game, then the final dungeon, which is already pretty much mapped out, then I have to write the ending, and finally, FINALLY, we'll be on to the battle system. A lot of test playing over and over there, I'm sure, which will be the boring part of the work, but nevertheless it will go a lot faster, and overall I bet it will be more intriguing than my doing this for hours on end ->

... Boop boop ... beep! ... boop b-b-b-boop ... b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-boop!!! ...... beep! ... beep! beep!
*save progress*

*backup progress*

*rinse lather repeat*



That was the sound of texting in RPGM1, by the way.

Believe me, I could tell.

i usually mute the sound when i make a lot of text because ive heard it so often. i no longer listen to the music as ill never be able to add music to my game because im so tired of it already. gogogo!

After going back and watching all the magcon presentations of AA I'm really looking forward to this beast. I know how huge of a task it's gonna be balancing and test playing a game of this size. If you guys need any help I'd be more then willing to help with a testplay before it comes out.

Yeah, I can't listen to the music when I'm working on it. I generally have the radio going in the background.

While I highly appreciate the offer, SK and I decided to keep testing local. My wife (who's not seen practically any of the game) as well as another friend of mine agreed to test playing it blind. SK and I will be going over the game countless times ourselves. I think between the four of us, we should catch every bug and produce a balanced system. But yeah, I'd kind of like the release of the game to be the first time any Magonians actually play the game.

Also, I don't think I mentioned this but in very few places yet... but a few years ago, SK and I decided we will be making DLC for the game (I mentioned this in an easter egg in the custom world map tech demo I put out way back when). Some of the optional dungeons are only going to be possible if you either grind up to an extremely high level or go through a New Game Plus mode. So as another option, we'll work on a battle arena that has unique items and equipment you can only get there. These will help out for those having problems with said dungeons. It will be playable only after you beat the game. It will also utilize the system data card from the original game, so this will only be just one scenario card long. There will be several different modes where you can either create your own party, go solo, or play with random handicaps. We're not entirely sure how exactly it will go, but we're hoping that maybe if there are people who didn't download the game when we released it originally, this will push them to try it out. As of now, I haven't even made the card the battle arena will be on. Probably won't start it till around the time we're done with test playing.

That will be interesting. Hopefully you'll have enough space on the system card to add the extra stuff.